Meet Jeffrey Ryznar of 898 Marketing

Today we’d like to introduce you to Jeffrey Ryznar. 

Hi Jeffrey, so excited to have you on the platform. So, before we get into questions about your work life, maybe you can bring our readers up to speed on your story and how you got to where you are today.
Though 898 Marketing was founded in 2014, it originated long before that year. Growing up, I didn’t have posters of athletes or rockstars on my wall whom I wanted to be like. I had four men to show me the way of who I wanted to be and how I wanted to live my life – my father, my two grandfathers and my uncle. Now, in 1983, I was 3 years old, and my maternal grandfather told me to point to three numbers on a card. As I’ve been told throughout my life, I pointed to the numbers 8-9-8. He played that number every day in the lotto for me. Every time it hit, he would invest it and save it for me. My grandfather and I had a special relationship, and when I turned 13, I started cutting his lawn each week to earn some money. Afterwards, we would sit on his front porch and just talk as we watched the cars drive past on his busy, one-way street. It was then that he told me what he had been doing for the last 10 years. He told me that he had a nice pot of money set aside for me and that, when I turned 16, he was going to buy me my own lawn care equipment and a new truck so that I can start my own lawn care company. As a 13-year-old, all I heard was that I was getting a truck! But he explained to me that he was doing this for 3 reasons: 1) God gave all of us gifts that make us special, 2) that these gifts should be shared with others to help them be better and 3) if we enjoy it and do it to the best of our abilities, someone will see our value and invest in us so that we end up doing what we love to do. Four days before I turned 16, he passed away of a heart attack on that very same porch that he shared this with me. I didn’t get a truck. I didn’t start my lawn care company. However, in losing one of the most important people in my life, I knew that I was going to own my own company one day with the advice he gave me. I didn’t know what it would be but I knew I was destined to live out the dream he and I created. Today, those three founding principles have guided our team at 898 Marketing to deliver accountable, strategic, and creative strategies that help companies around the country tell and share their stories and talents with customers, just as we do with ours. With a solid foundation of the guiding principles that call us to serve others with our own talents, 898 Marketing has grown from a small, boutique consultation firm, into Inc. 5000’s Fastest Growing Companies in America for 2022. Since 2014, we have proudly helped over 175 clients across the globe and have been partners in growing other companies into the dreams they have for their own businesses in helping serve others. Our culture is our compass and we stay in a direction that keeps us humble while aggressively helping companies with a relentless commitment to their success and our values. Money never leads, it follows. What started in 1983 continues to live on with the 23 team members who proudly serve our clients, our company, and our community, being the best version of ourselves we can be for that day. 

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way? Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
Nothing is smooth. If it is, we aren’t learning or growing. Like any young company, struggles exist. While we have managed to overcome them, new opportunities present themselves in ways that help us continue to learn and grow. As with any business, challenges with finding and retaining good people who are committed to the vision and culture of the company is key, financial obligations and building upon the trust of our clients and even ourselves is present. However, as I mentioned, we don’t look at these bumps in the road as challenges, rather, they are opportunities. Opportunities to prove ourselves, again and again. Opportunities to push our boundaries of comfort to see what we are truly capable of in difficult situations. Opportunities to prove to our clients that while our talents in our profession are vast, our passion and commitment to their success is irreplaceable because we truly care. More importantly, it is an opportunity to silence the voice in our heads that tries to bring doubt, worry, and insecurity, enabling ourselves to continue to humbly grow with and for the partners who rely on us to produce. We are only as good as what we have recently done for our clients so every day is an opportunity to prove ourselves again. 

Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know?
We are an award-winning, fully integrated marketing firm. While we are known as an honest and talented group of professionals, our abilities have been tapped by companies that are hyperlocal to Northeast Ohio, to national and international brands. Our team develops strategies based on initial goal setting because everything and everyone should be held accountable. Creative without a strategy belongs in a museum, not someone’s business plan, which is why we start with problem-solving first before we get to the elements most clients want to get into – how it will look. Our team capabilities range from creative and graphic design with an award-winning team of designers (2021 Addy Award Gold Winner), website development/hosting/management, content creation, and distribution through various mediums like blogs, social media management, and traditional communications. However, aside from the dedicated account management team that engrosses themselves as extensions of our clients, not just another vendor, our video production and digital solutions are where we have separated ourselves. Our video production team has been recognized over the last three years as award-winning producers of content, achieving local, regional, and national recognition. As a multiple, two-time Addy Award-winning agency, the video production team captures and tells stories through lenses of empathy and compassion, in an efficient and creative manner. The digital strategy and analytical team has taken programmatic and digital buying to a place where precision and accuracy leads to quantifiable results. Using over a quarter of a million data points, are team is able to systematically and strategically deliver messaging and creative to the people who want to hear it most, rather than blanketing to the masses. It has earned us national and international accounts that have grown by multiples that seemed unattainable. 

What would you say has been one of the most important lessons you’ve learned?
Our attitude is everything. In starting and growing our business, in dealing with clients, in creating strategies, in growing and learning, I’ve learned that we cannot control what happens to us. We can put ourselves in a position to succeed. We do everything we can to impact what happens. However, we cannot control the outcomes, what people think or say or do. All we can do is approach our lives and our business with an attitude of gratitude, being grateful that we get to have an impact in the lives of others doing what we love. Sometimes we win… sometimes we will learn. However, our attitude should always remain in a place of gratitude and humility, knowing that, at any moment, our time here can come to a close. 

Contact Info:

• Website: www.898marketing.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/898marketing/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/898marketing/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/898marketing
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/898marketing

Image Credits
Bentley Studios