By Phil Klutts
February 15, 2022

Local marketing agency serves long-term

Oakes Creative House connects the bridge between creative freelancers and business owners.
Oakes Creative House is a full-service marketing and design collective founded by Crystal Oakes. (Photo: Heather Glenn)

Entrepreneurs are required to wear many hats including owner, financial expert, decision maker, business developer and often even marketing guru. Oakes Creative House offers entrepreneurs the chance to outsource the marketing aspect, leaving them with more time to focus on their passion. 

The passion behind the purpose

Oakes Creative House is a boutique agency with a full service approach to helping entrepreneurs with marketing and branding. The company’s mission is to ensure each and every service makes an impact on sales and helps to create a business entrepreneurs can be proud to put their name behind.

Crystal Oakes, owner and creative director at Oakes Creative House, is a trained graphic designer who has over the years fallen in love with the impact marketing has on a small business. Inspired by her entrepreneur parents, she started her first design business while in college to maintain scholarships and earn a living, but freelancing rapidly outpaced the income of her full-time job. Now six years later, Oakes Creative House is serving international clients and growing faster than ever. 

“I saw from a young age how hard my parents worked, and I am driven each and every day to provide a life for my future children, no matter what their dreams are,” said Oakes. “I believe if you stick to your values and grow more than you regress, success is always soon to follow.”

Serving the entrepreneur spirit

All of Oakes’ clients have one thing in common: they are extremely passionate about what they do. The agency has years of experience with entrepreneurs, the movers and shakers of their industries and the dreamers and the doers of the business world. Oakes believes there is no stopping the impact her clients have set out to make and hopes her business can make a difference in their journey to success. 

Crystal Oakes has helped entrepreneurs for more than 15 years. (Photo: Heather Glenn)

“I started this business because I was tired of hearing stories from passionate entrepreneurs that were priced out of working with design and marketing agencies and forced to manage the entire process themselves,” said Oakes. “Instead of the business owner juggling information between a logo designer, web designer, content creator, and social media manager, we provide the whole team of experts and strategists behind their brand – meeting them where they are and leveling up over and over again.”

The agency works with an entire team of freelancers, which include experts in areas like content writing, business coaching, development, project management, and IT solutions. Along with the help of the top talent, Oakes believes in investing in education for herself and her team, which continues to lead to a deeper understanding of marketing that makes an impact on the bottom line of their clients.

Training for marathons, not sprints

Oakes realized many entrepreneurs don’t know the big picture of how marketing works and what it can achieve for their business. They often get into business because they wanted a different lifestyle, developed a product, or wanted to do a service differently, not because they spent years in business school. 

Many entrepreneurs don’t include marketing and design in their business plans and treat it as an afterthought. If they don’t yet understand the strategy behind marketing, clients can put a lot of false hope on the monetary sales success of just one blog post or just one month of consistent social media content. 

“Marketing is a long-term plan, not a short one, and it takes time to build your audience and consistently market your business,” said Oakes. “That is why we put education at the forefront of what we do and offer online courses and free resources to business owners of all experience levels to truly understand marketing from a bigger perspective.”

Oakes Creative House provides free resources for entrepreneurs including worksheets and checklists, brand audits, content topic ideas, values exercises, and more. The agency also hosts courses focused on marketing basics, goal-setting, and time management. Entrepreneurs and business owners can learn more about marketing and creative services with a free discovery session with Oakes Creative House. 

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About Phil Klutts

Phil Klutts helps businesses and leaders navigate from where they are to where they want to be. His leadership experience spans teams and projects at all levels of organizations, from Fortune 200 companies to startups. As a coach and consultant, he helps leaders gain the clarity and confidence they need to succeed.
Phil is the Managing Partner at Edmond Business and Founder at 405 Leadership Advisors, but finds the most satisfaction in raising his two boys with Tara, his wife of over 17 years. They live in Edmond and stay engaged in the community through church, school, and various other organizations.