Yes, when the studio uses its international range to read each local market better, and keeps the owner in direct contact with the people doing the work. Since 2014, Serafina Marketing has worked with clients in the United States, Italy, Sweden, Spain, Norway, Finland, Brazil, Uruguay and Puerto Rico. Every project still starts with a conversation between the business owner and our founder.
The two things look like a contradiction. In practice, one makes the other possible.
Why reach and closeness seem to pull apart
Small business owners have a fair worry about international agencies. They expect to become an account number, handed to a junior team, fitted into a template built for someone bigger.
They have the opposite worry about a purely local provider. The service is close, but the view is narrow. The brand ends up looking like every other business on the same street.
What a small business needs is the wide view and the short distance at the same time.
What international experience adds
Contrast makes patterns visible. When you work across cultures, you learn which buying behaviors are universal and which are local. That makes it easier to see what is distinctive about one market, including yours.
Three of our clients show the range:
| Client | Where | What earns trust there |
|---|---|---|
| FAB Homes, boutique developer | Palo Alto, California | Evidence. Its audience of executives, founders and investors trusts proof over promises. |
| Nonno, caregiving platform | Brazil | Warmth. A family needs to trust a brand before welcoming someone into their home. |
| Tawa, Nikkei hand roll counter | Union Square, New York | Story. A name and identity that explain why Japan and Peru meet in one bite. |
The method is the same in all three. The reading of the culture is what changes.
Cultural reading is a discipline, not a talent. I studied International Marketing in Sweden, Intercultural Management in Finland and branding in England. That training shapes how we research each market before we design anything.
A multidisciplinary team sees more. Strategy, design, content, websites and campaigns sit in one team. Each specialist looks at the business from a different angle, and the result is one plan for growth rather than five separate opinions.
Want that outside view on your own brand? The free Brand Diagnostic takes 20 minutes.
How we stay close
- You talk to the founder first. The Brand Diagnostic is a call with me, not with a salesperson reading from a script.
- Week one is for listening. The Longstanding Brands method opens with immersion, research and interviews before any design work begins.
- One method, not a menu. Because the process is standardized, our attention goes to your business instead of to reinventing the process.
- Relationships that last. We have followed Júlia Cherem and Nonno since day one. Our work with Dircksen, a medical clinic in Florianópolis, began as one project and became a long-standing partnership.
Where the name comes from
Serafina Marketing is named after Serafina Corrêa, the small town in southern Brazil where I grew up. Entrepreneurship there was simply how life worked. Everyone knew the owner of every business.
That is still the standard we hold ourselves to, now from New York City. Since 2014 we have helped brands in different places understand their own reality, culture and buying patterns, so they can hold a position nobody else has. You can read the full story on our About page.
Frequently asked questions
Where is Serafina Marketing based? In New York City. Founded in 2014, it has worked with clients in the United States, Italy, Sweden, Spain, Norway, Finland, Brazil, Uruguay and Puerto Rico.
Does Serafina work with small local businesses? Yes. The method was built for small businesses: restaurants, clinics, shops, startups and personal brands.
Does an international studio cost more than a local one? Not necessarily. A standardized three-week method keeps the engagement short and the scope clear.
How does Serafina adapt to a market it has not worked in before? Through the first week of the method: immersion, research and interviews with the owner and the market, before any creative decision is made.
See your brand from the outside
A fresh, international read on your brand can show what your own market has stopped noticing. Book a free 20-minute call with Lucas Alban, founder of Serafina Marketing, and leave with a clear read on where your brand stands.
