Fieldwork isn’t part of the work. Fieldwork is the work.
Welcome to the Fieldhouse
I’m Eric Zimmett, and I run my Fieldwork & Advisory practice from Bellefonte, Pa. I help organizations understand what’s really happening around their brand — and turn it into clearer direction, stronger storytelling, and better signaling.
The first question is simple: what is this business trying to say? To answer it, I spend time on-site — walking the floor, sitting in the space, watching how things actually work. If I don’t understand your business first, I’m in no position to offer marketing advice.
Once we have the answer, we find the clearest ways to express it through social media, photography, the press, digital channels, events, and advisory work.
This is fieldwork — it draws on 20 years in journalism and marketing, and on pattern recognition.
Fieldwork is a way of seeing: taking time to notice patterns and find what’s true to the brand. From this fieldwork, we develop strategy and content across social, digital, print, and in-person.
Fieldwork comes first
In my back pocket is a Field Notes notebook, worn, with bent pages and tea stains. It catches the artifacts — the small data — that most marketers might ignore. Those details are what help us uncover a brand’s true identity.
Back at the Fieldhouse, the notes get taped to the wall. Then I look for patterns and talk through what I’ve been noticing into my recorder.
I work the same way I did as a journalist: in the thick of it, paying close attention. Observe first, find patterns, then write the story.
“If you want to understand how animals live, you don’t go to the zoo, you go to the jungle.”
— Martin Lindstrom, consultant and author of Small Data, The Tiny Clues That Uncover Huge Trends
Some brands I’ve rolled up my sleeves with:
Penn’s Cave & Wildlife Park • Shaner Corp. • Zion Lutheran Church in Boalsburg • The Field Burger & Tap • Grace at Carnegie House • Toftrees Golf Resort • Go Tell It In the Mountains with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) • Centre County United Way • Domino’s Pizza • Long Construction Co. • Penn State University • Penn State Police & Public Safety
“Your content is spot-on. It doesn’t feel like an ad, which is the best part. A lot of agencies try to do this but ultimately fall short.” — Gautam Kulkarni, Meta Marketing Pro
Fieldwork is the starting point. From there, the work takes shape.
Most clients first come to me for social media marketing.
That’s often the entry point.
But social media is only useful when it reflects something real.
Fieldwork helps uncover what an organization is trying to say — its identity, its patterns, its relationships, and the people it serves. Once that’s understood, we determine the best ways to express it through social media, photography, press, digital, events, and advisory work.
The format changes. The process stays the same: careful observation, clear thinking, and attention to what makes your organization distinct — and how that identity connects with the people you serve.
About Eric Braden Zimmett
For more than 20 years, I’ve been interested in the same thing: research, discovery, uncovering the story.
As a kid, I thought that meant archaeology.
Later, I thought it meant journalism. I studied it, practiced it, and it taught me how to pay attention first. Maybe I’m still digging things up—just in different ways now.
Today, I do it through fieldwork.
For most of my career, that looked like journalism, then marketing, then a mixture of both. But when I started this practice, my first fieldwork project was myself. Braden is my middle name, but I discovered it has a deeper origin: the Irish Gaelic Bradán, meaning “salmon.” In Irish folklore, Bradán Feasa — the Salmon of Knowledge — gave wisdom to whoever caught it. That discovery led to the Braden Social name, the slogan Swim Against the Stream, and the salmon that became the logo.
After twelve years, Braden Social is still how many clients know me. Today it remains the social arm of the practice. Braden Fieldwork & Advisory is what it grew into — and remains the thinking upstream of it all.
The Salmon of Knowledge (Bradán Feasa) is a creature in the Fenian Cycle of Irish mythology
Training & Certifications
I’m Certified by Cannes Lions in Storytelling and Behavioral Science for Brands, and by Ogilvy in Applied Behavioral Science and Behavioral Economics. Penn State University, Bachelor of Arts in Journalism, 2008. Dale Carnegie & Associates Graduate, 2009; Dale Carnegie Graduate Assistant, 2010.
Fieldwork isn’t part of the work. Fieldwork is the work.
I like you
Eric B. Zimmett
814-441-7717
eric@bradensocial.com
Braden Fieldwork & Advisory
Website Built in the Field by Eric B. Zimmett
Braden Fieldwork & Advisory 