Russell Quinan is Co-Founder and Chief Strategy Officer of TheorySF, a San Francisco brand strategy and creative agency helping B2B technology, AI, SaaS and challenger brands find sharper positioning, create meaningful differentiation and build marketing people actually remember.

For more than three decades, Russell has worked at the intersection of brand strategy, positioning, technology and creative marketing, helping companies answer a deceptively difficult question:

Why should anybody choose you instead of everyone else?

Because most companies don't have a marketing problem.

They have a sameness problem.

From the dot-com boom to the AI boom.

Russell has held leadership roles at Publicis, FCB and McCann and has worked with brands including Microsoft, Xbox, HP, Sony, Adobe, Levi's, L'Oréal, Wells Fargo and Alibaba.

Today, his work focuses heavily on B2B technology, SaaS and AI companies, helping leadership teams develop differentiated positioning, brand strategy, messaging, go-to-market strategies and creative campaigns capable of standing out in increasingly crowded categories.

At TheorySF, Russell works directly with founders, CEOs and CMOs to find the strategic idea a company can own—and turn it into marketing people actually care about.

Explore TheorySF's brand strategy and creative services →

Thinking for CMOs.

Russell writes regularly about brand strategy, B2B technology marketing, positioning, differentiation, AI and marketing, creative effectiveness and CMO leadership in TheorySF's Brand Theories.

A few recent favorites:

The Courage Gap: Why Most B2B Tech Positioning Fails
Why companies that desperately want differentiation somehow emerge from the positioning process sounding exactly like their competitors.

You Spent $500,000 to Say "Powering What's Next"
Why so much B2B technology marketing has become interchangeable.

Your Category Leader Has a New Salesperson. It's ChatGPT.
Why AI search is changing how brands get discovered, evaluated and recommended.

Why Most Marketing Gets Weaker Before It Goes Live
How great ideas get slowly beaten to death by committees—and what CMOs can do about it.

Read more Brand Theories →

Marketing Mischief & Mayhem

Russell is also host of Marketing Mischief & Mayhem, where he talks with CMOs and senior marketing leaders about brand strategy, creativity, AI, growth, leadership and what's actually happening in the trenches of modern marketing.

Real CMOs. Real talk. No B.S.

Russell also serves on the board of the American Advertising Federation and lives in Marin County, California.

When he's not thinking about why perfectly intelligent technology companies insist on saying "powering what's next,"he's usually playing guitar, buying another guitar he absolutely doesn't need, or mountain biking around Marin.

Want to talk about your brand?
Let's talk →