Building a Better Brand: ClickUp's Melissa Rosenthal on Creative Strategy and Standing Out

Gray MacKenzie is joined by Melissa Rosenthal, Chief Creative Officer at ClickUp, for a conversation about what it takes to build a brand that cuts through the noise. Melissa joined ClickUp in October 2020 and leads the company’s marketing and branding efforts. Her resume includes serving as CRO and EVP of Marketing and Creative Strategy at Cheddar, leading BuzzFeed’s global creative team, and being named to Forbes’ “30 Under 30,” Business Insider’s “30 Most Creative People in Advertising Under 30,” and Digiday’s “Changemakers.”

Building a Brand for the Next 20 Years

Every company has a logo, a mission statement, and an advertising strategy. So how do you make your brand stand out when consumers are bombarded with content from every direction? Melissa’s answer is both simple and challenging: think in decades, not quarters.

Most companies approach branding as a short-term exercise - what campaign will drive results this quarter? What messaging will resonate with this year’s audience? Melissa argues that this thinking leads to a brand that constantly shifts its identity, confusing customers and diluting its position in the market.

At ClickUp, Melissa has been building a brand identity that is designed to compound over time. Every creative decision is evaluated against whether it strengthens the long-term brand or just drives short-term attention. This does not mean ignoring performance metrics - it means ensuring that performance-driven work is consistent with the brand story you are building over years.

Making the Brand Feel Human

If there is one through-line in Melissa’s approach, it is the importance of making brands feel human. In a world of polished corporate messaging and AI-generated content, the brands that win are the ones that feel like they are run by real people with real personalities.

For ClickUp, this shows up in their social media presence, their ad creative, and even their billboard campaigns. Melissa discusses specific tactics her team uses to inject personality into every touchpoint - from the tone of voice in social posts to the way they respond to competitors and industry trends.

This human-first approach extends to the creative department’s internal culture. Melissa has built a team that values experimentation over perfection. Her team ships creative quickly, measures what resonates, and iterates fast. The goal is not to produce flawless campaigns on the first try but to develop a feedback loop that continuously improves the work.

Social Media Strategy That Actually Works

Melissa shares her tried-and-true social media tactics, and the biggest takeaway is the importance of creating platform-native content. What works on TikTok does not work on LinkedIn. What resonates on Twitter does not translate to Instagram. Too many brands create one piece of content and repurpose it across every channel, wondering why engagement is flat.

At ClickUp, the creative team develops content specifically for each platform’s format, audience, and culture. This requires more work upfront but produces dramatically better results. Melissa walks through examples of how her team approaches content differently across channels and how they measure success beyond vanity metrics like impressions.

The conversation also covers the role of billboards and out-of-home advertising in ClickUp’s marketing mix. For a software company, billboards might seem like an unusual choice. Melissa explains the strategic thinking behind these investments - they serve a different purpose than digital campaigns, building brand awareness and credibility in a way that digital ads alone cannot achieve.

Building a Creative Department Culture

The final section of the conversation focuses on how Melissa has built and leads the creative team at ClickUp. She discusses the hiring philosophy, the creative process, and how she maintains quality standards while moving at the speed a high-growth startup demands.

One key insight is the balance between creative ambition and operational discipline. Melissa’s team produces a high volume of creative work across multiple channels, which requires strong project management and clear processes. There is an irony in the fact that the team building the brand for a project management tool relies heavily on that same tool to manage their own creative output.

Melissa also discusses how she developed ClickUp’s marketing strategy in her first year, starting with a deep understanding of the product, the user base, and the competitive landscape before making significant creative bets.

Resources Mentioned

• Melissa Rosenthal on LinkedIn - Chief Creative Officer at ClickUp
• ClickUp - productivity platform