Hi. I’m Monique Bouchard, and I’m a Maine-based writer, communicator, mentor, and marketer.
I have more than 25 years of experience in communications, marketing, and graphic design.
I’ve always loved communications in its varied forms: presentations, papers, promotions, and performances. As an empathetic communicator, I consider the audience and the goal together: form follows function, and function follows folks. But even more important than that — I know how to read a room. And I know what that means to the people with whom I work. (That’s what makes marketing work — bringing the right content to the right audience at the right time.)
I’ve been the full-time content writer for an educational technology startup, enjoyed the “do-all-the-things!” at a full-service ad agency, helped nonprofit organizations communicate their vision to donors and supporters, and even worked in a print shop where I used rubber cement as often as I used a computer. (Those are just the relevant highlights! Ask me about my summer working in Maine agricultural pest management some time.)
My rich and diverse interests help inspire my work and keep me sharp. I’m a singer-songwriter, lover of lots of weird science, avid kayaker, and enthusiastic Scotch drinker. I’m sometimes recognized locally as “Fan Jones,” our region’s infamous madam from the 1800s, in whose guise I provide walking tours of historic Bangor. I act in Zoom-based theatre projects from time to time. I’m always learning new things. And I’m writing a book about communication and geometry.
A few things that make me proud:
- Watching entrepreneurs and small businesses I’ve mentored thrive.
- When someone reaches out to me for networking, because they are sure I’ll be able to find just the right person to assist.
- Seeing a logo I created fly past me on the side of a tourism-boosting train.
- Designing and managing a Covid-safe, multi-person cast October cemetery tour.
- Winning a comedy pitch contest supporting a regional startup accelerator and business incubator.
- Successfully completing 14 songs in 28 days as part of February Album Writing Month.
- Hearing a song I wrote years ago being sung around a campfire by someone I’ve never met.
- Seeing the logo and school seal I designed for an independent school used to further the school’s mission.
- Watching someone’s “ah-ha!” moment during a brainstorming session (and all the great ideas!)
- Being told how a prospect kept a promotional postcard on their desk for more than a year and when they were ready, they called the business I’d made it for.
- When people hang out after a walking tour to ask questions and share their stories with me.
- Presenting an original poem written in Middle English at the Portland Museum of Art.
- My son’s willingness to lay down a percussion track for me when I need a sample for a song.
- A collaboration that makes a project greater than the sum of its parts and creators.
I love all the things. I’m a solid researcher, passionate about people and their successes, and deeply invested in all the ways we communicate.
And that includes, of course, marketing communications, encouraging human-focused business experiences, and making sure that people are getting across their messages in a way that makes sense to their audiences.
It’s who I am and it’s what I do.
How can I help?