Established in 2014, CKP is an independent, woman-owned, Texas-based integrated communications firm with full-time team members and designated sub-contractors in Houston, Austin, San Antonio, Dallas and other major U.S. media markets.

We develop smart strategies, create award-winning ideas and deliver results. We get excited about great people, organizations and brands doing great things. We're creative storytellers, detail-oriented data crunchers, and dogged researchers. Our research-driven approach provides the laser-focus to develop strategic action plans that elevate your brand.

We’re passionate about telling our clients’ stories. CKP operates across four service verticals—marketing and branding, public relations, content marketing and creative services—overlapping for an integrated service model. While we offer a comprehensive catalogue of services, we know there’s no such thing as one-size-fits-all. Our best work emerges when we can be creative in crafting a plan that embraces a holistic approach to communications.

Our partners include local and state government agencies, higher education institutions, national brands, oil and gas companies, healthcare entities, human services nonprofit organizations, arts institutions, entrepreneurial operations and more.

CKP is a member of the Unified Strategies Public Relations Network (USPR), a nationwide network of public relations and marketing professionals. From New York to California, we link our independent companies to leverage our power nationwide for clients, companies, campaigns, events, initiatives, branding and marketing. We scale up for regional and national work, and we scale down for local campaigns. USPR is diverse, deeply skilled and ready to dive into any project—public relations, marketing and branding, content marketing and creative services.

 
We collaborate with entrepreneurs, regional businesses and global brands. In 2019, CKP generated more than 7,500 positive earned media placements, 7.7 billion+ earned media impressions and earned media value exceeding $112 million for our clients.
 
 

History

CKP Founder and CEO Carey Kirkpatrick began CKP to solve a problem in the communications industry in Texas. While there were firms that specialized in one media channel—whether earned, owned, paid or shared—the boundaries that previously delineated these disciplines were becoming increasingly blurred. The quickly evolving communications services landscape needed an urgent overhaul: To better support clients' business, operational and marketing goals, it became critical to deploy strategies that targeted the right consumer in the right channel with the right message at the right time.

While most agencies focus on public relations (earned media) or advertising and marketing (paid media), the growth of social media has led to a constantly evolving series of content sharing platforms created by the client (owned media). CKP’s business lines include one that is unique to agency models: content marketing. At CKP, content marketing consists of all social media, images, video content, infographics, gifs and keyword dense blog content. It is not owned by public relations or marketing, but rather a partner to both. We collectively manage content strategy and social media execution for more than 400 channels, and we provide web strategy and creative for at least 50% of our client base.

Carey's efforts to build a company culture that attracted a highly talented team with nearly 0% turnover since the agency's inception earned her a spot in Houston Business Journal’s 40 Under 40 honorees for her outstanding role as a business leader and community advocate.

CKP has been recognized by the American Marketing Association, Public Relations Society of America and the Association of Marketing and Communications Professionals for client work across all communications verticals. Our people-first approach has landed us on several Best Places to Work lists, including being recognized by the Houston Business Journal on the Best Places to Work annual survey. Our culture of winning and success earned us the honor of PRSA Houston Agency of the Year in 2018 and in 2019, plus the Grand Excalibur best-in-show award for integrated communications. CKP ranked #77 on the Inc. 5000 Series list of the fastest-growing private companies in Texas, including being #20 in the Houston Metro area and #7 in the Marketing and Advertising category statewide. 

CKP is licensed to provide services in the State of Texas. CKP is a certified City of Houston Hire Houston First Local Business, a certified Woman Owned Business, as recognized by the Women’s Business Enterprise National Council, and a certified Historically Underutilized Business (HUB) by the Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts' Procurement and Support Services Division.