Daniel Barnes

Copywriter; Brand Content Manager; Copy Editor; Journalist; SEO Specialist; Podcaster

United States

I’m a Senior Copywriter and Brand Content Manager who specializes in shaping brand voice and turning complex ideas into audience-focused content that connects and inspires. My experience ranges from journalism and criticism to copywriting, brand management and search engine optimization. I specialize in crafting compelling copy, creating robust process documentation and owning content initiatives from start to finish. Whether it’s complex, cross-functional campaigns like app launches or store openings or brainstorming weekly puns for the famous Freeport Boulevard marquee, I approach every project with passion, insight, empathy and attention to detail.

Portfolio
The Raley's Companies
Summer Produce Campaign

This email was just one piece of a multi-channel, multi-phase seasonal campaign to promote Raley's as the best source for fresh summer produce. I worked with the brand manager, marketing manager and Produce team to determine the schedule, channels, assets, key products and copy points for the campaign. In addition to creating copy, I also coached my team on the style, tone and content of the campaign so that they could assist in content creation and proofing.

Capital Network Solutions
California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) FAQ

This blog post was part of a major campaign to market cybersecurity services to companies affected by the new California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA). In collaboration with sales and leadership, we formed a stratgy involving email marketing (with MailChimp), print brochures, organic social and blog posts. For this post, I used the SEO tool Ahrefs to target valuable keywords to improve our organic search rankings. I also used Ahrefs and Google Analytics to assess the campaign's effectiveness.

Raley's
Holiday 2025 Campaign

This sign is just one small piece of Raley's massive annual multi-channel Holiday campaign. I collaborated with the marketing director to concept a campaign that focused on taking "Time" to celebrate the holidays (tagline: "The Most Wonderful Time"). We wanted to create a campaign that felt aspirational yet affordable, so we eschewed our usual title-case headline format in favor of sentence-case. We used shorter sentences and callouts on print assets to make key points quickly for shoppers.

Raley's
Get Curious Campaign

In-store signage to promote Raley's new Get Curious offerings. This was a new initiative that required both long-form and short-form copy across print and digital touchpoints. Headlines and key copy points were created in collaboration with the brand manager and product innovation team.

Raley's
Pharmacy Campaign

In-store signage to promote Raley's Pharmacy. We collaborated with high-level stakeholders on the Pharmacy team to determine the messaging hierarchy and hone key copy points.

Raley's
Freeport Sign Puns

I created a new food-related pun every week for the iconic sign at Raley's Freeport Blvd. store. All puns needed to follow a strict format (2 lines of copy, 16 characters per line including spaces) and get approved by the marketing director. I worked with Western Sign company to make sure the puns were correctly added to the marquee.

California Community Colleges
05/05/2021
I Can Go to College (icangotocollege.com)

As a freelancer working with Runyon Saltzman, I created copy for the California Community Colleges (CCC) new website. This included organizing and copy-editing over one thousand sub-pages encompassing every college, major and degree in the CCC system.

Food City
Mi Club App Launch

Website copy to promote the new Mi Club app at Food City, a Hispanic-themed grocery store. This app launch required extensive marketing copy across all channels, including print, e-commerce, email, in-store and terrestrial audio, paid media and much more. I worked with the Food City Brand Manager to determine the tactics, schedule and key copy points.

Wikipedia
05/02/2022
Raley's Supermarkets - Wikipedia

When Raley's acquired Bashas' Operating Companies and rebranded as The Raley's Companies, I re-wrote the Wikipedia page and created new content for Raley's websites.

Comstock's magazine
02/19/2020
Loving the Lager - Comstock's magazine

One of my hundreds of published articles about craft beer and spirits, food and restaurants, film and music and other local issues. I love being able to interview and pick the brains of local legends and subject matter experts like Peter Hoey of Urban Roots Brewing Company.

Sacramento News & Review
11/20/2018
SN&R * Film * Film Reviews * Turkey talk

Feast your eyes on cinema's worst Thanksgiving dinners. This is one of the nearly 1,300 reviews and articles I wrote for Sacramento News & Review. I also write, host, produce and edit several film-related podcasts, and I am an active member of the San Francisco Bay Area Film Critics Circle.

Bike Dog Brewing Company
07/21/2017
About

I wrote About Us copy and more for the website launch of this West Sacramento-based craft brewery, now one of the most successful in the region. I also wrote descriptive, compelling and humorous copy for their beer can labels. For their new milkshake IPA, I created a spin on the famous "I drink your milkshake!" speech from There Will Be Blood for the can art.