My overall marketing communications skill set is well entrenched in both the creative and analytic. After obtaining a degree in journalism from the University of Georgia, Athens, my professional career started in 1993 as a direct response promotions writer in the publishing business. Working with a staff that was very thin on graphic designers, I further developed my graphic design skills to meet the deadlines demanded in publishing monthly periodicals.

After a few years of copywriting and design work, I took on a marketing management position for a start-up where I was the entire marketing department – creative, corporate communications, campaign management, and budgeting/planning. It was in this role that I learned the importance of justifying marketing spending and tracking performance from spreadsheets with data collected from marketing campaigns. By tracking cost per lead, conversion rates and cost per customer acquisition, I was able to concretely define marketing success and created a decision support method that allowed us to change direction when programs were not cost effective.

With a good foundation in creative, and solid working knowledge of analytics and reporting, my career path led to running the marketing department of an enterprise independent software vendor (ISV) where I was tasked with managing a global marketing team and a $5+ million budget. My responsibility there entailed managing strategic marketing for pipeline generation and holding watch over corporate branding and awareness.

For pipeline generation, I managed a telemarketing team, several graphic designers, copywriters, marketing program managers and product marketing managers. For corporate brand work, I managed a PR agency and facilitated as the head of analyst relations, working very closely with Gartner, Forrester Research and Enterprise Management Associates (EMA).

At the start of 2010, with the global economy for IT spiraling, the team I managed reduced marketing spending by 40 percent, and still maintained the same lead flow of the previous 2 years. Additionally, my work as head of analyst relations created great awareness for the corporate brand across many analyst firms. Gartner, Forrester Research and EMA repeatedly requested that this ISV participate in all applicable Magic Quadrants, Waves and Radar Reports.

Click here to view my marketing portfolio of work.
Click here to view my professional references.

Professional Skills

• 20+ years of management experience
• Strategic and tactical marketing communications experience
• Outstanding communication and interpersonal skills
• Outstanding copywriting and editing skills
• Excellent graphic design and web/new media design skills
• Excellent working knowledge of desktop publishing software (Adobe CS Suite, Macromedia, Quark, etc...) as well as the MS Office Suite

Education

Bachelor of Arts in Journalism, University of Georgia in Athens, Class of '92
Major: Advertising / Minor: Business Communications
Effective Product Marketing course (Pragmatic Marketing certification) - September 2004