JSMI Consulting, LLC. Park Ridge, IL 1997 - Present

President

National Responsibilities:  Lead Consultant, Client Relations, Business Development, and Operations Management.  Direct Reports: 2 Senior Consultants, 1 Art Director.  Virtual Staff Members (Contracted Subject Matter Experts) as needed. 

President of Strategic Marketing Consultancy working with a variety of clients from Fortune 100 companies to small start-ups to develop and implement programs to strengthen and grow their business.  Agency expertise includes marketing team development, opportunity identification, strategic planning, branding, new business/product development and launch, process development/redesign, target marketing structure and overall marketing communication targeting influencers (employees, industry leaders, media, etc.) prospects and customers.

Client Successes include:

Needed to increase market share and generate new revenue stream. Conducted business analysis, developed new business model to expand product/service offering to address the needs of a new target market within 120 days. Implemented plan which resulted in 9 month revenue and customer goal being achieved in 90 days.

Challenged with declining sales after rapid growth during initial launch. Within 16 weeks categorized current customers based on key segmentation criteria, reviewed current marketing strategies and developed a more targeted, consumer-oriented marketing program designed to reach new key market segments. Turned around the declining sales and long term established the company as a leader in the marketplace.

Tasked to develop a cohesive brand for multiple formerly independent skilled-nursing facilities while centralizing key marketing responsibilities and implementing quality controls.  Developed new brand identity and redesigned the marketing process to decrease redundancy, build on branding efforts and to support the local marketing needs. New brand identity was launched in multiple markets on a rolling schedule to support local market needs and issues.  Program increased resident population by almost 10% across all facilities and lowered marketing costs by 50% within 12-months.

Challenged to determine cause of low penetration and poor image rating from cable companies and viewers for a cable television network. Within 12 weeks conducted research and developed a plan to rebuild their image/brand focusing on the baby boomers. Implementation included new programming strategies, loyalty programs designed to help cable companies get and keep customers in a newly competitive environment, and local marketing programs creating special events and programs targeting baby boomers.  Immediate results from cable companies to new programs resulted in increased penetration by 30% within first 6 months of sales push.  Loyalty program also resulting in a decreased churn in  targeted customers by 45% in first year.

Ameritech New Media (Now AT&T), Chicago, IL  1995 – 1997

Director of Marketing

Business Responsibilities: Strategic Planning, Building/Market Launch Plans, Product Development and Management, Pricing, Programming Bundles, and Marketing Program & Sales Performance including $5 million Budget.  Direct Reports:  10 Product and Market Managers. 

Recruited to bring a new cable television service into the marketplace in 6-months.   Needed to create overall and local launch strategy based on construction capabilities. Led effort for final community build-out and product design, built local marketing organization and in-house marketing team, developed marketing plan for launch and on-going marketing, participated in the overall design of business and management systems, created and led launch team to design and implement market-by-market launch program. Achieved on-time launches in all markets, exceeded sales expectations by 30%.  Achieved 70% awareness in launch markets at 90-days post-launch.  

Recognized need for better cross-functional communications in a fast-paced environment where success depended on large & diverse yet intricately related teams. Developed a “Round Table” structure ensuring cross-functional interaction on a regular basis for broad strategic input sessions as well as impact & implementation planning to keep entire team in the loop and on track. Launched program within
8-weeks of hire leading to 100% on-time market launches.  Round Table was recognized as key to the overall success of the program at launch as well as in the smooth management of the long-term business by senior management.

Sprint, Inc., Kansas City, MO  1993 – 1995

Acting Director, Mid-Market Business Group

Group Manager, Mid-Market Business Group

Group Manager, Business-to-Business Base Management

Manager, Strategic Development & Business Planning

National Responsibilities:  Strategic & Market Planning, P&L/Budget, Pricing, Product Management, Customer Retention, Matrix Team Leader.  Direct Reports: 8 Managers, 1 Marketing Assistant.  Indirect Reports:  75.  Revenue Objective: $ 900 Million.

Recruited to build a stronger marketing vision and discipline in an engineering-driven company in order to create a more market-driven strategy to build long-term growth for their next planning cycle in 6 months.  Created and implemented a new, cohesive planning process for all business units in order to bring together long-term strategic vision, mid-term market planning, and short-term program development (including budget & measurement processes).  Led corporate team to define, implement and train against a comprehensive marketing process to support a more disciplined approach to the marketplace in all business units. This new approach resulted in a stronger market focus delivering marketplace results, supporting long- and mid-term strategies, eliminating inefficiencies and improving accountability.

Discovered market gap for medium-business segment resulting in significant churn and lower customer satisfaction. Led team to create, implement (in 180 days) new product targeted to Mid-Market business customer requiring a 3^rd party strategic partnership and the complete redesign of the marketing, selling and product delivery processes.  New offering grew share in the mid-market customer segment by more than 5 % in first 6 months and increased revenue from existing mid-market customers targeted for the program by 12%.

Identified the problem of increasing churn for the mid-small business customers draining resources from increased acquisition costs just to stay even in market share. Created a retention team tasked with focusing on existing B2B customers.  With team, led efforts to determine causes of churn and implement programs to improve both   retention and lifetime value of existing customers base. Programs resulted in 1^st year annualized churn reduction of 20 percentage points valued at $150 million dollars.

Hallmark Cards, Inc., Kansas City, MO 1986 – 1993

Hispanic Business Manager

Hispanic Development Team Leader

New Business Strategist – Product Discovery and Development

Marketing Associate – Ambassador Cards

Developed, launched and managed (with full P&L responsibility) company’s Spanish-language social expression business. Exceeded 3-year annualized sales target of $20 million sales by mid-second year.

Decreased time to market for new products by 13 months decreasing fixed costs by almost 40%.

First “3^rd” Brand in company history becoming the first Business Unit to serve both specialty and mass channels with a single product line.

Led corporate research and strategy team responsible for identifying market challenges to the venerable “Retail Channel” and provide recommendations for revitalizing this critical channel.

- Expansion of Preferred Retailer Program.

- Expansion of Approved Partners for 3^rd –party products.

- Implementation of test store program designed to test new store concepts.

Redesigned qualitative research process for organizations Product Discovery and Development division allowing for a shorter qualitative research phase in new product concepting (6 weeks vs. 16 weeks) and decreasing costs by 35%.

EDUCATION

INDIANA UNIVERSITY

M.B.A., Concentrations: Marketing

INDIANA UNIVERSITY

B.A., Major: English

AWARDS

Quest Club Excellence Award (Sprint) -- October 1994

Ambassador Club Award of Excellence (Sprint) -- January 1995

Aquila Partner of the Year – Spring 2003

RELATED EXPERIENCES

Lecturer/Speaker on Work/Life Balance, Strategic Management, Creativity & Innovation, Marketing and Process Management

Business Marketing Association

Women in Cable and Tele-Communications (Board Member, Newsletter Committee Chair, Marketing Chair)

National Association of Women Business Owners – Economic Development Sub-Committee

Brickton Art Center (Vice President-Board of Directors)

Boy Scouts of America (Local Committee Chair, Committee Member and Den Mom for 5 years)