News! News!
Phew.
What a brutal, soul-destroying, relationship-straining period of weirdness that was. Sheesh. Don't want to dwell on all that now, though. Suffice to say – it has sucked mightily to be us for most of the last few months. But 'tis done. Finito.
As of about two weeks ago I've joined Marqui, Inc. as Vice President, Business Development (with VP, Product Management thrown in for good measure – but they don't make business cards that long). Been talking to and kinda working with them for a while now, but we couldn't tie the knot properly until very recently. Long story.
You may already know a fair amount about Marqui. If you don't, but you're curious, you can Google them , of course, or check out the site.
FWIW, here's the short version of why I'm so pumped about this new gig.
I spent almost 15 years of my life working in marketing for tech companies. (This was despite studying philosophy at University. Guess I spent nearly four years reading philosophy, then asked myself "why?").
Many of the tech companies I worked for had something to do with document and content management, of one sort or another.
I worked with a little startup document management/workflow company that went from six guys in a rat-infested basement (really) on London's City Road, to a big glossy North American IPO in the space of about 18 months. I ran marketing for PC DOCS – one of the leaders in the DM/CM space way back when. Then I mucked about in corporate communications at Hummingbird, and was the first guy to suggest they get into the enterprise portal business (still the centre of their product set today).
I bloody loved this stuff, and thought I was sort of half-way decent at it.
For complicated but very good reasons, I chose to leave the software business in early 2000 – moving into Public Relations. Five years as an executive with some of the world's largest PR agencies and, of course, now I think I know everything about that world too ;-)
Actually, working at the high end of agencies like Cohn & Wolfe and Weber Shandwick – rolling around as a cog inside the mighty WPP and Interpublic marketing empires – was a lot more fun than it had any right to be. They're fundamentally messed up in all sorts of complex and nutty ways, but it's interesting as hell working for them. Imagine seeing the Gordian knot from the inside...
And then running a tiny boutique PR firm for a year and a bit after that was an... um... "educational" experience too. (Ask me if I know any good, small agencies in the Toronto area - go on, I dare you).
Enough. Here's the neat bit: Marqui's roots are sunk deep into the content/document management world. Hey! I know something about that stuff!
Better – they've extended and expanded their scope to address a whole bunch of common workflow and brand integrity issues faced by a typical marketing department. Call it "marketing automation", a bit of a holy grail thing for integrated marketing/measurement dogmatists like me. Cool! I know some of that stuff too!
Oh, and they've spent a bunch of time and effort carefully defining their market: PR agencies, Ad agencies, Interactive/creative shops, and mid-sized in-house marketing departments.
Heh. I am Marqui's target customer.
Or I would be, if I hadn't just gone and joined the management team, dammit. Don't suppose I can sell to me really, can I?
Many people reading this will also be aware (to put it a little euphemistically) of Marqui's presence in blog technology circles. Doesn't suck to be able to join a company that knows its Atom from its OPML.
So all in all, I'm doing quite the happy bunny dance right now. If I were a bell, I'd be ringing.
And you, you lucky people, you get the full force of my obnoxious joy in all its unfiltered, grinning foolishness.
It's nice to be back.
Ding dong, ding dong ding!
What a brutal, soul-destroying, relationship-straining period of weirdness that was. Sheesh. Don't want to dwell on all that now, though. Suffice to say – it has sucked mightily to be us for most of the last few months. But 'tis done. Finito.
As of about two weeks ago I've joined Marqui, Inc. as Vice President, Business Development (with VP, Product Management thrown in for good measure – but they don't make business cards that long). Been talking to and kinda working with them for a while now, but we couldn't tie the knot properly until very recently. Long story.
You may already know a fair amount about Marqui. If you don't, but you're curious, you can Google them , of course, or check out the site.
FWIW, here's the short version of why I'm so pumped about this new gig.
I spent almost 15 years of my life working in marketing for tech companies. (This was despite studying philosophy at University. Guess I spent nearly four years reading philosophy, then asked myself "why?").
Many of the tech companies I worked for had something to do with document and content management, of one sort or another.
I worked with a little startup document management/workflow company that went from six guys in a rat-infested basement (really) on London's City Road, to a big glossy North American IPO in the space of about 18 months. I ran marketing for PC DOCS – one of the leaders in the DM/CM space way back when. Then I mucked about in corporate communications at Hummingbird, and was the first guy to suggest they get into the enterprise portal business (still the centre of their product set today).
I bloody loved this stuff, and thought I was sort of half-way decent at it.
For complicated but very good reasons, I chose to leave the software business in early 2000 – moving into Public Relations. Five years as an executive with some of the world's largest PR agencies and, of course, now I think I know everything about that world too ;-)
Actually, working at the high end of agencies like Cohn & Wolfe and Weber Shandwick – rolling around as a cog inside the mighty WPP and Interpublic marketing empires – was a lot more fun than it had any right to be. They're fundamentally messed up in all sorts of complex and nutty ways, but it's interesting as hell working for them. Imagine seeing the Gordian knot from the inside...
And then running a tiny boutique PR firm for a year and a bit after that was an... um... "educational" experience too. (Ask me if I know any good, small agencies in the Toronto area - go on, I dare you).
Enough. Here's the neat bit: Marqui's roots are sunk deep into the content/document management world. Hey! I know something about that stuff!
Better – they've extended and expanded their scope to address a whole bunch of common workflow and brand integrity issues faced by a typical marketing department. Call it "marketing automation", a bit of a holy grail thing for integrated marketing/measurement dogmatists like me. Cool! I know some of that stuff too!
Oh, and they've spent a bunch of time and effort carefully defining their market: PR agencies, Ad agencies, Interactive/creative shops, and mid-sized in-house marketing departments.
Heh. I am Marqui's target customer.
Or I would be, if I hadn't just gone and joined the management team, dammit. Don't suppose I can sell to me really, can I?
Many people reading this will also be aware (to put it a little euphemistically) of Marqui's presence in blog technology circles. Doesn't suck to be able to join a company that knows its Atom from its OPML.
So all in all, I'm doing quite the happy bunny dance right now. If I were a bell, I'd be ringing.
And you, you lucky people, you get the full force of my obnoxious joy in all its unfiltered, grinning foolishness.
It's nice to be back.
Ding dong, ding dong ding!
