An edited version of this article recently appeared in the October 27 edition of DM News. Jeff and I are very fortunate that we have been so successful at recruiting and retaining the talented people here at Catalyst. Here’s how:

Finding great talent can be a challenge, especially if you’re located in a smaller market like Rochester, New York, where Catalyst Direct is one of only a few direct marketing agencies.

But it can be done. At Catalyst, we take a proactive approach to finding great people, employing all the tried-and-true tactics including internships, job boards, job fairs, and executive recruiters.

The most effective method, however, takes advantage of Catalyst’s positive working environment and engages our employees who are more than willing to help us.

Let’s face it: the very best talent is not looking for a job. Their employer knows and appreciates how talented they are and does everything they can to keep them from looking elsewhere, just like you do with your best people.

Before you can find and recruit them, you must first create and maintain a great working environment, the kind that even people who are happy in their current position will find intriguing and attractive. If you have such an environment, prospective employees will know about it. And if they don’t, they’ll soon figure it out when they do due diligence on your firm.

We have just such an environment at Catalyst Direct. Our people are fairly compensated, have opportunities to grow and the flexibility they need to accommodate what’s going on in their personal lives. Plus, they get to work with a lot of other great people.

We rely on the staff to recruit for us by being evangelists within their professional and personal networks. Every open position is posted internally, not only to reach out to internal candidates who might want to apply, but to make everyone in the agency aware. Depending on the position, our Employee Referral Program pays employees up to $1,500 when they refer candidates whom we eventually hire.

The hard work and thought leadership of Catalyst Direct is hitting the industry press. Recently, Jeff Cleary, one of our managing partners, took part in a roundtable discussion in B to B Magazine discussing trends in direct marketing, ranging from use of BRC’s to offers, to prospect targeting and analytics.

Frank Magnera, account director on our Kodak business was also highlighted in a B to B Magazine piece about a campaign we created for the Kodak ScanMate i1120. You’ll see that the comments Jeff made in his piece are reflected in the work that Catalyst produced for the ScanMate project. It’s all about walking the walk.

Consumers are in the driver’s seat today. And it is the Web that has put them there.

Today’s savvy consumers engage with brands on their own terms – when they want and the way they want. They also connect with brands through multiple channels – researching, comparing, and buying as they choose – on the Web, through the mail, over the phone, and in brick and mortar stores.

And they behave in many different ways. Some shop at 2:00 p.m., others shop at 2:00 a.m. Some do their “pre-shopping” on the Web and then buy in brick and mortar stores, while others pre-shop in brick and mortar stores and then buy on the Web.

The most successful marketers are the ones who recognize and adapt to this new reality that relationships with today’s consumers occur at the consumer’s discretion. The brand no longer calls the shots.

As marketers, we must be relevant and accessible in all channels – wherever the consumer wants to engage. Since more and more consumers are engaging with brands in several channels, our marketing efforts must be integrated.

And therein lies the challenge. Not only must the customer experience at all levels be consistent, but customer data must now be gathered, analyzed, and leveraged across channels. Customer databases need to provide a single view of customer behavior and relationships so we can deliver measureable marketing results.

The new realities of consumer marketing require a new kind of agency. Not a traditional media agency, not a direct marketing agency, and not an interactive agency, but an agency that can seamlessly link marketing in the traditional offline world to marketing in the online world. And it can deliver consistent, branded experiences and messages across all channels. The new kind of agency also takes a 360° degree view of consumers and their behavior across all channels. And the new kind of agency understands when media and channels complement each other and when they compete.

Catalyst Direct is that new kind of agency. Founded as a traditional direct marketing agency, Catalyst began preparing for the new realities in consumer marketing more than three years ago.

Today, our work is integrated across multiple channels. The databases that we develop for clients, our systems, and our tools provide a holistic view of customers and their behavior.

In 2006, we significantly increased our ability to analyze and work with customer data when we acquired the data and marketing analytics company, Equient. The company, which had been owned by General Dynamics, specialized in customer profiling, segmentation and modeling. The data analysts and statisticians who came with the acquisition greatly enhanced our ability to provide clients with insight and knowledge about how their customers behave.

Then, in 2007, we acquired Auragen Communications, a leader in strategic interactive services. The acquisition allows us to combine the targeting and one-to-one communications of traditional direct marketing with the engagement and interactivity of the Web.

And we recently reorganized Catalyst Direct, blowing away the traditional media vs. interactive silos so we can efficiently provide and measure integrated, multi-channel programs.

It’s finally here! I can tell you from past experience that’s it’s a lot more difficult to create a website for your own company than it is to create a site for a client. But we made it. We’re still in semi-beta, because we’re doing some things differently. For starters, we built the site on a blog platform (WordPress) so we can update it easily and try out new things.

We also had to create a number of custom templates and bend them to work in this environment. We also got inventive with new plugins for listing tags and displaying custom functions and information, authors by ID or username and some other more techie details (let me know if you want/need specifics). 

All in all, it’s simple, intuitive, user-focused and comprehensive. We’re pretty happy with it. But what do you think? Give it a look and let me know.

It’s been pretty busy here at Catalyst Direct recently, but not too busy to work on our new website. Here’s a sneak peek. We’re feverishly working away and look forward to the launch, coming soon.

It’s no secret that we’re in a very competitive communications environment out there. We don’t just compete with other DM or online materials. It’s everything that people look at…television, outdoor boards, point-of-purchase materials, newspapers, magazines, Web sites, YouTube and other forms of alternative media.

An article in The New York Times last year stated that “a person living in a city 30 years ago saw up to 2,000 ad messages a day, compared with up to 5,000 today.”

As ECD at Catalyst Direct, one of my key roles is to review all the work that goes out the door. That means that I look at a lot of different pieces of work, so it helps to have a process on which to rely.

As a client, you’re faced with many of the same tasks. So where do you begin? Easy.

1. Start with the Creative Brief. Yes, that same one that our account folks require you review and sign. It’s true, people actually read it—in fact, my creative teams depend on it as their road map. Review the strategy, objectives, offer, audience, mandatories, deadline … everything about the project. Of course, someone from the agency … an account or creative person…will review this as a setup to the presentation, but it’s always good to read it first.

2. Watch, listen and take notes. As you’re looking at the work, watch, listen and take a few notes. There can be a lot to absorb.

3. Ask questions. Once we’ve presented the concept (or the final creative, depending on where we are in the process), ask questions about why we did or didn’t do something. And feel free to make any suggestions and recommendations. It’s a very collaborative process that depends on an open give and take of ideas.

4. Challenge us, poke at the work. Are we meeting the objectives? Are we solving the consumer’s needs? Start off with these higher-level questions before working your way down to whether you like the photo or the colors. While these are important elements, we all have to agree that the strategy is effectively executed, that we’re speaking to our desired audience.

5. Forget everything. Now comes the hardest, most important part. Forget everything you know about the strategy, product, offers, rationale, marketing, advertising, communication theories about how people scan the page, what you like or don’t like, and look at it as just another customer. Ask yourself “does it ring true?” If the answer is yes, you know we have a winner.

The key to creating and evaluating effective creative is making good decisions based on our knowledge of your product or service, the customer’s wants and needs, our individual experience. Then taking all those decisions and bending them, and even breaking them when necessary, in order to create something that has impact and will resonate with the consumer.

Make sense? Let me know how you like to look at our work. Is there something you do that might help us be more successful? We want to know, because you’re not only the client, you’re part of the collaborative process.

As you can see, we have a new look…but it’s not our final look. Let me take a moment to explain.

We began the process of redesigning the Catalyst Web site a few months ago (with help from Auragen). It’s a very thorough process of determining what you, our clients, and other interested parties would like to see from us and how we can best deliver that to you. I’ll leave that for David Thiel, our director, digital marketing, to explain more in a future post.

While we were in the midst of developing our new site with this extremely talented group, the discussion of the acquisition and DM 2.0 started and quickly progressed. Though our new site wasn’t near completion, we wanted to show something that represented our way of looking at your business and your consumers’ needs.

One of the first things you’ll notice is the blogs. We want to share our observations and experiences with you, and we encourage you to share yours as well. Over the next weeks you’ll see posts from a variety of Catalyst thought leaders. We hope you’ll come back often.

Now, this isn’t our finished site; you’ll see what that looks like in due course. But in the meantime, tell us what you think of DM 2.0 and what you would like to see from us. As you well know, we love a good discussion, especially when it’s about helping you and your business become more successful.

As you may know by now, Catalyst Direct recently purchased the interactive agency, Auragen Communications. Auragen began in 1995, as one of the first organizations of its kind, and built an impressive record delivering strategic brand experiences online to leading national companies such as Russell Investments and Eastman Kodak Company. Now we are integrating this knowledge and experience into Catalyst. Here’s why.

We see it every day—more and more marketing dollars are shifting to the Internet. The Direct Marketing Association’s Power of Direct Marketing report predicts that expenditures in Internet marketing and commercial e-mail will claim more than 11% of the total direct marketing spend this year.

Over the next five years direct marketing will become even more Internet-oriented as online spending grows faster than traditional direct marketing media spending. At Catalyst, we’re seeing an even faster shift. Last year, interactive projects accounted for 13% of our clients’ spend. This year it will be closer to 20%.

The fastest shift is occurring in the B2B category. And there is a very logical reason. Business decision makers are constantly looking for research and information that can help them make sound business decisions.

The Web is easier and less intrusive than other forms of interaction. Consequently we see this as an opportunity to leverage the Web within marketing campaigns to extend selling messages and create dynamic interaction with prospects and clients.

Over the past four years, virtually all of our B2B campaigns have contained a landing page, a personalized URL or a Web site as a destination point. In our efforts to drive purchase behavior, we see the Web as a fundamental component of all integrated direct marketing programs.