Session Sponsor
11:15 AM - 12:30 PM
Session A:
E-Mail as an Entertainment and E-Commerce Medium
Have you received your first audio enhanced, video or animated email? If you haven’t, it’s a whole new experience. Email will never be the same. As the technology moves forward, so do the amazing things we can do with it and the future of email as a broadband entertainment experience is just around the corner. In this session we bring together the companies who are leading the way in technology and content application in the e-mail marketplace. As your community of users grows and becomes more complex, so will your ability communicate with them.
Courtney Nichols, General Manager, Consumer Messaging Services, Mail.com
Scott Ferber, CEO and co-Founder, Advertising.com
Jack Serpa, EVP Sales & Strategic Planning, Internet Wire
Don Howren, Vice President Sales, MindArrow Systems
Laurence Roth, COO, SuperSig.com
Wanda Meloni, Principal, M2 Research, Moderator
Additional speakers to be announced
Courtney Nichols, General Manager, Consumer Messaging Services, Mail.com: Courtney Nichols, formerly senior vice president of network sales and commerce, was named General Manager of Mail.com Consumer Messaging Services in March 2000. As GM, Nichols is responsible for overseeing and developing Mail.com’s entire consumer business, including: ad sales, e-commerce, permission-based marketing, product development, business development, consumer marketing and data mining and analysis. Nichols joined Mail.com in February 1998 and became vice president of advertising sales and e-commerce within one year after helping to establish the Company’s sales department. Nichols was instrumental in building Mail.com’s advertising network, which now brings nearly $2 million a month in advertising revenue and is trusted by top media companies, including Snap.com, Dell, CBS, EarthLink,and CNET, to sell their targeted advertising. Under her direction, Mail.com has become as one of the leading sales organizations in online publishing. With over 300 blue chip advertisers, serving over 700 million impressions each month, for marketers such as American Express, IBM, and Hewlett Packard, Nichols and her team built Mail.com into the fifth largest ad network ranked by Media Metrix, with reach in excess of 40%. Recognized by Jupiter Communications as one of the top providers of opt-in e-mail lists, Nichols has led the Mail.com sales department to success, providing six million direct marketing opportunities a week to their clients. Nichols played an integral role in the launch of the Mail.com Marketplace, a one-stop resource designed to make shopping easy and convenient for Mail.com members. Under her leadership, the Mail.com sales team partnered with top commerce vendors, including Barnes and Noble, Value America and Big Star, to provide Mail.com members with high quality merchandise at low prices with free shipping. Prior to joining Mail.com, Nichols managed New York sales for CNET, running the top three accounts for the company. She was responsible for creating and building the interactive sales organization at Interactive Imaginations, now 24/7 Media, and served as Director of Sales from 1995 to 1996. From 1993 to 1995, she acted as a liaison to the General Motors board of directors and served as financial analyst for the investor relations and mergers & acquisitions group. In the past, Nichols has spoken to the agency community about buying targeted advertising online and future ad models and is a member of the Fast Forum Committee on Future Ad Models. Nichols received her B.A. from Davidson College in Davidson, North Carolina.
Don Howren, Vice President Sales, MindArrow Systems: Don Howren has over 14 years of experience in the financial software applications market and advanced technology industry. In his current position as Vice President of Sales, Howren will oversee global channel marketing strategies, business development initiatives, and strategic alliances. Prior to joining MindArrow Systems, Howren served as Vice President & General Manager at Best Software, Vice President of Marketing & Business Development for OmniVista Software Corp., and Vice President of Marketing and Strategic Partnerships at Epicor Software Corp. Howren received a Bachelor of Business Administration degree from the College of William and Mary in Virginia.
Scott Ferber, CEO, Advertising.com: Scott Ferber incorporated TeknoSurf.com in October of 1998, later changed to Advertising.com. Mr. Ferber saw the opportunity presented by the Internet and by the application of superior technology to rapidly generate statistically significant data sets. Advertising.com current advertisers include numerous Fortune 100 companies and, and 3 out of the top 10 Internet advertisers. Mr. Ferber started his career in manufacturing with Procter & Gamble, then moved into information-based marketing for CapitalOne. While at CapitalOne, Scott was responsible for developing new industry opportunities to apply the Information Based Strategies that led to CapitalOne's phenomenal growth and stock market success of the 1990s. Scott graduated with highest honors from The University of Virginia and Stanford University and received engineering degrees at both institutions.
Jack Serpa, EVP Sales & Strategic Planning, Internet Wire, Inc.: Jack Serpa is responsible for expanding the Company’s sales force with outside representatives in New York, San Francisco and Los Angeles, as well as new product development and business strategy. He serves as head of all east coast operations and is housed in the Company’s New York office. Serpa brings more than 15 years of PR wire service, market research and interactive experience to Internet Wire. Serpa was a pioneer in the PR wire service field as national director at Business Wire, where he created and launched Entertainment Wire, one of the PR wire service industry’s first entries into vertical markets. He also spent five years as vice president of sales and marketing of fax-based PR news distributor ECN (Entertainment Communication Network), where he rolled out a national sales force in Los Angeles, Chicago and New York. Previously, Serpa co-founded NorthStar Interactive, a groundbreaking, Internet-based market research firm, which he sold to Arbitron in 1997. Serpa comes to Internet Wire from Mediamark Research, Inc., a sister company of PR Newswire, where he served as head of new media research.
Wanda Meloni, The Principal of M2 Research, Wanda Meloni is a market analyst and strategic management consultant. Wanda publishes market research reports on the graphics and digital media markets. She has been tracking 3D, graphics technologies and applications as a market analyst for over four years and has worked in the digital media industry for nine. Previously, Wanda was the Senior Analyst with Jon Peddie Associates (JPA) tracking the 3D graphics software market. The author of the successful 3D Tools & Applications Study 1998, she initiated and successfully grew the company’s graphics software research and consulting business which included 3D animation, CAD, visual simulation, 3D on the Web, 3D gaming, and enterprise graphics solutions. Prior to her work with JPA, Ms. Meloni worked with a variety of software tools vendors, content providers, and game developers on strategic marketing and development issues. Ms. Meloni holds an MBA in International Business. She frequently contributes articles in industry trade publications and speaks at trade events on the digital media market. She is also quoted in publications such as The Wall Street Journal, Business Week, Computer Graphics World, New Media Magazine, and SGI World.
Laurence Roth, COO, SuperSig.com, Inc.: Larry is a seasoned consumer Internet and entertainment industry executive. He comes to SuperSig.com, Inc. from AOL, where he was Executive Director, Community Programming. There, he had overall responsibility for AOL's community areas. This included strategies, revenue generation, product definition and customer experience for AOL's chat, message boards, homepages and other member generated products. He also developed business and programming plan for Community product integration across AOL.com, Netcenter and AOL. Previous to this, he was Vice President, Content and Business Development for Kidstar Interactive Media where he developedtargeted interactive kids programming for national advertisers. Before Kidstar, Larry ran his own CD-ROM consulting company. Previous to this, he was Vice-President, Worldwide Film Acquisitions for MGM/UA Communications. Larry is a Co-founder of the Venice Interactive Community (VIC), a 1,000 member trade association devoted to promoting digital media in Greater Los Angeles. Larry holds a Master of Business Administration from UCLA, and a Bachelor of Arts in Science, Technology and Society from Vassar College.