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Expertise / Strategist Profiles
Experience & Industry Categories | Strategist Profiles
Each Due North consultant is unique in their approach to marketing as a business strategy, with proven successes that distinguish them as leaders in their field.
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Michael H. Thompson
Senior Strategist
After receiving a master's degree in mass communications in 1975, Michael H. Thompson, Sr., began his career as a marketing leader and innovator.
In fact, Michael's career epitomizes the expression, “Necessity is the mother of invention.” After just 2 years in the business, Michael found himself on the streets after an agency layoff. So he promptly started his own marketing communications firm, now $60 million in billings. And that was just the beginning of an inventiveness and initiative that have served him and his clients well over the years.
In the early days, while preparing for a campaign presentation to Gillette, a client for 7 years, Michael asked his team to develop a projected ROI analysis on the new work. The analysis was so thorough that the marketing director replaced his own projection with Thompson's and commented, “Some of the biggest agencies in the world work for me, and never once have they brought in any ROI analysis.” This was well over a decade before the advent of accountability.
Just a short time later, another client was transforming its consumer marketing model from broker sales to direct sales, and Michael asked his team to build a lead generation model which could manage a daily lead-tracking system-from response to closed sale, and by source (television, direct mail, referral, etc.)- so that the value of each source could be analyzed and adjusted for continuous improvement. The result was an efficiency tracking system now known as Funnel Management.
Soon to follow was the creation of a proprietary planning process called Strategic Pathway, developed again by Michael and his team. Used literally hundreds of times, Strategic Pathway brings an efficient, yet practical process to a multitude of client marketing budgets.
Michael's drive for accountability and effectiveness advanced his career from ad maker to marketing program efficiency consultant and, over the years, has led to the creation of some of the industry's most forward-thinking models for marketing cost analysis. Today, Michael believes his job is to take the waste out of clients’ marketing budgets by utilizing tried and true efficiency methods - many of which he helped invent.
Robert F. Vornbrock
Senior Strategist
Bob Vornbrock's career has seen him play significant roles in the revolution and evolution of marketing efficiency thinking.
In the early 1980s, as advertising and merchandising director of Bendix Corporation's Automotive Brake Division, he led a team of Deming disciples in search of more efficient resource utilization. This was the beginning of the Quality revolution in American business, where teams like Bob's examined processes to improve efficiencies.
Since 1986, Bob has focused on leading client companies toward a more efficient, effective use of marketing resources utilizing a suite of revolutionary planning and research tools.
Bob's expertise in Channel Insights helped a Fortune 500 building products manufacturer uncover service benefits that created loyalty and long-term relationships in the channel. The launch of the ensuing program more than doubled expectations during its first year, and shortly became the gold standard for the industry. As competitors began to copy the program, turning the once value-added features into basic expectations, Bob led a Value Analysis study that allowed the company to divert a $2 million investment in now "basic" services toward those that distributors valued most.
Bob has led the way in using the Internet's powerful, new knowledge-based tools, like Buyer Insights, that can quickly tap into a 2.5-million consumer panel on line to deliver qualitative or quantitative insights in a matter of days. Bob has also spearheaded countless Strategic Pathway sessions that bring knowledge and the effective planning of strategic disciplines together to achieve the most efficient allocation of resources.
Bob believes that certainly knowledge is power, but only if you know how to use it.
Evette White
Senior Strategist
Agency principal for over 20 years, Evette is often referred to as the "helicopter pilot" for the teams she works with. Her ability to identify global perspective potential, as well as the steps to achieving that potential, has served clients well throughout her career. Inspired by experience with clients who were not always prepared for marketing that produced measurable results, Evette realized a need for understanding operational capacities before driving business through integrated marketing. This prompted questions that are not typical of a marketing partner, often delving into business areas that go beyond the marketing effort. Marketing as a Business Strategy is the result, an approach assuring brand equity and marketing effectiveness that go beyond any single campaign or communications effort. This approach is based on strategic thinking and business planning for clarity in achievable goals.
While retail, manufacturing, entertainment, financial, and corporate clients have all trusted Evette and her team with their business goals, it is the rapidly changing healthcare industry that has become her strategic thinking specialty. Her experience includes 10+ years with the home market of HCA (the largest for-profit health system) and several years with Saint Thomas Health Services (a member of Ascension Health, the nation's largest not-for-profit health system). In both systems, the coming together of competing entities to achieve best practices for better outcomes, as well as efficiencies and economies of scale for assuring sustainability in an era of shrinking reimbursement, generated an understanding of the healthcare landscape that goes beyond external issues.
Evette's inspiration is a history of making a difference, sharing in the development and implementation of plans with measurable accountability.
Ralph Berry
Public Relations Strategist
Ralph Berry's 25-year career has spanned every aspect of public and media relations and corporate communications. He has directed the strategic public relations and internal/external communications surrounding brand and product launches, corporate sales and acquisitions, crisis communications, and general awareness-building to the financial, consumer, and trade media for a broadly diverse number of companies.
Ralph is recognized as an excellent strategist, and is focused on the complete brand picture for a company or product. He values the linkage between every message point to the media, investors, employees, and others with direct or indirect influence on the success or positioning of a company or product.
His work in ongoing and issue-specific media relations has led to articles and placements in publications and media outlets such as Fortune magazine, The Wall Street Journal, Business Week, Newsweek, Fortune Small Business, PC World, USA Today, Red Herring, Forbes, CNBC, MSNBC, Fox Business, and CNNfn, as well as numerous Web-based newsletters, trade media, and local media outlets. And, his internal communications and annual report work have led to numerous awards and recognition.
Ralph has worked as a senior communications officer for a Fortune 500 entertainment company, developed brand outreach efforts for a major snack food company, helped launch a dot com that is still operating, and helped guide the strategic local/national/international public relations for dozens of clients as the senior officer of a regional public relations firm.
Ralph holds a bachelor's degree in broadcast journalism and has worked as a reporter, editor, and columnist.
David Dasenbrock
Media Strategist
David is a 26-year media veteran. He brings a wide range of media experience, having worked with client budgets that ranged from $250,000 to $250,000,000. David also brings a passionate point of view about media, target audiences, and relevant choices within today's rapidly evolving media landscape.
During his career, David's had the opportunity to hone that point of view for clients that range from A-to-Z. Literally. Applebee's, Brown-Forman, Cracker Barrel Old Country Stores, Dad's Root Beer, Eveready, Fujitsu, GlaxoSmithKline, Golden Corral, Homelite, Inacom, Jack-in-the-Box, Jollytime Popcorn, MGM-Mirage Hotels, Monsanto, Mutual of Omaha, Nebraska Lottery, O'Charley's, Purina, Rainforest Cafe, Six Flags, Tyco International, Tony's Pizza Company, U.S. Air Force, and Volvo Trucks.
He still needs an X, Y and Z. So look out, Xerox, Yamaha, and Zebco.
David has served on a number of industry committees and community boards throughout his career.
A graduate of the University of Missouri in Journalism, he shares his non-working hours with his wife, Debra, two dogs, and three cats.
Michael Thompson, Jr.
Sports Marketing Strategist
After graduating from the University of Mississippi, Michael moved to Atlanta, where he worked at the GEM Group as an account executive. While at GEM, his account experience included working with The Weather Channel, Domino's Pizza, United Parcel Service, and GM Racing/Team Cadillac.
For The Weather Channel, Michael planned and executed the Weather Quest 2002 promotion, which included designing a five-city tour to obtain sweepstakes entries and to promote The Weather Channel in top markets. With Domino's, he assisted in introducing Domino's Pizza to NASCAR as a lead sponsorship opportunity and aided in the negotiation process between Domino's Pizza and NASCAR corporate marketing.
Michael's account experience includes completing an audit of First Tennessee's sponsorship activities with consultation, analysis, and recommendations on leveraging activities. Currently, he leads two other employees in the division as they manage First Tennessee's current sponsorships and assist this client in maximizing all sponsorship assets through tailored and experiential leveraging programs. Michael's team also provides strategic sponsorship consultation, negotiation, and turnkey on-site event execution for First Horizon Home Loans, Georgia Boot, and Aristotle.net.
