Meet the Broker: Kay Levada, Millard Group Inc.
Today we meet Kay Levada, account manager in the list brokerage division at Millard Group Inc. Levada believes Internet media represents the future of direct marketing, although she recalls how the dotcom crash broke many hearts.
“I got into this business working for a dotcom, Empower, a spinoff of ALC back in 1990. Everyone then thought they would become millionaires right away,” says Levada.
Empower didn’t survive, nor did a second dotcom company, where Levada also brokered lists in various consumer markets.
Levada joined Millard Group in 2003. Her brokerage clients currently include Orvis, Woolrich, Eagle America, TravelSmith and Home Bistro.
“The Internet is coming back. This is personally exciting for me, because that’s where I got started. Companies that got burned are getting back into Internet marketing,” she says.
Levada has seen catalogers shift resources online, paid search advertising budgets grow and e-mail prospecting increase, as companies seek less expensive ways to find new customers and retain old ones.
Mobile marketing is shaping up to become the next big thing, she adds, with consumers ordering products and responding to offers received on cell phones.
“If you’re open-minded and willing to evolve the changes happening will be very good for the industry in five or six years,” she says.
Levada doesn’t slow down after work. She and her husband have an adult daughter; and a girl, 14, besides a dog and a cat at home. She enjoys entertaining, especially this time of year. “We had 21 people at my house for Thanksgiving and I’m expecting about 45 people on Christmas Eve.”
Levada admits being a rowdy fan of the Boston Red Sox and New England Patriots
