The Direct Marketing Association (DMA) will open a Silicon Valley office on September 12 to interact with current and prospective members on the West Coast. Alexandra Morehouse, former CMO of AAA, will oversee the Sunnyvale, Calif.-based Center for Accountable Marketing (CAM), reporting to DMA CEO Lawrence Kimmel.
The DMA created the center to serve existing members on the West Coast and to attract prospective members there, said Kimmel. The office will provide C-level executives and marketers a community network and a venue to obtain information.
“We want to bring together the innovative and the established companies out there,” he said. “If we can be a catalyst to bring together ingenuity with opportunity, we will serve the community well.”
Kimmel defined the center as “a special operation with heightened dedication to [Silicon Valley] and the companies that reside in this geography.”
DMA will run the office with support from a consortium of 13 direct marketing and technology firms, including Google, OgilvyOne Worldwide, Return Path, Infogroup, Experian Marketing Services, Pitney Bowes and Acxiom Corp.
Morehouse will run the two-employee office. She most recently served as CMO and SVP of corporate strategy at AAA from May 2002 to January 2011. She also worked as chief marketing information officer at Charles Schwab & Co. from 1999 to 2002 and CMO of Ancestry.com from 1998 to 1999.
“My role will be to understand the emerging and unique needs of people playing in this segment,” said Morehouse. “There are almost no sources of unbiased information for marketers, and that’s what CAM is hoping to provide.”
When asked if the center could provide unbiased information about marketing technology despite partnering with specific vendors, Morehouse said: “Unbiased is absolutely the correct word to use. I’m sure because right now I am CAM. My radar for baloney is fine-tuned.”
Morehouse said the center’s partner consortium will “serve as a [de facto] board of directors and provide crowd-sourcing opportunities.”
