David purchased the company, then known as Merkle Computer Systems, Inc. in 1988 and became its 24th employee. Today, Merkle has more than 1400 employees in locations in the United States and China and is today the nation’s largest and fastest-growing independent Customer Relationship Marketing agency.

Under David’s leadership, Merkle has sustained 25% annual growth over the last 20 years and was recognized as a market leader by Forrester Research in 2003, 2006 and 2007. Advertising Age ranked Merkle as the 15th largest marketing services agency in the U.S. and 7th largest marketing services agency specializing in direct marketing. David was recognized by Winning Workplaces and Fortune Magazine as one of America’s Best Bosses of 2006, and was the 2007 Maryland Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year.

David currently serves on the Board of Directors of the Direct Marketing Association where he also serves on its Executive Committee. He also serves as a member of the Board of Trustees at the Howard County General Hospital: A Member of Johns Hopkins Medicine. David is a frequent speaker at industry events and has written numerous articles and white papers about topics such as Customer Relationship Marketing, Database Marketing and Analytics, Digital Media and Marketing Technology. He began his career at Butcher & Singer, a Philadelphia-based investment bank, and holds a Bachelor of Science in business administration from Shippensburg University in Pennsylvania.

Craig directs an expanded marketing function, overseeing Merkle’s demand generation, vertical marketing, and corporate marketing communications functions, including public relations, events and advertising. He also leads Merkle’s Innovation group which focuses on early stage best practices and new capabilities.

Previously, Craig was corporate vice president of Merkle’s Content Solutions Group and led a team that further established Merkle’s proprietary data solutions and offerings. He has also served as co-leader of the company’s Quantitative Marketing Group, a core pillar of Merkle’s future growth strategy.

Prior to joining Merkle in 2006, Craig had a long career at Metromail and Experian (which acquired Metromail in the late 1990s). Among his positions there, he was director of market development for Metromail’s data assets, director of interactive marketing, vice president of data licensing, and various sales management positions. Craig joined Merkle after serving as senior vice president of sales and account management for Experian Marketing Services.

Craig holds a political science degree from Hofstra University.

With a career built on bringing the conceptual strengths of brand advertising to bear in the business of response marketing, Mark has earned the trust of clients the world over for work that’s breakthrough in concept and impactful on the bottom line. Before joining Merkle, Mark was Managing Partner and Chief Creative Officer at OgilvyOne Worldwide, and prior to Ogilvy was Executive Creative Director at Wunderman/Young & Rubicam. To date, Mark’s award-filled portfolio showcases results-driving work across the full spectrum of marketing media for dominant brands including British Airways, Starwood Hotels & Resorts, General Electric, Federal Express, NBC, Miles Laboratories, Astra Zeneca, American Express, Sprint, and other category leaders. He is a frequent speaker at national events and regularly serves as judge in a variety of international industry award shows.

Ron has more than 14 years of experience in quantitative analytics and database marketing. At Merkle, Ron has led strategic engagements with clients like Dell and NIKE. Ron’s area of focus is developing analytically-based strategies for improving marketing performance. Prior to joining Merkle, Ron held positions at Hostway, a leading web hosting company for small businesses, InfoWorks, a member of Rapp Collins Worldwide, and Market Knowledge, now part of Equifax. Ron holds a Master of Science in Applied Math from DePaul University and a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from the University of Chicago.

As the General Manager of Merkle’s Data Solutions Group, Ozgur oversees the delivery of analytically driven data sourcing and optimization solutions for Merkle’s clients. Ozgur has 14 years of experience in building, implementing and integrating database marketing solutions for many Fortune 500 clients. Ozgur’s CRM experience stretches across many functional areas such as strategy, analytics, infrastructure, data content and many clients, including Capital One, DIRECTV, T Rowe Price, Glaxo Smith Kline, Procter&Gamble and 21st Century.

Ozgur is the recipient of multiple awards within Merkle, including the Exceptional Client, Operational Excellence, Database Marketing Excellence and most recently the Chairman’s Award, which is the highest recognition within Merkle. Ozgur has spoken at various Predictive Analytics and Database Marketing Events globally. Ozgur holds a B.S degree in industrial engineering and an MBA degree with a focus on marketing and management information systems from the University of Georgia.

Joe has been in the data processing industry since 1984. Joe’s last 15 years have been in specializing international and business to business database and customer relationship marketing (CRM) capabilities for Fortune 500 companies. He has overseen the creation of over 30 CRM databases in the last 11 years. He has a solid industry reputation for delivering these databases cost-effectively, on budget and on time. Joe has written white papers on b-to-b marketing and international database best practices and is considered an expert at understanding strengths and weakness of many different approaches. 

Chris Crayner has developed and led customer marketing strategy, initiatives and functions for more than 15 years across the media and entertainment, pharmaceutical/consumer package goods and financial services industries. At Merkle, he leads the Enterprise Strategy Group focused on integrated marketing and CRM. Most recently he spent 7 years at The Walt Disney Company leading customer relationship marketing areas at the corporate level, and at both Theme Parks and Resorts. He served as Vice President, Global Customer Managed Relationships for Walt Disney Theme Parks and Resorts, responsible for customer relationship marketing strategies and initiatives worldwide. He has also served as Vice President, Technology – Corporate Brand Management where he led CRM business and technology strategy work across Disney’s diversified businesses.

Angie oversees Merkle's focus on the nonprofit industry and ensures that Merkle's expertise, strategies and tools are positioned to help clients excel and distinguish themselves in an increasingly competitive landscape. Angie has more than 22 years of experience in direct marketing — 14 of those years in the nonprofit community where she led the direct marketing and constituent relationship management areas for the national offices of the Arthritis Foundation and the American Cancer Society. In addition to overseeing these top-class direct marketing programs, Angie led the American Cancer Society (a $1 billion charity) in its transition to a constituent-centric nonprofit that focused on building long-term relationships with its donors to improve retention and achieve sustainable revenue across the organization. Angie is a frequent speaker at industry events, writes articles about topics important to the nonprofit community and, in 2009, was chosen by the Nonprofit Times as one of the ten most effective and influential fundraisers.

John leads a dedicated team of industry experts to support clients in insurance and wealth management. John has more than 15 years of customer relationship management and database marketing consulting experience in the insurance and financial services industries.

Prior to joining Merkle in 2008, John played executive roles in marketing, distribution and technology in Liberty Mutual’s Personal Markets division. He was previously a senior manager in CapGemini’s Insurance and Financial Services CRM practice. John has also held management positions with Rapp Collins Worldwide and BearingPoint where he managed direct response, interactive, and loyalty programs across multiple industries. As an insurance and financial services specialist, he has delivered marketing and CRM solutions to clients such as AARP, Aetna, AG Edwards, Allstate, American Express Farmers, GEICO, MetLife, NY Life and US Bank.

John is a graduate of Franklin and Marshall College.

Will is a member of Merkle’s executive leadership team and vice president and general manager of Merkle’s Retail Banking and Consumer Finance group. In this role, Will is responsible for existing client relationships, growth and profitability of the business, and the continued application of Merkle’s core value proposition into the Retail Banking space. With more than 12 years experience in relationship marketing, Will leads a dedicated team of CRM marketing experts, across disciplines.

Before joining Merkle in early 2008, Will spent five years in the Asia Pacific for Acxiom Corporation as a member of Acxiom’s regional leadership team. In this role, Will worked to integrate Acxiom’s acquisitions in the region into an organized regional footprint. During that time Will built and led sales and marketing teams and worked with leading global brands, defining and implementing region-specific CRM strategies. Prior to his overseas assignment, Will held various roles with Acxiom in the US.

Will holds a BS in international economics from Louisiana State University.

Pete Mehr has more than 13 years of experience leading and supporting marketing programs for pharmaceutical firms. Pete is responsible for developing and overseeing the execution of Merkle’s customer strategy development for the healthcare industry. These customer centric initiatives include physician relationship marketing programs, consumer/patient relationship marketing programs, managed care integration, promotion “media mix” allocation approaches and market research initiatives.

Prior to this role, Pete was responsible for one of Merkle’s client teams, managing relationships with P&G, Bose, AARP and Life Line, among others, both from a strategic marketing view as well as a tactical perspective. These areas include segmentation, response modeling and other strategic analyses; database development and enhancement; and content solutions.

Before joining Merkle, Pete was Vice President of Health Products Research, Inc., a division of inVentiv Health. At HPR Pete was instrumental in doubling the size of the company while expanding the company’s product portfolio. Pete supported clients in developing and implementing marketing and sales strategy, including sales force size and structure analysis, segmentation, promotion mix analysis, promotion optimization analysis, sales force territory alignments, and direct-to-consumer advertising tracking and optimization. Pete’s clients included GSK, AstraZeneca, Sanofi Aventis, Shire, Abbott Laboratories, Pfizer, and numerous divisions of Johnson and Johnson.

Prior to HPR, Pete worked at AT&T in the Consumer Marketing Organization, where he was a leader in the customer retention marketing and customer acquisition marketing areas.

Pete holds a Ph.D. in Econometrics from Rutgers University, and had his dissertation published in the Journal of Econometrics.

Peter Vandre currently leads Merkle’s digital analytics group. During his career at Merkle, Peter built Merkle’s digital analytics practice and led the development of Merkle’s digital data integration product. Additionally, he has led analytical engagements with such clients as Dell, Samsung, NIKE, DIRECTV, GEICO, Urban Outfitters, Disney, and others. He has extensive experience in CRM strategy and measurement and has recently been recognized for his work in customer engagement modeling and integrated measurement.

Peter has spent the last 7 years at Merkle and has more than 13 years of consulting, analytics, and strategic marketing experience. He earned an MBA from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Megan joined Merkle in November 2010 to lead the display media division, which is focused on delivering targeting, insights and measurement to advertisers on the Merkle Trading Platform. She is responsible for business development, servicing and technology partnerships.

Prior to joining Merkle, Megan led the Professional Services team at the Right Media Exchange, a Yahoo Company. She was responsible for Right Media’s in-house demand-side platform including servicing and platform strategy. In addition, Megan and her team were responsible for providing consulting services to agencies, advertisers, media trading desks and publishers.

Pagliuca received an MBA from Bond University in Queensland Australia, where she studied E-commerce and Internet Marketing. She also holds a BA from the University of San Diego, where she majored in Business Administration and Information Systems.

Chris is responsible for the operations, profitability, and strategic planning for Merkle Mobile. Chris has more than 15 years of experience helping Fortune 1000 companies implement marketing solutions and strategies.

Prior to Merkle, Chris was vice president of global sales at iLoop, responsible for leading the company through a significant growth phase, expanding the business from 20 to more than 150 clients in North America and Europe. In addition to being responsible for all mobile platform licensing and campaign services revenue, he created channel relationships with digital marketing companies including Comcast Spotlight, DoubleClick, Google, Money Mailer, who resold iLoop’s products and services.

Rich leads a team of marketing strategists and analysts who are experts in email marketing, website analytics, social marketing, mobile messaging, online acquisitions, and digital analytics. His team helps Merkle’s clients, such as Dell, DIRECTV, Disney, Samsung and Royal Caribbean, use data-driven techniques to refine and optimize their online marketing strategy.

Rich has been working in online analytics for the past 15 years, on both the consulting and client sides. Prior to joining Merkle, Rich was vice president of strategic services at Epsilon Interactive and was formerly a leader in the strategic services group at DoubleClick. Earlier in his career, Rich co-founded a boutique analytics consulting firm and also served as a consultant for Accenture. On the client side, Rich managed the online analytics functions for two internet start-ups.

Scott has more than 10 years of experience developing and implementing analytical solutions into marketing programs for many different companies, including GEICO, AEGON, MBNA, Fidelity, DirectTV, Eli Lilly, GSK, and Dell. Prior to joining Merkle, Scott worked for American Express as a statistician and modeler and taught graduate students statistical methods and experimental design at Cornell University. Scott has dual BS degrees in Brain and Cognitive Sciences and Statistics from The University of Rochester, a MS degree in Statistics from Cornell University, and an MBA from Johns Hopkins University.

Scott has been honored with several awards within Merkle, including The “Merkled” Award (Employee of the Year), Database Marketing Excellence, Outstanding Achievement, and the Chairman’s Award, which is the highest recognition within Merkle. Scott’s team also won the NCDM Excellence Award in the Modeling and Analytics Area with GEICO in 2005. Additionally, Scott has presented numerous times at the NCDM and DM Days, and has published 3 white papers for Merkle since 2008.