About

Email: ron.shevlin@gmail.com

Currently an analyst at Aite Group, LLC where I focus on retail banking issues including sales and marketing technologies, customer and marketing analytics, loyalty management, P2P lending, personal financial management, social computing, online banking, customer experience and consumer behavior.

Formerly VP of Marketing at Epsilon in Wakefield, MA. Prior to joining Epsilon in April 2006, I spent nine years at Forrester Research where I was a Research Director and Principal Analyst of the Financial Services team, and led Forrester’s consumer research efforts in financial services. Worked at consulting firms Symmetrix and Nolan, Norton before that. And before that….

I’ve got a BA in Economics from SUNY Binghamton and an MBA from the University of Texas at Austin (back when you could pay $3 to see Stevie Ray Vaughan play at Antone’s).

I have three objectives for this site:

1) Help marketers succeed. I’ve been consulting to large organizations for more than 20 years. I’ve got some ideas for how to run effective marketing organizations, and market effectively. I also believe that a lot of the marketing “ideas” floating around the Web and blogosphere are just plain wrong and aren’t worth the pixels they’re taking up. I’m going to let you know when I disagree.

2) Make marketers smile. The blurred boundaries between work and non-work are well-documented. But it seems like it’s always work that’s slipping into the non-work side of the coin. I’m going to try to bring some humor to the work side. [Warning: You may not always appreciate my sense of humor. Tough.]

3) Enter into conversations. There are two satisfaction-producing things that come from this site: when someone leaves a comment and says they agree, and when someone leaves a comment and says I’m all wrong. At least they read what I wrote. And I’m hoping the connections I can make through this page will help me find what will come after that inevitable day when my boss (who reads this blog, but probably not this page) tells me I’m fired.

[Full disclosure: The company I work for sells email and loyalty platforms. But remember this: I work for the company that I do because I believe in the value of email and loyalty programs to deliver bottom-line results -- not the other way around].