Over the course of this year, 3 has folded up. It's been an interesting ride since that inauspicious start in August 2001. But, it was time to move on. We've grown up and are moving out of our mother's basement joining a few other smart people who have better skills than we do. In the coming months we'll be unveiling Ascend Performance Group and explaining how it will make your company and your life a little better, easier and more joyful.
Spencer J. Brown & Associates is an executive leadership consulting firm helping CEOs and owners of privately held companies prepare for a successful sale, merger or acquisition.
About Spencer J. Brown.
Over the course of a successful and diverse business career spanning four decades, Spencer has served as a key leader in over two dozen financial transactions including mergers and acquisitions, Venture Capital and Private Equity transactions and Initial Public Offerings totaling over US$250 million in sectors as diverse as consumer goods marketing, semiconductor manufacturing and video production services.
Prior to forming Spencer J. Brown & Associates in 2006, Spencer served as chief executive officer of Euro RSCG DRTV, a division of the French marketing consulting conglomerate, Havas. Prior to being named CEO in 1999, Spencer served in the dual role of CFO/COO two years prior. During his tenure, Euro RSCG DRTV raised its annual billings from $14 million to over $400 million thus becoming the largest direct response television advertising agency in the world..
Before joining Euro RSCG, he served in a variety of senior corporate leadership positions in public and private companies including 800.com, Now Software, Sundance Electronics, TriQuint Semiconductor, GigaBit Logic, CR Technology, and Compact Video Systems.
Spencer is a retired Certified Public Accountant and is a member of the American Iinstitute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA). Early in his career, he was an Auditor at Peat Marwick Mitchell (KPMG).
He is the former Chairman of the Oregon Entrepreneurs Network (OEN) and a former board member of 800.com, Chemwest Engineering, Tactix and TriQuint Semiconductor. He has also served as a board advisor to Dotster and Tripwire. He received an honorable discharge from the U.S. Air Force in 1973 and earned a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science from U.C.L.A. in 1976.
He has been a guest speaker at U.C.L.A.'s Graduate School of Management, the University of Portland, the University of Oregon Law School of Entrepreneurship and frequently speaks to groups across the country on issues related to entrepreneurship, management and leadership.
Spencer is currently a member of the Board of Directors and President of the Portland chapter of the Association for Corporate Growth, one of the largest and oldest senior executive leadership organizations in the world. He is also a member of the Board of Directors of The Commerce Bank of Oregon, partially-owned subsidiary of NYSE-Listed Zions Bancorp. He is also a member of the Board of Advisors of Indent Studios, Intelesoft Technologies, Oregon Aesthetic Technologies and Rejuvenation. He is past Chair of OEN and is a frequent speaker at various investor conferences.
Spencer brings a significant amount of experience to projects throughout North America and Europe in the areas of:
Direct Response Television Advertising
Start-up company executive management anfd financial modeling.
Mergers and acquisitions
Venture capital and private equity fundraising.
The fundamental purpose of an online privacy policy is to let site visitors and, in this case, subscribers (to a periodic newsletter, announcement service, SMS text notification service, etc.) know what kind of data you collect, what you do with that data, and how you safeguard that information. It also details how you choose to share (or not share) that data. You probably already knew most of this, but it helps us to wrap our brains around what we're talking about here. Repetition helps us remember things. Hey, that's how we're wired.
In order to craft a privacy policy, one needs to involve those who handle the technical elements of your data-gathering tools or systems. This might include your IT manager, your marketing staff, Web development staff and, last but not least, your lawyer or general counsel.
3Mail uses CoolerEmail, thuse we subscribe to the tenets embodied in their privacy policy
We also recommend taking a look at law.com's privacy policy as another example (and a slightly different and more thorough approach). You can read their policy here: http://www.law.com/service/privacy_policy.shtml
So, our friend John Geigle at Masterpiece Models invents this new paint brush that essentially cleans itself. This video, produced by former 3 staffer, Mason West, was designed to provide re-sellers and consumers with a quick understanding of the unique qualities of what some consider to be one of the first advancements in paintbrush technology since the roller.
If the video does not load, you can also view it on YouTube by clicking here
Working with Than Clevenger has been a very rewarding experience. He invests every ounce of himself in what he does.
I appreciate his ever-present passion for his work, which is balanced by the compassion he displays toward others. Than and his company, 3, have been very instrumental to the Dave’s Killer Bread and NatureBake brands, helping us to understand our potential and brainstorming and implementing marketing strategies.
He has also introduced us to others who have helped us. When a man gives you the quality of help that Than provides, you count him as a friend.
Dave Dahl
Dave's Killer Bread
503-335-8077 ext 310
1170 NE 63rd
Portland, OR 97213
LICENSEE will not appropriate or make use of COMPANY's name or any of COMPANY's trade or service marks or property, in any advertising or otherwise, without prior written consent of the COMPANY. If the COMPANY grants written consent to use COMPANY's name and/or trade or service marks, for advertising, endorsement, or promotion, COMPANY shall have the right to reject any such use proposed by the LICENSEE which in the COMPANY's sole discretion violates the COMPANY's standards of advertising, publicity or promotion or is inconsistent with COMPANY's reputation or mission. The COMPANY's permission to permit particular advertising, publicity or promotion (including any and all media relations, electronic media distribution, public relations, etc.) shall not be unreasonably withheld.
LICENSEE may use the the COMPANY logo in the promotion of this Contract to Customers with the following stipulations; (i) the logo may not be modified in any way; (ii) when displayed, the size of the COMPANY logo must be equal to or larger than the LICENSS logo; (iii) the COMPANY logo is only used to communicate the availability of services under this Contract to Customers; and (iv) any other use of the LICENSEE logo requires prior written permission from DIR.
LICENSEE LOGO. The COMPANY may use the LICENSEE's name and logo in the promotion of this Contract to communicate the availability of Services under this Contract to Customers, Prospects, Investors, Media (both print and electronic). Use of the logo may be on the COMPANY Web Site or on printed materials.
Any use of COMPANY's Logo by the LICENSEE must comply with and be solely related to the purposes of this Contract and any usage guidelines communicated to the COMPANY from time to time. Nothing contained in this Contract will give the LICENSEE any right, title, or interest in or to the COMPANY's trademarks or the goodwill associated therewith, except for the limited usage rights expressly provided by the COMPANY.
TRADE SHOW PARTICIPATION. LICENSEE understands and agrees that it must participate by providing a staffed booth display or similar presence at no less than two (2) trade shows or similar functions sponsored by the COMPANY's Marketing Divi sion each calendar year at the LICENSEE's expense. LICENSEE must display the COMPANY logo at all trade shows that potential Customers will attend. The COMPANY reserves the right to approve or disapprove of the location of the use of the the COMPANY logo in or on trade show booth.
Challenge: Professional services clients typically offer a wide variety of services. This leaves them with the challenge of determining the most optimal method for quickly explaining who they are and what they do. That was exactly the case with this Executive level IT Consultant firm. It was 3's task to define the myriad services they offer and condense them into a one-page information sheet. 
Solution: Projecting that more detail on the services would be needed, 3 wrote the copy for individual sheets for each service. Each service engagement is custom fit to the client and manifests in slightly different ways. By approaching the project broadly first, 3 was able to better understand and present the many permutations.
Once that information had been gathered and written, a hard look at what was truly essential to understand each service boiled down the one-sheets into the 1-2 sentence descriptions seen on the information sheet.
The art direction by Blake Frey took full advantage of the company's blue color scheme to make the information easy to digest in a quick glance.
Result: This clean, professional information sheet provides a gateway into the company's consulting services. When distributed, it will accompany the detailed one-sheets of the individual services, almost as an index suggesting where to look for the most relevant information.
Challenge: 3 arranged for a food product client to participate in a local bicycling event giving samples to roughly 20,000 riders. The visibility for their brand was enough to justify the participation fee, but it was 3's challenge to make this event a truly measurable success.
Solution: As part of the sponsorship, 3 negotiated to have an exclusive e-mail sent from the event's contact list of 14,154 pre-registrants. The e-mail contained a special offer to receive a free product with registration to our client's e-mail newsletter. To ensure the client would not be overloaded by free giveaways, the offer was only valid for a limited time at their bakery outlet.
Result: During the four day period of the offer there were 774 new subscribers to the e-mail newsletter - more than tripling the size of their list. 106 coupons were redeemed at the bakery, which considering the two hurdles customers needed to overcome to use it (printing out the e-mail and taking it to the bakery) is an encouragingly high number. The success of this event has redefined our previous model for event sampling promotions.
Challenge:
First, please tell us: Who loves the lowly sales kit? Mostly the sales staff. Certainly the client or prospect pays these basics of marketing little respect. It's a quick glance and then a piece of a larger pile on someone's desk. We asked ourselves what we could do that might be a different, though far from novel or rare, approach. What if the sales kit could be used as a note pad? Or, a guiding document on a sales call? What if the sales staff could simply check boxes, make a copy and send one to the client? These days most all forms are Web-enabled. We wanted to take a page, if you will, from Web forms and put it to use in the real world. 
Solution:
A colorful, design-forward (yeah, that's a fine cliche), deliverable that is at once informative as it is brand-centric (another cliche' - sorry). Yes, we fell in love with our own creation here. And like any good parent, we think it's as beautiful as it is functional. We'd like your opinion, so lay it on us. 
Result:
We have shared the backgrounder -- including it's matching debossed folder -- with several clients and Xenium prospects in the past few weeks. We have received very positive feedback thus far. "It's elegant." "It's so clear and easily understandable." "Me like green," OK, that last one was from the bosses' two year old. But, you get the idea.
Special thanks to Todd Silberman of Green Dog Printing for his help in producing the final piece. It is printed on 100 percent post-consumer waste recycled paper using Soy-based inks. No trees were harmed un-necessarily in the making of this fine piece of collateral.
Special thanks also to Blake Frey of Frey Design for his clever art direction and "design forward" sensibility. Blake, you are the man.
Challenge: What do you do when you've got a product that requires a lot of technical explanation for people to truly understand how revolutionary it is? Do you send them a stack of papers? Sit down with them over coffee? In the case of Reserve Steel's Intelligent Framing Systems, we made a movie. Well, kind of. Please click on the link and see what we mean.
Solution: Now, people mean different things by "movie" these days. We didn't shoot any footage, but the combination of a tight narrative with words and pictures on screen is just as effective – sometimes more so.
We had been working on a PowerPoint presentation, which contained all the information we needed to convey. But anyone who has seen PowerPoint effectively used knows that the success of the presentation is in the charisma of the speaker. 3 associate, Mason West, took all the bullet points from our original script and completely rewrote it to be more conversational.
For the visuals, we wanted to show the product whenever appropriate and reinforce specific points with text on the screen. We also played around with fun visual gags to keep viewers amused and engaged through the video's five minute duration.
Result: This was largely an experiment on our part, so the client had not even read the script before seeing the video. When they finally watched it, their response was pure amazement at how we'd given such life to the story of their product. Let us know what you think. Special thanks to Mason West for the work here.
