Venture Marketing’s Team of Experienced Professionals

John Fox

John is president and founder of Venture Marketing. He has extensive hands-on experience as an entrepreneur and C-level new business developer for technology–enabled businesses. John has led the launch or re-launch of 44 companies, resulting in double and triple-digit growth for every client served.

Also known as the “Bob Vila of B2B Marketing,” John is the author of Marketing Playbook: The Definitive Guide to B2B Marketing for Small Business. The book was named Business Breakthrough of the Year, 2006 and has been endorsed by such well known marketing gurus as Seth Godin, author of All Marketers are Liars and Free Prize Inside; Guy Kawasaki, the original Apple Evangelist and author of Art of the Start; Al Ries, author of 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing; Ben McConnell, author of Creating Customer Evangelists; Rieva Lesonsky, Senior Vice President and Editorial Director of Entrepreneur Media/Entrepreneur Magazine and Doug Hall, Eureka! Ranch CEO, Judge on ABC TV’s AMERICAN INVENTOR and author of Jump Start Your Business Brain.

Unlike other marketing experts who are mere observers, he’s spent his career on the front lines getting new marketing strategies and tactics implemented. He knows the gotchas, the pitfalls, the timing and the costs and he communicates all of these in an easy-to-understand style. Bottom line: John’s advice and all the Plays in The Marketing Playbook are not written by an academic or pundit who has spent their career on the sidelines. He really knows how to make marketing work for sales people because he’s spent his career doing it.

John has been featured in numerous publications and radio programs, including BusinessWeek, Chicago Tribune, Crain's Chicago Business, Crain's B2B, PCWeek/eWeek, and the Advertising Show.

John is a graduate engineer from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in Computer Science. He earned his MBA from Keller Graduate School of Management. He and his wife, Ruth, of 26 years live in Naperville, Illinois with their five entrepreneurially-minded children.

He actively serves on an advisory board for the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign’s College of Engineering and Mercantec, Inc.

Vic Ranczynski

With a total of more than 25 years of high-technology sales and marketing, Vic has concentrated more than 19 years of this time on early stage and small technology companies, personally closing several 7-figure contracts with F500 customers.

He is skilled in strategic business development, marketing and sales force management.

Combining a background in corporate finance, product management and channel and vendor relationship development, Ranczynski focuses on helping SMBs bring their products and services to the marketplace. He has served emerging businesses across the full spectrum of hardware, software, telecommunications and “dot-com” technologies, relentlessly pursuing and closing sales among targeted accounts.

Prior to VM, Vic was Vice-President, Sales at Heurikon, an industrial controls start-up. Before Heurikon, he was North American Sales Manager for U.S. Robotics. He also has held several other sales management positions with Intel and Magicsoft where he gained significant experience in start-up and small business revenue generation and distribution channel management.

Ranczynski earned his MBA in Corporate Finance from the University of Chicago. He earned his BS in Engineering Mechanics from the University of Wisconsin in Madison, Wis. Ranczynski is a National Merit Scholar and has been active with Habitat for Humanity for more than ten years.

Matt Yubas

Matt Yubas is the author of Product Idea to Product Success: A Complete Step-by-Step Guide to Making Money from Your Idea and several other inventor workbooks. He has been featured on television and radio and has been tapped for his expertise in bringing products to market in many syndicated publications.

Matt is a Certified Professional Marketing Consultant for the Small Business Development and International Trade Center. He has developed products for 20 years as an engineer, product manager, and independent consultant for startups, small business, and Fortune 500 companies. He has launched new products such as software applications, wireless devices, and websites. In addition, he has helped clients in a diverse number of industries that include photography equipment, auto accessories, soy candles, children's clothing, sporting goods, digital art, and home décor.

As an entrepreneur, he was a co-founder of a software company that developed one of the first personal information management software products. Matt earned a B.S. in Engineering from Pennsylvania Spring Garden College in Philadelphia, and an M.B.A. in Management from San Diego State University.

He is on the board of directors for Publishers and Writers of San Diego (PWSD), and Published Authors Creative Alliance (PACA). Matt resides in San Diego, California.

Mercy Ehrler

Mercy specializes in branding, marketing and design and uses these to help companies of all types in creating unique identities and developing hard-working visual communications that help better position their brands in the marketplace. She is a highly skilled copy-writer, editor and graphic designer, and leverages these skills to take a marketing concept from start to finish (copywriting to layout and design).

Jason Sherman

Jason Sherman has helped more than 60 organizations — from RE/MAX International to Abbott Labs to technology startups to non-profits — identify and further their business, marketing, and communications missions by helping clients better understand their constituents, develop effective communications and marketing strategies, gain significant media coverage, increase sales many-fold, secure investment funding, boost attendance at events, increase employee morale, forge strategic partnerships, launch new products, attract talented employees and establish solid brands.

His experience includes directing communications and marketing for: StudioNorth, a 70-person graphic and Web design studio and its clients; iGive.com, the first online charity shopping mall; dozens of clients of both a Chicago-based public relations firm and Shandwick, the world’s largest independent public relations firm; the southeast Michigan region of RE/MAX International; and for clients of Ross Roy, a 500-person advertising firm.

Jason has a diverse background in technology, healthcare, professional services, real estate, remodeling/construction, the arts and non-profits, automotive and transportation, and education. Reporters and editors that have worked with Jason know he understands and tries to make their jobs easier by being highly responsive and in tune with what makes a story. Clients know Jason for being highly strategic, creative and focused on their success.

Jason graduated with honors from Michigan State University with a Bachelor of Arts degree (and was awarded Outstanding Senior Man by the faculty and staff of the advertising department).

Frank Thomas

Frank has spent over 25 years in sales and marketing leadership positions with early stage and startup technology companies. During those assignments, he demonstrated the capacity to develop both sales and marketing teams, create atmospheres for high achievement, and consistently met the company’s revenue objectives.

He successfully created plans and initiatives to penetrate and capture market share of emerging markets, plus the Enterprise, SMB firms, governments, and Carriers. He is experienced and knowledgeable in all sales channels (Direct, Distribution, OEM, System Integration, and Value Added Resellers).

Frank likes to keep the focus on the fundamentals of sales and marketing: Who is the target market for the product or service? How does that market usually select and purchase? Who (what channel) do they purchase from? How does this product or service solve the business problem? What is the best Go-To-Market strategy to get to that market?

Frank has held senior-level sales and marketing positions at Motorola/Codex, Telebit (now Cisco), Digital Link, BoostWorks, and Teltone. He holds a BA degree from Murray State University.

Gene Crawford

Gene is a designer with more than 10 years experience creating simple, user specific, and elegant web sites and applications. He graduated from the University of South Carolina with a degree in Art.

In 1994, Gene met the Internet and has been honing his skills in information architecture and usable interface design ever since. He has overseen the design and architecture of dozens of web sites and applications. Gene practices by the governing principal that good design should not only present itself well—it should also be usable and persuasive.

Bob Marks

Bob has 25 years of experience in direct sales (both product and services related), senior level sales management, strategic sales & business planning/development and streamlining of business operations. Marks’ utilizes this breadth of knowledge in working with small to medium sized organizations to increase efficiencies in sales and operational functions.

His business acumen originated with 8 years of experience as a bond broker on the financial futures trading floor of the Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT). This experience formulated his base and developed a firm understanding of market driven forces that determine price point exchange between buyer and seller.

Post his tenure with the CBOT, Marks’ spent 5 years with the Marriott Corporation working in their National Account sector developing & executing complex sales strategies, culminating in multi-year/multi million dollar contracts within fortune 100-companies (Ford Motor Co., Chrysler Corporation, General Motors Corporation, Harley Davidson, Exxon and Amoco Oil etc.).