Why Splash Media and WebDex Media Joined Forces

When I was just out of high school, I saw the movie Nothing in Common with Tom Hanks and Jackie Gleason where Hanks plays an advertising executive. I remember thinking then how cool it would be to be in advertising. In 2000, after more than 14 years in marketing and sales, I got my wish and started WebDex Media Group.

On July 1st, WebDex Media Group merged with Splash Media.

However, the world had changed a lot since that 1986 film release and if I was going to help companies promote their businesses it would be in the online world. My passion in 2000 and today is to help businesses leverage a new media that is continually evolving and tap in to near endless amounts of opportunity. When WebDex opened its doors, Facebook, YouTube, even pay per click didn’t exist. In some ways it was much harder back then to extract value from the Web because there were fewer people and fewer opportunities. Today, it’s more about noise reduction and focusing on those areas that drive value as efficiently as possible.

In the past two years I have seen more change in online marketing than in the previous ten. Social media is on fire, people are watching the Internet (like television) just as much as they are reading it. Because of this significant change in the landscape, I knew that WebDex would have to partner with some really solid companies if we were going to continue to move the needle for our clients. Splash Media is by far the most impressive video production company around, with several Emmys and hundreds of Tellys under their belt, a $5.5M state-of-the-art studio, and a production team that is first rate. Chris Kraft, the original founder of Splash, and I started talking two years ago about partnering. During our talks we discovered that we were kindred spirits in our desire to help companies grow, our work ethic, and our faith.

Back in late May, Chris and I realized that by combining the Internet marketing and social media skills WebDex has with the online video production skills of Splash, we could create an organization that would be something special. We could really help companies transition from old school traditional advertising to online marketing by providing social media, online video production & distribution, and search engine marketing services, and wrap it all around a strategy that generate huge value for our customers. In fact we decided to keep WebDex’ original mission statement because it is still true with the new organization: “Connecting Customers to Our Clients.”

I can honestly say that the combined company is in a better position to help other organizations in the new world than just about any other agency out there. That’s exciting! To kick off the merger, which occurred back on July 1st, we put together a new seminar series called Social Media Boot Camp for CEO’s and launched a new product called BAM! Turnkey Social Media Marketing. The seminar series was a great success with over 160 people registered. We have been humbled by the amount of positive feedback we have received from our first 4 seminar events.

We have also started a new group in Linkedin called Social Media Bootcamp for CEO’s. This is a place where you can stay up-to-date on all the interesting things going on in social media, especially the things that can move the needle for your business.

If you are in the Dallas/Ft. Worth area, I encourage you to come by our facilities in Addison. We would love to give you a tour and share our vision on how new media can take your business to the next level.