October 25, 2023 3:42 pm
• Last Updated: October 25, 2023 7:29 pm
Clarity Quest founder Christine Slocumb of Stonington sits exterior the BioCT Innovation Commons, the place she retains an workplace, on Sept. 15, 2023. Slocumb’s agency has developed a distinct segment in marketing for know-how firms within the well being subject. Photo by Lee Howard/The Day Buy Photo Reprints
Groton ― Christine Slocumb frolicked early in her profession at Motorola, the place she began as {an electrical} engineer. It was a great firm, most notably creating the primary mobile phone know-how, nevertheless it didn’t survive.
“I noticed what poor marketing may do to an organization,” Slocumb stated. “You want a mix of great know-how and great marketing.”
Intrigued by this thought, she went on to work at a number of startups on the West Coast earlier than lastly deciding on marketing as a profession path. She now works largely out of her house in Stonington as founder and president of Clarity Quest Marketing, but in addition maintains a small house on the BioCT Innovation Commons in Groton, at a former laboratory house carved out of the Pfizer Inc. campus.
Clarity Quest has developed a distinct segment in marketing for health-related know-how firms, and it merged in June with Dallas-based Supreme Optimization, a frontrunner in life sciences digital marketing. Slocumb’s firm is a staff of about 20, whereas Supreme is about 5 occasions the scale, including vital capabilities. The deal included an fairness curiosity in Supreme.
“It is a great marriage,” Slocumb stated.
It’s a good distance from Tempe, Ariz., the place she toiled for Motorola in her early profession, ever observant that she was considered one of just a few feminine engineers in a subject the place there appeared to be a glass ceiling. Then, whereas working with varied startups, she had the expertise of being a part of an FBI raid, a jolt that made her rethink the quick and livid life the place girls once more appeared to be continually handed over for promotion.
She remembers considering on the time, “This is ridiculous. … I needed to do it on my phrases with who I needed to work with as a substitute of who I needed to work with.”
So, when her husband, Ronald, determined to return to high school to turn out to be a physician, Slocumb jumped on the probability to start out over in 2001 and went into the marketing and public relations enterprise, specializing in know-how initially within the Ann Arbor, Mich., space. She focuses on things like SEO, biotechnology and the life sciences, mergers and acquisitions, serving to with branding, leads, digital adverts, marketing plans and messaging.
For the primary 10 years, she figures she was most likely undercharging purchasers, an inclination Slocumb stated many ladies have. But she extra just lately has turn out to be savvy about fixed-bid billing.
“We’re not the most cost effective people on the block,” she stated. “Generalist companies are dying. Having a selected area of interest is the place it’s at.”
As she began her firm, Slocumb stated she typically was the one lady within the room throughout main enterprise conversations. But currently she is beginning to see extra girls getting concerned in enterprise capital.
“We nonetheless have a protracted strategy to go,” she added.
As for her personal enterprise, issues began actually choosing up through the COVID-19 pandemic as working remotely turned a factor and trade-show marketing dried up. Suddenly, companies had to determine the world of digital marketing, and Slocumb was properly positioned, tripling the scale of her firm.
Slocumb writes a daily weblog on marketing, and is now doing loads of business-to-business work in addition to video marketing and putting Google adverts.
“There’s return on funding if you understand how to do it proper,” she stated.
Slocumb relocated to Connecticut 12 years in the past when her husband joined a follow in Norwich, however because of such applied sciences as Zoom and Slack, she is ready to oversee a staff of specialists, some with superior levels, from throughout the nation. She maintains the Groton workplace as a result of it’s inexpensive, gives free espresso and permits her as soon as per week or so to mingle with like-minded entrepreneurs.
Clarity Quest was named Agency of the Year by Healthcare and IT Marketing Community in each 2014 and 2022, and this 12 months it made the Chief Marketer 200 prime marketing companies listing. Slocumb just lately revealed a e-book titled “You’re Not Spending Enough on Marketing” wherein she expounds on her view that 80% to 90% of the promoting job for a product is finished earlier than anybody talks to a gross sales specialist.
“I based the company with the No. 1 purpose that this might be a spot the place individuals love to come back to work they usually actually actually may develop,” she stated in a video interview on swaay.com revealed in May 2022. “We give individuals wings to fly right here. I’m not a babysitter, and everyone seems to be an grownup.”
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https://www.theday.com/local-news/20231025/clarity-quest-founder-connects-great-tech-sparkling-marketing/
