PEOPLE

Seth Baum
Managing Director

Seth Baum has 15+ years of marketing, sales and website product development experience on both the client and agency sides of the business, and has worked in marketing and operational roles at two venture capital-backed startups as well as for publicly traded companies.

Seth founded The SoundView Group in 2008 to utilize the strategic, creative, media, and go-to-market approaches he had developed throughout his career on behalf of clients seeking world-class execution without the overhead of traditional full-service agencies. Based in Los Angeles as a Marketing Consultant, Seth is a magna cum laude graduate of Harvard University with an MBA in Marketing and Technology from The Anderson School at UCLA, where he is also a Guest Lecturer in Marketing and Advertising.

Key Positions Held:

  • Alchemy Worldwide Direct Response – VP Marketing for 6 Week Body Makeover and Food Lovers Fat Loss Direct Response products; responsible for offline and online media buying, customer acquisition and conversion, media buying and optimization, product websites, SEM/SEO, and Social Media Marketing
  • Spot Runner Advertising Agency – Head of Client Strategy (National Accounts); created groundbreaking messaging and media strategies for dozens of mid-sized firms and Led Product Marketing/Development of National Account Group's Direct Response Service Offering
  • DIRECTV Inc. – Director of Acquisition Marketing; led the firm's nation-wide acquisition marketing efforts in capturing subscribers from cable companies
  • DIGITAS Agency – Engagement Director responsible for leading Web Product Development team that redesigned www.Williams-Sonoma.com
  • Petstore.com – Director of Online Marketing
  • Channel One Network – Director of Business and New Product Development
  • Mercer Management Consulting – Consultant

APPROACH


The SoundView Group's lean business model allows it to realize significant cost savings for its clients.

Depending on client need, we utilize a virtual team of online and offline experts (in creative production and media planning/buying) selected for both their years of subject matter expertise and their price/value ratio given our overall objective and budget. This best allows us to manage the "You can get it Fast, Cheap, or Good but not all three at the same time" equation.


Marketing and Sales Philosophy

  • 1.
  • Always start with a clear positioning for the brand or product.
  • 2.
  • Make sure every marketing and sales touch point (website, collateral, email, phone call, meeting) plainly describes how the company/product addresses the needs of the customer.
  • 3.
  • Test and learn, test and learn. It’s the only way to maximize ROI.
  • 4.
  • You can be successful with any size budget – a smaller budget just means making tough choices concerning what marketing channels to utilize.
  • 5.
  • All marketing is about response that leads to a sale – direct response simply happens TODAY, sales driven by equity in the brand happen sometime in the future.

Advertising Philosophy

Creative: There is no fixed ratio between impactful creative and budget.

Media: No matter the advertising medium (online or offline), our chief concerns are response and measurement.

Methodology: research, test, measure, learn, optimize, and maximize.