Dave Louden
“Life is not primarily a quest for pleasure, as Freud believed, or a quest for power, as Alfred Adler taught, but a quest for meaning. The greatest task for any person is to find meaning in his or her life.” Viktor Frankl, Man’s Search for Meaning
Driven by the belief that we are all wired to seek meaning in our lives, Dave founded LoudenClear on a commitment to helping organizations boldly declare what they stand for so they can build more meaningful relationships with customers, employees and others they serve.
For more than 30 years, Dave has worked with leading organizations to craft brand strategies and marketing programs that engage and build loyalty with core audiences, create sustained competitive differentiation and drive new business opportunities, and ultimately, compete and win in their marketplace.
Some highlights from Dave’s background include:
Lead strategist with more than 30 years of high-profile experience with global and national brands
Conceived of and built the iconic VeriSign Secure Site checkmark – the leading symbol of trust on the internet
Led brand and marketing efforts for four technology startups with successful exits – one large IPO, three substantial acquisitions
Featured on the cover of Time Magazine's issue focused on the growth of the Internet
Founded and grew Fathom to national recognition for its brand, web and marketing work – led firm through 20 years of success
Advised leading public corporations, national non-profits and dozens of closely-held organizations on brand & marketing strategy, program development & optimization, cultural drivers, and much more
Stanford graduate and national champion athlete
Background
Dave’s competitive spirit was fostered from an early age as an athlete. From the age of 8, he trained and flourished as a swimmer, winning national championships through his teen years, earning a full athletic scholarship, four years as an All American, and three national championships at Stanford University, and culminating as a finalist at the US Olympic Trials.
Pioneering Online Marketing & E-Commerce
After graduating from college, he built his early career in Silicon Valley just as the World Wide Web came into being. In 1994, Dave started as employee #3 at the first e-commerce company – Internet Shopping Network – where he helped pioneer the first examples of online advertising and email marketing, and worked directly with Barry Diller as he acquired the company that would be the first piece in his internet empire, IAC.
Building Globally-Recognized Brands & Lucrative Startups
From there, Dave moved to VeriSign early in 1996, before the company had any revenue, to help build their brand and marketing effort. Over the next 2.5 years, VeriSign grew to be one of the most successful and visible companies in the world, going public in 1998 and reaching a market valuation of $40 Billion within the 18 months that followed. Dave helped build the first websites, online marketing program and brand for the company, and created the iconic VeriSign Secure Site Seal program just as e-commerce was starting to accelerate. The seal became the leading symbol of trust on the internet, appeared on hundreds of thousands of websites, and the check mark became an icon that is globally visible to this day. In fact, Symantec acquired the checkmark logo from VeriSign for $1.28 Billion and uses it as the brand for all of its Norton products.
Next, Dave moved to the leading internet calendar and commerce startup, When.com. At this high-flying startup, Dave built marketing programs and partnerships, helped craft the companies brand, and grew the user base to 100,000 in less than three months, culminating in the companies $250MM acquisition by AOL. After the sale, Dave joined Affinia, a fast-growing content and commerce startup funded by Sequoia Capital’s Mike Moritz (who seed-funded Google, Yahoo, PayPal and many others). Affinia grew rapidly, gained amazing visibility on the cover of Time Magazine among other publications, but ultimately was a victim of the market crash of 2000.
Growing His Own Firm & Elevating New England’s Finest
Dave decided to move back to Connecticut to raise his new family, led marketing for his final startup company, DirectAdvice, that he helped grow and sell to Mellon Financial in 2002, and then co-founded brand and marketing firm Fathom. Fathom grew to a team of 30 and won national awards for its marketing work for leading corporations like Medtronic, Pratt & Whitney, Kaman, Cotiviti and Meyer and nonprofits like Newman’s Own Foundation, Junior Achievement, Keep America Beautiful, Root Center for Advanced Recovery and dozens of others.
Now, with LoudenClear, Dave and his team bring world-class brand and marketing work to relationship-driven businesses and substantial nonprofit organizations across the Northeast.