A Short Introduction to Deven Parekh

What do Insight Venture Partners - a multi-billion dollar venture capital firm that specializes in software and businesses that utilize the Internet - and Publicor - a non-profit organization that works with disaffected youth - have in common? One of the managing directors of Insight Venture Partners, Deven Parekh, also sits on the board for Publicor.

Deven Parekh graduated from the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School with a Bachelor of Science in Economics. He worked at The Blackstone Group, where he advised on acquisitions and mergers as well as participating in principal activitivies. Prior to working for Insight Venture Partners, he worked as a principal at the New York merchant banking firm Berenson Minella & Company.

The Aspen Institute also honored Deven Parekh as a Henry Crown Fellow. The Henry Crown Fellowship fosters leadership based on values. The fellowship was started to commemorate the late industrialist Henry Crown, who espoused industriousness and philanthropy throughout his own life as well as a strong commitment to moral principles and honesty.

Carl Sgro - Internet Marketer

Catching customers is a lot like catching bass. Carl Sgro has developed a strategy along with a team of experts to help companies harness the marketing power of the Internet. Sgro's company helps develop marketing plans for businesses by managing their Internet presence, utilizing time honored sales techniques and good old fashioned marketing along with types of advertising that have just come into use within the last couple decades, such as search engine optimization and search engine marketing.

This includes pay per click advertising, algorithmic marketing, and targeting topic pages. These three techniques are the key to successful Internet marketing. We have all seen ads on sites that will click you through to a business home page, where customers can then buy products or services offered by the customer. The algorithms which rank websites are also important elements of any marketing strategy, as the higher ranked sites on search engines are the ones to which customers invariably go first. Topic pages offer a way in which to communicate with customers by directing potential customers towards a specific product or service.

Though other companies claim to be able to bring in customers easily and with minimal expense, according to Carl Sgro one should not believe this hype. I know from personal experience that Carl Sgro is right about this. New customers are hard to come by, and it is much easier to hold on to the customers that you aleady have. It is much more difficult to gain a new customer than to keep an old one and in order to develop a new customer it costs many times what it would cost to retain an old customer.