About Steve Caler, CEO, Strategic Planning

Did Steve Caler set out to transcend marketing communications? Or did he immerse himself in marketing in order to learn its lessons—and rewrite some of its rules—so he could apply that kind of strategic thinking across the spectrum of business needs?

The answer isn’t clear, and Steve isn’t telling. What’s apparent though, is that he emerged from the Madison Avenue culture with a new business model for intensive consultative services, for every business challenge faced by companies and organizations seeking growth.

He gained his entrée in the markets of New York, Columbus, Cleveland and Akron. He served as Senior Art Director for the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency, Grey Advertising, Graber & Cohen Advertising, Arocom Marketing Group and Hesselbart & Mitten Advertising. In these roles, he absorbed the industry’s standards and practices, as well as the art, science and philosophy of marketing. He began to identify those elements that best serve clients...and those which must be left behind. He then set out to create an entirely new concept in strategic marketing communications for businesses.

Steve founded Caler&Company with these three notions:

• an emphasis on strategic thinking, planning  and executing brings the best return on marketing investments;

• a dedication to relationship building is the smartest way to work with clients, employees and vendors;

• a small team of decisive "creative commandos" will always outperform large, megalithic agencies when it comes to delivering targeted, efficient, creative and effective brand-building results.

Caler&Company quickly established itself as a unique consultative resource for clients, crafting results-driven strategic planning and powerful brand-building tools. Moreover, Steve and his team have gained the insight they need—an insider’s view of dozens of industries—to be the resource for helping companies deliver compelling and persuasive marketing and selling platforms.

The health care industry is just one of Steve’s spheres of expertise, and he has been intimately involved in marketing communications and strategic planning for hospitals, free-standing clinics, group practices and private practitioners. He’s also a sought-after consultant for medical products manufacturers.

Caler&Company’s experience beyond health care services is equally vast. The firm has provided marketing communications leadership and support for clients engaged in a myriad of industries, with particular strength in real estate development, finance and insurance, industrial and manufacturing, packaged goods, business-to-business and non-profit organizations.

Steve is also noted for his acumen in identifying and qualifying new business opportunities on behalf of his clients. He has actively participated in trade expositions and international conferences including the Akron Dental Society, American Association of Physicists in Medicine, American College of Surgeons, American Society of Technicians in Radiation Oncology, International Rubber Expo, Rubber World, The Canadian Plast-EX show, National Association of the Remodeling Industry, National Decorating Products Association, Plastics Society of America, Radiological Society of North America, American Society of Therapeutic Radiology and Oncology, Cleveland Dental Society, The Fire Department Instructors Conference, Society of Automotive Engineers International Congress and Exposition, and The World Congress of the International Family Therapy Association.

Caler&Company has also inaugurated a unique inter-advisory council, Business Communications Forum (BCF). Initially conceived as an advisory resource for Caler&Company, BCF has evolved into a mutually supportive business, “brain trust.” BCF brings together management principles and innovators from a diverse group of financial, manufacturing, engineering, health care, legal, information technology, real estate and non-profit organizations. BCF has convened quarterly since 2000 to discover the universal truths of success that apply across the gamut of business models by sharing insights, ideas, opinions and advice. BCF advises Caler&Company on ways to stay ahead of market trends and new technology. In turn, Caler&Company is able to pass on the dividends of such knowledge to its clients.

Steve was recently appointed to the Nutrition Dietetic Programs Advisory Board of the University of Akron and is currently serving as Chairman of the Resource & Development of Public Relations Committee. He is also a Charter Member of the Board of Trustees for The Sonny Sneed Project, LLC. With additional collaborative support from the National Museum of Education, The Sonny Sneed Project was created with strategies that will provide alternative life choices and professional opportunities for inner city youth to grow, develop and secure professional status. As a Board member, Steve will help to steer the organization’s start-up guidance and future governance. Caler&Company will create The Sonny Sneed Project’s national branding initiatives and provide public relations leadership.

Steve Caler is also proud to have served on the Board of Trustees for Child Guidance & Family Solutions, a 70-year-old behavioral health care services organization providing Greater Akron with a progressive system of mental illness treatment and prevention services. Its methods and practices have been modeled by Ireland, Chile and several African nations. Steve also provided a half-day presentation to Child Guidance & Family Solutions' staff of 150 professionals. The topic of the presentation touched on the many intricacies of branding and strategic planning in a no-nonsense, down-to-earth style. Steve seeks to demystify the jargon often associated with marketing and strategic planning to make his insights accessible and practical. Steve also served as the outsourced Director of Marketing Communications for Child Guidance & Family Solutions. His team of “creative commandos” helped to usher the agency through a merger and subsequent branding strategy that has positioned Child Guidance & Family Solutions as a leader in behavioral health care through “weaving together the fabric of family.”

Numerous client and industry-related boards and councils have also tapped Steve’s business skill. He is an active shareholder and serves on the Boards of Directors for several start-up enterprises (such as AvWorld  FliteMatrix®, Guardian Zone Technologies, Inc.® and TEARS,® Inc.). He and his team have added incalculable value to the intellectual property and business models of these organizations. Steve is a member of The Board of Directors of Healthy Connections Network, a collaborative 501(c)3 organization comprised of nearly 40 associations to respond to critical health and social issues in Summit County. Caler&Company also helps to direct communications initiatives for the Healthy Connections Network's Access to Care Program, the purpose of which is to mobilize community resources to connect uninsured community members to a regular source of care. Steve has also served on advisory councils for the Dental Resource Alliance, Pain Management Technologies, Smithers Medical Products, Inc., Cohen & Company Certified Public Accountants and United Dental Laboratories, Incorporated. Steve chaired United Dental Laoratories’ United Bridge Committee for five consecutive years where he helped the company with leadership of key staff within five departments of the organization. The Committee identified areas of organizational strengths and weaknesses along with recommendations for laboratory enhancements.

Steve is Caler&Company’s senior strategic planner and meeting facilitator, having authored and refined a method of creative storyboarding known as Jump Start™. Jump Start helps businesses develop strategic solutions from within by making the best use of resources that went largely unnoticed, but were always there. Steve has hosted Jump Start sessions for literally hundreds of companies, businesses and organizations, helping them to address issues as diverse as start up, mergers, acquisitions, as well as product and service improvement initiatives. Veterans of the Jump Start process agree that this is just one of the many ways that Caler&Company provides total business consultation for its clients.

In 2004, the Akron Area YMCA, an association of six membership branches and nearly 40 child care centers, “experimented” by retaining Steve as its outsourced Director of Marketing Communications. The Caler Team of account service managers, production managers, designers, Web content authors and writers ostensibly became the outsourced marketing and public relations department for the 136-year-old YMCA association. Since that time, Caler&Company has helped streamline marketing systems and methods for effectively communicating with over 12,000 members, hundreds of employees, volunteers, advisory boards, Board of Trustees and the community at large. The Caler Team led one of the most successful YMCA regional membership campaigns ever in January 2008, which included six independent YMCA associations representing ten counties in Northeast Ohio and a target of 2,867,389 households. The multimedia blitz resulted in nearly 50,000 new visits to www.URYMCA.org in a four-week period and generated enough inquiries so that all six YMCA associations met or exceeded their aggressive membership goals during the campaign period.

In recognition of his success and expertise, Steve Caler has provided several keynote speaker and continuing education presentations on strategic planning, marketing communications, brand development, business plan development and how image and awareness shape the brand. Most recently, Steve provided a two-hour Masters Degree program on Business Planning and Marketing Strategies to The Building Industry Association of Stark County. Builders, developers, general contractors, real estate brokers and local media were present to hear Steve’s presentation on Branding and its Relevance to Business Development. Steve was also the recent keynote for Ohio Council of Behavioral Healthcare Providers in Columbus, Ohio, on the topic of strategic planning.

Steve is currently at work on his first book, “Inside Out.” Written with the business owner in mind, “Inside Out” will demonstrate that efforts to promote a company, its products and its services before developing the necessary supportive internal culture are doomed to fail. Steve is also the author of the Agency’s Cell Branding® process, which details the fundamental elements of a successful branding strategy. Steve speaks at hotel luncheons regionally and sheds new light on how Cell Branding can become integral in an organizations culture to transform it into a powerful and competitive contender.

Since Steve founded the company in 1984, it has operated profitably under his leadership and administration as a corporation in good standing registered under the laws of the State of Ohio.