Tony Palombo

In 1996 I began my professional career working as an art director for an advertising agency. The breadth of clients at the agency allowed me to hone my skills both in marketing strategy and design.

In 1999 I had taken a serious interest in using the internet as a communications medium. I took courses in HTML and Flash, read every book I could get my hands on, and began designing and developing web sites soon after.

Seeing the potential that the internet offered the world of marketing communications, and feeling the entrepreneurial lure, I ventured off to start Next Media Interactive in 2000.

In 2002 I developed a template-driven web site publishing program for Home Hardware and Castle Building Centre dealers called NMI SiteBuilder. The initiative allowed the dealers to publish web sites with customized content while maintaining the brand standards set by their respective home offices. I sold the technology in to Silk Systems 2004. Today SiteBuilder continues to be one of the single largest web initiatives put forth by Home Hardware and Castle Dealers.

Much of what I do now is help clients to realize the benefits the web has to offer by taking a leading role in getting them to break the cookie-cutter approach to web design and examine the best ways to communicate their uniqueness to target audiences.

I am an advocate of web standards and best practices - yet I always have an eye to the fulfillment of true business needs.