EAG president Michele Markham was honored in June and joins 24 other top women business leaders in Kansas City Business Journal’s 2018 class of Women Who Mean Business. Women Who Mean Business recognizes remarkable professional women across a variety of industries who are making meaningful contributions to their business or industry, as well as the Kansas City community.
Nominations were put before a panel of independent judges who reviewed each nominee’s career accomplishments and her role in contributing to other women’s career success. To be selected as a Woman Who Means Business the nominee must be an entrepreneur, the highest-ranking woman or highest-ranking woman who reports to a woman CEO, a practice group partner, or serve on an executive committee, and live and work in the Kansas City metro.
Michele joined EAG Advertising & Marketing in 2012 and was named president in 2014 following a successful career at Omnicom’s Ketchum, where she served as president from 2008 to 2011. At Ketchum, Michele’s leadership and marketing experiences were honed, directing national marketing efforts for major brands. Michele was also a franchisee of three Title Boxing Club franchises in Dallas.
It was at Ketchum where Michele’s and EAG Advertising and Marketing CEO Paul Weber’s paths crossed. Paul served as the director of marketing for national day care center chain La Petite Academy, and Michele led the agency representing La Petite. Soon Paul joined Michele at Ketchum, serving on her business development and account service team. There, a life-long friendship was created and a merging of marketing minds organically occurred.
In 2012, ready to leave life on the road and devote more time to her growing family, Michele was enamored with the EAG mission to serve small and entrepreneurial businesses. The rest, they say, is history.
“Throughout the years I have known, worked with and consider many Women Who Mean Business close personal friends. It is one of the organizations I admire most, even though I can’t get in,” Weber says with a grin. “Michele’s addition to the group is a true delight for all of us at EAG. Well-deserved is an understatement and we join proudly in the celebration.”
Today, as president, Michele leads a team of 15 dedicated marketing professionals in all disciplines – serving more than 300 businesses as an outsourced marketing department. In addition to her role with EAG, Michele is the current president of the Kansas City Chapter of ANA (American Association of National Advertisers) Business Marketing.
A marketer by day and a wife and mother 24/7, Michele also finds time to contribute to her community in many ways, all of which can be found in her official Women Who Mean Business biography, published by the Kansas City Business Journal.
Michele is a Kansas City-area native and currently lives in Brookside with her husband, son and daughter. She is active in her childrens’ school community.
Kansas City Business Journal profiled the Women Who Mean Business honorees in a special online and print supplement on August 24, 2018. Also, on that day, the 2018 class of Women Who Mean Business were honored at an awards luncheon held at the Overland Park Convention Center.