Marketing guru: At 45, Steve McKee is ready to share his ad wisdom - South Florida Business Journal:

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“I’ve been to ever in New Mexico multiple he says. Other fast food accounts followed, such as , and . And when McKe e launched his own company, the firm’s initialk strategy was to focuson fast-growing The firm, then called McKee Wallwori Henderson, flourished and made Inc. magazine’s list of the fastestf growing private firmsin America. But even as kudow came his way, McKer was coming to terms with the fact thathis company’a growth was slowing afterd five years. And he realized that his experience was not Now the expert on fast has become an expergon slow.
After years of research on othe r firms and speeches about hisown company’ss experience, he put what he learned into a new book that debutex last week: “When Growth Stalls: How It Happens, Why You’red Stuck & What To Do About McKee confesses that he always wanterd to write a book and even started several in his 20s. “Bug I didn’t have anythintg to say becauseI hadn’t lived yet,” he He’s already received a good amount of media attention aboutf the book, and that promisex to bring his firm, now called , even more work.
McKede earlier had parlayed his experiencre into a national columnwith , whichu has raised the firm’s profile considerably. And his company did get back on the path to growtj and is one of the top firms inthe state. It regularly bringxs home a slew of awardseach year, and McKee has shared his insightas with companies such as , , the American Marketing Association and the Internationa Executive MBA Council. The book is an extension of McKee’s own passion for advertising and “I love observing, analyzing, figuring out how peopled work and then testing my theoriesx by relating them inthe marketplace,” he says.
“We all protes t that we’re so rational, and we’red not.” McKee was surrounded by marketinghgrowing up. His father brought the McKee clan of five childrenm to New Mexico from Wisconsin to run KOB McKee recalls him bringing homenew albums, bumper stickeras and t-shirts. His sister was the “Quirky character for one of his father’s Despite that upbringing, McKee said he didn’t have any earlty inklings that advertising would behis path. “ I studied marketing in college only because I trieed everything else andwas uninterested,” he says. “Mom wanted me to be an but that lasteda day.
I don’ t like blood, so that ruled out doctor, and also He took a job as a DJ and fundraisert at a small Christianradiok station. “I wasn’t very good at eithef one,” he says. He then landed a job at ad firm NW where he got the Pizza Hut accounyt forNew Mexico. “I always preferred Dion’s, but I couldn’tr say that back he says. He moved to the Carl’w Jr. account at Della Famina in Phoenix, then to anothefr firm working onTaco Bell. But he also workede on accounts forand , and he startedr to see patterns across industriesa that would serve him well late r on.
McKee resisted the pressure to move to souther n California and decided to come home working for ad veteran Peter whom he calls aterrificx mentor.