When the Web was in its infancy in 1995, a young woman with a successful career in her family's business, armed with a Marketing degree, became fascinated by the possibilities of the new medium and set out to learn everything she could on the subject in an effort to begin harnessing it as a business tool. She became so interested in her studies that she changed careers and joined the fledgling rank of the earliest Web developers.

Setting Up Shop

Thirteen years later, that young woman, Karla Shelton, now an expert in Web design, marketing, and management decided to put her many years of experience to work serving small enterprises through her own Web development firm. Calling the new business Find 8 (an equestrian term denoting achievement and success), Karla has set to work bringing the power of the Internet to clients in both commercial and not-for-profit sectors.

Traveling the Career Superhighway to Find 8

Karla’s Web career began at National University in Lombard, Illinois where she designed and managed the university’s first Web site.

From there, she moved into positions of increasingly broad Web marketing and  management responsibility at global companies like 3COM/US Robotics. Five years as Director, e-Marketing Services at one of the nation’s most renowned advertising and marketing agencies (Critical Mass, part of the Omnicom network of global agencies) finely tuned her Web marketing, advertising, and analytics skills. With Mercedes Benz and other high-end clients requiring blue-chip results, Karla’s hard work and professionalism led not only to stellar successes for her clients, but to recognition by her peers via multiple industry awards. Of these, she is most proud of the Gold Award received in 2001 at the Digital Marketing Awards for “Best Integrated Campaign.” The award is a testament to her mastery of the many areas of marketing and advertising that comprise an integrated campaign.

Directorships at other global enterprises and media agencies continued to broaden and deepen Karla’s knowledge and experience. Requests for her expertise eventually led her to moonlight as a Web media consultant to a variety of organizations. Some of these were smaller organizations with big marketing needs but limited funds. In working with her new clients, Karla discovered she enjoyed helping the smaller organizations achieve what were often remarkable results by stretching their marketing dollars through very efficient Web-based tactics. And as the demand for her consulting services grew, she saw an opportunity to establish her own business. Find 8 soon became a reality.