Marketing & Media
Growth spurt leads Talent Zoo to new offices
Atlanta Business Chronicle - by Erin Moriarty
An Atlanta-based recruiting firm and employment agency specializing in the communications industry is on the move.
Talent Zoo Inc. recently relocated to 1736 Defoor Place, a 7,000-square-foot office building off Howell Mill Road in Atlanta that the firm purchased. Talent Zoo had outgrown its office off Cheshire Bridge Road.
The company does professional recruiting for both the creative and accounts side of advertising, and it also runs an online job board for positions in advertising, marketing, public relations, broadcasting and publishing.
Talent Zoo has been experiencing a growth spurt in recent years.
In 2005, the agency did 75 recruiting placements, and is on track to do 150 in 2006, said Joe Folan, marketing manager for Talent Zoo. Revenue has increased more than 200 percent in the past two years, and more than 700 percent during the past five years.
The agency, which has more than 30 employees, was started 10 years ago. It added five employees when it moved into the new location a few weeks ago, and expects to add five more before the end of September, Folan said.
"What drives our growth is we were really the first on the scene for the advertising and communications industry for recruiting services and the job board," Folan said. "Interest in the communications industry has continued to grow. Among young people, the general attitude is that it's a more hip industry to go into than others."
Talent Zoo's Web site has about 100,000 registered users, including employers looking to recruit new talent, as well as job-seekers. Niche recruitment sites like Talent Zoo aim to help employers quickly find talent "without being flooded by an overwhelming number of junk résumés," Folan said.
The Web site is also an industry resource, featuring details on the latest trends, career information and interviews with leaders in the communications business.
Ackerman & Co. assisted Talent Zoo in purchasing its new headquarters.
Football score
The Chick-fil-A Bowl has chosen Atlanta-based Ames Scullin O'Haire Inc. as its advertising agency of record for the 2006 bowl.
Ames Scullin O'Haire will develop an integrated multimedia advertising and marketing platform for the event. The 2006 campaign will include print and outdoor advertisements, as well as 30-second television and radio spots to market the college football bowl game. It kicks off Nov. 1, said Matt Garvey, spokesperson for the Chick-fil-A Bowl.
"Our bowl is all about creating an exciting experience for our teams and their fans, so it's important to us that we have a creative partner who shares that belief," said Gary Stokan, president of the Chick-fil-A Bowl.
Ames Scullin O'Haire, which was founded in 1997, has a client roster that includes Food Lion LLC, Mitsubishi Electric Corp. and AutoZone Inc.
As a not-for-profit organization, the Chick-fil-A Bowl contracts with an advertising agency on a pro-bono basis. The contract is rotated every three or four years, and the past contract was with Blue Sky Agency from 2002 to 2005.
The 39th annual bowl game is Dec. 30 and will be nationally televised by ESPN.
MARTA campaign
Bigelow Jones Worley, a collaboration of Bigelow Advertising Inc. and Jones Worley Communications, has been selected by MARTA to do advertising, public relations and media planning for MARTA's new Breeze smart-card fare collection system.
Jones Worley Communications worked with MARTA on the naming and initial branding of the Breeze system.
The smart card is about the size of a credit card and it contains a memory chip that allows users to store value on the card and use it for multiple trips. Similar cards are already being used in Washington, D.C., and Chicago on public transportation systems.
The Breeze system "is the core of our overall renewal efforts," says Jannet Thoms, MARTA's chief information officer.
Tech account
Hood Marketing Solutions Inc., an Atlanta-based advertising agency, has added another technology client.
Hood is assisting Lancope Inc. with its launch of the new version of StealthWatch, a network monitoring and security program.
StealthWatch optimizes network performance, minimizes service interruptions and protects networks against attack and misuse.
If you have news for Marketing and Media, contact Erin Moriarty at (404) 249-1074; fax, (404) 249-1058; or at emoriarty@bizjournals.com.
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