about

An experienced creative director, communication strategist, multimedia producer, and one-man production team, Alan Segal is the spark behind The Offswitch.

For over 20 years -- with agencies from New York to New Zealand, and on his own -- Alan has been applying creative vision, logic, and business problem-solving skills to the development of effective branding and marketing programs. The clients, industries and media he's worked with run wide and deep -- from high tech, energy and telecom to retail, durable goods and finance, both b2b and b2c, in direct media, email/web, print, video, mobile, and more.

His career began at Saks Fifth Avenue in New York, art-directing video, print, catalogs, and the first interactive shopping tests in America (1984). This experience led him to early database-driven direct marketing efforts for Nissan, AT&T Sheraton, and others while at Chiat/Day (in both New York and Los Angeles).

Alan was the first associate CD for interactive media at Saatchi & Saatchi Los Angeles in 1995. There he designed, co-wrote, and co-creative-directed Toyota.com from its launch through 1999. Under Alan, Saatchi's interactive creative team grew from one to sixteen, collecting a few awards for out-of-the-box "new media" along the way (from Communication Arts, Graphis, and Advertising Age, among others).

Saatchi's senior management tapped Alan to seed interactive skills in their New Zealand offices; he helped create a department in Wellington, and contributed to a major site build for Telecom New Zealand (the largest corporation in NZ). After this tour of duty down under, Alan returned to L.A. and was promoted to Director of New Media Strategies.

Alan then became Senior Creative Director at USWeb/CKS, then Director of New Media at Pedersen Media Group (both San Francisco). He supervised projects from large-scale ecommerce sites to banners and promotions for Time Warner, Kinko's, and JCPenney, a worldwide webcast of Sun's JavaOne conference (the largest developers conference in the world), and Qwest Communications' annual report (online and print).

With a combined strategic/creative focus, Alan founded the Offswitch in 2001, working with clients on the integration of direct marketing, advertising, and branding with online media efforts. A long-term consultant to Walmart.com, Alan is also an Advertising Advisor and parttime Instructor at the Art Institute of CA-SF.

View Alan Segal's LinkedIn profile