Last month, Proxibid, welcomed Damon Peters to their executive staff. Peters was appointed Chief Marketing Officer, a new role within the company.
Peters moved to Omaha from Salt Lake City where he most recently served as Vice President of Marketing at Overstock.com, where he oversaw the company’s digital marketing business.
Peters said he wasn’t originally looking towards Omaha for jobs, but Proxibid and the city appealed to him.
“As I was making the transition, I was looking on both coasts and Seattle. I started looking at Proxibid [and] as I visited town, I realized that I’m making a life transition and I like the region quite a bit,” said Peters. “The team at Proxibid was very appealing; a young team, smart people doing interesting projects. All that combined, it was actually a very easy decision in the end.”
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In his new role, Peters will be will be responsible for establishing the strategic growth and brand direction for Proxibid.
“Damon has a proven track record in driving marketing strategy, growing businesses, and leading high-performing teams to success,” said Ryan Downs, President and CEO of Proxibid. “His experience across marketing disciplines, and from start-up to large enterprises, makes him an excellent addition to our leadership team.”
The position of Chief Marketing Officer is new to Proxibid. Downs said that after an institutional capital raise at the very end of 2015, the management team knew that an executive marketing role was on the horizon but they wanted to take the time to make sure they found a perfect fit.
“Of all the companies I’ve worked with over the years, I haven’t been this impressed with a management group in quite some time,” said Peters. “We have an opportunity to do exciting things in this space, some things I don’t believe have been done before. High-value assets require precise connections between buyer and seller. Proxibid has been the best for sixteen years, and I couldn’t be more proud to join this team.”
Downs said that their existing marketing team does great work every day, but the company needed an executive from the outside who could bring experience from similar environments in order to take Proxibid to the next stage of growth.
“I’ve had a lot of opportunities to meet with pretty much every major e-commerce player in the industry […] and figure out what works and what doesn’t work and apply that to the assignments that I’m given,” said Peters. “Those that were unsuccessful and those that were successful, they all had a kernel that they either ignored or paid attention to. Those that were successful just kept pounding on that value proposition and I think here we have the opportunity to do that on both sides with our buyer and seller marketplace.”
Downs said that Proxibid is a rather simple company that’s ultimate goal is to connect buyers and sellers at an increasingly faster pace. If they can maintain that, their business will continue to grow.
“At the highest level, [Damon] shares our three goals with us which are: be a great strategic tool for the customers, be a highly valuable enterprise and be a great place to work,” said Downs. “We recruited a very skilled executive who had options on both coasts to come to our great city and take on a senior role with us.”
Peters said he’s been fortunate enough to travel to lots of states and have a few different careers. When looking at jobs in communities like Portland, Austin, Denver and Seattle, Omaha was ultimately the place he wanted to call home.
“Omaha is a cool place. I’m not sure enough folks in the country know what we have here,” said Peters. “I’m actually an advocate now when I go outside the city. […] Omaha is the best unknown place.”
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Christine McGuigan is the Associate Editor of Silicon Prairie News.
