Columbia, Md., March 31, 2009 -– Merkle (www.merkleinc.com), one of the nation's largest and fastest growing database marketing agencies, announced it is harnessing its years of experience in working with healthcare and pharmaceutical clients with the creation of a formal business practice that will exclusively focus on providing data-driven marketing strategy and integrated communications to companies within these sectors. Heading up the group as vice president and client team leader is Jeff Wiltrout, who served for 13 years in marketing leadership roles within major pharmaceutical and healthcare companies.

Merkle decided to formalize the healthcare practice in response to increasing industry demand for marketing solutions that demonstrate a measurable return on investment, changing marketing, sales and regulatory dynamics with the healthcare and pharmaceutical sectors, and an increasing shift toward direct customer relationships in place of mass advertising. Merkle currently works with several major pharmaceutical and healthcare-related companies, including GlaxoSmithKline and sanofi-aventis.

Leading the healthcare group is Jeff Wiltrout, who joins Merkle from GlaxoSmithKline. There, he served as director, integrated marketing and media services. In this position, he managed a team of account managers providing strategic and tactical CRM, Internet and emerging media marketing support to more than a dozen of the company's brands. Wiltrout also led the development of innovative consumer-centric CRM initiatives within GlaxoSmithKline's U.S. pharmaceutical division.

Wiltrout previously served at Mead Johnson Nutritionals - A Bristol-Myers Squibb Company. There, he played a major role in developing the division's CRM vision and approach, which harnessed customer insight to create competitive advantage and increase market share.

In 2006, Wiltrout was named as one of the "100 Most Inspirational People in the Life Sciences Industry" by PharmaVOICE Magazine. He earned his M.A. and Ph.D. in industrial/organizational psychology from Ohio University and holds a B.S. in psychology from West Virginia University.

Merkle President and CEO David Williams said,...