We are THE FOURCE.

STRENGTH. ENERGY. INTELLIGENCE. MOTION. INSPIRED FOURCE.

People often ask “What’s the POWER of The FOURCE?” Our answer is simple. It’s new territory – creative solutions, inventive developments, and outside thinking – the kind of innovation that drives meaningful change within an organization, individuals and the marketplace. We specialize in developing innovative ideas, communications and marketing opportunities on a local, regional, and national level.

We come suited for success. We work night and day to offer solutions that prepare you for tomorrow – today. We have life stories that have crafted our ability to make a way out of no way and forge new paths that leave others scratching their heads. We don’t pretend to be something we are not. We build relationships in good faith and believe in a Higher Power. Our word is our bond. We insist on working with others who believe that hard work and honesty are the bedrock of a great relationship. We are ideas. We are brain power. We are craftsmen with creative prowess and powerful purpose.

The FOURCE leverages its extensive knowledge of the public and private sector, consumer and business behavior, as well as non-profit entities to discover insights that will ignite results-driven strategies to advance the business and issues of our diverse clients.

The partners of The FOURCE have been working together since 2012.  Collectively, the partners in the firm each have a combined 75 years in the marketing, advertising, and interactive business.  We have experience in health care, government, professional services, consumer packaged goods, entertainment, non-profit, commercial industry, transportation, law and more.

Located in O’Fallon, Illinois, one of the fastest growing suburbs of St. Louis, Missouri, we have built a team of professionals that are meeting the marketing demands of our clients big and small.

We pride ourselves on being a boutique firm that has grown into a force to be reckoned with in the digital and marketing arena.

Our work has been recognized with awards from the Tellys, MarCom, IPRA Innovate, and Global Trend. Our greatest reward, however, is getting a notification that our work has generated a qualified lead for our client.

OUR SECRET WEAPON.

The word “no” is not in our vocabulary.

We value exploration. We promote innovation and renovation. And we take calculated risks to produce actions that matter to the bottom line.

MEET THE TEAM.

CREATORS. MAKERS. GO-GETTERS. DOERS.

Your team will be led by the principals of the firm – Tom on Strategy and Creative. Rich on Analytics and Interactive Design. Moe on Plan Development and Implementation. Together with our team, we will create a centrifugal force that will operate around HSHS to build business solutions in a straight-forward manner.
MAUREEN   WOODROME.
CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER.
Maureen brings a 30+ year history of business expertise as a savvy negotiator to THE FOURCE. She serves as the Chief Executive Officer of The FOURCE and a Partner, where she leverages her experiences working in the film, entertainment and beverage industry to the FOURCE team. Her drive and passion is reflected not only in her portfolio of successful projects but by the quality of work that her team at The FOURCE provides to every client. Her track record of producing successful brand identity and marketing campaigns is the direct result of The FOURCE'S growth and enviable reputation in the advertising industry. An expert in business development and strategy, she works with The FOURCE's collaborative team to identify new ways of connecting people with brands, Maureen provides strategic insight, thought leadership, and upholds ongoing management, continuity, and execution of multiple simultaneous digital marketing programs in order to meet each client’s business and brand goals.
RICH SALCIDO.
CHIEF INTELLIGENCE OFFICER.
Rich is a twenty plus year veteran in the digital world - having built his first website in 1992 before anyone knew there was a worldwide web. As a Partner and Chief Intelligence Officer, his vast experience in building, maintaining, coding, tracking and monitoring the digital world as well as the supporting analytics is put to use every day at The FOURCE through the utilization of programs such as Google Analytics, Facebook Insights, Twitter Analytics, YouTube Analytics, Adobe Analytics, Google AdWords, DoubleClick, and other ad serving networks. Rich uses an innovative mindset to determine how data can shed light on human behavior and has a hunger for answering tough questions about consumer behavior in order to understand how communications can affect each client’s bottom line. An expert in qualitative and quantitative research, Rich has experience working with digital platforms of all variety.
TOM   FAULKNER.
CHIEF CREATIVE OFFICER.
Tom has nearly 30 years’ experience working in strategic communications roles within the public and private sectors. As one of three partners at The FOURCE, Tom serves as the Chief Creative Officer. He manages all creative and research-based initiatives and is the leader that is continually developing and upholding each client’s corporate, industry and consumer-facing reputation while communicating the overall brand strategy. His diverse background as the former Chief of Staff to Illinois First Lady Brenda Edgar and then working in the advertising agency world and consumer packaged goods industry, allows to him bring a global perspective to our clients and our firm.
BECKY   BUGGER.
ACCOUNT DIRECTOR.
Becky’s background in publishing provides clients with a distinctive cognizance of online and print media. This background, in combination with superior communication skills and analytical capacities gives her the unique ability to work efficiently with both new and existing businesses. Through influencing and relationship-building skills, Becky provides clients with a level of service, research and market analysis that can only be found at The FOURCE. She persistently explores and uncovers the opportunities available for each client to define their creative and business needs in order to engage growth.
NICK    SCHAFLEIN.
INTERACTIVE ART DIRECTOR.
Nick is a true creative who is willing to jump in and make bold moves for clients to get the job done. The FOURCE’S resident Rockstar, Nick previously embarked on a world tour with his band before gathering more than a decade of creative experience in the agency world. Nick produces visual assets that can be used across all advertising channels including online, film, television and print, experiential. He successfully works within the parameters of each brief agreed upon with the client, creative director, planning and account teams to develop creative ideas and concepts by choosing the approximate media and style to meet the client's objectives before directing subsequent graphic designers as they embark upon each project. Nick is proud to be a part of developing designs that matter and specializes in graphics that break through the clutter and make an impact.
CHRISTINA KOMESHAK.
SENIOR DIGITAL AND GRAPHIC DESIGNER.
Christina brings nearly ten years’ experience in graphic design and digital development to the team at The FOURCE. An inspiring savant with an eye for detail, Christina designs for multiple clients while focusing on developing user experiences online and creating campaigns that produce results. Proficient Adobe Suite and HTML/CSS she works both autonomously and collaboratively with the team. She manages each project’s design layout, user navigation, typography, colors and image composition as applied to print, web and mobile experiences. Her dedication to exploring new territories is one of the key factors to her success. Christina has been a part of several award-winning campaigns during her time at The FOURCE.
MORGAN SMITH.
WEB DESIGNER.
Morgan is an expert in combining form and function to create engaging and effective websites, microsites, social media initiatives, mobile applications, and more. Her excellent conceptual thinking skills and robust mastery of Adobe Creative Suite along with proficiency in HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and other common programming languages allows her to exceed in clarifying each client’s goals while designing with functionality through site navigation, categorizing content and funneling traffic through content. In addition, Morgan designs digital and print promotions and effortlessly implements daily content updates.
JUSTIN    GRIMMER.
SENIOR INTERACTIVE AUDIO/VISUAL SPECIALIST.
The hometown hero at The FOURCE, Justin was recruited to develop complex video content for use across different mediums not limited to web, social and/or digital marketing channels. Justin supervises the creation of complex videos including storyboarding content, script recommendation, final music bed and editing. Justin’s work supports varying marketing campaigns and allows him to apply his widespread knowledge of videography to presentations, web applications, mobile and interactive media and recommend video standards and techniques that are consistent with marketing objectives to all of The FOURCE'S partners.
CHRIS    NICKERSON.
ANALYTICAL MANAGER.
Chris is a natural born “I.T.” geek and proud of it. When he’s not dominating the video game world, Chris manages and maintains all websites at The FOURCE to ensure they are technically built correctly and optimized for maximum searchability. He is also the chief troubleshooter on all of our digital platforms, providing solutions to complex and diverse issues, but Chris’s primary focus is on the prevention of these issues through the implementation of daily maintenance and security checks for all of The FOURCE'S clientele.
TYLER   GUSTAFASON.
AUDIO/VIDEO SPECIALIST.
Tyler’s extensive knowledge of Adobe Premier and After Effects has allowed him to be a part of award-winning animation campaigns at The FOURCE. He provides support to our Digital Marketing team with an objective to maximize the impact of The FOURCE’S clients within each respective digital space in order to increase lead generation and overall engagement levels. He works collaboratively with our team to conceive, plan, shoot, edit, and produce strategic, high-quality, high-impact videos and animations.
CHELSEA ARNOLD.
INTERACTIVE VISUAL DESIGNER.
Chelsea creates holistic digital aesthetics that translate across all digital platforms. Her love and excellent skillset as a photographer has given her the ability to create and translate visually impactful images into consumer and corporate communications. Chelsea is proficient in website design and an even better communicator and collaborator. With a relentless concern for the overall look and feel of each project in relation to the brand and campaign, she consistently works with The FOURCE’S Graphic Designers, UX Designers and Copywriters to bring every client’s digital vision to life.
CAROLYN   BROUSTER.
PROJECT MANAGEMENT.
Responsible for planning and scheduling project timelines and identifying the resources necessary to deliver project elements in an efficient manner, Carolyn works directly with each team at The FOURCE to develop, track and maintain project plans and deliverables, maintain and update schedules, communicate on project milestones and distribute weekly project reports. A champion for our clients, Carolyn facilitates an environment that supports leadership, management and each of the associates at The FOURCE.
KARA   RATERMAN.
RESEARCH ANALYST.
Through proficient use of Google analytics and social media analytical platforms, Kara has the ability to provide data driven intelligence and consumer insights in support of content strategy and marketing initiatives. She has a knack for finding information quickly and leverages a variety of research resources to consistently produce high-quality, factually accurate, timely, and relevant reports. Kara has the ability to manage time wisely and proficiently and always communicates in an effective and client-minded manner.
JOSH   DORSEY.
SEO MARKETING MANAGER & ANALYST.
Josh effortlessly partners with the teams at The FOURCE to implement SEO strategies that drive traffic to each client’s web properties. Josh implements organic marketing techniques & analyzes each website for improvements and identifies traffic-driving keywords, tracks keyword rankings across multiple divisions, and works to monitor search engine fluctuations. In addition to on-page optimizations, Josh manages all SEO projects during the year ranging from Social Media, Local Search, Mobile, UAT project management, or vendor management. An expert analyst of business metrics from multiple sources, he uses his love of data to recommend customer-facing strategies that ensure performance is on track.
ANA   SAURWEIN.
SOCIAL MEDIA STRATEGIST.
Ana’s experience managing mainstream social media platforms, including but not limited to Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest, gives her a unique understanding of marketing topics and trends in the social world. She maximizes each client’s social network interaction daily to keep communities engaged. Ana creates content for social media platforms that targets each client’s ideal customer niche as it relates to their market and regularly researches outside content (articles, blogs, video) for social media trends. Her ability to think outside of the box allows her to effectively evaluate analytics to determine success of social media strategy in order to maximize each client’s exposure and engagement with the necessary audiences.

OUR EXPERIENCE.

PUBLIC & PRIVATE SECTOR.

White Collar, Blue Collar and everything in between.
01. DIGITAL.

The FOURCE has established a significant footprint in the digital world – creating and managing over 578 websites of all sizes annually. From landing pages for targeted media campaigns to sites that are over 100 pages deep, we build sites that Google spiders love to crawl and build nests that attract users.  We build websites for the thumb and not the mouse.  With over 68% of websites being accessed online from a mobile device, we ensure our client’s sites are optimized for search engines as well as an end user’s device.

02. BRANDING.

Ideas + Brain Power = Creative Brand Communications! Branding is part science and part psychology. We create Brand Experiences by building a pyramid for success that starts with identifying product features that can connect in an emotional way to attract and keep consumers engaged. We work with our clients to identify the goals and then ask the difficult questions in order to solve problems and spark imagination. Answers exist. They happen to be inside our brains and in research that we conduct, then analyze and recommend sound solutions.

03. MARKETING.

As a full service marketing agency we take an integrated approach to our clients’ business. It takes the same level of thinking to deliver results for a small budget as it does a large budget. We put the same teams on both sizes. It keeps our team sharp as they have to find creative ways to break through the clutter and deliver results through paid and earned media, events, experiential marketing, story-telling, social media, and good old fashioned word-of-mouth.

SKILLS.

RESULTS DRIVEN DESIGN.

When it comes to skillset – The FOURCE is loaded because we get paid to THINK. Our team is cross generational – from Baby Boomers to Millennials – we are masters of any design and hundreds of  technical languages.
PHOTOSHOP 100%
UX/UI DESIGN 100%
HTML/CSS 100%
ILLUSTRATOR 100%
JAVASCRIPT 100%
GOOGLE MASTER 100%

THE USER MUST COME FIRST.

WORK.

RECENT PROJECTS.

APPROACH.

LET US CREATE YOUR VISION.

CLIENTS.

MAKE A DIFFERENCE.

We are proud to have a client base that we count as family. So if you need to hear about The FOURCE from someone other than us, please read on.

review1

“An Amazing team of individuals who made us think differently about our business to reconnect to our clients that led to double digit growth for our team.”

BRAD McMILLIN, BELTONE

review3

“We have worked with The FOURCE for over seven years and in that time, they have not only increased our client base, but helped to change minds about the stigma of mental illness to save lives.”

EMILY SMITH, KARLA SMITH BEHAVIORAL HEALTH

review2

“The FOURCE has taken Prairie to new heights by developing an exceptional online experience through paid and organic strategies that have exceeded our expectations beyond any other agency we have worked with – because they put results and our patients first.”

KRISTIN DOSTER, PRAIRIE HEART INSTITUTE

review2

“Operating three companies in one can be a challenge, but The FOURCE has helped craft a communication and digital strategy that allows our customers to find and engage with us online in a way we never could have imagined.”

MATT CUNDIFF, IRONHORSE RESOURCES

Feel free to contact us by filling out the form below or text/call us at 618-972-0942.