Execs & Accounts for May 22, 2006

Tribal DDB’s Paran Johar joins MRM Worldwide as EVP, digital marketing, and managing director of MRM’s Los Angeles office, effective in June. Johar, who led the Web media practice at Tribal DDB, will manage MRM’s LA office and expand its work into areas of online advertising beyond Web development. At Omnicom’s DDB, Johar was general manager of the Los Angeles office and headed the Web media practice. Earlier, he was managing director of the Los Angeles operations of Groundswell.

Johar has worked at Saatchi & Saatchi, BBDO, and iXL and founded Select New Media, Select Resources International’s interactive division.

“Digital marketing is going mainstream, redefining all aspects of the marketing mix and enabling new levels of accountability for return on investment. Paran’s depth of experience in interactive brand development, digital marketing, and interactive platform development will greatly benefit new and existing MRM clients alike,” said Reuben Hendell, CEO of MRM Worldwide.

Former Volkswagen marketing executive Tesa Aragones joins davidandgoliath (dng) as director of digital branding, a new position. “We’ve been reviewing all of our clients’ marketing practices in an effort to ensure that they’re leveraging their brands in the most efficient way possible,” said chairman and COO David Angelo. “Tesa’s expertise in digital marketing and branding is going to play a large role in this process…. She’s going to be a huge asset to us, both in terms of serving current clients and helping us win new ones.”

At VW, Aragones was director, VW media and interactive marketing. There she launched the first pontiac.com Web site, worked on the earliest releases of vw.com, and the dealer Web site programs for both brands. She was also responsible for the online marketing launch of the New Beetle. Aragones began her career at DMB&B and was an account supervisor on Pontiac-GMC before moving to the client side.

Interactive shop PinPoint Interactive Media launched a new division, PinPoint Mobile, which will offer SMS (define) marketing, mobile Web site development, and mobile marketing campaigns. Longtime agency client Carlson Hotels is among the first to take advantage of the services for its Radisson brand.

Forbes.com named Raymond (Ray) Ouellette to the newly created role of chief information officer. He’ll be responsible for overseeing Forbes.com’s infrastructure and engineering systems and report to VP and GM of operations Michael Smith. Ouellette comes from Thomson Media, where he was CTO. He joined that company in July 2000 as EVP technology. Earlier, Ouellette held executive management positions in systems engineering, R & D, product development, and more with several software companies, including Minolta Information Systems.

Think Partnership has named Scott P. Mitchell secretary, in addition to his current positions as president and interim CEO. Jody Brown, CFO, will now serve as treasurer. Both positions became vacant with the departure of the former CEO. The company’s board of directors also authorized moving Think’s corporate headquarters from Chicago, Illinois, to Clearwater, Florida, where Mitchell lives and where the company has operations, including Ozline, Cherish, and Personals Plus.

Webloyalty named David Lynch senior vice president, reporting to CEO Rick Fernandes; Lynch is charged with developing new business initiatives. Earlier, Lynch served as managing director, North America East for Digitas’ Modem Media. Prior to that, he served as marketing director for Evian at the Danone Group. Lynch has held multiple brand management positions at PepsiCo. He began his career in Dun & Bradstreet’s marketing services division.