Business Speaker Mark Hughes

Mark Hughes grew eBay's Half.com from zero to 8 million registered users as its VP of Marketing in less than three years. He did that by out-thinking versus out-spending.

He literally put Half.com on the map by convincing Halfway, Oregon to rename itself to Half.com, Oregon...dubbed by Time magazine as "one of the greatest publicity coups" in history. eBay later bought the company just six months after launch for over $300 million.

Hughes' marketing background spans from big brands, running $40 million budgets, to small start-ups where marketing dollars are ever so precious.

Before eBay's Half.com, Hughes spent his career working for: PepsiCo's Pizza Hut Division; Pep Boys, the automotive aftermarket retailer; and American Mobile Satellite (now XM Satellite Radio).

Mr. Hughes holds his MBA from Columbia Business School in Marketing & International Business. He is a contributing columnist for the magazine of international advertising, Admap.

He is the son of a Pulitzer prize-winning journalist, and his book, "Buzzmarketing" from publisher Penguin/Portfolio, has received accolades from: Ben Cohen, co-founder of Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream; Steve Forbes of Forbes Magazine; the former Chief Marketing Officer of Pepsi-Cola; and the former editor of The Wall Street Journal.

In its first year of publication, Fast Company proclaimed Hughes’ book one of "The Ten Best Business Reads of 2005" and The Financial Times of London named it one of the Best Business Books of the Year along with Freakonomics.

Top Ten Business Book of the Year

"Exceeded our every expectation!  Everyone from our group is still buzzing about his speech."   - Richard Brereton, Morgan Stanley

"An amazing storyteller!" - Jeff Bezos, Amazon

“I've engaged over 100 marketing speakers. My audience is a TOUGH GROUP, but they loved him. His scores were amazing!” - Judy Neiman, Health Care Strategy Institute