About Bill
Consultant, author and marketing expert Bill Geist watches consumer trends like some people watch reality shows (which is, of course, no longer a trend but an expectation).

Starting his post collegiate career as a radio rock jock and program director (to the shame of his loving parents that had been counting on medicine or law), Bill learned the principles of marketing cause and effect first hand. When he spun love songs at night, girls would come to his in-store appearances. When he played AC/DC, the guys would show up.

After breaking all the rules (and the ratings), Bill migrated to the marketing of destinations, eventually being named the President of the Greater Madison Convention & Visitors Bureau. During his tenure, he was the lead spokesperson and co-strategist for the successful public referendum fight to build the Frank Lloyd Wright-designed Monona Terrace Convention Center . He also succeeded in doubling the Bureau's sales and marketing budget and oversaw the launch of one of the Top 25 Marathons in the nation.

For the past decade, he has headed up his own consulting firm called, appropriately, Zeitgeist…which specializes in strategic planning, governance, marketing and legislative issues for destination marketing organizations, tourism-focused chambers of commerce, economic development organizations and communities. Bill is also the author of Destination Leadership for Boards and hosts the innovative teleseminar series DMOU, designed for destination marketing and management professionals.

Bill has served as the President of the Wisconsin Association of Convention & Visitors Bureaus and the Vice-Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Wisconsin Tourism Federation. Past associations have included stints as Vice-Chair of the Wisconsin Governor's Council on Tourism, a Board member of the Illinois Council of Convention & Visitors Bureaus and the past Chair of the Wisconsin Professional Speakers Association.

Bill holds an Executive MBA from the University of Wisconsin and a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science from Kenyon College.

BILL GEIST : SPEAKING THE "ZEITGEIST"
PO BOX 45445 - MADISON, WI 53744 - 608.836.8876