Feature Story

Deirdre Cavener
I.T. Doesn't Get Any Better
By Chary Southmayd

Deirdre Cavener makes an indelible impression on you from the moment you meet her. Her statuesque appearance and easy smile that exudes friendliness and confidence are immediate clues that this is someone who has it all together. Scratching below that attractive surface in conversation reveals an extremely intelligent and focused woman who has always known exactly what she wanted and has been willing to work for it. Cavener followed a bit of a circuitous route on the path to success, but there is no doubt that she was born and bred to lead the charge in today’s digital frontier.

Cavener is the creator and driving force behind Seminole-based KISS Marketing, a full-service digital marketing company that specializes in search engine optimization, Internet marketing, Web site development and digital advertising. In 2001, she launched Go Local Tampa Bay, a local Web site portal (portal with a personality, she calls it) comprised of 150,000 pages of anything you could ever want to find in the Tampa Bay area. She has also created Women Empower and My Green Pages Local Network, an online business directory network for 150 cities found in every state across the USA.

Cavener was motivated to start her business 7 years ago in part by frustration at what should have been an easy task, coupled with disgust at the good ol’ boy attitudes she encountered in the corporate world. Searching the Internet for a dentist in the Seminole area, Cavener wasn’t able to find exactly what she needed. She knew there was a huge void that begged to be filled. “Knowing my database background, I was thinking how easy it should be,” she said.

“If you put the yellow pages and chamber of commerce in a blender, out would come pinellaslife,” Cavener said. “And now we have Tampa Bay’s first customized local search engine.”

A self-described “whiz at data entry,” Cavener’s love for everything computer started early in life. She worked at a computerized tax firm when she was still in high school. She has always had the innate ability for high-speed analysis.

“My brain works like a computer,” she said, in understated fashion.

She was motivated even more to follow her vision and take the leap to business ownership when she overheard the president of a Clearwater company in which she was the vice president of application development, refer to her as “his token female.”

“I walked in at 5:00 the next morning, packed up my desk and left,” she said. “I was determined to open my own business.” Cavener’s family thought she was “nuts” to walk away from a six-figure job and enter a realm of financial uncertainty, but this very determined woman never looked back. She had a vision and followed what have proven to be very reliable instincts.

At age 43, Deirdre is at the youngest end of the baby boom generation. Like many other baby boomers, she encountered and ultimately conquered a bit of a bumpy ride en route to achieving her goals. After moving from the Washington D.C. area where she had grown up to Madeira Beach at age 20, Deirdre quickly learned she was in for a rude awakening. The fact that she had proven herself to be highly motivated in D.C. didn’t matter when she hit the Sunshine State. Without a college degree, finding a job here was tough. She settled for a job working in a gift shop at John’s Pass before landing data entry employment at the Eckerd Corporation offices. From there she moved on to Fotomat in downtown St. Petersburg, working in computer operations.

At Fotomat, fate stepped in. She met her future husband, fell in love, married and had back-to-back pregnancies. It was not exactly what she had envisioned for her life. “Growing up, I swore I would never have kids. I was on the total corporate track,” she said.

The marriage eventually ended, leaving Cavener to raise her two young daughters, Brittany and Danielle, on a very tight budget. They had to go on food stamps to make ends meet. That experience made a lasting impression. “I remember that ordeal as if it was yesterday,” she said. “It was the most mortifying thing I’ve even been through. They are so mean to you in those offices.”

A single mom with two daughters to care for, Cavener did what was necessary to get by. She badly wanted to complete her college education. She took classes at night and ran a day care during the daytime. She also worked as a statistics teaching assistant at USF. “It paid me a big $5 an hour, but it was sink or swim. I wanted to do what it took to raise my kids how I grew up,” she said.

And she grew up in a family of considerable means. Cavener was born in Ft. Wayne, Indiana. When she was 12, her father, an engineer at Magnavox, moved the family to Washington, D.C. and started his own engineering company, which became very successful. “I saw my dad take that step – moving out of the stability of Magnavox where he had worked himself way up,” she said, revealing insight into a scenario that she would later mirror.

When she was just 14, she worked in her father’s office, typing the company’s computer documents, for which she was paid $1 a page. She keeps a treasured photograph of her and her father posing with one of the very first computers in the 1960’s. “That put me on the path I stayed on, and am still on – anything to do with computers,” she said.

At age 32, Cavener graduated from USF with a 3.9 GPA. Her first job after graduation was running computer operations at Florida Mental Health Institute on the USF campus. She fondly remembers the day a doctor at FMHI told her that someday she would be president of her own company. “He was right, I was so driven,” she said. “I’ve always been an over-achiever.” After 5 years at FMHI, her desire to excel led Cavener to seek her next challenge.

“My entrepreneurial spirit leads me to move on when I see that my job is done and there is nothing else I can do to benefit the company,” she said. Referring to herself as a “database design guru,” Cavener was hired at Lucent Technologies, where she designed the entire enterprise data model for the company. After less than two years there, she accepted that ill-fated job with a Clearwater start-up company where she encountered the “token female” comment. That small-minded insult catapulted her to seek independence, financial security for her family and personal satisfaction.

Cavener credits her parents, James and Joyce, who were excellent role models, with instilling in her a strong ethical foundation. She is disturbed by the lack of ethics she encounters among others working in search engine optimization, which is one of her specialties. “That’s a very corrupt field,” she said. “Lots of people are being ripped off.” With all that she has achieved, if she could have any one thing come true, she said it would be to spend one more day with her mom and dad, who are both deceased.

Cavener also credits two high-profile people with changing her life in recent years – Dr. Wayne Dyer and Joel Osteen. “I’ve always known what I wanted, and they’ve taught me that if you put it out to the universe and you are willing to work for it, it will be delivered to you when it’s time,” she said. “Nothing fazes me anymore, because everything will work out OK.” She watches Osteen’s television program every Sunday morning, calling it “a half-hour of making me feel good.”

She also credits her business partner, Patty Sebok, with making a tremendous difference in her life. Sebok was actually Cavener’s first client, before later coming on board at KISS. “She is my Godsend and one of the most phenomenal women I’ve ever met. I’m an idea person, but I don’t want to do the daily part of things. Patty does that, she is my rock. It’s the best relationship I’ve ever had. We fit together exactly as two business partners should,” Cavener said.

A third link in the KISS Marketing partnership will be added this summer when Jen Seaman officially comes on board, handling sales responsibilities. As the former owner of the Las Vegas restaurant guide, Seaman relocated to this area and found her niche with Cavener and Sebok.

Anyone who would assume that such successful women on the digital frontier must dress to the nines and head to a lavish high rise office every day might be surprised to find out that nothing could be further from the truth. “People think we are some big operation,” Cavener said with a bit of a mischievous smile. “It would be funny for them to see how we really work - out of my house, wearing baseball caps and tennis shoes. That’s exactly how I wanted it. I did my corporate gig and I would never want to do that again.”

Cavener has settled in to a very rewarding life, with a deep love for her daughters, pride in their accomplishments and the peace that comes with achieving total freedom. “I never want to have to rely on anyone else. When I turned 40, I got my wings,” she said. “I’m so peaceful and content now. Everything is going exactly the way it should be.”

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