About Sage Marketing Group
Ronald J. Roberts
Ron is President and CEO of Sage Marketing Group, Inc., a real estate and leisure property marketing and consulting firm with offices in South Burlington, Vermont.
Mr. Roberts has over thirty two years in the timeshare, fractional, condominium, second home, and leisure real estate industry, working more than ten years for the The Global Group of Companies, beginning as a salesperson and winning many awards including ARDA “Salesperson of the Year”. Having been promoted to Vice President of Sales company-wide, and later to Vice President of Sales & Marketing, Mr. Roberts was instrumental in propelling the company to record sales levels in a number of U.S. states and then in Europe, where he started GME, U.K. PLC, the largest “Offsite” timeshare company in the world at that time, generating more than 41,000 direct generated guests per year, producing more than 4,600 real estate sales per year, and exceeding revenue of more than $56 million per year.
As Executive Vice President and Senior Group Director for more than ten Global Group Companies, Mr. Roberts was involved in all facets of the Group operations on three continents, seven countries, and a dozen properties. These include company acquisitions of more than $500 million worth of properties, key personnel recruiting, the design and setup of company structure, strategy for the subsequent sale of the acquired properties, group budgets for all sales & marketing companies, training throughout the sales & marketing companies, acquisition of financing for construction and end-loan, the on-going banking relationship and strategies for Group profits.
As President of Sage Marketing Group, Inc., Mr. Roberts is well known for providing sound sales & marketing profit strategies for large & small timeshare, fractional, condominiums, second home, mixed use projects and all leisure real estate sales in difficult markets and areas. The company provides guest and lead generation on behalf of a number of national clients, turnaround and startup strategies for exceptional sales and marketing results, and a “21st Century” approach to the sales and marketing process. Mr. Roberts has been called as an “Expert Witness” in a number of trial proceedings, and is generally regarded as an expert at planning for profit and the strategies for a successful project. Mr. Roberts & Sage Marketing Group, Inc. have, overall, been responsible for the successful sellout of a number of projects, and the profitable operation of a number of ongoing projects, in North America, Central America, Europe, and Africa.
Mr. Roberts is an Active Member of ARDA, and Executive Member of The American Marketing Association, a Fellow of The Institute of Sales & Marketing Management,
Appointed by Governor Snelling of Vermont to The Commission On Manufactured Housing, and has been a speaker for a number of organizations such as The European
Timeshare Counsel, RCI, Interval International, The Vacation Ownership Investment Conference, and C.I.T.A. Mr. Roberts has a BA from the University of Vermont in Economics. Prior to his
career in the industry, Mr. Roberts served in the United States Navy as an Air Traffic Controller for civilian and military flight operations, is a private pilot, and is a
Vietnam Era Veteran.
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Fred A. Daniels
Fred Daniels is the Vice President of Business Development for the Sage Marketing Group Inc.
Mr. Daniels has provided sound marketing, sales and resort management consultation services to developers, resort owners, marketing groups, and brokers for over thirty five years. Since 1971, he has worked with resort industry leaders and independent developers as well, in every aspect of development and management, including mixed use resort communities, timeshare resorts, fractional ownership condo hotels, resort land sales, RV resorts and a variety of resort real estate offerings. In-depth industry knowledge and an understanding of a wide range of products contributes to his ability to organize the most effective advertising, marketing, and promotional programs and seamlessly coordinate them with relationship sales practices. His team building approach has a proven track record for consistently producing maximum sales revenues with cost effective marketing results.
Mr. Daniels has often been referred to as a “pioneer” of fractional ownership. He has worked with major development companies, independents, lenders, exchange companies and industry consultants with a wide range of fractional products and projects. Since 1986 he has been involved with the constantly evolution of fractional properties, related services and their rapidly growing market. He has written articles, spoken at and attended fractional conferences and seminars for many years and has an extensive personal network of industry experts and resources.
Mr. Daniels is a long time member of the American Resort Developers Association (A.R.D.A.), a past Chairman of the Canadian Resort Developers Association (C.R.D.A.) and was a charter representative and signatory of the Global Alliance for Timeshare Excellence (G.A.T.E.) and a member of the SKAL International. He studied Business and Marketing at Drake University and San Bernardino Valley College, and real estate at the University of Maryland. He has received real estate brokers licenses in Maryland, Pennsylvania, Minnesota, Iowa and Wyoming and instructed brokers real estate sales classes for Penn State University at their East Stroudsburg campus.
A consistent history of successful associations, and his enthusiastic and uncompromising approach to quality, all reflect his commitment to professionalism and
sincere pride in the growth and development of the resort industry.
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Alex (Sandy) Blackwood | London, England
Alex is Director of Business Development Europe/Middle East/Asia for Sage Marketing Group, Inc. a marketing consultancy with offices in three of the United States and more than 100 years of combined experience in the fractional, timeshare, land, mixed-use, and whole ownership in 15 countries, 30 states and a number of sold out and ongoing projects on four continents. Mr. Blackwood heads up all European, Middle East, and Asian business development and project sales and marketing operations with offices in London.
Mr Blackwood has an outstanding record in sales and marketing within the fractional, timeshare, land, and mixed use development industries. From a background in Directorships of some of the world’s top 100 engineering conglomerates he entered the property and leisure markets 20 years ago when he was recruited out of Barlow Rand Group in South Africa to head up the sales and marketing of Barratt Developments Timeshare division in Europe. Handling sales, marketing, development, and financing at their resorts in Scotland, Wales and England and driving sales per annum from £18 million turnover and £7 million profit to over £36 million and £12 million profit in just three years. His innovations in lead generation are legend, providing over 60,000 direct generated guests per year for Barratt.
Post Barratt he operated his own marketing consultancy to over 80 timeshare companies, providing them with constant high quality traffic, sales training and management systems. As President of Keypoint International in the 1990’s he operated very successfully for ten years in Russia and China opening up these markets to European and Asian developers. His Moscow operation had four sales decks under one roof, each with 30 reps, constantly flowing with quality clients two times a day, six days a week.
In recent times he has been instrumental in the growth of Karma Developments one of the largest five star boutique hotel operators in Asia, which also offers fractionals: the billion dollar Land Holdings Group and Europe’s leading fractional consultancy The Fractional Group.
Through a disciplined approach to work coupled to his techniques for success, he consistently helps clients improve their viability, stability and growth.
Mr Blackwood has just finished writing a book on direct sales, shortly to appear on Amazon and Barnes and Noble, titled ‘HOW TO GET AHEAD IN SALES... understanding the inner motivations of clients.’ We are hoping the next one is on Direct Marketing.
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