Tom Collins, a pioneer of using database-driven technique to personally connect advertiser and customer, mentor, and well, an angel for all things good, is dead.

The co-founder of the iconic direct response agency Rapp/Collins (now part of the Omnicom Group ) more than anyone else is responsible for the 1-to-1 marketing revolution. Stan Rapp, his long-time partner summarized his influence:

“On the creative side of that [ One-to-One] marketing revolution none stands taller than Tom Collins. Tom was at the forefront of the turnaround from mass marketing to the responsive, individualized, data-driven advertising of the Information Age. He inspired and mentored those who followed with his uncanny ability to take the consumer by the hand and create a relationship leading to a positive outcome.“

Beyond corporate America, Tom’s influence was even more powerfully felt in the nonprofit world — particularly in the realm of progressive advocacy and politics.

• The six-page letter he and Morris Dees crafted for the 1972 McGovern presidential campaign broke the mold and produced a flood of contributions, enabling George McGovern to break the centralized financial strangle-hold that the political parties held on their candidates up ‘til then.

• The compelling four-page letter he and Ira Glasser, then the Executive Director of the ACLU, crafted in the mid-70s — when the ACLU came to the defense of American Nazis denied a parade permit in Skokie, Illinois — helped save the ACLU.

Under the letterhead of David Goldberg, the message began:

“Dear Friend,

I am the jewish lawyer defending the right of the Nazis to march in Skokie, Illinois.”

Time after time, cause after cause, Tom put his skills, his beat-up typewriter, and his heart to work for our causes.

Morris Dees, founder of The Southern Poverty Law Center remembers:

“Long after the [McGovern] campaign Tom came to the Southern Poverty Law Center at his own expense to help us develop direct mail packages. He never sent a bill.

“He wrote us one of the best planned giving letters any nonprofit every used. I can hear him now speaking the letter he wrote in such a compelling voice that I choked up: ‘Many years ago, I read an old and deeply affecting short story. It was about a man who died and how, within a year, all traces of his ever being on earth disappeared. None of us want that for ourselves. We all want to feel that our presence will be felt and our influence will continue after we are gone.’

“Tom’s wonderful deeds, the love he had for those with few champions and the good he did will not disappear. Long live my dear friend.”

In 1986, Tom and Stan Rapp, his partner, published MaxiMarketing, which trail blazed the use of computer technology for database marketing and advertising accountability.

Advertising giant David Ogilvy said of MaxiMarketing: “The authors of this book are competitors of mine, but that does not blind me to its value. Everyone who is in advertising [not to mention fundraising] must read it.”

You can read the tributes and more about one of my favorite ‘Angels’ here.

Thank you, Tom. Well done. So well done.

Roger