About Us
Meet our core creative team…
Anya Smilanick
Agency Director & Founder
With 20 years of marketing and design under her belt, Anya founded Small Dog Creative in 2007. Anya has worked on hundreds of projects for hundreds of small businesses needing marketing materials online and offline. Anya graduated from Claremont Graduate University with an MFA in Fine Art, and now channels her creative energy into all things marketing.
Joy Whittemore
Agency Partner& Marketing Director
Joy spent over 17 years managing widely recognized brands as an in-house marketing manager. After transitioning to owning her own agency, Add+In Marketing, She merged with Small Dog Creative in 2016 so she could offer clients a full array of creative and web services. Her ‘joy’ in life is watching the rewarding results that come from providing clients with the support they need to keep their businesses flourishing. Joy keeps the ball rolling and the artwork flowing.
Monica Delgado
Marketing Manager
As a member of the Small Dog family since 2018, Monica has worked with an extensive range of clients, helping entrepreneurs to elevate their online presence through brand storytelling and inbound marketing. Monica loves being able to apply her expertise to businesses of all shapes and sizes, and especially enjoys helping businesses establish a distinctive brand voice.
Nikki Laing
Project Manager
What do you get when you combine an English Lit graduate with 25+ years of sales and project management experience in the fuel, construction, and comms/defense industries? You get the anomaly that is Nikki Laing—SDC’s highly organized project manager with an unparalleled eye for detail. Nikki thrives in both technical and creative environments, loves Jeopardy, and can most often be found with a small dog on her lap and a large pup at her feet.
Note: the Office Gnome is NOT allowed to poop under her desk.
Daniel Manchego
Web Developer
Daniel Manchego is Small Dog Creative’s master web developer and has been an integral part of the team for over 6 exciting years. Daniel enjoys thinking critically to identify multiple solutions to one problem—thankfully— because our motto seems to be, ‘if you can dream it, Daniel can do it.’ We think his actual title is: Web Developer Wizard.
Melissa Gagnon
Graphic Designer
Since becoming a Pokemon trainer wasn’t realistic, Melissa Gagnon studied Advertising at Temple University with a focus on Art Direction. She knew it was the right choice when she looked forward to spending hours on creative content and was proud to explain to her friends the difference between RGB & CMYK. With over 5 years of design experience, Melissa’s creative journey has been fun and filled with days lost in the creative cloud. She is determined to incorporate sriracha in every meal and loves to cook her way through her Pinterest boards. When the weather is warm, she loves to garden, go for walks in the park with her pup Roxy, and plan her next adventure—each trip bringing her closer to her goal to hiking through all of America’s National Parks.
The Office Gnome
Mischief Maker
This semi-magical creature comes to life at night and causes mischief. His favorite pastime is roaming the office after hours and drinking the office beer. He is often found passed out in the conference room or pooping under someone’s desk. He has been kicked out of the office many times, left across town, and shipped to China, but he always finds his way back in.
