Experience

Walt Disney Parks and Resorts Online

Yield & Optimization Manager

Disney projects bring many disciplines together to create experiences for the web, mobile devices and emerging technology. Each project is run by a “quad” of creative lead, technical lead, project manager and product manager, using Agile, Lean and continuous delivery.

A/B testing

I worked with every group within Walt Disney Parks and Resorts Online on A/B, A/B/C, multivariate and machine-learning tests in Adobe Target.

• Got more out of the existing testing platform (Adobe Target) and supported the move to machine learning (Analytics for Target)
• Set standards and processes for experimentation on the web and in mobile apps
• Partnered with product managers, analysts and data scientists so tests were designed and analyzed properly
• Defined a data-driven process for proposing, prioritizing and scheduling campaigns
• Acted as controller to prevent test collisions and protect the validity of results
• Led the machine-learning testing team and met stakeholders on a regular cadence
• Evangelized experimentation and taught stakeholders the key concepts
• Set success metrics for the experimentation program and tracked them over time
• Worked with web analytics to build a culture of data-driven decisions across e-commerce, validating or disproving assumptions about how customers react
• Built trust with internal customers and senior management to keep diverse stakeholders aligned

The testing methods I used there (multivariate, sequential, bandit, personalization and Bayesian testing) are described on the A/B testing page.

Analytics

I built analytics dashboards and workspaces to track, analyze and optimize every testing initiative, including A/B, multivariate and machine-learning tests (Auto-Allocate, Auto-Target and Automated Personalization). They were built with:

• Adobe Analytics (A4T)
• Google Data Studio (now Looker Studio)
• R Studio
• Tableau
• Power BI

Advanced segmentation by user journey included first- and last-touch attribution, advanced user attributes (length of stay, party size, booking window, time lag), and alerts on data anomalies, spikes and worrying trends.

SEO and SEM

• Schema markup. Structured data that tells search engines about products, reviews, events and more, improving how results appear and how visible they are.
• Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP). Faster mobile pages, lower bounce rates and better mobile rankings.
• International SEO. Hreflang tags for language and region targeting, content for local search intent, and country-specific domains or subdirectories.
• Content gap analysis. Finding topics competitors ranked for that Disney didn’t, and creating content to fill the gaps.
• Log file analysis. Seeing how search engine bots crawl and index the sites, to find crawl errors, indexing issues and pages that were over- or under-crawled.
• Voice search optimization. Conversational content, long-tail keywords and featured snippets.
• UX optimization. Faster pages, better mobile responsiveness, clearer navigation and structure, and content that keeps visitors longer.

I worked with the stakeholders, copywriters, designers and management of each site on SEO plans for Walt Disney World, Disneyland Paris, Disneyland, Disney Weddings, Disney Meetings, Disney Cruise Line, the Disney Institute and Disney Gifts, optimizing desktop and mobile with a mobile-first, responsive approach.

• Optimized landing pages with the development teams, including Disney special offers
• Optimized hotel and cruise sites for extremely competitive keywords
• Sitemaps, tracking, title and keyword optimization, referrals, link popularity, rankings and saturation
• Advised internal staff and client developers, designers and copywriters on optimizing all new copy across Disney properties
• Researched search algorithm updates daily and corrected sites accordingly
• Presented to stakeholders and taught them about search strategy

Universal Orlando Resort

Senior Analytics Manager, Adobe optimization focused

I drove the adoption of testing at Universal Orlando Resort by building strong relationships with leadership, UX and design teams, and a culture of strategic exploration through experimentation. With all stakeholders I built a company-wide optimization and testing model, with processes, communication and reporting that moved the company from tactical testing to strategic optimization.

As lead implementation specialist for Analytics, Target and Audience Manager, I moved Universal from an outdated implementation (s_code, Target Classic and visitor ID syncing) to AppMeasurement.js and the Marketing Cloud ID Service. That improved mbox load times and cross-device tracking, and made reporting more accurate.

Tagging and analytics

• Drove the design, implementation and management of analytics tracking and targeting on the Universal Parks and Resorts websites and mobile apps, and managed the full testing and targeting technology stack
• Worked with partners across the organization to understand their needs, define the vision and build the capability to measure and test guest behaviour
• Managed the product roadmap and kept it integrated with sales and marketing, marketing operations, business intelligence, and web and mobile product teams
• Partnered with advanced analytics, BI, personalization, media and digital guest transformation teams on implementations, taxonomy and capabilities
• Partnered with Universal Parks Technology to implement code on websites, mobile apps and future platforms
• Managed a team of analysts, developers and operational support staff running Adobe (Analytics, Audience Manager, Target, Launch, DTM) and IBM (Marketing Cloud, Mobile Marketing Cloud) platforms

A/B testing

• Primary contact between marketing and technical teams for implementing, testing, monitoring and reporting across Analytics, Target and Audience Manager, spanning social, web, mobile, advertising, search and apps
• Made sure every test was specified and implemented so results could be measured accurately in Adobe Target and Adobe Analytics, often using advanced segmentation to understand conversions and statistical confidence
• Reconciled Target and Analytics data with sales and revenue data by SKU, working with data management, analytics, technology and business groups
• Worked with stakeholders on campaign planning, execution, KPIs and performance reporting, using advanced analytics to track audiences, campaigns and conversion segments
• Designed optimization plans with every team to understand visitor behaviour and increase conversion rates

ZulualphaKilo

Consultant, SEO and analytics (agency)

ZulualphaKilo was named International Small Agency of the Year. I worked on cross-channel, integrated campaigns spanning owned, earned and paid media.

Analytics

• Custom dimensions and metrics for user demographics, content categories, product attributes and business-specific goals
• Enhanced e-commerce tracking of product impressions, clicks, conversions, refunds, promotions and coupons
• Custom channel groupings that matched each client’s marketing strategy
• Advanced segmentation, such as logged in or not, new or returning, high-value customers and cart abandoners
• Custom alerts on sudden drops in traffic, spikes in bounce rate or changes in conversion rate. They even caught a wrong link in an email campaign that was driving visitors to 404 pages.
• Content grouping by product pages, blog posts and landing pages
• Custom reports and dashboards, including external and offline data
• Technical engineering for Adobe Analytics, Adobe Target and Adobe DTM implementations
• Tagging requirements for web, mobile and app campaigns; code changes, testing and deployment
• Data layer requirements for Google Tag Manager and Adobe Dynamic Tag Manager
• Custom JavaScript and jQuery in sites and tag managers for event, campaign and cross-domain tracking
• Data standards, processes and a solution design document
• Diagnosis of analytics and client-side tagging issues on web, mobile and native apps
• Analytics views and dashboards for each department and business unit
• Data layers for calls to action, navigation and footer, engagement events and conversion fallout

I hold Google Analytics and Adobe Analytics certifications.

SEO

• SEO plans for desktop and mobile campaigns, including landing pages for Facebook and Google advertising and local search
• Sitemaps, tracking, title and keyword optimization
• Advising stakeholders, developers, designers and copywriters on search-friendly campaigns
• Responsibility for SEO and PPC against clients’ visibility and ROI goals
• Rank monitoring and keyword research with Moz, Ahrefs, Raven, SpyFu and WordTracker

TBWA Toronto

Digital Marketing Analyst (agency)

TBWA\Toronto creates disruptive ideas for clients including ABSOLUT, Apple, Infiniti, Mars, Nissan, Petro-Canada and Visa, and covers paid, earned, owned and created media.

Marketing

• High-impact national campaigns for Visa, KPMG and Gatorade that consistently created new revenue and improved performance in target segments
• Planning and budgeting for SEO, new media, email and web marketing

Analytics

• Analytics administrator for TBWA-toronto.com, Visa.ca, Nissan.ca and all TBWA clients, capturing and measuring e-commerce KPIs for client campaigns
• Third-party JavaScript tracking on client websites and apps to measure ROI from Google Ads, Bing, Facebook, demand-side platforms and DoubleClick Campaign Manager Floodlights
• Defined objectives and KPIs with TBWA, Visa Canada and Nissan Canada, and built reporting and dashboards for each department
• Identified reporting requirements, monitored implementation and evaluated post-launch metrics
• Set up conversion funnels and goals before launch. On some campaigns these funnels led to a 20% lift in conversion within two weeks of changes based on the data (in French and English).
• Built a full website, email and campaign tracking scheme for Visa.ca
• Weekly reviews of ROI, bounce rates and exit pages by keyword, with improvements where needed
• Heat maps, multi-channel funnels, multivariate tests and click-through analysis
• Dashboards that let senior management quickly spot unsuccessful programs and cut or change them, including social media, mobile and campaign dashboards

SEO and SEM

• SEO plans for Visa.ca and VisaInfinite.ca with the development teams
• Responsive, mobile-optimized Visa Perks, Visa Infinite and Visa Small Business sections
• Landing page optimization for Facebook and Google PPC, email, TV, radio and print campaigns
• Local search optimization of the Nissan virtual showroom, plus training and technical support for Nissan dealers nationwide
• Visa Perks page views from organic search increased 80%, and Visa Infinite doubled its organic search results.

Web development

• Websites built from concept to delivery in HTML5, PHP, XML, MySQL, CSS3, JavaScript, AJAX and jQuery (and yes, even Flash)
• Applications with dynamic content from the Google Maps, Flickr and Twitter APIs, some with SSL and PayPal
• Databases in MongoDB, XML, JSON, Oracle, SQL Server, MySQL and PostgreSQL
• Domain registration, DNS, hosting, MX and CNAME records, and email migration to Gmail
• Custom microsites and landing pages to improve SEO and campaign conversion rates

Social

• Used Facebook (Visa had more than 3 million fans), Twitter and other networks to grow the Visa Canada, KPMG and Gatorade brands
• Visa’s Olympics campaign was one of its most successful ever on social metrics
• Gatorade’s Facebook campaign used the Facebook API with a fan gate to grow its audience
• Buddy Media was used to create and track all Facebook.com/Visa content, from photo galleries to surveys

Email marketing

Segmented, personalized email for Visa and Gatorade in Mailchimp, with rendering QA, deliverability testing and list hygiene. More on the email marketing page.

The Dan Network

Digital Marketing Analyst (worldwide agency network)

TBWA\DAN spans six continents, 19 offices and 700 digital specialists in creative technology, UX, e-commerce, social, content, mobile, analytics, search and production.

• Worked with the global team, specializing in SEO, SEM, social media and analytics, to pitch worldwide brands
• Social media SWOT analyses for every client, with recommendations for site, social and mobile improvements

Keyword analysis

• Identified which terms to target, predicted shifts in demand and responded to changing markets
• Used the Keyword Effectiveness Index (how often a keyword is searched compared with how many pages compete for it) to choose the most effective keywords
• Found new markets and redistributed budget to keywords that perform, cutting spend on those that don’t
• Keyword performance guides with recommendations on the areas with the biggest impact on the bottom line
• Competitive keyword analysis, including competitors’ meta tags and rankings
• Long-tail keyword reports, since these searches come later in the buying cycle and convert better
• Negative keyword lists to cut unwanted clicks, which raises click-through rate, Quality Score and ROI
• Tools: Wordtracker, SEMrush, Google Keyword Planner, Google Trends and Microsoft Advertising Intelligence

TheDigiblender

Owner, online marketing manager and developer

Online content from websites to full web applications, giving equal weight to mobile, social and web optimization. Clients included AccommodationsinBC.com, YorkBIA.com and VisionHome.ca. We brought small businesses and associations to the modern web.

SEO

• A redesign of drmousa.com optimized for “Orthokeratology Toronto” and “Ortho-K Toronto” increased organic search traffic by almost 200%.
• The York Eglinton Festival reached almost 5,000 page views a day in the week before the festival, ranking first on Google for “Eglinton Festivals” and “Toronto Eglinton Festivals”.
• Social media SWOT analyses for every client.

Web development

My first site, for Lerado in China, was built in Notepad and Netscape Communicator in 1996. Since then I’ve designed more than 30 sites from the ground up and collaborated on more than I can count, including thedigiblender.com, internationalstreetfest.com, accommodationsinbc.com, venter-plumbers.co.za, drmousa.com and yorkbia.com. See the web development portfolio.

Analytics

• Analytics administrator for all 14 TheDigiblender clients
• Identified reporting requirements, monitored implementation and evaluated post-launch metrics
• Integrated social media metrics and landing page tracking for every client
• Quarterly reviews of ROI, bounce rates and exit pages by keyword
• Dashboards that help senior management spot unsuccessful programs, including social media, mobile and campaign dashboards

Agency and organization work

Organization	Location	Work
Universal Studios	USA, Japan	Senior Analytics Manager (Adobe optimization)
Disney	USA, Japan, France	Yield & Optimization Manager
TBWA	Toronto	Developer, analytics and SEO
Interrupt Media	San Francisco	Analytics, tag management and data visualization
The Marketing Blender	Fort Worth	Data analysis, analytics, tag management, A/B testing and data visualization
Devsalsa	San Diego	Data analysis, analytics, tag management and data visualization
Grow and Convert	New York	Data analysis and analytics
Kraft Agency	New York	A/B testing
QS Digital	Bloomfield	Data analysis, analytics, tag management and data visualization
Ascendant Group	New York	Data analysis, analytics, tag management and data visualization
Pioneer International Group	Fort Lauderdale	Data analysis, analytics, tag management and data visualization

Websites I’ve worked on

abatepackers.com, audi.ca, bettenhauscanada.com, birchbabe.com, camh.ca, commonthreads.org, constructioncostservices.com, eliteseller.com, ewebinar.com, emergtechinc.com, fuller.com, gatorade.ca, hipaavideo.net, houseoftherozetree.com, interac.ca, kitchenaid.ca, levvel.io, maytag.com, mentalhealthmatch.com, missemilysbedandbiscuit.com, modzy.com, participaction.com, pixelfy.me, princessdentalstaffing.com, rebatekey.com, responsiblegambling.org, spiritspa.ca, themicropedia.org, trmnet.com, unbabel.com, visa.ca, wazzio.com and whirlpool.ca.