Content and SEO Experience
VP of Content and SEO; Shortlister (May 2020 – Present)
- Responsible for all SEO and content decisions at Shortlister.
- Site referring domains increased by 113% in first eight months.
- Site monthly organic traffic increased by 60.7% in first eight months.
- Site total ranked keywords (Ahrefs) increased by 81.7% in first eight months.
- Ahrefs domain authority up five points (47 to 52) in first eight months.
L2TMedia; SEO Manager (Nov. 2019 – May 2020)
- Managed two teams: 9 SEO specialists and 5 content editors.
- Developed and oversaw implementation of new SEO packages for 350+ clients, including developing new tactics, pricing and reporting.
- Oversaw new SEO tool selection process and led the implementation of BrightEdge.
Sr. Content Marketing Manager; G2 Crowd (Aug. 2015 – Sept. 2019)
- Grew blog traffic from 20k monthly visitors to 1.5m monthly visitors (90% organic) in less than 18 months.
- Led team of 23 content marketers while maintaining a team NPS above 50.
- Hired and successfully on-boarded 20 content marketers over nine months.
- Oversaw the scaling of our guest post network from 0 to 100+ monthly articles.
- Developed strategy for four content units tasked with driving traffic, email subscriptions, revenue generation, and backlink acquisition.
- Oversaw the strategy and editorial direction for 200+ published content pieces (blogs, downloadables, guides, etc) each month. Maintained editorial calendar via Asana.
- Helped develop backlink strategies that generated 5,500 new referring domains to Learn blog in less than 18 months.
Previously held positions at G2 Crowd
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- Research Specialist; Research Editor; Editorial and SEO Team Lead; Content Marketing Manager
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Software stack at G2 Crowd
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- SEO: Ahrefs; SEMRush; Botify; Google Search Console
- Content: HubSpot; WordPress; MarketMuse; Asana
- Analytics: Google Analytics; HubSpot; Domo
- Multimedia: Adobe Suite; Canva
- Social media: Hootsuite; Union Metrics; BuzzSumo
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Sports Media Experience
Illinois High School Basketball Newsletter (June 2020 – Present)
- I write a weekly newsletter about recruiting, commitments, transfers, coaching news, scores, stories and more about Illinois high school basketball.
- A top-75 sports newsletter on Substack (No. 68 as of December 2020).
- Average open rate: 61%
- Average readership: 585
Founder; Illinois-Basketball.com
- Founded a high school basketball news site.
- Grew audience to 13,000+ pageviews in first three months.
Contributing Writer; Chicago Tribune/Pioneer Press (2015 – Present)
- Have written more than 300 stories for Pioneer Press and Chicago Tribune sports sections. Covered primarily prep sports, including game, feature, and preview stories.
- Worked with external communications employees to coordinate interviews, receive story pitches, and obtain story artwork when necessary.
- Two stories featured on Chicago Tribune home page.
- Nominated for one Associated Press Sports Editors award for this story.
Application Writer; 120 Sports (July 2014 – Aug. 2015)
- Wrote content and managed visuals for digital sports television application.
- Monitored social media for breaking sports stories and to supplement packages.
Educator Experience
DePaul University, Lecturer (March 2020 – Present)
- Taught JOUR 280: Introduction to Online Reporting and Production.
- Introduced undergraduate students to online publishing, open data, map making, audio editing, video editing, and photography.
- Taught students to use Google Maps, Adobe Audition, Adobe Premiere, Photoshop, and other tools.
- Teaching Adobe Audition and Adobe InDesign workshops in the Fall 2020 quarter.
Additional Writing Experience
- Times of NW Indiana: Wrote high school, college, and professional sports stories. Filled in as sports agate. (2018 – 2019)
- Chicago Sun-Times: Wrote high school and college sports stories. (2013 – 2014)
- NBA Europe: Covered Kobe Bryant’s final game at United Center. (2016)
- Illinois High School Basketball: Created a website to cover Illinois high school basketball. It had more than 1,300 readers in its first week.
- Crusader Kings III Guides: Created a website for the popular PC strategy game Crusader Kings III
- Content Contributions: Databox, Intercom, BuzzStream, OneIMS, Planable.
Education
M.A. Journalism; DePaul University (2014)
B.A. History, English; Alma College (2010)