Bruce Rogers

Mr. Rogers founded the SITO Institute for Consumer Behavior and Locations Sciences, an education initiative from SITO Mobile to elevate the understanding and best practices for implementing location intelligence as a foundational signal for marketing effectiveness. He is also Head of Marketing for SITO Mobile and a contributing writer for Forbes Magazine.  He is a veteran of Forbes Media, having run marketing and founding its Insights research arm and CMO Practice, incorporating editorial, research and events for marketing leaders. He was part of the leadership team that grew Forbes.com into the world’s leading business site, and has served as Forbes Media’s Chief Brand Officer, Chief Insights Officer and Head of the CMO Practice 

Shuo Tian

Troy Barnes

Transformational leader driving entrepreneurial and cultural change with a focus on delivering value for customers. Extensive experience in process improvement, operations, IT, program and project management, training, coaching, mentoring and consulting leaders in a diverse cultural environment. Particularly interested in challenging situations needing transformation with a focus on customer experience and business growth.

Specialties: Transformation, Customer Experience, Innovation, Process, Change Management, Lean Six Sigma, Portfolio, Program and Project Management, Coaching, Mentoring and Training 

Shefali Gupta

Shefali Gupta is an Executive Director at DBS Bank, managing Strategy and Planning for the DBS Technology & Operations (T&O) team. Shefali manages the T&O management office and drives a wide number of strategic projects, including the Customer Experience strategy; the People Transformation and Future ready agenda; problem solving through Journey thinking; and driving change management through culture and communication.  

A strong Transformation evangelist with 20 years of experience, Shefali has worked on multiple initiatives to drive digital capabilities and adoption. She has a deep understanding of emerging industry trends, coupled with a strong ability to connect people, content and context to deliver effective solutions. Her global experience has further helped her replicate success across regions and build truly integrated audiences.  

Shefali Gupta is an Executive Director at DBS Bank, managing Strategy and Planning for the DBS Technology & Operations (T&O) team. Shefali manages the T&O management office and drives a wide number of strategic projects, including the Customer Experience strategy; the People Transformation and Future ready agenda; problem solving through Journey thinking; and driving change management through culture and communication.  

A strong Transformation evangelist with 20 years of experience, Shefali has worked on multiple initiatives to drive digital capabilities and adoption. She has a deep understanding of emerging industry trends, coupled with a strong ability to connect people, content and context to deliver effective solutions. Her global experience has further helped her replicate success across regions and build truly integrated audiences.  

Chris DuFresne

Chris leads the Digital Experience team at Allina Health, focusing on custom website, API and mobile app development. Chris’ background includes ecommerce, data management, and business intelligence roles at organizations such as Target Corporation, Macy’s, and Marshall Field’s. Chris focuses on how to simplify the healthcare experience using digital tools that are connected to the entire consumer experience.  

Chris is a graduate of the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, MN.  He has a Bachelor of Arts Degree and Masters in Business Administration.   

Manuel Christoffel

Samantha Krasner

Samantha joined eBay in 2017 as the Director of Business Operations for North American Advertising. She currently leads Ad Operations, Account Management, Sales Operations, Planning & Pricing teams. She has more than 13 years of experience in digital advertising leading operational initiatives for cutting edge advertising technology companies and large-scale publishers including Skype, Krux Digital, Dictionary.com and Say Media.

Andrea Joy Wenburg

As CEO and founder of the consulting and training firm, Voice of Influence, Andrea Joy Wenburg, M.A. draws out the best in customer service professionals, helping them become the Voice of Influence your customers want and your company needs. A maverick leader, known for her fearless approach to difficult conversations and her ability to rapidly cut to the core of any problem or issue, she has deep experience gaining consensus and alignment in high-stakes, strategic conversations. This success, along with her uncanny insight into human dynamics allows her to serve her clients and audiences with life-changing keynotes, trainings, retreats, executive coaching and strategic advising. Andrea is the creator of the Voice of Influence Academy, author of the #1 Amazon bestseller, UNFROZEN: Stop Holding Back and Release the Real You and host of the Voice of Influence podcast.

Parvez Ahmad

Parvez has an all-round experience in marketing, starting his career as a PR Professional during the heady days’ of the dot com era and media revolution handling clients from Sun Microsystems and MTV. Parvez moved on to a Corporate Communications Role and was part of the team which made a successful IPO for India’s first large Software Product Company – i-flex solutions. Parvez transitioned to the marketing team, in i-flex, which was one of the fastest growing Financial Technology companies on its own, which led to its acquisition by Oracle in 2005. 

In 2005, Parvez relocated to Singapore, overseeing marketing for Asia Pacific and Japan for Oracle Financial Services Business, deeply involved with the leadership team in growing the business. He was working across markets from  Australia to ASEAN to China and Japan. Parvez was awarded the Service Excellence Award for his contribution to Asia Pacific growth and market leadership.   

While in Asia he was part of Oracle’s Asia Pacific Financial Services Board, member of the Asia-Pacific CMO Council and a Mentor at Start-up Bootcamp FinTech Singapore.  He also mentored students in marketing at the Singapore Management University.  

In 2017, Parvez relocated to Oracle Headquarters in San Francisco Bay Area, to take up a global marketing role for Financial Services Global Business Unit.  

Since then, he has led digital marketing efforts, including the highly successful Oracle Digital Banking Campaign, which has won numerous B2B Marketing Awards. He was Oracle’s Global CMO for Marketing Excellence for launching the Oracle Financial Services Hackathon for FinTech Startups. 

In the San Francisco Bay Area, Parvez continues to be part of the Innovation and Startup space as a Mentor of Plug and Play FinTech, Silicon Valley 

Danny Tawiah

Currently the Chief Marketing Office / Co-Founder of Weare8: The People’s Platform. Weare8’s mission is to inspire, empower and enable a billion people to make social impact while claiming their economic and creative power in the digital economy: 

A former global VP at Nike for 13 years, Danny held several high-profile global leadership roles both in Europe and the US in which he played a pivotal leadership position in shaping and developing the evolution of Nike's global Brand Digital ecosystem. He lead some of Nike's largest global digital brand campaigns, Such as the 2010 FIFA World Cup (South Africa), 2012 Olympics (London), and 2014 FIFA World Cup (Brazil), and he has partnered with many of the world's most iconic sports clubs, athletes and cultural influencers across art, fashion, music, design, and sports verticals.


Danny also sits on several boards in an advisory capacity, including the Ghana Bob Slay Olympic Federation as well as the Manager for Akwasi Frimpong. The first West African athlete to qualify and compete in a winter Olympic.
 

Travis Mcneal

Travis works in Walmart Supply Chain as the Director of Change Management and Strategic Communications.  For Walmart, Travis has served in roles such as Organizational Development, Team Effectiveness, and Training & Communications.  Prior to joining Walmart in 2011, Travis spent 8 years with the Continuous Learning Group as a Sr. Consultant.  During that time, Travis assisted clients implement Performance Management, Leadership Development and Talent Management strategies.  Clients Travis has consulted with include; ExxonMobile, PPG, CN Rail, Chevron and Cigna to name a few.   

Travis earned his Bachelors in Psychology at Utah State University, where he also earned a minor in Human Resources Management.  Travis then earned Masters Degree in Psychology from the University of Nevada, Reno.  At that time, he also worked as a Human Resources Generalist for Tahoe Pacific Hospital and Healthsouth Rehabilitation Hospital. Travis lives in Bentonville Arkansas with his wife of 22 years and four daughters, ages 16, 13, 12 and 10.   

AnnaZulma Macfadden

Gaurav Bhatia

Chief Digital/Marketing Officer, Customer Experience, Digital evangelist, omni-channel strategist, marketing technologist, digital strategy/marketing with digital transformation. 

 Lead marketing transformation and customer experience by focusing on brand, data, customer journey, digital experience, technology. Focused on marketing/digital/advertising programs, customer experience, data analytics and integrated marketing strategy, advertising, digital, mobile and social media strategy, as part of marketing/brand mix. 

Benjamin Wood

Gina Wolf

Gina Wolf leads LinkedIn’s global content practice and has been with the company for almost 5 years. Her team of elite consultants is dedicated to inspiring brands to make human connections with content on the LinkedIn platform. Gina has spent the past 20 years helping some of the world’s most trusted brands tell better stories and align marketing strategies to business outcomes. 

Previously, Gina was a senior vice president at Zocalo Group (Critical Mass), Omnicom’s premier social and digital agency, where she built the B2B technology practice and oversaw several of the agency’s anchor accounts, including IBM, VMware and Dell. 

Prior to joining Zócalo Group, Gina was a vice president in the technology practice at Ogilvy, where she was the day-to-day lead for technology solutions provider CDW. She was also responsible for the integration of CDW’s multi-agency teams (communications, internal and advertising) to ensure alignment with overall content strategy and messaging. Gina also led the global agency comms team for Zebra Technologies, spanning nearly 20 countries.  

Gina attended Indiana University and is a native Chicagoan. She is an active member of the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) and a dedicated supporter of Trio Animal Foundation. In her spare time, you can find her at a concert, playing tennis, or spending time with her family. 

Amanda Chin

Nyajai Ellison

Nicole Maynard

I am addicted to experience design. The first step of my process stems from my empathetic wiring and research-driven thinking, to truly understand the current state and the end goal. From there I understand the areas of opportunity that will get us to a brighter future. My process is one part science and one part art, melding in a perfect union like mint and chocolate. 
 
Through experience, I have gained great insight of the power of user focused interaction, voice, aesthetics, and metaphor to create experiences that illuminate, educate, and compel. I'm grateful to have the passion for the hard work that it takes to both understand and solve challenging business and design opportunities. 
 
I believe in the greatness of our world, the rights of those in it and the necessity of doing my part to sustain its happy existence. Bringing these passions, skills, and values to create provoking and positive experiences are the core of my work. 

Tim Bay

Tim is currently Head of Digital Marketing at Fellowes Brands, where he is responsible for building comprehensive strategies and programs to drive greater brand awareness, increased engagement, and profitable growth via digital channels.  Before joining Fellowes, he has accumulated 20+ years of B2C and B2B digital marketing leadership experience in roles such as Vice President of Digital Marketing at Wilton Brands and co-founder of Shay Digital, an Internet marketing consultancy where he developed and executed online strategies for a wide breadth of organizations including Gatorade, Ty, Inc. (Beanie Babies), Boise Cascade, Children’s Memorial Hospital, Successories, and Nicor Energy.  He holds an MBA in Marketing and Finance from Northwestern University’s Kellogg Graduate School of Business and an undergraduate degree from Illinois State University. 

Jeff Foley

Jeff Foley is Vice President of Marketing at Luminoso Technologies. 

Jeff aligns sales, marketing, and product organizations to deliver software that his customers love to use.  He is passionate about ways that CRM, CX, and language technologies can improve the customer experience. Jeff started his career as an engineer before moving over to “the Dark Side” of marketing, first in product management, then product marketing. He has over two decades of experience at enterprise and consumer software companies, including Dragon Systems, Nuance, Bullhorn, Pegasystems, and now Luminoso. 

Jeff holds BS and MEng degrees in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from MIT 

Vanessa Yeh

As the Director of Marketing at Ascent, Vanessa owns all brand marketing activities and is focused on developing high-impact strategies and tactics to drive sales growth and repeatability. Previously, Vanessa served as the VP of Brand, Marketing, and Communications at 1871, Chicago's hub for technology and entrepreneurship, guiding the organization to achieve national awareness and visibility. A customer-obsessed storyteller with 10 years of experience in marketing for startups, Vanessa has built marketing functions from the ground up and is passionate about equipping and empowering talented people to produce exceptional outcomes. 

Mark Smith

With over 20 years of global experience in marketing applications and analytical CRM, Mark Smith is a leader in building, growing and managing successful companies. As the President of Kitewheel, Mark is focused on helping marketing agencies deliver better consumer engagement through solutions that unify the “logic” layer of today’s customer-facing technology for their large brand clients.

Mark’s journey into customer behaviour and experience started early in his career. Shortly after achieving his Ph.D. in Mathematics and Statistics from the University of Edinburgh, Mark founded Quadstone – the first data mining company to focus explicitly on the analytics of customer behaviour. In the years that followed, Mark moved to Boston to build the US business and oversaw revolutionary analytic progress at clients including T-Mobile, Dell, Merrill Lynch and Fidelity. His leadership role expanded to global sales, marketing and product teams that lead to a series of 3 successful M&A transactions over the last 10 years.

Mark shares his perspective on customer journeys, omni-channel marketing, solutions sales leadership and high-tech marketing.

Fred Skoler

Fred Skoler is an award-winning digital innovator, product manager and user experience designer who thrives at the intersection of business results and fun. Since founding MGM Interactive, Fred has produced hit video games (e.g. Goldeneye, All Dogs, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang), designed simulations for the US Department of Defense, consulted on user facing UX for digital advertising, wellness, health insurance, and delivered social games for social good reaching up to 11 million users. Fred most recently led digital product engagement for the Shop Your Way loyalty program at Sears Holdings Corp. and currently works as a consultant with DigiSnax LLC.  Fred’s most recent patents support omnichannel data collection leveraging gaming dynamics and personalized incentives having served 33 million unique users through 34,000 promotions, attracting up to 63 million entries per promotion, and over 3.5 million daily entries