2019 Speakers
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.
Amber Naslund
Amber is a senior content marketing consultant for LinkedIn, and a 20-year B2B marketing executive with a past roster of leadership roles with high-growth technology companies, professional services firms, and nonprofit organizations.
Her love for all things digital has given her the opportunity to work across every aspect of marketing strategy, from communications to product marketing, brand strategy, sales enablement and media. She’s successfully completed multi-million dollar fundraising campaigns, built and led high-growth marketing organizations, and launched and accelerated international brands from the ground up.
Amber’s experience working with enterprise and Fortune 100 businesses - including companies like American Express, Dell, Kraft Foods, Deloitte, Coca-Cola, and Microsoft - as well as startup and small businesses gives her significant breadth and depth of perspective about how digital and social media, content marketing, and online channels are shaping marketing success and challenging organizations to adapt to new ways of reaching and engaging their customers.
Amber is also the co-author of the best-selling business book The Now Revolution, helping companies navigate the fast-moving world of social media. She delivers dozens of keynote speeches on digital marketing, online culture and digital transformation at industry conferences and private events every year.
When she’s not working, Amber is a single mom to an incredible daughter, an equestrian, a rescuer of pit bulls, and a freelance writer.
Short:
Amber is the senior content marketing consultant for LinkedIn, and a seasoned marketing executive specializing in the era of digital disruption. She’s the co-author of The Now Revolution, and you can find her publishing frequently on LinkedIn as well as on Twitter at @ambercadabra.
Ian Simons
Ian Simons is Head of Industry for Facebook‘s eCommerce vertical, where he oversees the company’s largest advertising partnerships. Prior to Facebook, Ian was a founding member of Pinterest’s monetization team, which involved launching the company’s ad products, API ecosystem, and building the Sales teams across North America. He also served in a number of leadership roles at Google, including overseeing the Technology advertising business, launching Google's first ad serving platform, and participating in the DoubleClick integration. Ian received his MBA from Harvard Business School, and a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from London School of Economics and McGill University. He spends his free time chasing his three children around beaches, parks, and 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.
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.
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.
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
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.
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.
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.
Manuel Christoffel
Manuel is the Chief Customer Officer at woom bikes USA, managing marketing and Customer service for all of North America. Prior to joining woom, Manuel has held global cross-functional customer success, program, marketing and brand strategy roles at ADP, Dell, American Express, bazaarvoice, Hearsay Social and his own consultancy business. Manuel's declared goal is to deliver the best possible internal and external Customer Experience by combining EQ with IQ while cutting red tape.
Shuo Tian
Amanda Chin
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.
Jerri Helms
Jerri Helms leads the Marketing Operations team at HarperCollins Christian Publishing Group. In this role, Jerri is responsible for leading and serving as a digital marketing subject matter specialist. She works with many internal and external teams, as well as other HarperCollins and News Corp entities; to develop training, evaluate platforms and coordinate plans to meet company-wide digital marketing requirements. In her role she and her team of SME's work with internal marketing teams on SEO/SEM initiatives, interactive marketing and amazon strategies; as well as digital product development, email marketing, social media and the integration of those into overall marketing strategies & plans.
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.
Peter Berki
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
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.
Dr Quinn Wang
Quinn has a strong humanities background and diverse skill set. Her mission is to use modern technology to provide efficient, cost-effective, and high-quality medical and surgical care at the population level.
Sarah Busch
Sarah Busch is the Director of Digital Strategy at Aperture Investors.
Prior to joining the firm, she worked for Publicis Media in the U.S. and in Germany, where she focused on digital strategy implementation. Earlier in her career she also worked for the boutique asset manager 2020 Direct Invest in Australia. Aperture’s unique digital-first marketing strategy enables Sarah to combine her professional experience with personal and academic interests.
Sarah earned a B.A. in Business Psychology from Fresenius University, Germany, and a M.Sc in Global Affairs from New York University, where she graduated with distinction. She is an avid traveler, enthusiastic equestrienne, proud ASPCA member, and dog lover.
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
David Whited
David began formalizing his passion for experience design in a university setting, where he led multiple teams of creatives and academics in the development of powerful institution-wide learning encounters for college and graduate students. After ten years in a higher education setting, David transferred his creative energy, classroom facilitation skills, and team development expertise into the world of product development at Highland. Today, David helps Highland’s clients figure out the most important problems to solve through gaining an outside-in view of their customers’ experiences.
Diana Lucaci
Diana Lucaci is the Founder and CEO of True Impact, Canadian Chair of the Neuromarketing Science and Business Association (NMSBA), Top 30 under Thirty by Marketing Magazine and winner of the Best in Class research award, from the Marketing Research and Intelligence Association (MRIA). True Impact’s mission is to humanize marketing with brain science, having helped clients like Canada Post, Colgate-Palmolive, Yahoo Canada, DDB Group, Plastic Mobile and many more. She holds a degree in Neuroscience and Psychology from the University of Toronto.
AnnaZulma Macfadden
Kesha Williams
Ms. Williams is the Digital Customer Experience (DCX) Initiative Champion for the Chief Information Office (CIO). She has led multiple transformation efforts to drive efficiency across organizational lines to assess, plan and implement IT strategies and solutions. Her current efforts include reshaping the culture of the organization to drive customer centricity by creating a deliberate customer experience in the delivery of information technology (IT) support, products, and services. Her background includes project management, customer experience, strategic planning, organizational change management, business analysis and process reengineering, coaching, mentoring, and training.
Adam Arcus
Samantha Krasner
Bao Bui
Solutions Engineer working in the software space for 20+ years. Loves working with customers showing them how software can solve their business problems. Based out of Los Angeles and has experience in a variety of software areas including PLM, Cad/Cam, Knowledge Management, and now AI software for text analytics. Sectors served include aerospace, medical, high tech, retail, consumer goods, and gaming industries. When not working, enjoys playing guitar and practicing Brazillian Jiu Jitsu.
Yvonne Hangsterfer
