Open to senior roles & consulting

I turn ideas and budgets into measurable growth.

Marketing leader and hands-on strategist with 15+ years where growth, storytelling, design and data meet. I owned a $12M budget and helped drive 1,000% growth in three years by pairing creative that connects with media that performs.

StrategyCreativeStorytellingResults

See the 9.6x case study Résumé (PDF) LinkedIn
Courtney Dean
Courtney DeanMarketing Director · Growth, Brand & Creative
Inc. 5000 #335 overall · #2 Consumer Services Brands I've worked on
  • PetMedia
  • Pawrade
  • PetPay
  • The Nightmare Factory
  • Kaleidoscope Wedding & Events
  • Urban Paws Grooming
  • Stanley Black & Decker
  • McCormick Spice
  • Cloverland Dairy
  • University of Maryland Medicine
  • Cole Schotz
Selected impact

Growth, retention and operations, all owned end to end.

At PetMedia (Pawrade.com and PetPay.com) I reported directly to the CEO and owned marketing from strategy through execution. Here is what that produced.

Full-funnel acquisition · PetMedia
1,000%growth in 3 years

Scaled a consumer brand to $50M in sales and onto the Inc. 5000

1x 11x
  • Directed a $12M annual budget and a team of four across Google, Meta, TikTok, Microsoft and Reddit
  • Hands-on in the ad accounts daily: built campaigns, wrote and launched creative tests, managed bids and budgets, and reallocated weekly on CTR, CVR, CAC and ROAS
  • Owned vendor management end to end: ran agency evaluations, negotiated contracts and managed technology partners across the stack
Hands-on paid mediaBudget & P&LVendor management
Lifecycle & retention
$13M

Automated email and SMS revenue through Klaviyo

Connected customer behavior data to segmentation, flows and campaign strategy so revenue kept arriving after the first purchase.

  • Behavioral targeting and personalization across email and SMS
  • A/B and multivariate testing on flows, offers and timing
  • Customer journey optimization from first visit to repeat purchase
KlaviyoSegmentationLTV
AI marketing operations
4xcontent

AI workflows that multiplied output

Operationalized AI across the team: 4x content production and 5x faster planning and optimization, freeing time for strategy and craft.

Generative AIZapier
Brand & organic social
0 → 132K

Built a 132K community from scratch

Filmed, edited and produced the video and photo content myself, building trust with a skeptical audience. Owned brand identity and final editorial review.

ContentBrand voice
Measurement
MMM

Spend tied to business outcomes

Applied Marketing Mix Modeling, attribution, GA4 and GTM, and built the pacing, forecasting and executive dashboards leadership used to plan.

GA4Forecasting
Social & creative

Best creative, with the numbers behind it.

A few of the ads and posts I concepted, briefed or produced, and what they did. Every card links to the account it ran on.

Accounts I've run
    Portfolio

    Explore the work, from strategy through hands-on execution.

    Brand launches, creator engines, content systems and national retail launches. Each one opens its own case study.

    How I lead

    Numbers and narrative, in the same meeting.

    I've sat on both sides of the agency relationship, so I know what good work costs and what it should return. Four habits I bring to every team.

    Spend like it's my own

    Every dollar has a job and a benchmark. When a channel stops earning, the money moves, and leadership sees why in the pacing report.

    Judge on purchases, not applause

    Hook rates and views are signals. Revenue and cost per purchase decide where budget goes.

    Find the story that sells

    Data tells you which ad won. Creative instinct tells you why, and that is what you brief into the next round.

    Let AI do the busywork

    Automate reporting and production so the team spends its hours on original thinking.

    Featured case study

    $2.38M from a single creator campaign. Every ad paid for itself.

    Pawrade Meta partnership ads Nov 2025 to Sep 2026 Role: Marketing Director

    This is one campaign from the creator partnership program I built at Pawrade, running pet creators' content as Instagram partnership ads on Meta. Over ten months I put about $248K behind it and drove $2.38M in attributed revenue at a 9.6x return. The ads that cleared 5x carried 81% of the budget, so the returns held where the money actually went.

    $2.38MAttributed revenue
    9.6xBlended ROAS
    1,382Purchases
    $180Cost per purchase
    $248KMedia spend
    14.4MImpressions
    $17.23Blended CPM
    100%Of ads returned above spend

    Where the revenue came from

    Three creators did the heavy lifting. Feelin It Training, Polo Family and Victory Cottage produced 67% of all revenue on 55% of spend. Once the early numbers came in, I concentrated budget there, and they kept returning 10x to 16x as spend scaled.

    I judged every piece of content on purchases, not views. That single rule is what kept the budget pointed at creators whose audiences already trusted them.

    Average order value was roughly $1,720, so a $180 cost per purchase meant the campaign was profitable from the first month.

    Return on ad spend by creator

      Creators with multiple ads are combined. Hover or focus a row for detail. Source: Meta Ads Manager export, 11/20/2025 to 9/29/2026, Meta-attributed.

      View as table
      CreatorAdsSpendRevenueROASPurchasesCost / purchase
      Total26$248,480$2,383,0829.6x1,382$180
      57% hook rate → 5.3x · <10% hook rate → 12.1x

      Story beats scroll-stopping

      Hook rate did not predict sales. The highest hook rate in the campaign returned 5.3x, while a creator who hooked under 10% of viewers returned 12.1x. Trust sells.

      Puppy delivery cut: 7.9x · $219K

      The homecoming moment sells

      Same creator, same audience, four cuts. The story of bringing a puppy home beat the workout and adventure versions (4.6x and 2.7x) by a wide margin.

      Second reel: 13.9x

      Winners can go twice

      Victory Cottage's second reel still returned 13.9x. When a creator works, more content from them is lower risk than a new creator.

      $1,615 test → 22.4x at $62 / purchase

      Small tests find big efficiency

      A tiny test with Milo became the most efficient ad in the campaign. Keeping a standing test budget is how you find the next one.

      40% hook rate · $1,114 / purchase

      Knowing when to pull back

      Strong attention, weak economics. It still covered its spend, but that budget does more with the top creators, so it moved.

      Experience

      15+ years, agency side and brand side.

      From agency account work to national retail launches to running marketing for a high-growth consumer brand.

      1. Feb 2021 to Aug 2026

        Marketing Director, Paid Media & Performance Marketing

        PetMedia · Pawrade.com, PetPay.com

        • Led integrated performance, brand and growth campaigns behind $50M in annual sales and 1,000% growth in three years (Inc. 5000, #2 Consumer Services)
        • Owned a $12M budget and a team of four; reported to the CEO and managed agency and vendor partners
        • Planned full-funnel media across Google, Meta, TikTok and Microsoft, optimizing on CAC, ROAS, CTR, CVR, hook rate and hold rate
        • Built Klaviyo lifecycle programs that generated $13M in automated email and SMS revenue
        • Scaled affiliate and influencer programs through Impact.com and TikTok Shop
        • Grew organic social from zero to 132K followers and negotiated a category-exclusive Instagram Shop directly with senior Meta leadership
        • Applied MMM, multi-touch attribution, GA4 and GTM to tie spend to revenue and deliver executive forecasting
      2. Sep 2010 to Present

        Founder & Principal Marketing Consultant

        Fresh Start Growth

        Integrated brand strategy and growth marketing for clients across healthcare, retail, pet care and events: web design, Shopify, social, paid media, email/SMS, packaging, photography and B2B/wholesale strategy.

        Clients include University of Maryland Medicine, Cole Schotz, Posh Puppies, The Nightmare Factory, Kaleidoscope Wedding & Events, Urban Paws Grooming, McCormick Spice and Cloverland Dairy.

      3. Jan 2005 to Jan 2010

        Brand Management & Product Marketing

        Stanley Black & Decker

        Led launch planning and go-to-market strategy for national product launches with The Home Depot, Lowe's, Walmart, Sears, Ace Hardware and Menards, coordinating retail marketing and product positioning.

      4. Jan 2002 to Jan 2005

        Account Executive

        Bevel Design

        Agency-side branding and advertising for regional clients, supporting brand campaigns and creative development.

      Toolkit

      Strategic enough to set the plan, hands-on enough to build it.

      Creative strategy & brand

      • Brand strategy & identity
      • Creative direction
      • Performance creative
      • Campaign concepting
      • Creative briefing
      • Copywriting
      • Visual storytelling
      • Video & photo production
      • Adobe Creative Suite
      • Canva
      • CapCut

      Growth & performance

      • Full-funnel acquisition
      • Paid social
      • Paid search
      • Google Ads
      • Meta Ads
      • Amazon Ads
      • TikTok Ads
      • Microsoft Ads
      • Reddit Ads
      • Performance Max
      • SA360
      • ROAS & CPA optimization
      • A/B testing

      Analytics & optimization

      • GA4
      • Google Tag Manager
      • Attribution modeling
      • Marketing Mix Modeling
      • Conversion tracking
      • CRO
      • Performance dashboards
      • Forecasting & pacing
      • Hook & hold rate
      • CTR · CVR · CAC

      Lifecycle & CRM

      • Klaviyo
      • Email & SMS
      • Segmentation
      • Automated flows
      • Retention marketing
      • Customer journey optimization
      • HubSpot

      Creators, affiliates & partners

      • Influencer marketing
      • Creator sourcing & briefing
      • UGC strategy
      • Affiliate marketing
      • Impact.com
      • TikTok Shop affiliates
      • Partnership negotiation

      Digital experience & e-commerce

      • Shopify
      • WordPress
      • Wix
      • Website strategy & UX
      • Landing pages
      • SEO/SEM
      • Search Console
      • HTML/CSS

      AI & automation

      • AI creative workflows
      • Generative AI
      • Marketing automation
      • Automated reporting
      • Claude
      • ChatGPT
      • Gemini
      • GitHub
      • Vercel
      • Optmyzr
      • Zapier

      Strategy & leadership

      • Growth strategy
      • Integrated marketing
      • Go-to-market
      • Budget & ROI
      • Agency & vendor management
      • Executive reporting
      • Consumer insights

      Education

      Towson University
      B.S., Communications, concentration in Advertising
      Marketing, Business Administration
      Graduated with honors · Student ambassador, College of Business & Communication

      Certifications

      Klaviyo Strategist · Google Ads Search · Microsoft Advertising · Meta Ads Manager · TikTok Ads Manager

      Work with me

      Need someone to grow your brand? Let's talk.

      I'm open to full-time senior marketing roles and to consulting, contract and fractional leadership. Based in Pennsylvania and open to remote work.

      • Full-timeDirector and Head of Marketing roles in growth, performance and brand.
      • Fractional & contractPart-time marketing leadership: strategy, budget, team and agency management.
      • Project consultingPaid media audits and rebuilds, creator and UGC programs, lifecycle, launches and creative systems.
      LinkedIn Résumé (PDF)

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