Ben Garves
Leader in Digital and Growth Product Management
Work experience
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Gannett USAToday – Reviewed | May 2023 – November 2024
Led product and marketing teams, including PMs, Audience, Brand, Design, SEO, Paid Media, and our mixed-media content studio.
Reorganized the CMS taxonomy with 10k-plus product categories.
Led the engineering team in agile scrum (standup, estimation, grooming, retros.)
Drove two-year product roadmap with 60+ epics, a multi-million dollar budget, and P&L.
Aligned editorial, BizDev, BI, operations, leadership, marketing, and partner needs.
POCs and betas included a mobile app, proprietary and OTC CMSs, conversational AI augmentation, and data mobilization using an LLM.
Started a “testing first” culture of A/B testing and multivariate tests.
Led the SEO team through the transition from conventional SEO to AI optimization (AIO), schema incorporation, and optimizing for search generative experiences (SGE).
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Bloomberg LP Marketing Studio | February 2020 – May 2023
Developed, launched, and managed 30+ websites across Bloomberg’s massive portfolio of subsidiaries and nonprofits, owning growth and user retention KPIs.
Business focuses of those sites included FinTech, recruiting, eCommerce, fundraising, MarTech, hospitality, publishing, and hybrid events.
Roadmapped, built, and launched crossover functionality across Bloomberg’s 130+ websites, including clients in APAC, LATAM, and EMEA.
Operated as the organization-wide SME for search engine optimization (SEO), localization, and web accessibility best practices.
Ran the department-wide A/B testing program and deployment across our portfolio.
Launched: new UI/UX, interactivity tools, AI chatbot, data visualization, OTT streaming, CRM standup and integrations, and MarTech content syndication technologies.
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SolarWinds Marketing Team | August 2016 – February 2020
Senior manager over a gamified, 150k MAU online community and case-deferral forum.
Built and managed integrations with SolarWinds products and external SaaS tools.
Owned KPIs for growth and user retention of the community and integrated products.
Spearheaded gamification and SEO-focused UGC campaigns to drive engagement and user acquisition.
Integrated OTT streaming and live chat for monthly live streams and an annual multi-day, multi-track virtual conference.
Built and launched a corresponding mobile app, along with license management tools that allowed customers to manage their SolarWinds products on the go.
Oversaw engineering contracts, vendor partnerships, and a $3M+ annual budget.
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Benefitfocus Product Delivery Team | July 2014 – August 2016
Managed a 14-person team of solutions consultants, data specialists, product managers, and project managers working to customize our enterprise B2B marketplace and LMS solution for billion-dollar clients.
Transitioned engineering from waterfall to agile scrum, adopting JIRA and Kanban.
Launched a company-wide resource utilization model to track team assignments, map attrition, flag ailing projects, and optimize workload across the team. Later migrated this to an ERP tool.
Led roadmap development for platform enhancements, scrum, and sprint grooming sessions for our engineering team.
Oversaw complex QA and testing over thousands of scenarios to ensure our customizations performed as-needed for clients on day one.
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Appen Butler Hill PMO | February 2012 – July 2014
Ran end-to-end localization and data validation projects spanning 52 global markets.
Developed proprietary AI and ML data analysis tool offerings for companies like Facebook, Google, Twitter, and eBay with 100k-plus daily active users.
Wrote detailed project plans and Gantt charts with thousands of interdependencies across cross-functional teams, then implemented and ran those projects.
Headed our special projects division, providing customized beta services and pilot projects for new clients and existing partners looking to test innovative approaches.
Portfolio



Corporate Brand, Recruiting, and HCM




Fintech and Financial Products
AI, LLM, and ML


NGOs and Social Causes







Publishing and Legacy Media
eCommerce and Apps






Gamification and Community
Localization







OTT Streaming and Live Events
SaaS Tools and Marketplaces



Who I’ve Helped
Skills and Tools
Project and Product Management
Airtable, Asana, Confluence, GTM strategy, Jira, Miro, Monday, MS Project, MVP planning, POCs, Sharepoint, Smartsheet, Trello, Visio, Zendesk.
Code and Dev Tools
Algolia, API Integrations, AWS S3, AWS SES, C, Elasticsearch, HTML/CSS, Javascript, Pyton, SQL, SSO, Typescript, Zapier.
UX/UI and Design
Adobe Xd, Balsamiq, Canva, Figma, InVision, Zeplin.
OTT and Streaming
OTT: Kaltura, OBS Studio, Streamlabs, Vidyard, Vimeo OTT, Wistia.
Streaming: Facebook Live, Instagram live, Rumble, TikTok Live, Twitch, Twitter #GoLive, YouTube Live.
Administrative
Both the Microsoft and Google administrative ecosystems, including Outlook/Gmail, Slides/PowerPoint, Excel/Sheets (with advanced functions), and Word/Docs.
CMS and Enterprise Tools
Adobe Experience Manager, ADP, Drupal, FluentCRM, Hubspot, iCIMS, Mailchimp, MailerLite, NetSuite, Salesforce, Shopify, Sitecore, Squarespace, Webflow, Wix, WordPress, Workday, Zoho.
Experimentation and Testing
A/B and Multivariate Testing, AB Tasty, Adobe Target, Amplitude, Clarity, Crazy Egg, Hotjar, Kameleoon, Optimizely.
App Development
Appsmith, Bubble, FlutterFlow, Glide.
Ads, Affiliate, and Monetization
AdSense, Amazon Associates, Awin, CJ Affiliate, ClickBank, Impact, MaxBounty, Media.net, Outbrain, Rakuten, Skimlinks, Taboola.
Analytics, Tracking, and Dashboards
Firebase, Google Analytics, Google Search Console, Looker Studio, Power BI, Qlik Sense, SEMRush, Tableau.
AI, ML, and LLM
ChatGPT, Claude, Copilot, Custom GPTs, DeepSeek, Gemini, Perplexity.
Marketing Channels
Amazon SNS, Gleam, Hootsuite, Klaviyo, Later, Mailchimp (+SMS), Pushly, Sprinklr, Sprout, Substack, Twilio, Zoho.
Community Engagement and Gamification
BuddyBoss, BuddyPress, Bunchball Nitro, FluentCommunity, GamiPress, Gleam, JiveX, Khoros, SurveyGizmo, SurveyMonkey, Youzify.