Data Science

TIM H. WENTZLAFF

**** **** ****, ***. ** · Bronx, NY 10471 · 718-***-**** (h)

********@*******.*** · https://www.linkedin.com/in/tim-wentzlaff-3b6252a

Data Science and Analytics professional with over 20 years of experience developing and supporting data-driven Advertising, Consumer Marketing, and New Product Development initiatives. Track record of moving the business forward with analytics, leading by doing, actualizing team member performance, and providing stability in the midst of corporate change.

SKILLS

Telling the story embedded within the data; Explaining complex topics to non-technical audiences; Cross-functional teamwork; Mentoring and managing staff; Machine Learning; Multivariate Statistics; Experimental Design (A/B and Multivariate); Customer Segmentation; LTV; Advertising Targeting and ROI analysis; Customer Profiling; Demand Forecasting; Ad-hoc analysis with large customer files; Survey data; Click-stream data; SAS; Python; SQL; Looker; AWS; Snowflake.

EXPERIENCE

MEREDITH CORPORATION (Dotdash Meredith as of 12/21), New York, NY February 2018 – Present

Senior Director, Advanced Analytics

Meredith-Time Inc. Integration: Part of a broad team made up of both legacy Time Inc. and legacy Meredith employees responsible for integrating the data, analytical processes, and analytical staff following Meredith’s purchase of Time Inc. on February 1st, 2018. Led a team of 8 legacy Time Inc. direct reports through the challenging, year-long transition period when job titles and specific roles within the new organization were uncertain. A key participant in the conversations which resulted in raising job titles for 5 Des Moines-based legacy Meredith staff members rather than lowering job titles for the 4 New York-based legacy Time Inc. staff members chosen to join their legacy Meredith team.

Post Integration Focus: Tapped to build out the modeling and analytical capabilities of the newly formed Advanced Analytics team in April of 2019, reporting to its Executive Director and managing 3 to 4 analysts based in Bangalore, India. Key group level responsibilities include working with various internal Meredith groups to both enhance and utilize the site content viewing behavior and related data maintained within the “Meredith User Profile (MUP)”, a data source consisting of aggregated digital data for 400MM+ visitors to the Meredith network over a rolling 90-day time period. Profiled frequent individual website as well as network-wide visitors with MUP data to help inform new digital product development for the Consumer Revenue team working in conjunction with Meredith’s President of Digital and Chief Strategy Officer. Currently using MUP data to explore and test different content targeting/recommendation methodologies to provide personalized experiences for site visitors and E-Newsletter subscribers. Work to date indicates that even simple methodologies can generate 5%+ lifts in click rates as well as significantly reduce the time Marketers spend on manual content curation for newsletters.

Ad Product Creation and Measurement: Member of a small group of legacy Time Inc. staff who socialized the idea of using lookalike modeling in conjunction with offline name DMP onboarding to bridge the gap between survey research and online audience activation at scale. As a result, the activation of key segments identified through surveys conducted on Meredith’s research panels is now a service offered to Meredith’s advertising clients. Employed the methodology to activate a Beauty category client’s custom personas as well as create a suite of brand-specific “fandom” audiences within several different product categories. Sales against the fandom as well as other survey-derived audiences generate approximately $2MM in ad revenue on an annual basis. Coordinated efforts with NCS to enable Sales Effect measurement for CPG campaigns targeting these proprietary customer groups.

Automated Modeling Tool Development: Led the conversion of a SAS-based modeling system into Python so that it could serve as the driver behind the automated modeling functionality of Meredith’s “360-Degree View of the Consumer” platform. Involvement included not only writing the Requirements document and providing conceptual guidance for the primary programmers but personally developing and testing code as well. Models built in the 360 platform by the Audience Targeting team generate ~113MM impressions and ~$1.6MM in digital ad revenue annually.

TIME INC., New York, NY September 1997 – January 2018

Senior Director, Database Marketing Analytics (2/15 to 1/18)

Overview

Tenure and Business Impact: A 20-year member of an internal consulting group charged with using data to optimize the profitability of advertising and marketing efforts for Time Inc.’s portfolio of magazine titles. Hands-on statistical modeling, experimental design, profiling, ad-hoc analysis, and name selections to support Targeted Advertising (both print and digital), Customer Retention (Renewals, Billing, Loyalty/Value-Add), Customer Acquisition (Direct Mail, Email, Paid Media, Social, Digital), List Rental, and new product development programs generating $20MM+ in annual revenue.

People Skills: Managed, developed, and provided thought leadership for up to 10 direct reports located both on-site and offshore. Interacted with a variety of staff levels (Assistant Marketing Manager to C-Suite Executive) from various internal divisions (Marketing, Advertising, Finance, IT, Legal, Research, List Processing), external vendors (Acxiom, Experian, Epsilon, NCS, BlueKai, LiveRamp), agencies (Starcom), advertisers (GM, SONY, AMEX, SAKS) and consulting firms (McKinsey, Boston Consulting Group, IBB) to pitch analytical projects, make test recommendations, present completed work, set up advertising ROI measurement programs, discuss budget/contract/SOW concerns, and assess new data sources, analytical tools, and platforms.

Promotion Pathway: Promoted from Analyst to Senior Analyst (1999) to Manager (2000) to Assistant Director (2007) to Director (2010) to Senior Director (2015) with accompanying broader business function support responsibilities (Customer Retention, 1997 – 2018; Advertising, 2000 – 2018; Customer Acquisition/List Rental, 2007 – 2018).

Awards: A member of three cross-functional teams awarded a Time Inc. President’s Award and two Consumer Marketing Achievement Awards for initiatives incorporating modeling and segmentation work.

Select Time Inc. Highlights

Innovative Ad Targeting: Substantive advertising work in both the print and digital space included developing targeted programs with ROI measurement capabilities for Retail, Apparel, Telecommunications, Financial Services, Automotive, Consumer Packaged Goods, Insurance, Travel, Pharmaceutical, and Electronics category clients utilizing lookalike modeling, lifestyle interests, and/or demographics. Modeled a CPG client’s online segments defined by content viewing behavior using Time Inc.’s DMP onboarded offline data elements to facilitate targeting lookalikes in print. The ability to link the online and offline worlds turned a planned $200K national ad buy across three titles into a $1MM targeted program benefiting six.

Data-Optimized Customer Acquisition and Retention: To facilitate subscriber acquisition and retention contact strategy, optimize offer characteristics (price, term, premium, credit card continuous service, drive to web), creative personalization, and new product development, profiled key customer groups, built propensity models, and explored customer segmentation schemes based on demographics, survey identified customer personas, and/or clustering of subscribers based on their historical cross-brand and marketing channel purchasing behavior.

Experimental Design for a Test and Learn Culture: Consulted on sample size and significance levels for countless A/B tests including those set up to show no impact as well as accept more risk in order to grow smaller, niche programs. Part of an interdepartmental team that worked with an outside consulting company to design, implement, and analyze a Placket-Burman screening design to simultaneously test 24 new ideas for increasing renewal rates. Using in-house analytical tools, designed and analyzed two fractional factorial tests measuring the impact of various price, premium, creative, and offer-related factors on renewal rates. To help inform roll-out decisions, calculated changes in expected revenue and net subscribers based on offers made up of various winning factor combinations.

Marketing Mix/Econometric Modeling to Answer Macro Level Questions: Built a model to predict the impact on total audience size (buyers plus pass-along readers) of various subscription acquisition and retention channels. The model was used to recommend the number of Waiting Room copies Fortune Magazine should invest in to obtain a 5% lift in their audience numbers. During the “Great” economic recession and accompanying sharp downturn in advertising revenue, built a model directly for the then CFO of Time Inc. to forecast YOY ad revenue changes from various economic indicators. The model was used from 2009 - 2013 to manage the advertising revenue expectations of Time Inc.'s senior leadership team.

EDUCATION

M.S., Applied Statistics, Teachers College of Columbia University, New York, NY, 1997.

Coursework from Columbia University’s Teachers College, Mathematical Statistics, Business School, and Bio-Statistics divisions.

M.A., Physical Chemistry, Columbia University, New York, NY, 1990.

National Science Foundation fellowship honorable mention.

B.A., Chemistry, St. Olaf College, Northfield, MN, 1989.

Summa Cum Laude, Phi Beta Kappa.

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