Kurt Carpenter

I’m a digital producer with deep experience in technical production and operations.

I like to build things.

I’m a digital craftsman. I like to build smart things. Beautiful things. Entertaining things. But always things that make a difference for clients. See things I’ve built.

I love to help.

Clients. Agencies. Teams. We’re all in it together. I’ve got a big bag of tricks and I love being able to pull tools from that bag of experience that will help a project. There’s nothing like the feeling of seeing someone you’ve helped succeed and knowing that you were a part of that success. See who I’ve helped.

I’m passionate.

About life. About work. About creating memorable digital experiences founded on insightful strategy, effortless usability, inspired creative and robust analytics. It’s the passion for creating great work that drives me forward and keeps me asking, “How can I help you?”

Connect with me:

PROFILE

A digital producer with deep experience in technical production and operations and broad experience supporting all phases of development and management across digital channels including social media, mobile, and online advertising. Fueled by a passion for excellence and innovation, driven by usability and dedicated to pushing the boundaries of interactive experiences with the ability to motivate teams to achieve objectives. Solid grasp of both Agile and Waterfall project management methodologies with significant experience supporting all phases of SDLC including scoping, resource allocation, risk assessment, mitigation planning, user acceptance testing and deployment.

CORE COMPETENCIES

Website and application builds
Workflow process optimization
Rich-media advertising campaigns
User experience design
Project management
Quality assurance
Vendor selection and oversight
Research and analysis

EXPERIENCE

Kurt Carpenter ConsultingOld Tappan, NJ

Digital Producer2013 - Present

Provide expertise in digital production, project management and technology consulting to clients ranging from advertising agencies and software development firms to publishers and start-up businesses. Selected clients include:

Coty Inc, New York – Senior Technical Project Manager, Global Digital IT. Provided technology vendor selection, contract negotiation, technical management, coordination and Network Operations Center (NOC) support for all digital experiences in the Coty brand portfolio such as Calvin Klein Fragrances, Rimmel, and Sally Hansen. Selected projects include:
– Led an Amazon Web Services (AWS) migration of all Coty digital properties including data-driven web sites, microsites, Facebook and mobile applications requiring daily coordination of geographically distributed development teams and technology partners.
– Coordinated client-side effort for global rollout of a +$1 million contract with Sprinklr, an enterprise social media management platform for paid, owned, and earned media. Led initiatives to enable Single Sign On (SSO) across desktop and mobile apps, User Generated Content (UGC) marketing approval tracking system, as well as end user training and platform adoption.
McCann Health, Parsippany, NJ – Senior Project Manager supporting digital marketing efforts including website builds, email marketing and HTML5 banners for a healthcare marketing agency servicing clients such as GlaxoSmithKline, Allergan and Eisai.
Jack Morton Worldwide, New York – Lead Technologist and digital producer providing technical consulting, project management, and front-end development for clients of a leading brand experience agency. Successfully led website redesign and launch effort for agency client requiring data-driven, responsive design with parallax effect supported across mobile, tablet and desktop devices. Selected client engagements include: Verizon, Capital One, Emblem Health and Brillio.
KittyHawk Digital – Provided project management, digital production and quality assurance for software development projects. Contributed UX/UI design and project management for .NET based proprietary content management system built for the secondary education market. Selected client engagements include: Zoetis, Celgene, TIDAL, and Bronx Arena High School.

SidewaysNew York, NY

Executive Digital Producer2014 - 2015

Provided digital project management and consulting services to clients of Arcade Creative Group, a division of Sony Music Entertainment, such as American Express, KPMG, Sony and Bahamas National Festival Commission. Authored statements of work, developed production budgets, project timelines, staffing allocations, project reporting and change management as well as contributed to new business development efforts. Led cross-functional teams on digital projects from scoping, discovery and design phases to development, user acceptance testing and deployment. Selected client engagements:

American Express Serve – Coordinated efforts of digital team for a redesign and re-engineering of a responsive website covering all phases from discovery to user experience and visual design and implementation with external development team.
Bahamas Junkanoo Carnival – Orchestrated tactical efforts of digital team charged with the creation of inaugural launch campaign elements such as landing page, display and text banners, digital signage and billboards in Times Square.
Sony Brand Lab – Established project scope and direction for a vertical market website targeted to entertainment and brand professionals designed to consolidate and present the full suite of capabilities from music licensing, artist creative, merchandising, tour support and professional services offered under the Sony Music Entertainment brand corporate umbrella.

Sigma GroupUpper Saddle River, NJ

Director, Interactive Production2009 - 2013

Defined and refined digital production, quality assurance and review processes to expand load capacity, increase speed to market and provide the highest standards of digital production to agency clients. Gathered business and technology requirements for client projects, provided analysis and recommendations for technology partner selection, and conducted contract negotiations with partners. Served as Subject Matter Expert on digital production and provided education for Account Services team to raise awareness and understanding of both strategic and technical issues. Mentored junior staff in production best practices, executional techniques and creative problem solving. Successfully managed the production, development and deployment of HTML email campaigns on behalf of agency clients with commercial Email Service Providers (ESP) and vendors. Demonstrated strong Content Management System (CMS) skills, including providing technical support and training for clients. Led cross-functional digital production team to develop mobile applications for iOS with efforts ranging from visual asset generation and data formatting to device testing. Selected client engagements: Panasonic, Pert Plus, NUK, Gerber, BRUT, Infusium, Famous Footwear, Plum Benefits and Ciao Bella Gelato.

Instituted standardized agency processes for digital workflow management from concept to deployment resulting in higher team productivity, minimized miscommunication and effort duplication which enabled delivery of high quality products on time and budget.
Led agency initiative to implement an open source Digital Asset Management (DAM) solution to achieve a reduction in server overhead by eliminating duplicate assets, facilitating asset discovery and removing confusion for agency staff with version control.
Managed the production and launch efforts of Toughworld, an experiential website for Panasonic Toughbook computers, which helped the agency win the 2009 AdAge Northeast Small Agency of the Year award.
Received Sigma’s annual Asteri Award (2009) for most significant contribution to the success of the agency.

TracyLockeNew York, NY

Manager, Rich Media2008 - 2009

Provided interactive expertise on rich-media site builds and online advertising campaigns to internal client teams. Created prototypes for widgets, electronic signage, and mobile applications. Evangelized rich media technologies.

Managed corporate website redesign project. Led agency-side development process of Rich Internet Application (RIA) build featuring a dynamic content-driven modular architecture, web analytics and SEO optimized URLs.
Consulted on media buying strategy for client seeking to maximize ROI of interactive campaigns by shifting media purchase model from cost-per-impression (CPM) towards cost-per-action (CPA) and geo targeting users.
Developed HTML email communication template for monthly eNewsletter designed to strengthen the agency-client dialogue and demonstrate thought leadership on emerging trends in the beverage industry.

Digitas, Inc.New York, NY

Software Engineer, Rich Media2003 - 2008

Developed rich-media banner advertisements for clients such as American Express, Samsung, CNN, The New York Times, and Pfizer. Subject Matter Expert for DoubleClick rich media ad-serving platform and an experienced developer for other platforms such as MediaMind, PointRoll, and Flashtalking. Partnered with Media Operations team to ensure that user interaction tracking data was being properly captured and publisher site technical specifications were met.

American Express Travel: 2007 IAB MIXX Award winner in Super-Rich Media category for American Express Stress-Free Travel campaign. Developed in-page video banner featuring dynamic delivery of real-time streaming video from third-party webcam feed provider. Developed expandable banner featuring multi-language audio clips, printable PDFs and downloadable cell phone ringtones that required data interaction with third-party ringtone vendor.
CNN: Leveraged existing client-side RSS feed for automated generation of XML to deliver dynamic content to an in-page video banner that accessed assets directly from the client’s content delivery network (CDN). Developed custom solution for client that enabled dynamic generation of tracking tags within a DoubleClick banner component by utilizing undocumented features in the API.

Digitas, Inc.New York, NY

Senior Interactive Designer2000 - 2003

Provided art direction, creative services, project management, and production coordination to Creative teams across marketing initiatives. Built animated and static advertisements, web page layouts, digital POS device graphics, sitemaps, prepare and optimize graphics for web, detail page architecture for developers, and contribute user interface design. Partnered with Marketing and Development teams to ensure creative remained on-strategy and technical specifications were met. Contributed to project postmortems to share key learnings and recommendations for future projects. Selected client engagements: American Express, Pfizer, Barnes & Noble, The New York Times, AOL, Allstate Insurance, AT&T, Dun & Bradstreet, Ann Taylor, and Starwood Hotels.

American Express: OPEN: The Small Business Network℠ - core Creative member of 20-person team tasked with executing a 360° brand transformation of the Small Business Services unit. Project included product launch, microsite creation, brand awareness and card acquisition campaigns, and direct mail pieces.
Pfizer: MSLifeLines.com/Rebif.com - contributed to development of creative asset management system to track unique graphics and minimize asset inventory; provided creative support to 9-person team through design, development and site launch stages.