Nick F.

Nick F.

Senior Product Designer

West Orange, NJ, United States of America
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About Me

I am a creative strategist helping teams gain actionable insights into products they create, focusing on maximizing clarity, efficiency and purpose. I have agency and client-side experience leading UI/UX and other cross-functional teams to build highly-trafficked and innovative consumer, retail, enterprise & b2b, websites and apps. My qualitative research methods help inform feature prioritization, product roadmap & vision, while my pixel-perfect designs ensure the solution is communicated with the utmost respect for user’s time.

Work history

UpStack
UpStack
UX/UI Designer
2020 - Present (4 years)
Remote
  • Create and design web-ready digital content to support development initiatives or marketing projects.

  • Direct creative concepts and adhere to project guidelines to execute campaigns according to business needs.

  • Collaborate with the creative team to ensure designs and deliverables are being completed efficiently and on-time.

Four Lights Creative
Four Lights Creative
Lead UX Research, Design & Strategy Consultant
2020 - Present (4 years)
Greater New York City Area, United States of America
  • Generate qualitative and quantitative research insights to drive user growth and retention

  • Audit UX, UI, and analytics; conduct usability tests and competitive analysis to inform feature prioritization, product roadmap & vision

  • Craft clean, impactful and value-driven designs with “content-first” strategy for responsive websites, iOS, Android and enterprise apps

STATIONHEAD
STATIONHEAD
Head of Product Design
2018 - 2020 (2 years)
Greater New York City Area, USA
  • Performed 300+ user tests with 1,500+ potential and current users in addition to monthly qualitative exploratory and evaluative user research

  • Led iOS, Android & Web product design and tech teams to re-design and launch an award-winning music + talk social radio app

  • Re-designed and launched a fully responsive/adaptive, mobile, tablet, and desktop marketing sites targeting users, investors and press

Toys"R"Us
Toys"R"Us
Senior UX Designer
2017 - 2018 (1 year)
New York, USA
  • Led UX & UI team to redesign, test and launch a responsive omni-channel path to purchase experience, serving 40 million monthly unique visitors

  • Revamped site taxonomy and navigation based on competitive analysis, web analytics, SEO, and 100+ card sort and tree testing sessions

  • Discovered traffic patterns and conversion from primary, utility and footer navigation menus to identify hierarchy of content sought by shoppers, across different devices.

Crowdtap
Crowdtap
UX Research Consultant
2017 - 2017
Greater New York City Area, USA
  • Built prototypes and established frameworks for usability testing of a new Q&A iPhone app / marketing insights platform used by Fortune 50 clients

  • Introduced slow rhythm process for collecting stories and developing empathy with people (clients and consumers) the organization supports

  • Discovered a foundation for business opportunities and future features, by using essential user key themes in the Q&A space.

MediaMath
MediaMath
Lead UX/UI Consultant
2016 - 2017 (1 year)
Greater New York City Area, USA
  • Led user research, design studio, prototyping and usability testing for Bulk Editing and Tear-Sheet apps in the T1 ad-tech platform (8bn impressions/day)

  • Conducted audit of 24 data analytics apps, developed a UX strategy for and trained MediaMath's Analytics team in UX design principles, heuristics, user research and usability testing

  • Established UX/UI standards and defined complex workflow requirements for apps and labs developed by the Technology Solutions team

MerchantCantos
MerchantCantos
Lead UX Consultant
2016 - 2016
Greater New York City Area, USA
  • UX lead in Brunswick Group’s creative agency focusing on web strategy and design projects for Fortune 500 companies, top universities, and NGOs

  • Created information architectures, content strategies and designs based on insights from user research, stakeholder interviews, competitive analysis and web analytics

  • Conducted extensive research within the creative communication industry in pieces, with opportunity to bring a comprehensive, enhanced experience for future users.

Independent Consultant
Independent Consultant
UX, Product & Business Strategy
2014 - 2016 (2 years)
San Francisco, CA New York, NY, USA
  • Designed simple, enjoyable and rewarding cross-channel experiences for users of mobile apps, responsive sites and other digital products

  • Advised in identifying competitive product strategies, analyzing funding opportunities, and implementing value-driven initiatives

  • Built operating and financial models to forecast cash flows, investor returns, and funding needs used in budgeting and capital raising

Live365
Live365
Manager, Finance & Operations
2012 - 2013 (1 year)
San Francisco Bay Area, USA
  • Initiated ad inventory optimization analysis reducing unsold ad inventory by 40%

  • Identified and implemented reporting of operational and financial KPI metrics to achieve full business transparency.

  • Re-modeled music royalty calculations based on current agreements with US and UK performance rights organizations

Avenue Live
Avenue Live
Head of Product & UX
2012 - 2014 (2 years)
Wayne, Pennsylvania, USA
  • Designed a voice-powered mobile streaming and e-commerce platform, with 1,300 influencer profiles ($2mm budget)

  • Conducted industry research; conceived product specs, authored a patent

  • Initiated on-boarding marketing campaign resulting in 1,300+ claimed profiles

Live365
Live365
Director, New Products
2012 - 2014 (2 years)
San Francisco Bay Area, USA
  • Oversaw the company’s growth strategy as a key advisor to CEO on rebuilding the internet’s largest broadcaster platform, with over 5000 professional broadcasters.

  • Designed interactive music, sports, education, and comedy iOS & Android apps used by industry’s content creators, curators and consumers

  • Managed budget and operational reporting for broadcasting, VIP and advertising groups

BandReject
Manager & Digital Strategist
2011 - 2012 (1 year)
New York, USA
  • Successfully managed four national-touring artists, while ensuring a high level of exposure.

  • Oversaw cross-channel digital strategy for content promotion, distribution and amplification.

  • Lead and helped a cross-functional team to develop ideas that brought together brand goals and objectives.

DTE Energy
DTE Energy
Sr. Strategy and M&A Analyst
2008 - 2011 (3 years)
Ann Arbor, Mi, USA
  • Spearheaded a competitive auction for the company’s natural gas assets resulting in $15mm savings for the Michigan energy consumer

  • Developed a 3-5 year energy efficiency strategy to ensure alignment with legislative and financial goals

  • Identified and valued four diversified energy companies for cash and stock purchase

Citi Investment Banking
Citi Investment Banking
M&A Analyst
2006 - 2008 (2 years)
New York, USA
  • Valued multinational companies under various strategic scenarios using DCF, LBO, and Accretion/Dilution analyses

  • Executed a variety of global M&A transactions in the energy, power, technology, communications, and consumer industries

  • Liaised with executives, but also delivered board and management presentations and led site visits.

BPW Capital Advisors
Intern, Fund of Hedge Funds
2005 - 2005
New York, USA
  • Performed extensive peer group, evolution, and correlation analyses for current and prospective hedge fund managers

  • Built relationships with the executives of potential target investments.

  • Achieved goals in a shorter span, by effectively using analyses of gathered data.

IBWJ, Inc
President, Co-Fonder
2004 - 2006 (2 years)
New York, USA
  • Founded first deal-aggregator financial publication with revenue stream, in market research reports and advertising.

  • Promoted the publication and managed to engage and employ 17 Columbia and NYU students.

  • Advertised publication reached over 3000 subscribers, across 100 undergrad and business schools.

Portfolio

Stationhead, Head of Product Design
Stationhead, Head of Product Design

Stationhead offers the only mobile social radio platform for radio hosts to create talk and music shows, call guests on air, while interacting with their community. As Head of Product Design, I had led a team of UI, UX and interraction designers to define and execute the company's product strategy for redesigning and launching iOS, Android and Web apps, which resulted in 10X user growth, a 40% retention improvement per 30 days, an extensive media coverage as well as significant press and investor interests.

Lead UX/UI Designer, Toys "R" Us
Lead UX/UI Designer, Toys "R" Us

Toys "R" Us is and international clothing, toy and baby products retail company. Being the Lead UX/UI designer, I engaged all relevant stakeholders to identify the problem and explore, design and test navigation architecture solutions. The result was a refined, flattened taxonomy and a fully responsive mega navigation, utility and footer menu incorporating site analytics, SEO recommendations, competitive analysis, opinion labs and user testing.

Lead UX Researcher/Strategist, Crowdtap
Lead UX Researcher/Strategist, Crowdtap

Crowdtap is an online community, in which users receive extrinsic incentives for providing opinions related to Fortune 50 companies. As the Lead UX Researcher/Strategist, I worked with a team of 3 designers, being responsible for defining and executing company UX strategy, as it related to user research, usability testing, feature prioritization, prototyping and interaction design.

Lead UX Designer, MediaMath
Lead UX Designer, MediaMath

MediaMath is a leading programmatic company in the ad tech industry, responsible for transacting about 8 billion impressions per day. As the Lead UX Designer, I have researched, designed and validated the T1 platform app, while establishing UX standards in the Technology Solutions team, including all 7 businesses and generating over 30 designs in a two-month time frame. The result was an innovative enterprise tool which can streamline a several hour-long process into a few minutes.

Education

Education
BA, Economics
Columbia University
2002 - 2006 (4 years)
Education
User Experience Design Immersive
General Assembly
Education
Master of Social Work - MSW
Rutgers University
Education
Post-bac, Psychology
University of California, Berkeley