
Mike Benedetto
Verified Expert in Marketing
Brand Marketing Strategy Expert
Chicago, IL, United States
Toptal member since November 8, 2024
Mike is an experienced marketing expert who focuses on creating original products, campaigns, and deliverables that meet clients' business goals. He has served as a team lead, mentoring junior designers and actively contributing to brainstorming sessions. His strength lies in thoroughly researching and understanding what makes a successful design. A great collaborator, Mike quickly builds on others' ideas and encourages them to do their best.
Project Highlights
Expertise
- Adobe Suite
- Client Presentations
- Graphic Design
- Photoshop CC
- Research
- User Experience (UX)
- Websites
- Wireframing
Work Experience
Senior Visual and Marketing Designer
SAMMS Healthcare
- Designed a conference exhibit booth, marketing collateral, and social media posts for SAMMS Healthcare Group's market relaunch. The booth design substantially increased foot traffic at conferences held over previous years.
- Researched high-impact keywords and integrated them into page titles, website content, alt tags, image descriptions, and image names, employing search engine optimization (SEO).
- Performed a full website upgrade, bringing their website from two pages to a fully SEO-primed lead capture tool, delivering a steady stream of direct and organic search visitors compared to virtually none beforehand.
Design Lead and Marketing Manager
Cyclotron Group
- Designed and optimized web and landing pages, resulting in a 25% increase in user engagement and a 15% decrease in bounce rates, enhancing user experience.
- Produced and hosted webinars and events with partners, including Microsoft, generating over 500 new leads and boosting brand visibility.
- Developed a comprehensive library of recorded webinars, improving internal training and increasing sales enablement effectiveness.
- Boosted the social media engagement rate by 350% in 2023, leading to a notable increase in brand awareness and customer interaction.
Senior Visual and Marketing Designer
Netrix Global
- Increased user engagement by 25% by utilizing Adobe Creative Suite and Figma to design infographics, landing pages, and HTML emails.
- Managed the concept and brand development and oversaw the implementation of a new B2B product, contributing to the B2B product launch.
- Developed and executed marketing campaigns and social media strategies, driving a 40% increase in online engagement and lead generation.
- Created, conceived, and worked with other designers to execute logos, illustrations, and infographics for company products, services, and events, improving communication response rates.
- Generated over 1,000 new leads and enhanced brand visibility through event and webinar management while working within the team environment to create, promote, and host events and webinars.
- Edited and published webinar recordings, establishing a comprehensive video library that improved training efficiency and increased sales enablement effectiveness.
- Developed wireframes and mockups for websites and applications to improve user interface design, enhancing user experience and increasing conversion rates by up to 20%.
Design and Brand Lead
liQuidprint
- Managed the design and branding for multiple B2B and business-to-consumer projects simultaneously as a boutique web design firm grew from 3 employees to 25, leading to a portfolio with an annual contract value of $2 million.
- Worked with clients from small- to medium-sized B2B and B2C companies across a range of industries, including real estate, eCommerce, manufacturing, and healthcare.
- Initiated and led a culture initiative to clearly articulate company mission and values. Led workshops and drove culture initiatives.
- Directed and mentored designers, front-end developers, and video producers.
Project History
Conference Booth Design for SAMMS Healthcare Group
Increased foot traffic to the SAMMS Healthcare Group conference booth by designing a creative solution. Produced content on LinkedIn that promoted the company's presence at the conference.
SAMMS provides a software solution to clinics that treat patients for substance abuse. At their first conference after breaking off from their parent company, SAMMS needed an impactful conference booth.
To ensure the graphics were effective, I contextualized the design elements, helping the client visualize how the pieces would fit together and what the final product would look like. Through many iterations and tight collaboration with the client, I developed a design that contributed to a noticeable increase in foot traffic compared to previous years’ conferences. I also sourced vendors that could deliver the solution within the client’s budget.
In addition, I facilitated the production of a 2-minute animated informational video and oversaw the writing, design, printing, and delivery of collateral. To further boost visibility, I created LinkedIn video posts to promote SAMMS’ presence at the event.
The SAMMS team reported a substantial increase in foot traffic compared to previous years. I hope the research and work put into the design contributed to that success.
Collaboration Services Design and Marketing for Netrix Global
Increased user engagement by 25% by employing Adobe Creative Suite and Figma to design infographics, landing pages, and HTML emails. Boosted online engagement and lead generation by 40% by creating marketing campaigns and social media strategies.
Netrix Global, an IT solutions company, was looking for a way to differentiate itself from other players in the industry. Although Netrix had the full Microsoft 365 E5 toolkit, so did many of its competitors.
In order to stand apart, Netrix provided additional services that others did not—specifically, envisioning and user adoption. These services helped shape the entire client experience, from initial ideation to end-user adoption.
With the services, I realized that Netrix could be seen as a comprehensive guide, encompassing the entire process. I proposed the concept of the guide, designed and built the page, and wrote the copy.
To clarify the full scope of Netrix’s services to potential clients, I also created an infographic that illustrated the company’s comprehensive offerings, from envisioning to post-deployment support.
Collaborating with the marketing team, I developed the Collaboration Services page in Figma, settling on a winner through communication with Collaboration Services stakeholders. Finally, I implemented and deployed the solution in WordPress.
Website and SEO Overhaul for SAMMS Healthcare
Led a complete website upgrade, improving the design, SEO, and overall content, transforming the website from two pages into a fully-fledged, information-rich website.
In the buildout, I enhanced the website by populating it with photos of people throughout and adding a video in the hero area to make the website more dynamic and inviting. I also built the content and added a How It Works section to showcase the animated video.
I researched high-impact keywords and integrated them into page titles, website content, alt tags, image descriptions, and image names for SEO.
As a result, the website is now an effective SEO-boosted brochure architected on a modest budget.
Education
Master's Degree in Fine Arts
University of Chicago - Chicago, IL, USA
Bachelor's Degree in Fine Arts
School of the Art Institute of Chicago - Chicago, IL, USA
Bachelor's Degree in Architecture
Washington University in St. Louis - St. Louis, MO, USA
Certifications
Diversity in Marketing
Microsoft
Social Media Marketing
HubSpot Academy
Generative AI for Business Leaders
LinkedIn Learning
UX Reasearch
Springboard
Design Thinking
Interactive Design Foundation
Skills
Core
Branding, Marketing, Email Campaigns, Digital Marketing Strategy, SEO Tools, Social Media, Infographics, Brand Strategy, Digital Marketing, Social Media Marketing (SMM), Brand Marketing, Ad Campaigns, Email Marketing, Email Automation, Search Engine Optimization (SEO), Copywriting, Marketing Strategy, Local SEO, Organic SEO
Platforms & Tools
Adobe Suite, Google Analytics, Mailchimp, Canva
Business Models
Business to Business (B2B), B2B
Other
Zoom, Photoshop CC, Microsoft PowerPoint, Research, PowerPoint Design, Event Marketing, Internal Communications, Corporate Culture, Creative Problem Solving, Presentations, Communication, Drafting, Teamwork, Client Presentations, Graphics, Graphic Design, Websites, Case Studies, Email Design, Landing Page Design, Design, Drip Email, Creativity, Brand Identity, Web Design, Web UI, Web UX, Web Design Strategy, Art Direction, Creative Briefs, Stakeholder Management, Brand Development, Technology, Slack, Microsoft Teams, Figma, User Experience (UX), WordPress, Semrush, Act-On, B2B Marketing, Budgeting, Drip Campaigns, Event Planning, Virtual Events, Videography, Photography, Printing, Drawing, Complex Problem Solving, Project Management, Wireframing, ChatGPT, SEO Copywriting, AI Prompts, UX Research, User Behavior, User Interviews, Luxury Industry, Digital Newsletters, Email Content, Product Ideation, Website CMS, AI-based Content SEO, Technical SEO, Healthcare, Partnership Marketing, Relationship Management, AI Ethics, Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion (DEI), User Testing, Data-driven Decision-making, Paid Search, Channel Management
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