Nan Zhang, Marketing Expert in Cary, NC, United States
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Nan Zhang

Bio

Nan is a senior insights manager with a PhD in marketing and extensive experience in survey research using Qualtrics and SurveyMonkey, along with statistical analysis and data storytelling. Nan has a proven ability to visualize data using Power BI and Tableau and is a seasoned expert in quantitative and qualitative market research methods. Her expertise enables her to turn complex data into actionable insights that drive strategic decision-making.

Project Highlights

App Content Preference Study
Spearheaded, designed, conducted, and reported a customer preference survey study.
Focus Group Study
Headed the design and insight analysis for feature updates in a leading healthcare app.
Media Sources and Purchase Funnel
Defined major media sources and analyzed the purchase funnel for a leading healthcare app.

Expertise

  • Data Analytics
  • Go-to-market (GTM) Strategies
  • Google Ads
  • Google Analytics 360
  • Marketing Automation
  • Marketing Research & Analysis
  • Return on Ad Spend (ROAS)
  • Visualization

Work Experience

GEO Marketing Expert

2026 - PRESENT
MindBridge Analytics Inc
  • Led a 90-day generative engine optimization (GEO) engagement as embedded strategist, pivoting the scope from a traditional SEO audit to a three-engine LLM visibility program (ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude) targeting enterprise finance buyers.
  • Conducted a full-stack brand and content audit spanning 50 canonical claims, 42 corroborating sources, 195 published media placements across 123 outlets, 12 Gartner analyst reports, and 63 verbatim prospect quotes.
  • Quantified AI-engine visibility through a 100-prompt baseline test across three LLMs, scoring the brand with its competitors on a weighted GEO scorecard while flagging the lead as fragile, and validating findings against GA4 data.
  • Delivered a prioritized, execution-ready improvement strategy ranking seven structural fixes by impact-to-effort, leading with entity consolidation and redirecting category-creation investment toward the generic query language buyers actually use.
  • Built a self-serve measurement and governance system — a three-engine master scorecard, single-page executive scorecard, and re-run kit with companion tracking spreadsheet.
  • Established a monthly spot-check, quarterly full-run, and post-implementation milestone cadence so the client can independently monitor LLM citation lift after handoff.

UX Research & Usability Program Leader (Mobile Validation)

2026 - PRESENT
Stanford University - Graduate School of Business
  • Led mobile fintech validation program defining target-market profiles, behavioral patterns, and preference matrices for a pre-launch product.
  • Designed, executed, and analyzed multi-modal user tests on product features; advised product, marketing, and executive leadership on go-to-market, UX design, and payment-model decisions.
  • Architected a multi-phase survey strategy validating GTM personas and end-user behaviors for the fintech app.

Influencer | Marketing Strategist

2026 - PRESENT
Apex Media Partners, LLC
  • Performed competitive analysis of influencer brands, focusing on brand awareness and growth strategy development.
  • Developed execution plans for 3-, 6-, and 12-month influencer initiatives, including bios and Instagram Reel, Carousel, and Story content schedules.
  • Aligned target audience profiles with influencer bios, content, hooks, and CTAs.

Marketing Analytics/CRO Expert

2025 - 2026
CPK Media, LLC
  • Partnered with executive marketing leadership to architect membership data governance from scratch — defining canonical rules, documentation standards, and multi-platform ingestion protocols across the subscription business.
  • Engineered AI-driven data automation pipelines transforming raw cross-platform data into executive-grade dashboards; deployed conversational LLM-powered agents that democratized analytics access for non-technical stakeholders.
  • Built and orchestrated front-end A/B testing infrastructure (VWO) for membership conversion pages; layered AI-powered visualization on test results for audience-friendly insight delivery.

Marketing Operations Expert

2025 - 2026
Worldwide Fertility Specialists, LLC
  • Implemented end-to-end marketing measurement architecture across Adobe Analytics, GA4, GTM, Meta, LinkedIn, and Pinterest — establishing unified attribution for an emerging specialty healthcare brand.
  • Designed and operationalized marketing campaign content automation workflows that scaled output without adding headcount.
  • Architected AI-driven social media marketing automation; programmed autonomous data agents and dashboards for the founder and marketing leadership.
  • Diagnosed enterprise email deliverability failures; engineered a sender-reputation warmup strategy that resolved rejection issues and restored campaign credibility.

Marketing Analytics Expert

2025 - 2026
Smile Doctors - Main
  • Directed enterprise "Buy vs. Build" evaluation, pivoting a stalled 18-month engineering initiative into a high-velocity 4-week Alpha rollout — compressing a 16-week timeline by 75% to meet board-level February deadlines.
  • Architected multi-platform data unification across 300+ brands and 500+ locations; engineered custom mapping layers and complex back-end SQL logic blending Adobe Analytics, Meta, GA4, and Google Search Console APIs into a single source of truth.
  • Designed persona-centric BI views for executives, clinicians, and regional managers; built proprietary geographic ("Geometric") attribution engine for real-time spend-to-conversion tracking and channel investment optimization.
  • Led TCO optimization by insourcing critical workstreams; instituted a "plumbing validation" framework and sprint cadence delivering a sub-7-day trial-to-rollout window across the national network.
  • Owned end-to-end SQL pipeline architecture, consolidating disparate API feeds into Adobe Analytics — eliminating data silos and establishing enterprise data-integrity standards.

Social Media Marketing Specialist

2025 - 2026
Tsinghua Shenzhen International Graduate School
  • Developed and executed targeted social campaigns across TikTok, LinkedIn, Instagram, and Facebook — tailoring content to diverse global audiences.
  • Engineered follower growth, engagement, and audience-interaction strategies to strengthen brand presence in the target market.
  • Optimized posting cadence via analytics-driven content strategy and coordinated cross-functional teams for messaging consistency.
  • Built actionable social strategies and execution playbooks — content calendars, platform-specific tactics, engagement initiatives.
  • Conducted competitive and benchmark research on 3 global competitors; assessed unique academic and industry positioning.

GA4 and GTM Expert

2025 - 2026
Vivun Inc
  • Audited and remediated GTM and Adobe Analytics implementations across multi-site, global web properties — established scalable governance for cross-region compliance.
  • Engineered HIPAA-compliant tracking architecture preventing unauthorized PII exposure within tag execution.
  • Led full GDPR compliance program for global digital properties — consent management deployment, regional tag zoning, and data residency controls.
  • Conducted enterprise web technical audits; deployed market-segmented tag strategies for reliable, audit-ready data collection and reporting.

Marketing Survey Expert

2025 - 2025
Slide Insurance - Main
  • Led a full-phase survey research program delivering brand-positioning insights for an insurance carrier across four coastal states.
  • Designed, fielded, and analyzed surveys targeting coastal homeowners in high-risk geographies in the US.
  • Engineered representative sampling frameworks ensuring statistical validity of insight delivery.

Marketing Analytics Expert

2025 - 2025
CELSIYA, INC.
  • Led a comprehensive funnel audit and rebuild in Mixpanel to improve patient engagement and conversion tracking. Conducted a full assessment of the company’s existing event structure, including how onboarding and follow-up engagement were tracked.
  • Redefined key funnel events, implemented a consistent tracking taxonomy, and built custom dashboards that visualized user journeys from initial sign-up to repeat engagement.
  • Analyzed drop-off points and optimized the activation flow, increasing conversion rates, delivering more personalized digital experiences, and turning complex behavioral data into clear, actionable insights for the growth and product teams.
  • Performed customer segmentation research and A/B testing for the app's major function design.
  • Integrated data governance and set up data rules for multi-platform data. Trained analysts and engineers to implement the data rules.

Marketing Operations/Business Intelligence Expert

2025 - 2025
Legacy South Builders, LLC
  • Identified underperforming channels and reallocated 25% of the marketing budget to higher-ROAS platforms, resulting in a 32% overall improvement in return on ad spend (ROAS).
  • Led a comprehensive multichannel marketing performance audit for a real estate company, covering display ads, paid search, social (Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram), and email marketing.
  • Optimized search ad keywords and negative match filters, improving click-through rate (CTR) by 18% and reducing cost per qualified lead (CPL) by 22%.
  • Implemented targeting refinements in Facebook and LinkedIn campaigns, boosting lead quality and reducing audience overlap, which led to a 15% decrease in wasted ad spend.
  • Streamlined email segmentation strategy, increasing email open rates by 12% and conversion rates by 9% through better timing and personalization.
  • Automated cross-platform reporting dashboards by building a media performance dashboard by connecting HubSpot, Google Sheets, and custom API feeds, enabling real-time visibility into PR campaign performance.

Senior Insights Manager

2023 - 2025
Instinct Science
  • Automated cross-platform reporting dashboards by building a media performance dashboard that connects Adobe Analytics, HubSpot, Google Sheets, and custom API feeds, providing real-time visibility into PR campaign performance.
  • Tracked customer metrics such as net promoter score (NPS) and customer satisfaction (CSAT) using SurveyMonkey and Qualtrics, collecting feedback from over 50,000 clients.
  • Developed customer insights by partnering with cross-functional teams, including data engineers, to extract and analyze data from Mixpanel and Google Analytics 4, and conducted statistical analysis using SPSS.
  • Improved HubSpot workflow efficiency by automating lead scoring and email campaign reporting using HubSpot and ChatGPT plug-ins, increasing campaign iteration speed and improving MQL conversion rate by 15%.
  • Developed AI-enabled brand monitoring reports by integrating ChatGPT with HubSpot and Google Sheets to auto-summarize daily media mentions and flag emerging sentiment trends, reducing manual analysis time by 40%.

Customer Research Manager

2018 - 2023
PEDAGO
  • Designed and implemented an interactive Tableau dashboard that integrated data from CRM systems, surveys, and operational datasets.
  • Set up Google Tag Manager to track website traffic sources and monitor customer retention using Google Analytics.
  • Managed all phases of survey projects, from design to insight delivery, using SurveyMonkey, and analyzed data with SPSS, applying techniques such as ANOVA, MANOVA, factor analysis, and SEM modeling.
  • Optimized internal workflow efficiency by conducting a full process audit for a virtual team and restructured content creation, client reporting, and task tracking workflows, cutting weekly reporting time by 30%.
  • Built a Google Suite-based collaboration hub by creating standardized templates and automation within Google Drive, Docs, and Sheets for intake forms, PR reports, and campaign summaries, improving remote team alignment.
  • Published peer-reviewed research in top academic journals, with a strong foundation in designing and communicating scholarly insights.
  • Taught MBA and EMBA students in AACSB-accredited U.S. colleges, specializing in breaking down complex theories into clear, accessible concepts.
  • Created educational videos and hosted webinars for adult learners.

Data Insights Manager

2014 - 2018
SurveyMonkey
  • Collaborated across time zones on workflow design by leading an async team across 4 time zones to co-design shared automation protocols, improving collaboration cadence, and project handoffs.
  • Performed ANOVA, regression, cluster analysis, structural equation modeling, and multivariate analysis on collected data to extract actionable insights.
  • Conducted consumer use habits research for clients such as Schneider Electric and The Farmer's Dog, created Tableau dashboards using data from over 200,000 respondents, and identified and tracked KPIs for clients' customer performance.

Assistant Professor

2013 - 2018
North Carolina Central University
  • Conducted in-depth research on consumer behavior and marketing strategy, utilizing SPSS to provide customer insights for both U.S. and international organizations.
  • Designed and executed surveys to explore the relationship between consumer psychological traits and social media behavior.
  • Performed a consumer needs survey for Duke Energy, using regression analysis and MANOVA to inform strategic decisions, which led to the development of forecasting models that improved client satisfaction by 20%.
  • Created educational videos, hosted webinars, and led online training sessions for global audiences hundreds of times, giving me the practical skills to design and deliver engaging, jargon-free content.
  • Taught MBA, EMBA, and PhD students on more than 20 marketing courses, including business leadership seminars and webinars.

Project History

App Content Preference Study

Spearheaded, designed, conducted, and reported a customer preference survey study.

I headed a customer preference survey for a leading U.S. veterinarian app, collaborating with the content and product teams to gather client feedback on potential content updates. I collected and analyzed the data, then presented key insights to the executive board, recommending a shift from long scrolling to a concise table of contents or keyword list. This change resulted in a 25% improvement in app content click rates.

Focus Group Study

Headed the design and insight analysis for feature updates in a leading healthcare app.

I led a focus group study for a leading veterinarian app, collaborating with the product team to design and conduct a focus group interview to explore client preferences for updated features. Based on the insights, I recommended adding “open all” and “close all” options and removing features that customers deemed unimportant. Following these changes, app usage increased by 12%.

Media Sources and Purchase Funnel

Defined major media sources and analyzed the purchase funnel for a leading healthcare app.

I set up and tracked media sources for the app using Google Analytics, identifying key sources—organic, paid, and referred—for first-touch interactions. I established the current purchase funnel and identified sources that were not contributing effectively. Based on the analysis, I recommended further studies to explore the inefficiencies of underperforming media channels.

Crash light Go-to-market Strategy

  • 70% — high potential market coverage, discovery of 70% of addressable market
  • Customer personas — Developed five detailed customer personas improving campaign targeting accuracy by an estimated 30%.
  • Marketing efficiency — Recommended social and geolocation marketing tactics projected to increase campaign ROI by 15–20%
  • Pricing strategy — Designed a tiered pricing model to capture 10% higher revenue per customer in premium segments.
  • **Offline launch ** — Proposed location strategy expected to boost event attendance by 40% in initial launch cities.

• The client lacked a clear understanding of their ideal customer profiles across regions.
• Difficulty aligning pricing strategy across three markets with different consumer expectations.

• Developed detailed customer personas for each target market based on psychographics, media consumption habits, and willingness to pay, enabling precise campaign targeting.
• Designed a tiered, region-specific pricing framework balancing local price sensitivity with global brand positioning, ensuring consistent value perception.

Accelerated Market Entry: Enabled Peachpie LLC to finalize their US, UK, and South Korea launch strategy two months faster than planned.
• Improved Targeting and Efficiency: Customer personas and segment prioritization improved campaign targeting precision, projected to reduce customer acquisition costs by 20%.
• Revenue Growth Potential: Pricing strategy and channel mix are expected to generate 15% higher launch revenue compared to a single-price, untargeted approach.
• Increased Market Confidence: Delivered actionable, data-backed insights that gave the leadership team confidence to secure budget approval for a multi-market rollout.
• Brand Awareness Boost: Offline and social media activation plan is projected to reach 1.5M+ impressions in the 1st 90 days, increasing awareness in key music hubs.

Wellness App Marketing Insights

  • Tracking coverage — Increased event tracking coverage from 30% to 98% across key funnels.
  • Data Accuracy — Reduced duplicate or mislabelled events by 85%, improving trust in analytics data.
  • Funnel Visibility — Built conversion funnels that revealed a 27% drop-off point between onboarding step 2 → step 3.
  • Attribution Clarity — Improved attribution accuracy, aligning 90%+ of conversions to the correct marketing channel.

• Many critical user actions (e.g., free-to-paid upgrade, wellness goal completion) were not tracked or were labeled inconsistently, making funnel analysis unreliable.
• Lack of actionable funnels and segmentation
• Channel attribution uncertainty

• Set up clean Mixpanel funnels and user cohorts, uncovering a 27% onboarding drop-off and enabling 3x more effective targeting of high-LTV users.
• Streamlined dashboards and reporting schedules, reducing reporting time by 40% and enabling weekly performance reviews.
• Improved campaign tagging and attribution setup in Mixpanel, achieving 90%+ channel attribution accuracy, restoring trust in marketing ROI metrics.

• Delivered a comprehensive tracking taxonomy and governance guide, ensuring consistent event naming and future scalability.
• Enabled marketing to launch A/B tests faster and measure campaign ROI with confidence, projected to lift paid campaign efficiency by 15–20%.
• Flagged and fixed critical gaps in Mixpanel setup, preventing underreporting of active users by 12%.
• Empowered the product team to prioritize features that drive engagement, increasing weekly active users by an estimated 10% within 60 days.

Web lead Generation Strategy

  • SEO Visibility — Identified 15 high-opportunity keywords projected to raise organic traffic by 25–30% in 6 months.
  • Audience Segments — Discovered a 20% younger audience (18-24) segment not previously targeted
  • Benchmarking — Revealed that client’s bounce rate was 10% higher, providing a clear target for im
  • Channel mix — Found that 65% of traffic was from organic search, highlighting needs for diversification efforts
  • Engagement — Recommended content strategy expected to improve session duration by 15–20%.

• High bounce rate and low engagement on key landing pages
• No clear data on audience preferences and behaviors
• Brand not resonating with the emerging audience segment
• Under-leveraged paid media and SEO opportunities

• Conducted content audit, recommended UX improvements, and restructured landing pages to align with top search intent.
• Used analytics and media consumption data to build robust audience personas, revealing a younger segment that prefers short-form video and mobile-first experiences.
• Recommended new branding strategy and tone of voice to appeal to Gen Z and younger Millennials, plus geotargeted campaigns to reach high-potential regions.
• Designed an integrated media mix (SEO/paid/social) projected to boost traffic diversification and reduce dependency on organic search alone.

Provided a data-driven roadmap that positioned the client to grow their younger audience share by 15% YoY.
• Delivered actionable insights that helped leadership reframe branding efforts and budget allocation.
• Created a sustainable measurement framework so the client could track improvements over time and benchmark against competitors.

Multiplatform Data Ingestion/Dashboard Insights/Pipelining

  • 100% — Data Pipelined from Shopify, Klaviyo, GA4, Meta, Subscription Website, and More
  • 95% — Data Insights Query Workload Reduced
  • 100% — Improvement Data Visibility of Marketing Performance, Web Analytics, and Financial Performance

I led the consolidation of eCommerce, marketing, and analytics data across Shopify, Klaviyo, GA4, Meta, Omeda, and more into a centralized source of truth. By standardizing metrics, aligning attribution to realized revenue, and delivering role-based dashboards, I improved data trust, accelerated decision-making, and enabled scalable performance insight across the organization.

I consolidated eCommerce, marketing, and analytics data from Shopify, GA4, Meta, other social platforms, and Klaviyo into a centralized platform. I normalized metrics, aligned attribution to actual revenue, and stitched web sessions, marketing touchpoints, orders, and subscriptions despite inconsistent identifiers. By delivering role-based dashboards for marketing, finance, product, and executives, I created a trusted, scalable reporting foundation that improved adoption, clarity, and faster, confident decision-making across the organization.

Centralized multiplatform data into a single platform, aligning revenue, conversions, subscriptions, and ROAS, cutting reporting time 60–80%, reducing metric disputes 70%, improving dashboard load 50%+, and enabling faster, trusted decisions.

Education

2008 - 2012

PhD in Marketing

Southern Illinois University Carbondale - Carbondale, IL, USA

2005 - 2007

Master of Business Administration (MBA) in Marketing

Huazhong University of Science and Technology - Wuhan, China

2001 - 2005

Bachelor's Degree in Business Administration

Huazhong University of Science and Technology - Wuhan, China

Certifications

JUNE 2022 - PRESENT

Data Science

Cornell University

JANUARY 2021 - PRESENT

Social Media Marketing

Stanford University

Skills

Core

Marketing Strategy, Social Media, Market Research & Analysis, Social Media Analytics, Customer Segmentation, Marketing Analytics, Generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI), Go-to-market (GTM) Strategies, Growth Hacking, Digital Marketing, Google Ads, Return on Ad Spend (ROAS), Marketing Automation, Lead Generation, Paid Advertising, Search Engine Optimization (SEO), Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO), Content Marketing, Product Marketing, Omnichannel Marketing, Facebook Ads, Audience Targeting, Email Marketing, Landing Pages, Brand Strategy, Social Media Marketing (SMM), Social Media Strategy, Digital Marketing Strategy, Google Tag Manager, Funnel Marketing, Funnel Optimization, B2C Marketing, Branding, App Store Optimization (ASO), App Store Marketing, A/B Testing, Marketing, Brand Marketing, Agile, Google Paid Ads, Customer Experience (CX) Design, Content Marketing Strategy, Social Media Content, TikTok Marketing, Social Media Management, Media Buying, Marketing Research & Analysis, Marketing Operations, Product Positioning, Instagram Marketing, LinkedIn Marketing

Platforms & Tools

Google Analytics 360, Mixpanel, Google Analytics 4 (GA4), Google Analytics, HubSpot, HubSpot Marketing Hub, CRM Systems, Triple Whale, Klaviyo, Claude, Looker Studio

Business Models

Business to Business (B2B), Software as a Service (SaaS), B2B, SaaS

Technical

SQL

Other

Statistical Analysis, Market Research, Qualtrics, SurveyMonkey, Microsoft Power BI, SPSS, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Quantitative Research, Qualitative Analysis, Data Analytics, Consumer Insights, Tableau, Customer Research, Research, Data Science, Customer Journey, Regression, Voice of the Customer (VoC), Data Analysis, Data Analytics (Marketing), Data Analysis Consultant, Buyer Personas, Cohort Analysis, Customer Data Platform (CDP), Direct to Consumer (D2C), Customer reviews Analytics, Growth Strategy, Visualization, Pitch Decks, Google Display Network, Growth Marketing, eCommerce Marketing, Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC), Webinars, Reporting, Social Listening, Marketing Agencies, Dashboards, Salesforce, Adobe Marketo, Market Insights, Customer Insights, Web Analytics, SimiliarWeb, Sparktoro, Net Promoter Score (NPS), Stakeholder Management, Vendor Management, Global Project Management, Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Sales & CRM Platforms, HubSpot CRM, Mobile Apps, D2C Branding Strategy, Startup Marketing, Go-to-market Plans, Go-to-market Execution, Lifecycle Marketing, Subscriptions, Data Reporting, Databases, Marketing Reports, Analytics, AI Design, AI Programming, B2B Marketing, Value Proposition, Website Traffic, Competitor Analysis & Profiling, DTC branding, Storytelling, YouTube Marketing, Subscription Pricing, Online Course Design, Automation, Dashboard Development, Qualitative Research, User Interviews, User Research, Customer Acquisition, User Retention, Paid Search, ResearchOps, Project Management, Customer Interviews, Project Coordination, Data Analysis, Microsoft Power BI, Data Tracking, Event Tracking, Marketing Attribution, General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), User Research, A/B Testing, Customer Experience (CX) Design, User Experience (UX), UX Research, Focus Groups, Higher Education, Survey Development & Analysis, Google Slides, Creative Strategy, Research, Reporting & Dashboards, Surveys, Wix, Conversion, Data Analytics, Adobe Analytics, Business Analytics, BI Reports, Product Launch, Data Strategy, Predictive Modeling, Team Leadership, Cross-functional Collaboration, React, Next.js, JavaScript, Go, TypeScript, Generative Engine Optimization (GEO), Documentation, Large Language Models (LLMs), Playbook, Product Management, SEO with AI, Standard Operating Procedures Development, Geofencing & Geotargeting, Outreach, User Engagement, CX Strategy, Loyalty Programs, Organizational Structure, Nonprofits, Agentic AI, Website Audits, Change Management, Customer Experience Strategy, Answer Engine Optimization (AEO), AEO, YouTube SEO, Schema Markup, Schemas, Schema.org, Shopify, Video Editing, Meta Ads, PostHog, Mobile App Design, Looker, Fintech, Travel & Leisure, Technical SEO, Survey Design, Data Visualization, Marketing and Statistics Education, Business Intelligence (BI), Messaging, Data Collection, Web and audience analytics, Data Pipelines, TikTok Content, Domo, Data Architecture, Data Governance, Multiplatform data ingestion, Claude Code, COUPLER.IO, Ninjacat, Personal Branding, Adobe Analytics, User Testing, Airtable, Cursor AI, OMEDA, Lifetime Value (LTV), AI Automation, VWO

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