Matthew Zammit, Product Manager in Mellieha, Malta
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Matthew Zammit

Verified Expert  in Product Management

Bio

Matthew is a product leader with 15 years of experience and a focus on building beautiful products and achieving results. He excels in defining strategic roadmaps, engineering features, and UX, including building mobile apps from concept to commercialization. Matthew is successful in leading global teams and scaling product organizations through hiring, strategy, prioritization, getting to product-market fit, and mentoring product teams.

Project Highlights

From Idea to MVP for Automotive Mobile App
Brought the product from idea to MVP with the founding CEO, defined the product strategy and requirements, developed the roadmap, recruited the product teams, and took the product to market in record time, helping raise $4 million in seed finance.
Mobile App Management and Growth
Increased the Vodafone Malta mobile app adoption by 249% and the mobile app NPS score by 26 points.
Vodafone Malta Digital Strategy
Created and kicked-off the Vodafone Malta digital strategy and 5-year vision.

Expertise

  • Digital Strategy
  • Growth Marketing
  • Marketing Strategy
  • Minimum Viable Product (MVP)
  • Mobile Apps
  • Product Leadership
  • Product Management
  • Startups

Work Experience

Chief Product Officer

2021 - PRESENT
Ferry Automotive, Inc
  • Took the Ferry platform from an idea to MVP in six months. Defined the product strategy, roadmap, and organizational structure requirements.
  • Recruited and led a multi-disciplinary remote team of 20 in nine locations which launched 40+ major product features. The team included design (UI/UX), engineering, product management, and product marketing.
  • Implemented a pre-launch waitlist that encouraged users to share the product with friends; it resulted in 5,000 sign-ups at launch. Built the platform, including subscriptions, KYC ID verification, contract management, and asset management.
  • Developed a go-to-market strategy that, through product-led growth tactics and marketing campaigns, ensured a steady 30%-35% month-on-month growth in platform usage and an NPS of 74.
  • Raised $4 million. Facilitated two fundraising rounds with venture capital firms through pitches and product demos. Ensured an overall smooth process by sharing the status of products with investors and the leadership team.

Lead Mentor

2021 - PRESENT
Techstars
  • Provided guidance to over 30 startups on product, positioning, messaging, growth, and experience.
  • Collaborated with other Techstars mentors to give advice that enables startups to do more and faster.
  • Led workshops to support startups in developing their product messaging and go-to-market strategy.

Founder and Fractional Chief Product Officer for Startups

2016 - PRESENT
Know Your Social
  • Advised startup founders on product positioning and messaging. Achieved an increase in user conversion rate averaging 27%-45%.
  • Mentored product leaders on strategy, user experience, and prioritization. Improved team efficiency by 38% and increased output by 43% while pivoting products and adjusting roadmaps according to new strategies.
  • Coached 100+ startups in different industries on product, prioritization, user experience, and team structures. Raised combined capital rounds of over $100 million after working together.
  • Crafted a strategic plan for a major client with revenues of $45+ billion through insights from market trend analysis, organization effectiveness diagnostic, and interviews with senior stakeholders.

Interim Chief Product Officer

2023 - 2023
Veria (stealth)
  • Led the market research to create a strong product positioning strategy and brand identity, resulting in a persuasive pitch deck communicating the company's unique selling points to potential investors.
  • Created a product strategy aligned with the company vision, ensuring successful implementation and market penetration. Streamlined the platform roadmap, enabling efficient team collaboration and on-time delivery.
  • Assembled and led a top-performing remote six-person product team, including a PM, designers, and engineers, establishing the design system and initiating platform development.

Visiting Lecturer, Marketing Department

2018 - 2022
University of Malta
  • Delivered lectures as part of the Master's Program in Digital Marketing. The curriculum included goal setting, measurement, and building a full marketing plan.
  • Lectured on Introduction to Digital Marketing at the undergraduate level. Focused on the fundamentals of digital marketing and strategy development.
  • Connected students with industry players through guest lectures, practical case studies, and introductions to mentors where useful.

Startup Mentor

2017 - 2021
YouStartIT Accelerator/MITA Innovation Hub
  • Supported over 50 startups working in fintech, digital health, telco, gaming, blockchain, retail, and travel.
  • Held one-on-one meetings with founders for deep dives into their product strategy, struggles, and positioning.
  • Prepared startups for demo day, working on pitch decks and training on the delivery of the presentations.

Product Director, Digital Customer Experience

2018 - 2020
Vodafone Group
  • Transformed cross-functional teams (tech, business development, management, support, eCommerce) to implement a new billing system. Restructured back-office operations and customer touch points alongside core systems replacement to reduce cost by 50%.
  • Brought the development of mobile apps in-house. Prepared business cases for required resources and recruited the teams. Designed organizational structure and set OKRs while reducing costs by 65% and increasing efficiency by 45%.
  • Organized Vodafone's strategy for the B2C mobile app with 300 million users. Directed research, design, roadmaps, prioritization, and development of the prepaid segment for 21 markets focusing on payments and bundles.
  • Guided three product teams (21 people) in the development of web and mobile apps. Redesigned onboarding. Improved retention and user experience by 40% through user interviews and A/B testing flow optimization.
  • Overhauled the obsolete legacy code of two production applications, shifting to native languages for iOS and Android while upgrading calls to back-end APIs. This resulted in optimized usability and improved performance by 52%.

Lead Product Manager, Customer Experience

2014 - 2018
Vodafone Group
  • Created a five-year transformation strategy covering product, marketing, and operational initiatives leading to changes in company priorities, budgets, and roadmaps. Achieved 20% revenue growth across web and mobile vs. a 1% trend.
  • Analyzed markets, defined strategy for customer shift to the mobile app, and directed product teams focusing on top user journeys and cost reduction. Grew B2C app to 38% of customer base.
  • Launched campaigns increasing mobile app adoption by 249% in six months and improving NPS score by 26 points. Introduced upselling on checkout pages resulting in an increased average order value of 23%.
  • Identified a $3 million savings opportunity from the call center by developing a call-reduction model. Prioritized roadmaps and ran campaigns for support teams to articulate the value resulting in 14% of calls being diverted to the web and apps.

Marketing Executive

2012 - 2014
Vodafone Group
  • Spearheaded branding and pricing restructuring by focusing on willingness to pay instead of the product cost. Implemented a three-tiered pricing model growing product revenue by 35% and the NPS score by 31 points.
  • Analyzed pricing, advertising, and distribution data for niche markets (international, tourists, new subs). Identified seasonal trends and white space via consumer insights. Recommended strategic changes in portfolio, reversing sales slump to +5%.
  • Assessed the product portfolio for phone accessories and created a sales and distribution strategy for all retail shops will the right suppliers. Doubled the accessories-to-phones attachment rate in eight months.

Product Manager

2010 - 2012
Vodafone Group
  • Overhauled website flows and navigation menus, reducing the frequency of misdirected customer service queries by 30%, reducing bounce rates by 23%, and increasing traffic to neglected pages.
  • Relaunched website brand redesign at a record-low budget within the Vodafone Group at a 60% lower cost while achieving an upsell of 33%. Delivered online campaigns to support the launch of new products.
  • Conceived the social media strategy and turned Facebook into a core channel for support and marketing. Trained and managed a support team of seven agents on social, live chat, and email support.

Implementation Specialist

2007 - 2009
Computime
  • Implemented projects for asset management, spend control, and ERP software solutions for companies in Libya, Malta, and the UK.
  • Oversaw within the oil and gas industry the upgrade of asset management systems to newer versions. Managed the overview of the data migration between software versions and evaluated the integrity of the data.
  • Delivered report writing, user training, and go-live support. The project also required six weeks of on-site work at the client's oil extraction plant.
  • Gathered requirements, implemented systems, and trained users for spend control software within a telecommunication company.

Project History

From Idea to MVP for Automotive Mobile App

Brought the product from idea to MVP with the founding CEO, defined the product strategy and requirements, developed the roadmap, recruited the product teams, and took the product to market in record time, helping raise $4 million in seed finance.

Led the design, development, and product management.

Built a company that is app first, data first, and lifestyle first.
Austin, Texas; Bay Area, CA; Los Angeles, CA;
iOS: https://ferryauto.com/app

Worked with and coached the Founding CEO to bring the product from an idea to launching an MVP. Defined the product strategy and requirements.

Developed the roadmap, organized the product teams, and took the product to market in record time, resulting in one of the fastest-growing automotive apps in the US.

Recruited and led the product organization, including the design team (UI/UX), engineering, product management, and product marketing.

Participated in fundraising. Gave presentations and demos to venture capital firms. Raised $4 million in an initial seed round.

Regularly reported on the product progress as part of the C-Suite and gave updates to investors. Analyzed the data internally to influence the product direction.

Mobile App Management and Growth

Increased the Vodafone Malta mobile app adoption by 249% and the mobile app NPS score by 26 points.

Oversaw the team to rebuild and launch a new mobile app through which customers could manage their accounts.

Acted as a product manager taking care of the roadmap and balancing requirements coming in from company stakeholders against customer needs and feedback. Worked closely with a significant number of stakeholders to feed into the product roadmaps based on customer journeys.

Managed virtual teams placed across locations, time zones, departments, and organizations, including project managers, digital architects, UX/UI designers, developers, and testing engineers. Kept 2-week sprints with new updates being released to the public every month.

Created offers to increase the mobile app base penetration, feature usage, revenue, and retain users and reduce churn. Collaborated with the marketing and customer value management teams on a communications plan and campaigns to drive take-up. Provided scripts to live-care agents (live chat, Facebook, email, call center, retail stores) to include the My Vodafone app as part of the customer interaction process.

Regularly provided updates to the CEO and C-level executive on progress, KPI impact, and relevance for their respective departments.

Native Mobile App Insourcing and Development

In-sourced the development of the customer-facing mobile app to relaunch as native apps for iOS and Android.

Defined and built the business case for the required resources and separation from the agency building the mobile app at the time.

Worked closely with the technology teams to find and employ developers, a technology architect, and product owner for the agile squad dedicated to the project.

Led the team from multiple departments in charge of rebuilding its mobile app into native code for iOS and Android.

Acted as a product manager to manage the roadmap and took the team through the development cycles. Trained a new product manager to take over the final phases of the project towards launch.

Vodafone Malta Digital Strategy

Created and kicked-off the Vodafone Malta digital strategy and 5-year vision.

The strategy looked at customer pain points and envisioned where the market was going. Five strategic pillars were identified onto which we enabled the digital customer experience.

1. Omnichannel Service and Sales: Integrating all online and offline channels giving the customer the option to choose their preferred way to be served, having real-time notifications, reporting, and billing.

2. Products: Focusing on digital products and data.

3. Marketing and Customer Relationship Management: Personalizing, real-time and contextual offers.

4. Processes: Becoming a paperless company, using AI in customer care, and investing in automation processes.

5. People and Space: Re-imagining the office space and employee lifecycle.

The strategy was accepted and adopted by the company's C-level executive and every department moved the vision within their own teams.

Acted as the digital evangelist and cascaded this strategy across the organization.

Call Reduction

Reduced calls received by a call center by 13.7% in 12 months and reduced the average frequency of contact by 29%.

Set up and led the "Call Reduction" steering committee made up of representatives from various parts of the company, including members from support, care, marketing, technology, project management, digital, commercial, and retail.

I discovered that 60% of calls were around the same ten high-level topics. I focused on these top ten reasons for calling and expanded them into granular details to tackle by the different teams.

The four main streams created were:
- Digital: Improved capabilities on the website and mobile and shift customers to use digital channels first.
- Communication: Improved CRM targeting and ran educational campaigns for self-help.
- Call Center: Trained call center agents to provide direct links to the digital channels and stop serving customers for basic tasks.
- Processes: Improved the back-end processes to reduce the impact on the contact center.

Across a 12 month period, this strategy reduced calls going to the call center by an average of 13.7% by enabling self-care functionality for customers via the mobile app and website and agent training.

Mentoring Startups on Growth Strategies

Mentored over 30 startups on business positioning, growth, and product strategies, with one-third of the mentored companies having raised over €10 million in funding.

Provided team workshops and one-to-one support for the startup founders. Built early-stage growth and product strategies with founders from Poland, Italy, Serbia, Armenia, United Arab Emirates, India, USA, and Malta working in Fintech, digital health, telecommunications, gaming, retail, sports, travel, retail, and blockchain.

Prepared startups for meetings with investors. Reviewed their pitch decks, advised on improvements, and trained them on the delivery of the presentations.

One-third of them have received over €10 million in further funding.

Business Transformation

Drove digital strategy and business transformation.

Led the transformation team specifically responsible for the digital and customer channels stream. Documented all the customer-facing processes and redesigned them to fit within the new billing system. Focused on simplicity and customer experience.

Served as part of the leadership team overseeing the business transformation project to implement a new billing system and revamping all integration points. Designed new business processes and digital requirements for the projects and related OKR.

Managed different suppliers to get the best fit software for the company.

Chatbot Implementation for Customer Care

Provided business efficiency by having an AI chatbot successfully answer 60% of customer care queries coming in through Facebook without needing a human person to intervene.

Led the teams to launch an AI-assisted chatbot giving customers a conversational experience that could directly solve problems using Natural Language Processing (NLP) technologies and business rules combined into dialogues.

This provided two major benefits:
1. A better customer experience by giving an immediate reply to customers rather than having to wait in a queue for a human to assist them.
2. Improved business efficiency through reduced operational costs and offer support 24/7.

I managed the team taking care of conversation designs, customer support, and customer experience to go to market quickly, measure, and learn from the process. KPIs measured were the volume of queries, containment rate, user satisfaction, and containment rate. Success rates for queries were constantly being improved as the chatbot was learning from failed conversations up to when I handed over the project at a very satisfactory 60% containment rate.

Growing Mobile Phones Accessories Business

Doubled the number of phone accessories sold through retail shops while getting the sales teams more engaged and aligned to this secondary line of business.

Built and managed the phone accessories portfolio for Vodafone Malta. Maintaining all stock levels in the Vodafone retail shops and in the warehouse while managing replenishment and suppliers' orders.

Trained retail agents on setting up accessories in the shops. Provided scripts to use to sell more accessories with every new phone which was being purchased. Created competitions for the sales agents and gave out monthly prizes to the agents who sold the most.

The accessories-to-phones attachment rate was doubled in six months.

Education

2014 - 2014

Professional Diploma in Digital Marketing

Digital Marketing Institute - Ireland

2005 - 2007

Master's Degree in Informatics

University of Malta - Malta

2002 - 2005

Bachelor's Degree in Business and Computing

University of Malta - Malta

Certifications

OCTOBER 2022 - PRESENT

Product-led Certification

Mind the Product

JANUARY 2017 - PRESENT

Digital Marketing and Future Leadership course (Developed with Google)

Squared Online

Skills

Tools

Slack, Zoom, Trello, Google Analytics, Hotjar, Figma, Asana, Jira, Board Reporting

Paradigms

Agile Product Management, Kanban, Mobile App Design, Desktop Web Design, Rapid Prototyping, Pay-per-Click (PPC), App Store Optimization (ASO), User Testing, Agile, Scrum, Change Management, Quantitative Research, B2B2C, Business to Business to Consumer (B2B2C)

Platforms

Adobe Suite, Google Ads

Industry Expertise

Telecommunications, Startup Accelerators, Venture Capital, High-tech Startups, Asset Management, Oil & Gas, Health

Other

Notion, Microsoft Office, Digital Marketing, Marketing Strategy, Social Media, Social Media Strategy, Digital Strategy, Digital Marketing Strategy, Project Management, Product Management, Presentations, Market Fit, Feature Roadmaps, Stakeholder Management, Stakeholder Engagement, Growth Marketing, Net Promoter Score (NPS), SaaS Product Management, Software as a Service (SaaS), Startups, Team Mentoring, Product-market Fit, Product Owner, Minimum Viable Product (MVP), Product Discovery, Technical Product Management, Product Planning, Head of Product, Lean Product Manager, Coaching, Product Coach, MVP Design, Feature Prioritization, Business to Business (B2B), Business to Consumer (B2C), Product Frameworks, Product Strategy, Best Practices, Chief Product Officer (CPO), Conceptualization, Ideation, Applications, Lean Startups, Mockups, Sprint Planning, Web App Development, Project Coordination, Electric Vehicles, WordPress, Business Administration, Business Cases, Business Development, Business Models, Business Strategy, Director of Product, Financial Modeling, Go-to-market Strategy, Pricing Models, Pricing Strategy, Mobile App Development, Wireframing, Management Consulting, Consulting, Project Timelines, Product Delivery, Quality Assurance (QA), Requirements & Specifications, User Journeys, Production, Product Consultant, Web Accessibility, Management, Strategy, Leadership, Mobile, Business Transformation, Customer Journeys, Content Management Systems (CMS), Mobile Apps, Product Roadmaps, Product Marketing, SaaS, SaaS Product Marketing, Mentorship, Mentorship & Coaching, Digital Transformation, Startup Consulting, Messaging, Product Growth, User Research, Product Ownership, User Interface (UI), User Stories, Design Sprints, Feature Backlog Prioritization, Team Leadership, Web Product Management, Lean Product Management, Project Consultancy, Product Design, Web Design, Backlog Management, Social Networks, Data-driven Dashboards, Customer Insights, Corporate Strategy, Business Intelligence (BI), Agency, Quantitative Analysis, Design Systems, Business Services, Hardware, Vendor Management, Forecasting, Direct to Consumer (D2C), Data Analytics, Agile Leadership, Agile Coaching, Usability, Business, Computer Science, Research, Planning, Teamwork, Facebook, Facebook Ads, Digital Campaigns, Search Engine Marketing (SEM), Search Engine Optimization (SEO), Display Advertising, Web Analytics, Business Planning, Customer Support, Customer Research, IT Program Management, Analytics, Process Design, User Experience (UX), Customer Experience, Customer Experience Management, iOS, Android, Commercial Strategy, Mobile Applications, App Store, Budgeting, Budget Management, Project Budget Management, Launch Strategy, Product Launch, App Growth, Growth Strategy, Revenue Management, Revenue Optimization, Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Communication, User Retention, Churn Management, Scripting, Reporting, Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), Product Development, Commercials, Information Architecture (IA), Web, Website CMS, Website Redesign, Website Management, Website Optimization, Online Marketing, Online Business, Facebook Marketing, Marketing, Teaching, Workshops, Workshop Facilitation, Early-stage Startups, Startup Funding, Startup Growth Strategy Development, Chatbots, Positioning, Product Positioning, Advisory, Marketing Mix, Fintech, Edtech Design, Medtech, Growth, Digital Health, Gaming, Retail & Wholesale, Angel Investing, Pitch Decks, Pitch Preparation, Pitch Deck Consultant, Pitch Presentations, Social Media Platforms, Social Media Analytics, Social Media Marketing (SMM), Google Display Network, Software Implementation, Data Migration, Reports, User Acceptance Testing (UAT), Training, Employee Training, Technical Training, Training Content, Training Materials, Procurement, Entrepreneurship, Apps, Call Centers, Team Management, Distributed Team Management, Microsoft Excel, Websites, Business Processes, Digital Communication, Conversational Design, Chatbot Conversation Design, Teams, App UX, Digital Product Management, Digital Product Development, Digital Marketing Product Manager, Presentation Design, Product Vision, Organizational Design, Product Evangelism, Omnichannel Marketing, Contact Centers, Mobile UX, Design, UX Design, Project Delivery, Agile Delivery, Software, Billing Systems, Change Leadership, Product Development Manager, New Product Development, Revenue Strategy, Training & Training Content Development, Jobs to be Done (JTBD), Qualitative Research, Web Applications, Executive Coaching, Early-stage Funding, Fundraising, Remote Work, Remote Team Leadership, SaaS Design, UX Leadership, Design Leadership, Product Leadership, Senior Executive Management, User Validation Testing, App Development, Roadmaps, Software Development, eCommerce, Market Research & Analysis, Influencer Marketing, Product-led Growth (PLG), Mergers & Acquisitions (M&A), B2B Lead Generation, Artificial Intelligence (AI), B2B, Machine Learning, Platform as a Service (PaaS), Accounting, COO, Chief Digital Officer, Chief Operations Officer (COO), Human Resources (HR)

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