Michael Sutyak, Product Manager in San Francisco, CA, United States
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Michael Sutyak

Verified Expert  in Product Management

Product Manager

Location
San Francisco, CA, United States
Toptal Member Since
March 27, 2019

Michael is a technical product and growth leader in the consumer and enterprise technology space, leading product and growth at leading companies like Airbnb. He specializes in international growth, revenue-driving activities, emerging technologies, incubating new products and business categories, creative mobile and web-based product and feature building, automation, optimizing funnel flows, and new user experiences.

Project Highlights

Airbnb Experiences and Incubations
Built-up the incubation categories, including concerts, social impact, surfing, and outdoor adventures through various means.
Magic Mind
Set up the SEO and other tactics for the new Nootropic company, leading to seven figures in sales.
Tubi TV-streaming Service
Attracted and converted millions of users that led to a $20 million series C close.

Expertise

Work Experience

Product Manager

2009 - PRESENT
Various Consulting Work
  • Consulted with various clients, including Calm, Uber, Google, Bird, Turo, Getaround, Q.ai, Givelify, and more.
  • Drove double-digit growth percentage for multiple clients.
  • Developed robust advertising and acquisition strategies and machines to drive growth.
  • Increased revenue by double digits and, in some cases, by ten times.

Head of Growth

2020 - 2023
Tech Unicorn
  • Trained and mentored a cross-functional team to drive growth programs.
  • Managed 8-figure budgets for advertising, partnerships, and acquisitions that resulted in large-scale international user growth.
  • Ideated product features that led to growth multiples above two to drive virality.
  • Developed notification and SMS systems to drive re-engagement.

Growth Lead | Product Manager

2017 - 2019
Airbnb
  • Led cross-functional partners to drive demand for the concerts category, scaling to 130+ concerts per week at 45% average occupancy.
  • Achieved 1,000% increase in weekly booked seats for Airbnb concerts through product- and marketing-based initiatives.
  • Innovated, scoped, and executed a series of experiments using internal tools (ERF) that led to a 24% global increase in bookings.
  • Acted as the POC with the product for demand for concerts and pushed through ERF experiments (concert grouping, naming, algorithms, and more).
  • Ideated changes to the ML algorithm ranking model for the Experiences marketplace that drove a 15% increase in concert bookings.
  • Brokered a partnership affiliate deal with Time Out for the concerts category (and Experiences at large) that has led to 200+ bookings.
  • Created all dashboards and led all data science activities to derive insights for the Airbnb Concerts team (and other incubations).
  • Led the pricing experiment that resulted in findings that every $1 reduction in price resulted in a 1.8% increase in booking demand.

Founder

2016 - 2019
Mobile Growth Sage
  • Led a consultancy focused on growth efforts for digital technology companies.
  • Drove 100% return on ad spend for mobile app clients.
  • Led the redesign of many companies' onboarding app experience and referral programs.

Product Manager

2016 - 2017
Tubi TV
  • Led engineers and designers to revamp native mobile and web-streaming applications informed by experimentation and A/B testing.
  • Spearheaded growth efforts to hit aggressive targets (9x growth in MAU YoY) that resulted in $20 million Series C round close.
  • Innovated features for mobile, web, and OTT/CTV products that resulted in a 150% increase in cumulative viewing time per user.
  • Achieved a 37% increase in retention through email, push, and in-app notification strategies and product improvements.
  • Implemented unsupervised learning ML algorithms to inform a recommendation engine that increased video starts by 50%.

Product Lead

2015 - 2016
StudyBlue (Mobile Learning Platform)
  • Led engineers, designers, and junior product members to scale the platform to 10+ million MAU.
  • Created a connected experience from click to downstream behavior with tailored content and increased retention by 15%.
  • Ran A/B tests to optimize dynamic landing pages (browser and mobile), ultimately increasing conversion by 12%.

Growth Product Manager

2012 - 2015
KIXEYE (Game Development Company)
  • Rose from employee 35 as an analyst and became a senior leader of a 1,000+ employee organization.
  • Tailored the new user experience and was responsible for growth, engagement, and P&L on several game titles.
  • Led cross-functional teams/reports and dictated strategy in growth that directly resulted in $110 million in revenues on 16 million installs.
  • Managed $30+ million in worldwide ad spending while maintaining 150-200% ROI across mobile- and browser-based titles.
  • Influenced copy, creative, NUX, and landing pages through A/B tests that improved conversion by 10% and retention by 15%.
  • Realized a strategic deal with Google to ensure featuring in the Google Play Store that led to 800,000 organic installs ($4-6 million value).

Founder

2008 - 2010
Crowdsets
  • Led a team of designers and engineers to build a music marketplace to bring your favorite artists to your town.
  • Ran large-scale campaigns to bring on the supply and demand side of the marketplace.
  • Generated seven figures in revenue year one for the service.

Airbnb Experiences and Incubations

http://www.airbnb.com

Built-up the incubation categories, including concerts, social impact, surfing, and outdoor adventures through various means.

I helped Airbnb Experiences reach nearly 100,000+ weekly bookings during its incubation period and nine figures in revenue monthly. Experiences is an additional business unit to the Airbnb Homes business.

Magic Mind

http://www.magicmind.com

Set up the SEO and other tactics for the new Nootropic company, leading to seven figures in sales.

I established web properties and an SEO machine from scratch for Magic Mind when it was first starting. I helped consult and work with the founding team to develop a go-to-market strategy that allowed the product to hit the ground running.

Tubi TV-streaming Service

http://tubitv.com

Attracted and converted millions of users that led to a $20 million series C close.

I spearheaded the growth effort across multiple platforms, including Roku, Apple TV, Comcast, Playstation, Xbox, Samsung, Sony, Amazon Fire, mobile, and web. I used various product-based tactics to convert visitors into viewers and power users.

Assorted Consulting (Product & Growth)

Consulted with and scaled numerous companies in a variety of verticals, including Calm, Uber, Google, ClassPass, Bird, etc.

I have consulted with and scaled numerous companies in a variety of verticals, including Calm, Uber, Google, ClassPass, Bird, and so on.
2005 - 2009

Bachelor's Degree in Engineering

Cornell University - Ithaca, NY, USA

2005 - 2005

Certificate Program in Computer Science

Stanford University - Palo Alto, CA, USA

JANUARY 2015 - PRESENT

Facebook Advertising Certification

Facebook

JANUARY 2015 - PRESENT

Google AdWords Certification

Google

JANUARY 2015 - PRESENT

Machine Learning

Udacity

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