I'm an SEO and AEO strategist specializing in how enterprises build visibility in an era when search no longer begins and ends with Google. My focus is on the technical foundations, content architecture, and entity signals that determine whether your brand gets found, cited, and trusted by AI engines alongside traditional search.
Career highlights include my time as Director of Product Development at Nasdaq, where I architected the technical search infrastructure behind a 638% increase in annual visitors, and as founder of Clickseed, an enterprise SEO consultancy that drove measurable organic growth for clients including the New York Post, Kiplinger, and Lumifi Cybersecurity. Today, as SEO Operations Lead at McClatchy Media, I lead AEO and technical SEO strategy across 36+ brands while developing the measurement frameworks and governance standards that connect visibility signals to real business outcomes.
Early Years
Although I earned a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from Tennessee Tech, I never interviewed for an engineering job because my e-commerce side hustle started taking off before I graduated in 2001. I was thrilled. I couldn't believe I could actually earn a living with an Internet-based business.
I named the business meBags, but it didn't take long for the attorneys for eBags, Inc. to inform me of the poor name choice. So in the fall of 2002, I bought a new domain, whipped up a new logo, and BagsForMe was born.
Check out that killer table-based design! One of the best parts was having the opportunity to work with my brother, Dan, when he was home from school (pictured below).
I learned so much during those years: fundamental business practices, enough PHP and SQL to be dangerous, and most of all, how to grow and scale a business through SEO. I handled every aspect of the business, from web design to marketing to customer service to accounting and order fulfillment. By the end, I had built a thriving business and relationships with more than 30 name-brand manufacturers. I enjoyed a modest but successful exit in 2005, and I learned the value of believing and investing in myself.
Nasdaq
The SEO skills I gained while building an e-commerce business led to my being hired at Nasdaq as Audience Development Manager, and I was later promoted to Director of Product Development. In that role, I created numerous website tools and features to serve our retail investor audience, managing the product lifecycle from ideation to launch.
I'm most proud of the early work I did with programmatic SEO, where I merged data into templates and user-friendly interfaces that ultimately drove a 638% increase in annual visitors over 5 years through organic search. I was awarded the Nasdaq CEO Award for leading the creation of the Nasdaq Community, a layer of social features integrated into Nasdaq.com, and selected for the Nasdaq High Potential program, an executive leadership and product management training program for high-performing employees.
Clickseed
While I thoroughly enjoyed my time at Nasdaq, I felt the time was right to break out on my own and fully leverage my knowledge and expertise in SEO. Clickseed was a digital marketing agency that served media and technology companies for seven years, from 2013 to 2025. We specialized in SEO, SEM, and content marketing, and I served as lead strategist for all client accounts.
Clickseed was a small, boutique agency. At our peak, we had three full-time employees and four contractors. But we did some impressive work and always punched above our weight with the results we achieved for our clients.
Fun fact: I was featured in a two-page spread in the December 2016 issue of Money Magazine. The writer was looking for examples of people over 40 who had left a corporate job to strike out on their own. It was exciting and generated quite a bit of attention, but as an SEO guy I was annoyed that they never published the story online, which meant I never got a backlink.
What I'm Doing Now
I currently serve as SEO Operations Lead at McClatchy Media, acting as the connective tissue between strategy and execution across a portfolio of 30+ news sites and 6 lifestyle and entertainment brands. I leverage my extensive experience to develop and prioritize the SEO roadmap, manage complex project delivery, and optimize systems for maximum efficiency. I lean heavily on AI-powered tools and advanced data analysis to surface deep performance insights and make data-driven decisions that define and optimize the next generation of successful digital content products.