Summary
Overview
Work History
Education
Skills
Timeline
Generic
JOHN CLIFFORD

JOHN CLIFFORD

Pittsburgh ,PA

Summary

Technology focused business development executive with a track record of creating long term value for start up and corporate organizations. Skilled in strategy, partnerships, and client development with board room experience. Specialist in growth hacking and creating new lines of business from conception through systemization. Organized and dependable candidate with twenty years of successfully managing multiple priorities with a positive attitude. Willingness to take on added responsibilities to meet team goals.

Overview

24
24
years of professional experience

Work History

Head of Business Development

Niche.com
01.2020 - Current
  • Lead Business Development for Series C, VC funded educational technology company in growth stage from $5M to $50M over three (3) year period
  • Worked with Leadership team to develop and implement growth strategies, strategic partnerships, and corporate development activities
  • Identified and acquired data set that "changed the course of the company" according to COO, enabling Niche to calculate actual attribution of primary product line
  • Developed strategic relationships with four potential strategic investors for potential cash infusion proposals during down market
  • Analyzed and performed due diligence on over two dozen partnership/acquisition targets to determine make/buy path forward to support company's strategic growth
  • Liaised with primary venture partners to create business/corporate development strategies for Niche.com
  • Developed and maintained relationships with key strategic partnerships across higher education and primary school markets
  • Worked cross functionally across with Product, Sales, Research and Leadership to explore and vet new opportunities as they arose
  • Developed and executed strategic initiatives to implement key changes and improvements in business development and sales programs.

Chefs.cloud, Llc

Founder
08.2016 - 05.2020
  • Conceptualized, researched, and built food focused technology company
  • Produced Two dozen chef focused, one-minute videos of Pittsburgh's top chefs
  • Negotiated deals with local media partners to sponsor and distribute videos
  • Developed system to index, update & recommend meals from eighty restaurants
  • Worked with Chatham University Food Studies Program to develop allergy and health filter for food
  • Worked with major hospital group to make technology available to their customers
  • Worked with major hotel group to explore food tourism pilot to increase sales and delight customers
  • Built team of ten on demand workforce to build food focused technology company,

SVP Business Development

Rhiza Labs (a Nielsen Company)
06.2014 - 06.2015
  • Recruited by the CEO and board to:
  • Guide transition from consulting focused development shop to product centric SaaS data visualization platform
  • Introduced eventual acquirer (Nielsen) to executive team
  • Retained 100% of existing clients through annual subscription renewal negotiations
  • Grew client base by 33%, signing major media network to alpha product offering
  • Negotiated reseller agreements with strategic data providers
  • Recruited Data Science team to build SaaS product.

Sales Manager

Amazon.com
01.2005 - 01.2009
  • Identify new opportunities for print on demand technology with top tier publishers and largest consumers of on demand printing to meet sales quota of $1M/month from newly acquired content
  • Negotiated over 100 contracts w/ C level executives to list digital assets with Amazon print on demand and Kindle
  • Managed entire sales process from prospecting, through client education and terms negotiations
  • Responsible for ongoing terms improvement and increased client participation in Amazon digital programs
  • Managed over 100, including 8 of top 10, clients contributing 60% of overall team gross sales ($24M/annually)
  • Educated sales team and publishing industry on benefits of print on demand technology by developing marketing materials, presentations, conference strategy and other inside and outside sales activities
  • Managed business and technical teams to deliver existing media and convert to Amazon proprietary format for global just in time printing
  • Established new relationships with over 100 new publishers, ranging from boutique to top tier, publicly traded
  • Led team to grow gross margin sales from $16M/annually in 24 months
  • Defined requirements for new Salesforce.com CRM system and rolled out to content acquisition team
  • Developed and refined metrics for four man b2b sales team for reporting to senior management.

SVP

CivicScience
01.2005 - 01.2008
  • Developed and implemented new strategies and policies in collaboration with executive partners to establish and achieve long-term business objectives, providing company with strong and sustainable organizational leadership.
  • Proved concept for both supply and demand side of new "opinion exchange" business model
  • Increased supply of data (measured in poll responses) from 10,000/month to over 400,000/day
  • Developed partnership program that allowed for distributed input of data across hundreds of websites
  • Negotiated contracts and managed relationships with strategic partners and key accounts
  • Worked with dev and product teams to craft client solutions increasing sales from negligible to six-figures/month.

President/CEO

ELEPHANTSHOPPING LLC
01.2004 - 01.2005
  • Conceptualized, developed and incorporated web-based social networking shopping site
  • Built financial models, elevator speech and pitched investors
  • Hired and managed three person development team to build beta version of web-based community order management system.

Duration, Inc.

Director Of North America
01.2003 - 01.2004
  • Managed US sales and over 50 client relations for Singapore based software development company.
  • Responsible for requirements capture and technical rollout of Duration technology solutions for all US based clients.
  • Worked closely with organizational leadership and board of directors to guide operational strategy

Hyperknowledge

Knowledge Management Consultant
01.1999 - 01.2002
  • Developed strategic partnerships with technology/consulting firms to support sales distribution, service, and implementation of Hyperknowledge, knowledge management software.
  • Guided business prospecting of new and existing accounts for Financial Services, Professional Services, and Technology industries.
  • Responsible for project reporting to client's executive teams, and development of case studies
  • Conducted hundreds of one-on-one and group interviews with subject matter experts to extract and analyze best practice process methodology across multiple sectors
  • Managed consulting teams of five consultants during expert interviews, process mapping and metrics analysis
  • Created education materials and trained clients on new process developments and Hyperknowledge methodology
  • Consulting clients and challenging assignments included; American Electric Power (Risk Analysis, Asset Management), Merrill Lynch (New Technology Rollout), Shell Chemical (Executive Learning), American Airlines (Customer Service), CSFB (SOX Reporting), and NASA (Telemetry and Rocket Launch Procedures).
  • Quickly learned new skills and applied them to daily tasks, improving efficiency and productivity.

Education

Bachelor of Science - International Business

Fairfield University
Fairfield, CT
06.1997

Skills

  • Business Development
  • Sales Planning
  • Strategic Positioning
  • Partnership Development
  • Contract Negotiation
  • Problem Resolution
  • System Development
  • Teamwork and Collaboration

Timeline

Head of Business Development

Niche.com
01.2020 - Current

Chefs.cloud, Llc

Founder
08.2016 - 05.2020

SVP Business Development

Rhiza Labs (a Nielsen Company)
06.2014 - 06.2015

Sales Manager

Amazon.com
01.2005 - 01.2009

SVP

CivicScience
01.2005 - 01.2008

President/CEO

ELEPHANTSHOPPING LLC
01.2004 - 01.2005

Duration, Inc.

Director Of North America
01.2003 - 01.2004

Hyperknowledge

Knowledge Management Consultant
01.1999 - 01.2002

Bachelor of Science - International Business

Fairfield University

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