Authors & Featured Experts

Ilana Davis is a Shopify SEO and structured data specialist and the creator of JSON-LD for SEO, a Shopify app that generates structured data to win Google rich results and feed Merchant Center and AI search. Based in Portland, she is widely recognized for practical education on structured data and product entity readiness for Shopify stores.

Vinny O'Brien is an Ireland-based ecommerce strategist and consultant who advises global brands, platforms, and technology companies on digital commerce, marketplaces, and go-to-market growth. A former eBay enterprise manager and head of ecommerce at Arnotts, he runs the consultancy Vinny & Co and publishes The V Spot newsletter for retail and tech leaders.

Will Laurenson is a UK-based DTC conversion optimization consultant and founder of Monkey Blocks, and the host of the Customers Who Click podcast, where he interviews operators about DTC growth decisions, customer psychology, and CRO. He focuses on how ecommerce brands turn traffic into revenue as they scale.

Chloe Thomas is a UK ecommerce educator, author and keynote speaker, and the host of the long-running eCommerce MasterPlan and Keep Optimising podcasts. After nearly two decades in ecommerce—including running her own marketing agency for almost a decade—she now focuses full-time on helping ecommerce brands make better marketing decisions. Her shows have interviewed hundreds of ecommerce operators since 2015.

Kunle Campbell is a UK-based DTC ecommerce advisor and the host of the 2X eCommerce podcast, where he has interviewed hundreds of ecommerce founders and growth operators. His work covers customer acquisition, lifetime value, retention and the ecommerce tech stack from a cross-functional operator's perspective. He is also co-founder of consumer-brand platform Octillion Capital Partners.

Francois Marchand is the editor and podcast host of The Ecomm Manager, bringing more than 20 years in marketing, journalism and communications to the ecommerce beat. He moved into ecommerce and marketing after years as a reporter and editor, including a managing-editor role at Unbounce. At The Ecomm Manager he interviews ecommerce professionals and curates practical resources on tools and operations.

Brett Curry is the CEO and co-founder of OMG Commerce, an ecommerce marketing agency and Google Premier Partner that runs Google, YouTube and Amazon advertising for direct-to-consumer brands. He hosts the eCommerce Evolution podcast, interviewing merchants and experts about what's next in ecommerce. A veteran online marketer and speaker, he specializes in paid search and video advertising for growth-stage brands.

Austin Brawner is the founder and CEO of Brand Growth Experts, a coaching and consulting practice that helps ecommerce owners scale from six to seven figures with the right systems in place. He hosts the Ecommerce Influence podcast, featuring interviews with world-class operators on acquisition and retention strategy. His work centers on building repeatable, retention-led growth systems for DTC brands.

Patrick Coddou is the founder and CEO of Supply, a men's grooming and razor brand he launched in 2017 with his wife Jennifer and grew into a profitable, bootstrapped business before it was acquired by Foundry Brands. He is known for building in public and sharing candid lessons on profitability-first, founder-led DTC growth. His commentary is widely cited across ecommerce media on the realities facing DTC brands.

Marcia Kilgore is a serial entrepreneur who has founded multiple beauty and consumer brands, including Bliss, Soap & Glory, FitFlop and, since 2016, the members' club Beauty Pie. Beauty Pie sells beauty products direct to consumers at prices closer to their manufacturing cost, a model that reframes the economics of the category. Kilgore is widely profiled as one of the most influential builders in modern DTC beauty.

Michele Romanow is a Canadian tech entrepreneur, investor and co-founder of Clearco (formerly Clearbanc), which she grew into one of the world's largest ecommerce funding platforms, deploying billions across thousands of companies. She stepped down as CEO in 2023 and remains executive chairman, and is a longtime "Dragon" on CBC's Dragons' Den. Her perspective centers on capital, customer-acquisition cost and profitability in DTC growth.

Connie Cen is an ecommerce email and copywriting specialist who helps DTC brands grow revenue through lifecycle email and SMS marketing. She runs her own consultancy and publishes on conversion copy, and her work has been featured by Shopify, Klaviyo, Forbes and Entrepreneur.

Sara Du is co-founder and CEO of Alloy Automation, a platform that lets ecommerce brands and SaaS companies build and manage integrations and automated workflows across tools like Shopify. A Thiel Fellow who left Harvard to start the company, she has raised over $27M from investors including a16z and Bain Capital Ventures.

Joe Spisak is founder and CEO of Fulfill.com, a marketplace that matches ecommerce brands with the right third-party logistics (3PL) and fulfillment partners from a network of hundreds of providers. A multi-time founder who previously built and exited ShipDaddy, he was named a top ecommerce logistics voice to follow by Shopify.

Ashvin (Ash) Melwani is co-founder and CMO of Obvi, a bootstrapped collagen and health-supplement brand that scaled past $40M in sales and 250K+ customers. He is known in DTC circles for community-led product launches and performance marketing on Meta.

Ronak (Ron) Shah is co-founder and CEO of Obvi, a collagen-focused supplement brand he launched in 2019 and grew to eight figures in sales across 75+ countries. A former agency owner and EY Entrepreneur of the Year honoree, he is an active advisor and investor in consumer brands.

Shaan Puri is a founder, angel investor and co-host of the My First Million podcast, which draws tens of millions of downloads a year. He previously sold his startup Bebo to Twitch and runs an early-stage rolling fund backing consumer and internet businesses.

Jake Kassan co-founded MVMT, the direct-to-consumer watch and accessories brand he bootstrapped to over $70M in annual revenue before its sale to Movado Group in 2018. He now works as an investor focused on consumer and AI-enabled platforms.

Chris Meade is co-founder and CMO of CROSSNET, the four-way volleyball game he helped build into an eight-figure DTC-and-retail sporting-goods brand now sold in thousands of stores. A Forbes 30 Under 30 honoree, he also runs the Founders Forward newsletter and community for ecommerce entrepreneurs.

Molson Hart is the founder and CEO of Viahart, an educational toy company he built into a multi-million-dollar Amazon and DTC business. He is widely followed on X for candid, data-driven commentary on Amazon selling, manufacturing, tariffs, and the realities of running a product business.

Jonathan Snow, DMD is a dentist-turned-ecommerce operator who founded The Snow Agency, a Shopify-focused growth agency later acquired by Avenue Z, where he is now Chief Innovation Officer. He and his brother built DTC brands that generated tens of millions in revenue, and he shares weekly ecommerce and paid-acquisition lessons through his 'In the Snow' newsletter and social channels.

Jaime Schmidt is the founder of Schmidt's Naturals, a natural deodorant and personal-care brand she grew from a farmers-market startup to an acquisition by Unilever. She is the author of 'Supermaker' and co-founder of the investment firm Color and the Supermaker community, where she supports founder-led CPG and DTC brands.

Dave Gerhardt is the founder of Exit Five, a B2B marketing community, and a former marketing leader at Drift and Privy. He is the author of 'Founder Brand' and is widely followed for lessons on brand-building, content, and community-led distribution.

Ben Jabbawy is the founder of Privy, an email and SMS marketing platform built for small and mid-sized ecommerce merchants, which was acquired by Attentive. He is a recognized voice on helping SMB Shopify stores grow through owned channels, popups, and retention marketing.

Allen Walton is the founder of SpyGuy, a niche ecommerce store selling security and hidden cameras that he grew as a bootstrapped DTC operator. He writes and speaks openly about the realities of building a small, profitable ecommerce business.

Marco Marandiz is an Austin-based DTC operator and product marketer who founded the DTC marketing firm Petri Growth and has led product and marketing at consumer brands including Sugardoh and the commerce platform Elliot. He is a recognized voice on product marketing, positioning, and brand strategy for direct-to-consumer businesses.

Alex Garcia is the founder of Marketing Examined, a widely read marketing newsletter and education brand focused on growth experiments and content frameworks. Based in Austin, he breaks down how brands grow through repeatable content and distribution playbooks.

Nate Rosen is the founder of Express Checkout, a widely read newsletter and community covering CPG, DTC and retail trends, product launches, founder interviews and M&A. What began as a personal newsletter has grown into a trusted media voice for thousands of consumer-brand founders, operators and investors.

Harry Molyneux is co-founder and head of CRO at DTC Pages, a conversion-rate-optimization agency for Shopify brands built around A/B testing and high-converting landing pages. He publishes swipe files and landing-page frameworks — including an awareness-based, four-type landing page model — used by seven- and eight-figure ecommerce brands.

Neville Medhora is a copywriter and educator who runs Copywriting Course (formerly Kopywriting Kourse), teaching plain-spoken, persuasive writing frameworks to marketers and founders. He publishes prolifically across his site, X and YouTube on how to write copy that customers actually read and act on.

Patrick Campbell founded ProfitWell (formerly Price Intelligently), the subscription metrics and pricing-optimization software he bootstrapped to eight figures in ARR before its ~$200M acquisition by Paddle, where he then served as chief strategy officer. He is a widely followed voice on subscription pricing, retention and lifetime value.

Jason Portnoy is a Montreal-based entrepreneur and founder and CEO of JPORT Media, a digital marketing agency focused on paid media and retention for ecommerce brands. A former DTC apparel founder, he also hosts the Perfectly Mentored podcast and writes on growth and advertising.

Nick Shackelford is a partner at Structured, a performance-marketing agency, and co-founder of the DTC beverage brand BRĒZ. Having run paid media and creative for well over 100 direct-to-consumer brands across Meta, Snap and Pinterest, he is a widely cited voice on creative testing and paid growth for ecommerce.

Lauren Schwartz is the founder and CEO of The Loft 325, a creative studio she launched in 2020 to put creative at the front of performance marketing for DTC and ecommerce brands. She specializes in creative direction, creative testing and offer design, and has produced paid-social creative for beauty and wellness brands such as ColourPop and Love Wellness.

Cody Wittick is co-founder and co-CEO of Kynship, an influencer-marketing agency he built with Taylor Lagace around relationship-first creator partnerships for DTC brands. Before Kynship he built a 500-plus influencer program at ring brand QALO, and today he co-hosts a podcast on scaling ecommerce brands through influencer and UGC strategy.

Taylor Lagace is co-founder and co-CEO of Kynship, an influencer marketing agency built for direct-to-consumer brands. Before Kynship he built out the influencer department at Common Thread Collective and worked in sports marketing at Athletes First. He is known for a 'no strings attached' creator-seeding model that prioritizes organic UGC over pay-per-post deals.

Sarah Chrisp is the New Zealand-based founder and face of Wholesale Ted, one of the largest ecommerce education channels on YouTube with well over a million subscribers. She teaches print-on-demand, dropshipping and Shopify store-building, and runs the Ecomm Clubhouse membership. She is a Shopify-approved educator and official Shopify partner.

Travis Marziani is a US-based ecommerce entrepreneur and educator behind Effective Ecommerce and the Passion Product Formula. On his YouTube channel he teaches beginners how to launch Amazon FBA private-label and Shopify products built around personal interests. His courses emphasize product research, branding and crowdfunded launches.

Jody Edgar is a Canadian ecommerce educator who runs the 'How to Shopify' YouTube channel, sharing tutorials and case studies on building and scaling Shopify stores. He has worked with Shopify since 2010 and teaches store strategy, buyer psychology and conversion optimization. He also runs a Shopify masterclass for growing merchants.

Lauren Kleinman is founder of Dreamday, a performance PR, affiliate and influencer agency for consumer brands, and co-founder of the commerce publication The Quality Edit. She previously helped build vitamin brand Ritual as VP of Marketing. She coined 'Performance PR' to tie earned press and publisher affiliate placements to measurable revenue for DTC brands.

Barry Hott is a growth and performance marketing consultant and founder of Hott Growth, based in Brooklyn, New York. He has managed hundreds of millions in paid social spend for brands from AT&T and Toyota to DTC names like Athletic Greens, Keeps and Hubble. He is widely known for championing 'ugly ads' — authentic, native-feeling creative that outperforms polished production.

Danavir Sarria is founder of CopyMonk, an ecommerce email marketing agency, and a longtime copywriter who started writing marketing email as a teenager. He works with 6-, 7- and 8-figure DTC brands on retention, promotional campaigns and lifecycle copy. He publishes 'The Upsell,' a newsletter of ecommerce growth tactics for founders, agencies and executives.

Matthew Kobach is a content and social media strategist known for building brand presence on platforms like Twitter/X. He was previously Director of Content Marketing at fintech startup Fast and managed digital and social media at the New York Stock Exchange. Adweek has named him among its most inspiring minds in marketing, and he is followed for concise, high-signal takes on brand voice and audience growth.

Clint Butler is the owner of Digitaleer, a US web design and SEO agency, and has worked in search since 2009. He hosts the long-running 'SEO This Week' show and educates practitioners on schema, on-page optimization, and hands-on SEO testing.

Charles Floate is a UK-based SEO entrepreneur known for affiliate SEO, aggressive link-building tactics, and his early 'God of SEO' blog. He runs an SEO agency and publishes courses and YouTube content covering the full spectrum of search tactics.

James Dooley is a UK SEO entrepreneur and investor, founder of FatRank and PromoSEO, who operates a no-win-no-fee lead-generation model across hundreds of ranked digital assets. He is an author and podcast host focused on scaling search, automation, and knowledge-graph visibility.

Gareth Hoyle is the founder and managing director of Marketing Signals, a UK agency delivering SEO, PPC, digital PR, and GEO/LLM visibility, with 15+ years in search. He is a frequent commentator on running and scaling SEO agencies.

Karl Hudson co-founded Searcharoo, a UK link-building and content agency he runs alongside James Dooley, managing outreach campaigns across roughly 2,000 sites monthly. He built his background in competitive iGaming SEO and scalable backlink operations.

Trifon Boyukliyski is an SEO and iGaming specialist with 15+ years running performance-driven campaigns in regulated markets, having led programs for 50+ global companies. He publishes on link building, SEO tooling, and measurable growth in highly competitive verticals.

Georgi Todorov is the founder of Create & Grow, a link-building and digital PR agency, and previously built and sold the ThriveMyWay blog. He was hired by Semrush in 2021 to develop their internal link-building processes and writes widely on SEO and content.

Nikola Baldikov is a Bulgaria-based SEO with over a decade of experience and founder of SERPsGrowth, a link-building and digital PR agency, as well as Inbound Blogging. He publishes influential SEO and GEO expert round-ups and writes on link strategy and search authority.

Miłosz Krasiński is the founder and managing director of Chilli Fruit Web Consulting, a London-based agency focused on off-page SEO, link building and digital PR. He works mainly with SaaS and B2B brands, and writes and speaks regularly about international SEO and authority building.

Szymon Słowik is a Polish SEO consultant and strategist and the founder of the boutique agency Takaoto (takaoto.pro). He is known for combining business strategy, brand positioning, semantic architecture and AI-driven search visibility, and speaks at conferences such as BrightonSEO while lecturing on internet marketing in Poland.

Viktoria Altman is the founder and CEO of BSPE Legal Marketing, a US digital agency that helps law firms grow visibility in both traditional and AI-driven search. Based in New York, she focuses on SEO for legal professionals and hosts the Law Firm Accelerator Podcast.

Kristján Már Ólafsson is an independent, Berlin-based SEO consultant specializing in international and multilingual search. He is known for merging on-page localization with entity-level optimization across markets and languages, and increasingly frames his work as a move from SEO to GEO.

Mark Slorance is a Glasgow-based SEO consultant and founder of Pixel Juice, focused on local and national SEO and mass-page strategies. He is known for transparent reporting and practical tactics that increase visibility and sales for local businesses.

Dean Signori is a UK-based SEO consultant and founder of UK Web Geekz, specializing in SEO and Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) for service and ecommerce businesses. He created the Signori Trust Signal Framework to help brands get understood and cited by AI search, and speaks regularly on GEO.

Ronan Walsh is the founder of Digital Trawler, a remote SaaS-focused SEO agency based on the west coast of Ireland. He has worked in SEO for around a decade and also lectures in web design and digital marketing, making him a useful voice on SaaS SEO for European audiences.

Kieran Daly is a European SEO practitioner named by Primary Position among the SEO influencers and educators to follow in 2026. He is tracked here as part of GEOly's European SEO watchlist.

Carrie Hill co-founded Ignitor Digital with Mary Bowling in 2013 to bring high-quality local search, SEO, and social media help to small and very small businesses. She has been working in SEO since 2006 and also serves as a Local SEO analyst at Sterling Sky, where she is known for solving real-world local ranking problems. Carrie is a long-time contributor to industry publications including Search Engine Land.

Chris Dreyer is the founder and CEO of Rankings.io, a search marketing agency specializing in SEO for personal injury and elite law firms, which has made the Inc. 5000 list for eight consecutive years. He is a Wall Street Journal and USA Today best-selling author of books including "Niching Up," and hosts the Personal Injury Mastermind podcast. Chris built Rankings.io from an earlier attorney-focused venture he launched in 2013.

Gerrid Smith is the founder and CEO of Fortress, a legal marketing agency he started in 2018, and has been in SEO since launching his first agency in 2008. He built one of the earliest law-firm-focused SEO agencies (later Black Fin), which worked with more than 100 firms before its 2020 sale. His work centers on authority-building through link operations, content strategy, technical audits, and AI-driven search optimization.

Anatolii Ulitovskyi is the founder of UNmiss, an organic-growth platform offering 45+ free SEO and GEO tools plus automated content and analytics, and previously founded the Ukrainian agency SEOquick. He has spent 15+ years in SEO, digital marketing, and PR after moving into the field in 2008. He publishes educational marketing content across YouTube, LinkedIn, and industry blogs.

Chris Deferio is the founder and host of Keys to the Shop, a podcast and training company for coffee retail professionals that has grown to more than 900 episodes and millions of downloads since launching in 2017. He has spent over 20 years in specialty coffee as a barista, trainer, manager, and consultant. Based in Louisville, Kentucky, he focuses on leadership, management, and customer experience in retail coffee.

Liran Hirschkorn is the founder and CEO of Incrementum Digital, an agency that manages advertising for Amazon, Walmart, and TikTok sellers. He built the firm on firsthand experience, having started and scaled multiple e-commerce brands to millions in Amazon sales after exiting an online insurance business in 2014. He is a widely followed speaker and thought leader on marketplace advertising and growth.

Michael Gonzalez is a direct-to-consumer operator best known as the founder and CEO of FitTea, a detox tea brand he grew to over $100 million in sales before exiting in 2021, with distribution reaching retailers from Walmart to GNC. An early adopter of Instagram influencer marketing starting in 2013, he later created the CBD-infused beverage brand HappyTea. He shares founder-led DTC commentary on X as @teaceoo.

Wiz of Ecom is Mubbu, a direct-to-consumer operator and creator who posts about ecommerce tactics on X (@wizofecom). He has built DTC brands, marketing agencies, and SaaS, and previously ran a large Instagram audience network. He also created The Presence Pillars, a course on building authority and audience for founders and operators.

Michael Patrón is an eight-figure Amazon seller who shares candid, anti-guru commentary on marketplace selling — covering Amazon fees, logistics, PPC and the platform's algorithm — with a sizable following on X. He is featured on Commerce Caffeine's list of ecommerce experts.

David Hoos is a DTC growth marketer who now advises technical agency founders ($1M+) on scaling their businesses. Listed among Commerce Caffeine's ecommerce voices, he shares practical tactics on ecommerce growth, retention and marketing operations across his X and LinkedIn presence.

Chris Cantino is co-founder and partner at Color Capital, a consumer venture fund he runs with Jaime Schmidt, investing across CPG, marketplaces, ecommerce and emerging media. He previously helped grow Schmidt's Naturals to its acquisition by Unilever and co-authored the book Supermaker.

Chad Ross is the founder and CEO of Dorsal Bracelets, an ocean-inspired DTC accessories brand built around ocean conservation. He shares hands-on paid-social and TikTok advertising tactics for ecommerce and is featured among ECORN's list of DTC creators.

Alexa Kilroy is a DTC and ecommerce marketing leader who has served as Head of Brand at Triple Whale, Director of Marketing at FERMÀT and Head of Marketing at Stay AI. She writes and speaks about creative strategy, consumer psychology and data-driven growth for consumer brands.

Helen Guo is co-founder of Schoolyard Snacks (formerly The Cereal School), a low-carb DTC snack brand she grew to eight figures, and a Forbes 30 Under 30 honoree. She now runs SMB Deal Hunter, acquiring and investing in small businesses, and shares ecommerce and entrepreneurship content.

Dan Vas is a Canadian ecommerce entrepreneur and YouTuber who has published Amazon FBA, Shopify and online-business content since 2017, reaching a large audience through his channel and his Ecom Freedom training program. He shares his journey building brands on Amazon and Shopify.

Lindey Glenn is a US reseller and ecommerce YouTuber who has built a channel of 100k+ subscribers around eBay and Poshmark reselling, liquidation sourcing and money-saving hauls. She runs her reselling business from rural Kansas while balancing family life.

Darrel Wilson is a US-based WordPress and web-design educator who runs one of YouTube's largest free tutorial channels for building websites with WordPress, Elementor, AI builders, and Shopify. A former freelance web designer, he now teaches beginners how to launch online stores and business sites, and also publishes paid courses on Udemy.

Nathan Nazareth is a Canadian (Vancouver) ecommerce entrepreneur and YouTuber with a large following who teaches Shopify dropshipping through free step-by-step walkthroughs and product-research content. He launched multiple six-figure dropshipping brands in his early twenties and now runs an ecommerce education platform and courses.

Mohammed Kamil Sattar, known as 'The Ecom King,' is a British ecommerce entrepreneur and founder/CEO of an e-commerce mentoring business with stakes across several brands. His YouTube channel offers 400+ free dropshipping and Shopify tutorials, including a multi-hour free course, alongside high-ticket mentorship programs.

Anton Kraly is the founder and CEO of Drop Ship Lifestyle, an ecommerce coaching program he created in 2013 that has trained thousands of students across dozens of countries. He opened his first dropshipping store in 2007 and now teaches a 7-step blueprint for building high-ticket, niche dropshipping stores through his YouTube channel and courses.

Tatiana James is a Canadian digital entrepreneur and investor who built a multi-million-dollar ecommerce brand starting on Amazon FBA before expanding to Shopify, later selling it. On her YouTube channel she teaches Amazon FBA, ecommerce, and online business strategy to a large audience.

Jordan Welch is a US ecommerce creator with over a million YouTube subscribers who documents his dropshipping journey and teaches store-building and paid-ad strategy. He scaled a winning product to seven figures, built the Viral Vault product-research tool (acquired by AutoDS in 2024), and now runs AI-focused ecommerce coaching.

Biaheza is a US-based ecommerce creator with over a million YouTube subscribers, known for documenting dropshipping experiments alongside broader online-business and lifestyle content. He built and scaled a Shopify dropshipping business as a teenager and sells a widely reviewed dropshipping course.

Chris Conrady is a US ecommerce creator who runs the YouTube channel 'InvolvingChris,' where he breaks down Shopify print-on-demand and personalization-store strategy and shares lessons from scaling multi-million-dollar stores. His content centers on product customization and building profitable POD businesses.

Chris Heckman is an e-commerce entrepreneur and educator with over seven years building Shopify print-on-demand brands that have collectively done more than $25 million in sales. He has scaled multiple brands past $1M and exited several of them, and now runs WeScale, a large Shopify print-on-demand community where he teaches sellers how to build acquisition-worthy DTC brands. He publishes practical store-building and scaling content on YouTube and through his Skool community.

Founder and CEO of iPullRank, and a researcher in technical SEO, content engineering, and generative search.

Principal Product Manager at Microsoft Bing, and a public speaker on Bing, IndexNow, and AI search.

Co-founder of Authority Hacker, focused on content sites, SEO, AI content, and monetization.

Founder of Local SEO Guide, specializing in local search, technical SEO, and enterprise-level projects.

Founder of Wiideman Consulting Group, an ecommerce and multi-location SEO consultant.

An ecommerce SEO consultant who has long provided SEO and growth advice to Shopify merchants.

COO of Shopify, focused on the product platform, AI tools, and merchant operational efficiency.

One of Shopify's product leaders, involved in product directions related to AI and consumer shopping experiences.

A creator in the AI content and search space who continually discusses AI search, content, and zero-click trends.

Host of Breaking B2B, covering B2B SEO, AI SEO, AEO, GEO, and LLMO.

An SEO consultant and content strategy researcher who emphasizes user journeys, brand, and content quality.

A BrightonSEO speaker whose public talk is titled "The Organic Discoverability Framework: Connecting SEO, GEO, Content & PR."

A BrightonSEO speaker whose public talk is titled "AI search reality check: Making sense of change with imperfect signals."

A BrightonSEO speaker whose public talk is titled "Turning Search Data into Work that Delivers."

A BrightonSEO speaker whose public talk is titled "GEO Experiments 2026: What We Tested, What Failed, and What Actually Works."

A BrightonSEO speaker whose public talk is titled "Entity SEO, Topical Authority and Information Gain in the Age of AI Searches."