THE PERSON / THE PRACTICE
About Jarrod Tafoya: Growth Strategist & Creative Director
I'm Jarrod Tafoya, an Atlanta-based growth marketing strategist and creative director. I work independently across strategy, acquisition, digital experiences, analytics, creative development and automation. Sometimes I'm hired to find the answer. Often I'm also the person who builds it.
The analytical foundation came first. I studied finance and marketing at Georgia State University, earned an MBA from Kennesaw State University, and spent more than eight years analyzing live options and futures markets at NYSE / Intercontinental Exchange. I learned to evaluate incomplete information, separate signals from noise, and make decisions where accuracy, timing and risk mattered.
At Huddl'n, a venture-backed social platform, the operating environment changed. I joined as the third team member and became Director of Growth & Marketing. I worked across user acquisition, creator onboarding, content, partnerships and community, often directly with founders and technical teammates. During my tenure, active users increased from approximately 5,000 to more than 60,000. The growth was team work; my responsibility was connecting the pieces that brought people in, helped them engage and gave them a reason to return.
As Artist Manager & Brand Director for Iman Europe, I worked where brand, creative identity and commercial strategy meet. The work extended across digital distribution, release campaigns, streaming, social, email, merchandising, partnerships and live operations. That meant thinking about audience growth and ownership at the same time: not just attracting attention but building channels that could sustain a business.
Since 2023, my independent practice has crossed entertainment, healthcare and wellness, institutional projects, local businesses, creative production and technology. I've shipped client websites and digital platforms, built marketing and lifecycle infrastructure, developed commercial treatments and awarded RFP materials, led creative experiments, and created AI-assisted software tools used in working environments.
That breadth is not the pitch by itself. The value is the ability to understand what a business needs, choose a practical response, and take responsibility for getting it done. Sometimes that is a better message or acquisition system. Sometimes it's a clearer website, a persuasive proposal, or an automation that gives people time back.
01
How I approach growth strategy and technical execution
Diagnose the real constraint. Test the assumptions worth testing. Build the necessary intervention. Systematize what can become repeatable. I care about evidence and craft in equal measure: it has to work, and it has to be worth putting in front of people.
02
Experience across finance, startups, marketing and creative work
- Independent Growth Strategist & Creative Director2023–present
- Artist Manager & Brand Director, Iman Europe2023–2024
- Director of Growth & Marketing, Huddl'n2021–2023
- Senior Analyst, NYSE / Intercontinental Exchange2013–2022
03
Education
- MBAKennesaw State University, Michael J. Coles College of Business (2016)
- Undergraduate study/degrees in Finance and MarketingGeorgia State University, J. Mack Robinson College of Business (2009–2010)
04
Working together
I work with founders, marketing teams, agencies, artists, institutional organizations and owner-operated businesses. The best engagements begin with an outcome worth improving, not a channel that has already been prescribed.