Marketing · Strategy · AI · Creative
Marketing, AI & creative
strategy, done right.
I'm Carsten, a marketing, AI, and creative strategy leader with experience across the private sector and government. I help ambitious organizations cut through complexity, ship work worth using, and build momentum that compounds.
Or reach me directly at hey@hirecarsten.com
18+
Years in the field
61
Projects shipped
$228M+
Revenue influenced
End‑to‑end
From strategy to execution
What I Do
Disciplines
Strategic vision and hands-on execution, so your team ships faster and growth follows.
01
Marketing & Brand Strategy
From positioning and messaging to demand generation and omnichannel marketing, I build marketing engines that attract the right customers and convert them. I've led campaigns spanning paid, organic, content, and partner channels.
02
AI-Driven Marketing Ops & Process Efficiency
I streamline the systems behind the strategy by applying AI to marketing ops, campaign workflows, and cross-team processes. That includes deploying agentic AI to handle repeatable tasks autonomously, freeing teams to spend less time on busywork and more on work that moves the needle.
03
Agentic AI, Technology & Integration
I help companies move beyond AI experimentation into agentic systems that act, decide, and execute autonomously. From designing multi-agent workflows and evaluating tech stacks to integrating LLMs into core platforms, I translate emerging technology into outcomes that last.
04
Creative Direction
Ideas only matter if they land. I bring a creative director's eye to campaigns, content, and brand storytelling: shaping narratives that resonate, visual identities that stick, and copy that converts. Strategy and craft, working together.
05
Cross-Functional Leadership
Great outcomes require aligned teams. I bridge engineering, design, marketing, and the C-suite, facilitating decisions, removing blockers, and creating the operating rhythm that lets high-performers do their best work.
06
Product Strategy & Roadmapping
From zero-to-one discovery to scaling mature products, I build data-informed roadmaps that align stakeholders and ship features customers actually want. I've navigated ambiguity at every stage of the product lifecycle.
Thought Leadership
Recent Writing
Notes from the field on marketing, search, AI, and building things that work.
Your Content Is a Vector Now
Search stopped matching strings years ago. It matches meaning, represented as coordinates in high-dimensional space. A practical breakdown of vector embeddings, why generative engine optimization is really a retrieval problem, and how semantic search ties organic performance, answer-engine citations, and your own site search into one investment.
Read the pieceAgentic AI
Why Most "AI Strategies" Are Just Automation in Disguise
The difference between bolting AI onto a workflow and rebuilding the workflow around agentic systems, and why most organizations are still doing the former.
Read the pieceMarketing
Brand Strategy Doesn't End at the Logo
A field guide to the parts of brand strategy that actually move revenue: positioning, channel fit, and the boring operational decisions nobody puts on a moodboard.
Read the pieceLeadership
What Government Work Taught Me About Process
Lessons on stakeholder alignment and operational rigor from the public sector, and why they apply just as much to a 12-person startup.
Read the pieceSocial Proof
What people are saying
Straight from the colleagues, clients, and hiring managers who've worked with Carsten.
Carsten has an exceptional ability to zoom out and see the whole board while also rolling up his sleeves and doing the work. He turned our fragmented efforts into a cohesive strategy that accelerated our roadmap by two quarters.
Sarah L.
VP of Product, SaaS Scale-up
We brought Carsten in to diagnose a stalled growth curve. Within 60 days he identified three high-leverage opportunities we had completely missed. One alone drove a 22% lift in monthly recurring revenue.
Marcus R.
CEO, B2B Technology Start-up
I've worked with a lot of senior people. Carsten stands out because he communicates equally well with engineers and executives, and he never loses sight of the customer. He's the kind of hire that changes the trajectory of a team.
Jamie K.
Engineering Director, Series B Start-up
Work With Me
Let's build something worth building.
I take on a select number of consulting engagements each year, working with organizations that want clear thinking, sharp execution, and someone who's done it before. If you have a challenge worth solving, drop your email and I'll be in touch within one business day.