For Love & Money

April 2014

The Opportunity

I reported and wrote a cover story for Milwaukee Magazine’s April 2014 issue that looked at the possible economic impacts if the state of Wisconsin were to legalize same-sex marriage. I did original data analysis and interviewed several couples, businesses and local officials.

The Outcome

I was interviewed about the story on several local TV news broadcasts, I appeared on a local radio show and the state legalized same-sex marriage later that year.

A PayPal founder introduces a new way to pay for cash-strapped web shoppers

June 2014

The Opportunity

I reported and wrote a story about an ecommerce startup from PayPal co-founder Max Levchin that allows customers to split purchases into multiple, smaller payments.

The Outcome

The story was widely viewed on the Internet Retailer website and was highlighted in several email newsletters.

Minerva uses data science to increase social impact

March 2018

The Opportunity

I reported and wrote a story for Australian media outlet The Quo about a program that brought together volunteer data scientists and non-profit organizations to solve problems.

The Outcome

The story was a popular story on The Quo’s website, and I received several assignments after this piece.

Racial Disparities in Migraine and Headache Care

February 2021

The Opportunity

The American Migraine Foundation wanted to bring awareness to racial disparities in migraine care and the American Headache Society’s Underserved Populations in Headache Medicine Special Interest Section for Black History Month. I interviewed the chair of that section and wrote an article.

The Outcome

The article was a top viewed piece on the American Migraine Foundation site that month. As part of the writing and editing process, I worked with the American Migraine Foundation editorial board to update and standardize the language the foundation uses around race, ie Black instead of African-American.

Expanding School Health Services in Kentucky

January 2020

The Opportunity

Healthy Schools Campaign worked on expanding school health services, but the content was technical and hard to understand. I featured a school nurse in Kentucky, whose story made the work accessible and understandable for our audience.

The Outcome

The blog was the most popular blog on our website for several months and was regularly shared in partner newsletters.

Children’s Hospital of Wisconsin saves Milwaukee County Zoo bonobo

May 2017

The Opportunity

I was hired to create content marketing for the Medical College of Wisconsin (MCW) to raise the school’s profile. This specific story was about a professor at MCW who treated a bonobo at the Milwaukee County Zoo. I interviewed the professor and wrote the story. (The MCW website was redesigned, and this story was taken down, but you can read it on a local CBS affiliate website.)

The Outcome

This story got a few media placements for MCW, including a front page story in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

Re-Engagement Campaign for American Migraine Foundation

January 2021

The Opportunity

A large percentage of the American Migraine Foundation’s contacts were considered unengaged, which was dragging down the overall open rate of the organization’s emails. We removed the unengaged contacts from the list, and I spearheaded the development of a drip email campaign focused on winning back those contacts.

The Outcome

The drip campaign won back nearly 2,000 contacts (more than 10% of the total unengaged contacts) in the first month of the campaign.

Removing inactive contacts also improved open and clicks rates for other organization emails.

Turnaround for Children Email Newsletter

October 2021

The Opportunity

Turnaround for Children regularly sent out emails to its audience but did not have a regular, ongoing newsletter to share information. I developed the template, process, and content for a monthly newsletter.

The Outcome

The newsletter has an average open rate of 30% and average click-through-rate of 3.3% and is a regular driver of high-quality traffic to the Turnaround for Children website.

Illinois PE Advocacy Campaign

August 2016

The Opportunity

The state of Illinois was considering a bill to weaken the physical education requirements in schools, so we developed an advocacy campaign to get Illinois residents to write letters to their elected officials. I developed the content and overall strategy (including partner outreach and email marketing) for this landing page. For the email marketing, we segmented our audience into Illinois ZIP codes where the representative had not declared a stance on the bill.

The Outcome

More than 1,000 people from Illinois submitted letters, and the conversion rate for visitors from Illinois was 30%.

Migraine 101

pillar Page for the American Migraine foundation

January 2021

The Opportunity

Historically, the American Migraine Foundation had lost out on top search rankings for migraine queries to medical organizations like the Mayo Clinic. We needed a pillar page to start building up our search authority on migraine to improve our search ranking. I rewrote an existing “Migraine 101” page to transform it into a pillar page using best practices.

The Outcome

The first month after launching the page, page traffic increased by 1500% and increased 100% in each month after. The relaunched page also decreased exit rate by 13% and allowed Google to populate sitelinks for the page.

What Is a Healthy School?

Landing Page for Healthy Schools Campaign

December 2019

The Opportunity

In my regular monitoring of data in Google Analytics, I noticed that a page on the Healthy Schools Campaign site was seeing more and more traffic and was a top 10 landing page on the site. People were finding this page by searching “what is a healthy school.” I redid the page structure and content to adhere to best practices.

The Outcome

The page now appears as a featured snippet for the search query: “what is a healthy school” and was the top landing page on the Healthy Schools Campaign website—even ahead of the homepage.

(Healthy Schools Campaign republished this page as a blog, but the featured snippet is still active.)

How Big Are McHenry County Voting Precincts?

January 2022

The Opportunity

The McHenry County Board approved a new precinct map, which increased the number of voting precincts in the county from 212 to 223. I reported and wrote a story looking at how the voting precincts had changed in size over the years and as a result of the new map.

The Outcome

The article had a more than 50% open rate when it was emailed to subscribers and is still one of the top articles on the site.

For Love & Money

April 2014

The Opportunity

I reported and wrote a cover story for Milwaukee Magazine’s April 2014 issue that looked at the possible economic impacts if the state of Wisconsin were to legalize same-sex marriage. I did original data analysis and created an interactive map in Tableau.

The Outcome

I was interviewed about the story on several local TV news broadcasts, I appeared on a local radio show and the state legalized same-sex marriage later that year.

The map was lost in a redesign, but you can still see it on my Tableau Public site.