Jeff Kamikow
Musings from the CEO of Cross Audience
About Cross Audience
About Jeff Kamikow
Jeff Kamikow, President and CEO of Cross Audience, has nearly 20 years of media experience including sales and operations management, business development and executive management at companies including Pulse 360, Time Inc. and Ziff-Davis.
Jeffrey Kamikow is a digital marketing expert and revenue strategy executive with more than two decades of experience in sales and operations management, business development and executive management at several successful companies.
After graduating from Southern Illinois University in 1993, Jeff Kamikow launched a promising career in the print industry. He took his first career-track job with PC World magazine, as an account executive. He cut his chops for a year in the account management department, then took a once-in-a-decade opportunity with Ziff Davis Media, the publisher of PCMag — then among the top brands in the nascent digital media business.
During his seven-year tenure with Ziff Davis, Kamikow managed offices in Los Angeles, Chicago and New York, holding positions of increasing responsibility and pushing his superiors to think about advertising in ways they never had before. He ended his stint with the company as its East Coast Corporate Sales Director, a position widely regarded as the linchpin that held Ziff Davis's entire business development operation in place.
While working at Ziff Davis, Jeff Kamikow became fascinated with the rapidly evolving, high-potential world of digital marketing. He had the good fortune (and fortitude) to make the digital transition just as the space's best minds were figuring out how to squeeze revenue from online ads.
In the subsequent decade and a half, Kamikow has cultivated a reputation as one of the continent's foremost brand strategists, not to mention a top-tier technical strategist who has architected dozens of innovative campaigns.
After leaving Ziff Davis, Kamikow accepted a job as National Advertising Director at Field & Stream and Outdoor Life, two Time Inc. properties with storied histories and flagging ad sales. Jeffrey Kamikow successfully turned the properties around in part thanks to a groundbreaking digital marketing strategy. One of the proudest moments of his tenure: building a digital revenue stream on the order of $5 million within 18 months of coming onboard. When he left in 2006, he was widely credited with laying the groundwork for the properties' long-term digital success.
Eager to embrace the technical side of online marketing, Kamikow took the reins as digital advertising firm Pulse 360's vice president of sales. Under his leadership, Pulse 360 completely reinvented its brand, and the firm's board promoted Kamikow to president of sales and operations. By 2011, Kamikow oversaw a recurring revenue stream of about $55 million and worked with a some of the biggest publishers in the United States.
Jeff Kamikow left Pulse 360 in 2011 and accepted an executive position with Verve Mobile, one of the very first companies to crack the mobile advertising code. Kamikow subsequently moved to Lyfe Mobile, whose methodology and approach closely mirrored Verve's. As Lyfe's chief revenue officer, Kamikow was responsible for growing the company's revenues, expanding its brand, and ultimately executing a complex and highly beneficial sale to BlinkX, a larger European competitor seeking a foothold in the American market.
Lyfe's successful exit earned Kamikow newfound respect in the tight-knit revenue community, opening up new opportunities that he scarcely could have imagined as a young account executive at PC World. Kamikow's currently works as chief revenue officer at Go2mobi, a large (and growing) British Columbia firm that executes metrics-driven mobile and digital advertising campaigns for startups and blue-chip firms in the United States, Canada, Europe and parts of Asia. Jeff Kamikow's duties also include ownership of far-ranging brand strategy initiatives, ad network building (especially in the still-growing mobile space), and developing revenue-securing strategies for the company's eight-figure revenue stream.
Although his responsibilities at Go2mobi keep him quite busy, Kamikow has time to oversee a second passion project: Kamikow Media Group (KMG), a rapidly growing, highly diversified media consulting firm. KMG is a vital creative outlet for Kamikow, who intentionally seeks projects that keep him connected to the mobile and digital ad realm's cutting edge and foster fruitful connections with the industry's smartest, most innovative thinkers.
Jeffrey Kamikow grew up in the Chicago area, but now lives in the New York City area with his family. When he's not working on innovative digital marketing strategies, he can be found playing golf, tennis or baseball near his home. He also finds time to coach his son's club baseball team, which won a state championship in 2015 — partly, says Kamikow, thanks to his above-average amateur coaching skills. And he still finds time to cheer for his alma mater's beloved Salukis — or, as Jeff Kamikow puts it, "the best Division I athletic department you've never heard of."
Connect with Jeff on LinkedIn.
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