Programmatic Trailblazer Mike Zeman Jumps From Netflix To Intuit

Intuit has hired Mike Zeman, an architect of Netflix’s programmatic trading desk, to help grow its Mint personal finance brand.

Zeman will serve as director of marketing and business development for Intuit’s Consumer Ecosystem Group, reporting to SVP Albert Ko.

During his three years at Netflix, Zeman led digital marketing during a period of dramatic global expansion, fueled by programmatic buying. He built up a substantial in-house marketing practice that used auction- and API-based methods to source media across search, display, social and video. He was later promoted to a global digital marketing role.

Previously Zeman was a senior exec within Publicis Groupe’s VivaKi trading desk organization.

In a 2014 column for AdExchanger, he advised marketers evaluating the in-house option to press ahead so long as they meet some basic pre-reqs. Those criteria included in-house engineering resources, cross-departmental buy-in and spending clout.

“I do think there is a certain profile of marketer that will be taking a hard look at the ‘build’ scenario is coming months and years,” Zeman wrote. “You own the intellectual capital, data and insight that programmatic marketing unlocks. [Additionally], your decisions on how/where/when to buy are always based on expected return. For example, you are much more likely to try and tease out the true incremental value of remarketing if you are not incented on spend volume or percent of media.”

Zeman and an Intuit spokesperson declined comment.

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