Success Stories, Case Studies, and Proven Strategies for Business Growth and Innovation
What I do
I’m a Growth and Product professional with a background in Electronics Engineering (BSc) and Engineering Management (MSc). I have 14+ years of experience across industries and business models.
On the side, I’ve been podcasting and angel investing in early-stage companies.
Work
Below is a selection of companies I worked for/with in recent years.
Co-founder, Intale AI (Apr 2023 – Present)
As the co-founder of Intale AI, I’m focusing on leveraging AI to enhance storytelling and creativity. Intale AI’s flagship product, TaleBot, creates personalized stories for children, capturing their imagination and turning their prompts into unique narratives.
My responsibilities include:
- Building the first versions (MVP) of new products. I built v1 of the TaleBot product without external help.
- Co-leading the strategic direction and vision of the company.
- Driving marketing and growth initiatives to expand our user base globally.
Other products we’ve built:
MamaRap: Personalized rap song videos for mothers
PapaRap: Personalized rap song videos for fathers
Founder, Cagri Sarigoz LLC (Oct 2022 – Present)
I founded Cagri Sarigoz LLC to help entrepreneurs, startups, and SMBs grow and succeed.
The projects I’m currently working on:
- BizStack: a resource hub dedicated to empowering entrepreneurs with comprehensive product reviews, newsletters, and actionable insights.
- 1:1 Growth Sessions and Consulting.
What I’ve done so far:
- Interviewed 50+ entrepreneurs and solopreneurs in two months. Found the interviewees via LinkedIn outreach.
CitizenShipper (May 2020 – Present)
Head of SEO and AI Officer (Oct 2023 – Present)
Responsible for managing the growth levers in a US-based two-sided transportation marketplace.
- In my tenure, the SEO traffic has increased by 42% year over year.
- Implemented AI into everyday workflows, from drafting content for various purposes to create an AI sidekick for the support team.
Growth Marketing and Operations Manager (Dec 2021 – Oct 2023)
- Migrated the behavioral email & SMS messaging platform twice, from Mixpanel to Onesignal and then from Onesignal to Customer.io.
- Migrated the whole site from one affiliate program platform (ShareASale) to a more modern platform (Impact) by myself.
- Built a referral program by myself, using the company’s existing no-code and low-code tools.
Here’s the presentation I’ve made to a group of digital growth professionals:
- Initiated email retargeting programs that generated more than 5% of total revenue.
- Acting as the Product Manager of all marketing web properties
- Had been interviewed (the page is translated from Turkish) for a digital marketing strategy guide for 2022.
Growth Marketing Manager (May 2020 – Dec 2021)
- Leading company SEO initiatives and building a team to achieve SEO goals.
- Migrated the behavioral email & SMS messaging platform twice, from Mixpanel to Onesignal and then from Onesignal to Customer.io.
- Built and iterated on in-app onboarding flows using UserGuiding, which generated a 15% lift in activation rates on the supply side and a 10% lift in activation rates on the demand side.
Had been interviewed by the onboarding vendor about the success story. 👇
- Had been interviewed about our team and how I manage my team as a remote team leader. I was also interviewed about our company culture and how our hiring process works. It had a positive brand lift effect for CitizenShipper as a remote-only employer.
Growth Advisor, Guul Games (Feb 2022 – Present)
I’m helping the co-founders tackle getting their first users and starting to build Monthly Recurring Revenue (MRR).
Growth & Product Advisor, UserGuiding (May 2020 – Aug 2020)
I helped growth and product teams to build frameworks and best practices around scalability and impact.
- The product manager of the company and I joined (the page is translated from Turkish) Turkey’s most popular product management podcast about our work.
Digital Marketing Manager, CarHopper (Sep 2016 – Jul 2019)
Was in charge of traffic acquisition & conversion rate optimization efforts of the CarHopper car rental app, which raised its seed funding from $500K to $1.5M in 2017 and exited to Turo in March 2020.
Technical Product Manager, Aselsan (Aug 2019 — May 2020)
Contributed to product management of video management system (VMS) solutions.
I cannot mention the projects here because of confidentiality.
Picus Security (Jul 2017 – Jul 2018)
Product Marketing Manager (Jan 2018 – Jul 2018)
Was in charge of marketing operations and acted as product manager of the company website.
- Managed the process of moving up the company from B2B Marketing Maturity Level 0 to Level 1, i.e., from survival to enabling sales over 9 marketing functions.
Product Manager (Jul 2017 – Jul 2018)
Hired as the first product manager of the company.
- Managed the entire development cycle & release process of 5 major features.
- Managed the selection & implementation of an on-premises product analytics platform.
Digital Marketing and Analytics Specialist, Onedio (Apr 2015 – Jul 2017)
Specialized in analytics & growth efforts of Onedio, the fastest growing online media website in Turkey, expanding to Russian and English, with 30M monthly unique visitors, 22M of which are on mobile.
- Led SEO efforts: increased monthly organic search traffic by 150%.
The case study we made with the SEO agency can be seen here.
- Developed A/B testing processes for Facebook ads: decreased Cost Per Click by 40%.
Digital Marketing and Analytics Analyst, Nokta Media (Aug 2013 – Apr 2017)
Specialized in product development & growth efforts of İzlesene, the biggest video-sharing website after YouTube in Turkey, with 200M+ monthly video views. Led software projects using Kanban with the guidance of the product manager.
I’ve been interviewed for my work here.
- Co-led increasing Internal Search CTR by 5% points & Recommended Videos’ CTR up to 2x through improving algorithms’ performance by A/B testing different scenarios.
- Led SEO efforts: followed the best practices and came up with ideas to compete with YouTube.
- Collaborated with developers by writing product specifications and conducting release reviews.
Side Projects and Volunteering
Angel Investor (Mar 2020 – Present)
Investing in series A or earlier stage startups. So far, I have invested in these startups:
- 11Sight (Aug 2020, Present)
- DAtAnchor (May 2021 – Present)
- Evimdeki Piskolog (Feb 2022 – Present)
Podcaster (Jan 2018 – Dec 2023)
Started and involved in these podcasts:
- Çağrı Sarıgöz Podcast (Jan 2018 – Oct 2022): My podcast (in Turkish) on entrepreneurship, tech, and careers.
- Sıfırdan Globale (Jun 2019 – Dec 2023): Started as a business podcast, transitioning into a social enterprise.
- Satır Arası (Jan 2018 – May 2020): A podcast (in Turkish) where my friends and I read and talked about more than 30 books.
Mentor, YFYI (Jan 2018 – Jan 2019)
I mentored early-stage startups at New Businesses New Ideas (YFYİ), Turkey’s first and largest technology-based entrepreneurship acceleration program, organized by ODTÜ TEKNOKENT since 2005.
Even though I stopped mentoring, I’m still in close contact with the program management team. In 2022, I gave a lecture titled Introduction to Growth Marketing to the new cohort of entrepreneurs in the program. Here’s the presentation I’ve used in the lecture:
Testimonials
I worked with Çağrı on online video platform project over 2 years. Çağrı is an excellent team player, invaluable asset to a project team and contributes significantly to the project’s success and growth using analytics datas with his enthusiasm, dedication. He constantly brings new ideas to the table and always lends a hand when others … Read More
Cagri and I have worked together in many projects during our study in METU Engineering Management program. He is a very brilliant, creative and hardworking person. I was really impressed with his problem solving skills and his dedication to work. I am very glad to have known him he is also a valuable friend. I … Read More
Cagri Sarigoz was my mentor in Nokta. He has advanced analytical intelligence and teamwork skills with his gentle and adaptable personality. He encourages his team members to accomplish their tasks without burdening and putting them under pressure. He is completely master of his domain and a true individual learner who loves detailed research.
I worked with Cagri longer than one year on production of electro optic systems at Aselsan. He is focused and dedicated to produce his best using creative methods to solve problems. He has shown that; he is able to deal with uncertainty using analytic data, he predicts possible problems and quickly responds to keep produciton … Read More
I had a chance to work with Cagri during hobiyo.com launch. He was a great help in establishing our SEO and Analytics efforts. Along with his deep subject matter expertise, he is on top of every product management related trends. I highly recommend him as these are instrumental in every product team’s success!
Cagri is a very hardworking and highly analytical professional. He is very data focused and goes above and beyond to deliver the absolute best results in a timely manner. His knowledge in Google Analytics, Adwords, and Mixpanel helped us understand user and platform behavior. I highly recommend him to any organization.
I have worked with Çağrı as him being my product manager. His organizational skills, and precise knowledge on what has to be done, even on unknown territory, have guided us through each goal. I would highly recommend him for such a role without a moment’s hesitation.
I’ve had the opportunity to work with Cagri for about one year, six months of it on the same team where he was the product owner. I’ve seen firsthand that he’s very hardworking, detail oriented, willing to go the extra mile. He’s an excellent communicator, a team player and cares a lot about the customer. … Read More
It’s rare that you come across with a colleague like Çağrı talking the same language with us, designers. I’ve worked with Çağrı for 10 months. He was the product owner of another team, but I learned a lot from him thanks to some side projects and daily moments in the office. I’m amazed by his … Read More
I’ve worked with Çağrı for about one year as him being my product owner and product marketing manager. He has a great work responsibility. I am very impressed by his management and communication skills as well as his intelligence in digital marketing. Besides being a highly skilled product manager, he is a good-humored and supportive … Read More
Cagri is the guy who’ll always find solutions. He will always advise if you ask for his opinion and come up with plans and strategies. I’m happy to work with Cagri and I’m grateful for having him as a teammate.
