Hi there, I’m Simon Muys
I’m an entrepreneur, musician and author
and also looking for a Marketing & Communications Director position.
What am I about?
My name is Simon Muys. I was born and raised near Calais, in the North of France. I have studied journalism and politics, but am mainly experienced in digital communication.
I am an experienced communication professional with a background in project and product management, user experience design, innovation programs and team leadership. I have a proven track record of designing and driving marketing strategies and optimizing acquisition funnels for measurable results. I’m also a skilled entrepreneur with experience in concept development and business planning. I am multilingual and proficient in design, analytics, public relations and content creation.
I am currently working on a startup project called Dymens, aimed at helping authors to publish, spread and monetize contents.
I have been working for 7 years as a Senior Marketing Manager / Technical Program Manager for Amazon Prime in its Luxembourg headquarters, leading a team of Front-End Engineers in charge of the main content architecture for the Prime program WW.
In earlier years, I worked as an Account Manager, Project Manager and Brand Content Manager for digital agencies Vanksen and Nvision in Luxembourg.
In 2019, I founded the association ForLiveable with my wife to build a sustainability gateway for Latin America in Europe bridging finance and technical capacity for the Sustainable Development Goals.
I play music in a duet-band called Says with Mister Jean Caritte.
I’ve also published a novel called Zodia (actually only the first book of a five-book series: “Of Life And Death”). It is available as e-book or printed edition in English and French on Amazon.
All my websites
Projects on which I have worked
These are some of the accounts and projects I have been working on for the past several years.
Tasks I have carried
I have made efforts to keep a very general profile and to get experience in a large range of complementary fields.
1. Strategy
From my very first experience, I have always tried to look at each professional experience from a strategic point of view to propose solutions that fit requirements, but also to foresee future needs or difficulties and to plan for the big picture. Drafting business strategies and plans or conceiving communication campaigns has been one of my prior task in my career.
2. Communication
As a content, project, and account manager within communication agencies, I have learned to carry on all the usual parts of a communication strategy, from the most operational point of view to decision making. Over the years, I have conducted PR operations, street marketing, community management, advertising, video shooting, search engine optimisation, digital campaigns…
3. Project Management
As a generalist, I have not specialised in any particular field but rather developed management skills to organise and overview projects and strategies deployments. I believe in team work and expertise, and I believe a good manager should know and understand his collaborators. I think my ability to detect people abilities and to accompany them in their personal development makes this easier.
4. Web development
I have built several websites, using Laravel framework or Drupal CMS and I am used to integrate bootstrap templates. I am currently leading a team of Web Development Engineers at Amazon, maintaining the main architecture of global templates for Amazon Prime that I have initiated and created.
5. Web design
There again, I am not a designer and I sometimes believe I have a poor eye and little creativity. Still I am fully suited to perform design work on Adobe Creative Suite, for vectorial design, photoshop, video edition or animation. These technical skills allow me to communicate better with artists and designers and understand possible barriers.
6. Content Management
As a trained journalist, my first activity has been content production (articles, photos, videos). Within Vanksen agency, I have conducted a research about brand content strategy and set up a team to propose content strategies for clients. Neweet is also about finding a way to facilitate content production and management at a much wider scale.
Languages
“Wherever you go, whatever country you visit, learn the language!”
(From T.E. Lawrence to Indiana Jones)
Resume
My journey has been long serie of experimentations through very different paths and structures to gain experience and perspectives.
Work Experience
2006 – NowEntrepreneur – Dymens
Senior Marketing Manager / Technical Program Manager – Amazon
- Leading a team of 3 engineers
- Support for the content testing team WW
- Development and support of the global architecture of content templates
- Technical support for all marketing teams deploying technical projects for Prime on the websites WW
- Content testing for the program Prime in France, Italy and Spain (A/B experiments)
- User experience and acquisition funnels optimisation (+5M subscribers since 2016)
- Product management for research tools (autotargeting and multivariate tests)
Entrepreneur – Neweet
Account Manager – Vanksen
During this experience, I’ve initiated and led a department for brand content, covering communication strategies on social media (SMO), brand content creation (texts, audios, videos), content editing and content testing.
Content & Project Manager – Nvision
Webmaster/Project manager – Decathlon
Communication Officer – Klinger Sogefiltres
Intern – European Parliament
Analyst Reporter – China Trade Winds
Web Content Manager – Hikari Productions
Education and training
2001 – 2006Master in International Political Journalism
Institute for Political Studies, Aix-en-Provence, FRANCE
Short-term mandarin program
Beijing Language and Culture University, Beijing, CHINA
Diplôme de Sciences Po Aix-en-Provence
Institute for Political Studies, Aix-en-Provence, FRANCE
Baccalauréat Scientifique
Lycée Léonard de Vinci, Calais, FRANCE
Time spent abroad
“You step onto the road, and if you don’t keep your feet, there’s no knowing where you might be swept off to.” (Bilbo Baggins)
Personal Skills & Competences
When it comes to technical matters, my proficiency mostly comes from curiosity, experience and hands-on approach.
References
Feel free to contact any of my former managers or colleagues for references.
Amazon
Erik
Direct manager
Erik joined the Amazon Prime EU in 2017 from another Amazon department and became my direct manager at the time. He oversaw my daily work and entrusted me with initiating the Prime EU engineering team until he left to lead AWS Just Walk Out department in 2022.
Amazon
Ferenc
Direct report
I recruited Ferenc in 2021 as a front-end engineer in my team and she worked for two years with me.
Amazon
Kushnoor
Direct report
I recruited Kushnoor in 2021 as a front-end engineer in my team and she worked for two years with me.
Amazon
Federico
Colleague
Federico has joined Amazon Prime in 2017. We worked together in developing the EU content testing team, which he ended up leading when I initiated the engineering team in charge of the technical architecture.
Amazon
Louis
Direct manager
Louis has worked in Amazon since 2014, building some of its best programs, from MarketPlace to operations, Prime SameDay and Prime Europe.
Vanksen
Jérémy
Direct manager
Jérémy has been Associate Director for Vanksen for around ten years. He recruited me and has remained my direct manager during my years within Vanksen.
Vanksen
Julien
Colleague
Julien has started as a young developer within Nvision and followed me to Vanksen where he rised quickly to become Production Manager. We have worked together on technical matters and websites development on many occasions.
Vanksen
Joffrey
Direct report
I have recruited Joffrey as a trainee Project Manager and hired him fulltime afterwards. He has become the agency’s Social Media Manager after my leave.
Vanksen
Alicia
Direct report
Alicia was a trainee Project Manager within Vanksen when I joined the agency and has been the first teammate put under my supervision. I have managed her through several projects during two years.
Vanksen
Mathieu
Direct report
Mathieu has been a Project Manager within Vanksen for several months before joining my team. I have managed him through some of the agency’s key accounts.
Vanksen
Margaux
Direct report
I have recruited Margaux as a trainee and successfully hired her several months afterwards to become a Social Media Project Manager within my team.
Vanksen
Rashina
Direct report
I have recruited Rashina as an intern within my team, but I have left the agency before its end.
Vanksen
Sophie
Direct report
I have recruited Sophie as a trainee Project Manager during her studies.
Vanksen
Eva
Direct report
I have recruited Eva as a trainee Project Manager within Vanksen.
Vanksen
Gauthier
Colleague
Gauthier has started as a trainee designer within Nvision, where he got recruited. He followed me to Vanksen, where we have worked on many occasions on design, front-end and user experience questions.
Vanksen
Xavier
CEO
Xavier has been the CEO and founder of Vanksen until 2020 and has monitored personally my work on several occasions.
Nvision
Nathalie
Direct manager
Nathalie was Art Director within Nvision when I joined the agency. I got under her supervision after my trial period and she has managed me during 18 months afterwards.
China Trade Winds
Eric
CEO / Direct manager
Eric is the founder and director of China Trade Winds. He recruited me in 2007 to be an analyst reporter for his weekly publication.
Hikari Groupe
Anthony
CEO
Anthony is the founder and CEO of Hikari Groupe. He recruited me as an intern in 2006 and hired me afterwards to be the main editor of the newly created website www.aujourdhuilachine.com.
Hikari Groupe
Christèle
Colleague
Christèle is a TV news reporter who worked with me on several occasions and trained me to edit video news reports.
Hikari Groupe
Aviva
Colleague
Aviva is a TV news reporter who is now Chief Editor within Hikari Groupe. She has worked with me on several occasions to train me as a journalist.Expertises
I value general knowledge above all and have little true expertise about a single topic but I am more qualified in the following areas.
My novel Zodia
Of Life And Death is the first book of a series of five fiction novels I intend to write.
A story about life and death. And those who decided to play them like Gods.
“Zodia kills people. It’s death, with its long scythe, taking lives carefully selected by Gods. Who leads the organisation? How is it organised? How does it judge so absolutely? Does it condemn itself absolutely too? It is up to you to uncover all this.
What I know is that the Z pin is their fabric. Their proud signature stamped next to each of their stunts. A golden Z letter on a circle, half way between Zorro and the Anarchy symbol. A shining beacon of hope.
Because Zodia is starting to raise hopes. For those who despaired. Of the powerful, the untouchables, the richest among the richest, the usual criminals, the ones who usually pull strings, and triggers. Zodia doesn’t just kill anyone. It kills those who deserve it most. From my information, the assassins have targeted some of the worst human beings on this planet. And so the word spread. The organisation became a legend. In a matter of months.
Little information filtered through… But I gathered it all. They are knights, with names taken from stars constellations. There was an old Japanese manga which had the same way of storytelling… It must have inspired them… I guess there must be bronze knights, silver knights and gold knights then, same as the anime. But who’s in charge? Who started it? How are they funded? It is as much a mystery to me as it is for most governments.
Zodia kills people. No one knows for sure if we should be glad and thankful, or worried, concerned, afraid… But everybody’s trying to find out who they are and why they do it.”
Bernhard Elberg
The association ForLiveable
ForLiveable is a sustainability gateway for Latin America in Europe bridging finance and technical capacity for the Sustainable Development Goals.
As a Secretary, I’m responsible for the communication and digital marketing for our projects in Climate Finance Action.
My music band Says
I sing and play guitar, bass and piano with my friend Jean Caritte with our duet folk band Says.
If you want to get a little glimpse at what’s being done on this front, just visit Says website.
Contact Simon Muys
Feel free to contact me anytime for professional matters.