About Justin Johnson

Winding paths lead to exciting destinations

After graduating from a small university in Indiana prepared to teach elementary school, things changed dramatically. It wasn't because I don't like teaching itself. To this day I still enjoy that aspect of leading teams, working with clients, and learning new things personally.

What became apparent deep inside was a desire to create. It started with photography and video. It evolved to include graphic design. Then after falling in love with branding, product design, and creating websites, I became obsessed with building things. The short story of how I got here:

2003

Graduated college with BS in Elementary Education

2005

Graduated (again) with an AS in Digital Media

2006

First startup experience. Just me, the founder, and an office in a closet. Grew a team, worked with clients like Enterprise Car Sales, Regal Boats, and Southeast Toyota.

2008

The startup didn't make it, and I went on to be Art Director at a timeshare company leading work for print, email, and presentation design.

2009

After the financial collapse, I left and started a small digital agency.

2010

Produced and directed videos and designed experiences for clients like Amazon Kindle, VaxCare, Generous Giving, One Hope, and more.

2013

Veered into product at an early stage startup called Spotlite. I designed benefits enrollment and management tools for employers, while also taking on double duty of marketing creative and execution.

2014

Spotlite was acquired by a larger startup called Rally Health, where I adapted and grew our enrollment tools into their ecosystem and took on more product work in personal health and wellness.

2017

Rally was acquired by United Health Group. I built experiences for 20M members on myuhc.com including benefits enrollment, individual health records, prescription management, and member onboarding.

2018

After building a prototype for the CEO and board of UHG, I left to return to a new scrappy startup. I joined a group of founders solving problems in commercial construction finance and compliance.

2019

Branded the company as Vertical, built v1 of everything, and then iterated rapidly. I led marketing work, pitched investors for Series A, and eventually took over the product which was facilitating $2B per quarter in construction disbursements around the country.

2023

As Vertical failed to reach exit velocity, I moved into a new role and new industry, joining the product team at ConnexPay—a B2B fintech issuing virtual card payments for travel, advertising, ticketing, and embedded SaaS.

2024

I was asked by the CRO to lead the marketing team as we reached revenue of ~$45M / year. I had a $1.25M budget and owned brand, product, partnership, and event marketing along with lead gen, outside vendors, and all in-house creative requests. I also continued owning and building a complex client application process required for fintech compliance.

Earlier this year I decided to press pause.

I love to work. Absolutely love it. I was grateful to be asked to lead the marketing team, but I concluded it was not the path for me to continue on. I was challenged in new ways, learned by doing, and demonstrated that I was capable. However, I missed the hands-on designing, creating, and building aspect of daily work.

I took a break to spend a few months resetting by building a passion project and exploring what I could offer in the mental health space alongside licensed counselors and therapists. We produced five courses across a range of topics, which you can learn more about here.

Now I'm returning to what I realize I'm wired to do, having given myself some time to learn, grow, and rest before what comes next. After sitting in the Head of Marketing seat, I've gained even more insight into how to be a better brand and experience designer with greater business impact.