Wes Finley has been leading branded communities longer than anyone, and he has results to show for it.
While serving as a Webmaster at CNN.com Wes took over management of the CNN Twitter accounts to increase site traffic. Along with an API to deliver breaking news, @CNN shared details on live streams happening around the world. This always-on strategy propelled @CNN to a top account, breaking 1M Followers just moments after @AplusK broke that record.
2003 – 2011
- Grew @CNN to 1M+ Followers
- Created initial Facebook profiles for anchors (before Pages existed)
- Developed and scaled first remote interview solution using Skype
Wes lead global social operations at Coca-Cola at a time when social marketing was just emerging as a practice. He directed 190 regions and 772 agencies in social best practices and helped them to utilize shared global Coca-Cola accounts.
2011 – 2016
- Grew Facebook Page to become first brand with 10M+ Followers
- Lead social operations for 772 regional agencies
- Pioneered social paid media and grew the practice to $100M+
Wes initially joined Facebook as a Product Marketing Manager for core ads products. He received awards for simplifying ad format specs and recommendations. Wes then took a role as Head of Social Marketing for Facebook’s B2B channels.
2016 – 2021
- Grew Facebook Page from zero to 20M+ Followers
- Identified and capitalized on unexplored opportunities for paid media, growing the trial paid budget from $80k to $14M+ in 2 years. Expanded the team to manage global paid marketing.
- Created Facebook’s first ad specs API, aligning surfaces with true product requirements for dynamic ad products.
Wes joined Protocol Labs to lead community marketing across brands while focusing on Filecoin. He implemented a paid and organic strategy that quickly expanded communities. Many of his social posts directly influenced market cap by generating token demand.
2022 – 2024
- Grew Twitter from 67k to 667k Followers
- Campaign highlighting Solana integration doubled token price within 48 hours.
- Built successful staking services from zero to $100M TVL in 4 months.