Meet the Board of Directors

As Vice President of Global Partnerships at Partnerize, Erin Killian-Kristyniak leads a high-performing team, delivering data-driven insights and strategic guidance in the evolving partnership ecosystem. With over 18 years of experience in affiliate and partnership marketing, Erin successfully guides her clients into the machine-mediated market by championing transparency and relationship-building. Her career is built on driving measurable growth and strategic, trust-based relationships.

Her journey includes managing key brand programs at Pepperjam and leading agency relationships across both the Partnerize and Ascend™ platforms. Erin also served as VP of Community at Mavely, focusing on creator growth and leveraging performance-driven influencer networks.

A recognized thought leader, Erin is a valuable member of the Performance Marketing Association’s Board of Directors, committed to advancing the partnership economy and shaping the future of performance partnerships.

Kelly Ground is a distinguished expert and consultant in affiliate and partnership marketing, boasting nearly 20 years of unparalleled experience. Her profound knowledge and innovative approach have consistently driven strategic growth for affiliate and partnership marketing programs. In her recent role as Chief Growth Officer at an acquisition marketing publisher, Kelly spearheaded initiatives that achieved over 100% user acquisition growth for leading brands. She earned recognition as one of the Top 50 Women Leaders of Tampa for 2024. Previously, as Senior Director of Strategy and Insights at Acceleration Partners, Kelly excelled in guiding global affiliate marketing programs for over 6.5 years, earning recognition as a Top 30 Partnership Marketing Changemaker in the US by Hello Partner in 2023.

Kelly’s extensive experience includes her tenure as a Senior Digital Marketing Manager at HSN, where she drove significant revenue generation through effective affiliate and display programs. Her professional journey also includes roles such as Marketing Manager for an employee benefits publisher and experience in the manufacturing and telecommunication industries. Currently, Kelly serves on the Board of Directors for the Performance Marketing Association as the Treasurer and holds a Bachelor of Arts in political science with a minor in journalism from Clemson University. Her diverse background and proven track record make her a formidable force in the affiliate marketing arena.

With over 20 years in digital marketing, business development, and executive leadership, Kerry is excited to bring her expertise to support the PMA’s mission. She has held strategic and executive roles with leading agencies, including iProspect, Digitas, GroupM, and Gen3, where Kerry built relationships with senior marketers and drove results through thought leadership, education, and networking. Kerry has also participated on local non-profit boards and is currently the President of the PTO for her daughter’s school.

Affiliate marketing is at a pivotal moment, intersecting with ecommerce, influencer marketing, martech innovations, and data-driven strategies. Kerry’s vision for the PMA includes: 1) expanding brand engagement by fostering relationships with brand advertisers and providing targeted, curated content and events; 2) enhancing the PMA’s industry influence to secure a greater share of media budgets for affiliate marketing; and 3) driving data innovation by leveraging affiliate customer data to inform other digital channels. She also aims to elevate the PMA’s educational impact by developing targeted master classes and workshops for brand-side marketers.

Kerry’s contributions to the affiliate marketing industry include serving as a panelist, keynote speaker, and emcee at events such as Affiliate Summit, AWIN Think Tank, and impact.com’s iPx. She was also a guest on Impact’s The Partnership Economy podcast, and spearheaded the 2023 state of the industry research paper, High Performance, High Demand [link: https://hubs.ly/Q02WfSfd0].

As the founder of RBMA: Revenue Based Marketing Advisors and host of Revenue Boost: A Marketing Podcast, Kerry works with executives to emphasize the importance of marketing for sustainable growth.

During Jeannine’s 20+ years in affiliate marketing, her dedicated focus has always been to grow our industry by supporting everyone involved, whether publisher, merchant, network or vendor. She has actually spent time working in each of those areas, giving her the knowledge to see issues and opportunities from a variety of perspectives. That’s a key strength in representing all of the members of the PMA.

Her involvement with the PMA began back in 2010 when she testified before the Colorado House and Senate Finance Committees fighting the Amazon Tax under the guidance of their legal council. We were successful in changing the law so that affiliates did not establish nexus, thus saving the jobs of 5,000+ affiliates in Colorado. Since then she has been honored to serve on both the PMA Compliance Council and the PMA Publishers Council.

Currently she is the Partner Acquisition & Development Manager at Awin US, supporting both merchants and publishers for both the Awin and ShareASale affiliate networks. In her role she constantly helps individuals make the most of their affiliate marketing efforts, whether optimizing their sites or improving their affiliate programs, either one-on-one or via webinars, podcasts, or speaking at events such as Affiliate Summit. The next Affiliate Summit will be her 33rd, including speaking over a dozen times.

Her vision for the PMA is to raise the profile of the organization. While she understands that the wide variety of members means a wide list of needs and priorities, there are definitely numerous items we can agree on, such as Compliance, Transparency, and Ethics. These are the values which will keep our industry on the right track both internally and externally to a world which rarely understands what we do.

Sarah joined Affiliate Marketing in 2005 at ShareASale as program manager. While at ShareASale, her career progressed from Director of Client Services, overseeing all Publisher, Agency, & Advertiser development, to Vice President, post Awin acquisition, where she was responsible for all operations & revenue for the platform.In 2020 she began her own independent consultancy working with several agencies on publisher development strategy and recruitment, which lead to her current role as Vice President, North America for global affiliate & partner marketing agency, Silverbean.Helping to make connections is at the core of what Sarah sets out to do both on a professional and personal level which has led to the creation of two passion projects in 2021. The first is regularly posting industry job round ups to help connect active job seekers with new and available career opportunities across the industry. And second, coordinating “Chicago Affiliate & Partner Marketers Giving Back”, an initiative to combine local networking with volunteer efforts.

Parrish Essell has spent nearly eight years helping agencies and brands grow through strategic partnerships, transparent conversations, and performance-driven collaboration. She is passionate about the evolution of affiliate marketing and how technology, especially AI, is reshaping our industry.

As a BOD member, Parrish’s focus will be on how we adopt AI responsibly while leveraging its potential to enhance partner discovery, optimize performance, and deepen personalization. She also aims to advance conversations around incrementality – ensuring our channel continues to prove its measurable value within the wider marketing mix.

Parrish believes the PMA plays a vital role in defining standards, encouraging innovation, and uniting the performance marketing community. As the Global Agency Director at Awin, she brings her global perspective, agency experience, and passion for growth to the PMA Board.

Katie is passionate about the PMA’s goals to promote the growth of the industry, help model standards and best-practices, and advocate on behalf of the businesses that comprise the performance marketing industry, and is honored to be part of this organization.

She is grateful to have learned from and collaborated with incredibly talented people in a variety of creative marketing, data management, and leadership roles, including past positions of Account Manager and Senior Manager of Customer Success and Operations at Sound Partner Marketing, as  FMTC’s Network Liaison/Integrations Manager, and currently as FinTech Affiliate Manager with KINESSO.

Katie has a strong track record of achieving sales and new customer growth goals, diversifying and scaling up partnerships, and helping companies find common ground. She works with all players in the industry to build long-term, transparent and profitable partnerships with advertisers, merchants and retailers, networks, publishers, agencies, and tech solution providers. She is a skilled relationship-builder and has a proven ability to facilitate consensus and work effectively with others.

Teresa Grammatke has worked in affiliate marketing since 2006, managing client programs across industries—first at Rakuten and now at eAccountable. She is passionate about our industry and the people who make it thrive. As a thought leader, Teresa has participated in PMA webinars and panels, as well as events like PR Net Future Focus, PI Live, Martech Record, and CJU.  Also, she has served as a four-time Performance Marketing Awards judge.

Teresa’s vision for the PMA is to advocate for our industry’s full value—beyond tracked sales—to include branding, SEO/GEO, and credibility; elevate the channel by promoting compliance and rewarding true value drivers; support ongoing education and mentorship; and amplify the PMA’s benefits—from networking and thought leadership to event discounts that make membership indispensable.

Christie Frazer is a seasoned leader in affiliate marketing with a proven track record of driving growth and innovation. As the Senior Vice President of Agency Growth at CJ, she leads strategic initiatives that elevate agency partnerships and performance. Previously, Christie served as Global Vice President of Affiliate Marketing at Assembly, where she built and led a high-performing team of 40+ affiliate experts across North America, EMEA, and APAC. Her leadership was instrumental in launching and managing affiliate programs for multiple Fortune 500 brands, earning my team five Agency of the Year awards. Christie was also recognized as a Top 30 US Changemaker in Partnership Marketing.

Her vision for the PMA includes championing innovation in affiliate marketing through research and best practices, empowering the next generation of affiliate marketers with mentorship, education, and career development and, fostering inclusivity and inspiration, ensuring the PMA remains a place where all voices are heard and valued.

For over 12 years, Noelle has been immersed in the world of partnership marketing, collaborating with top networks, agencies, and partners to drive meaningful growth. Throughout her career, Noelle has had the privilege of managing affiliate programs for leading brands across diverse industries.

Noelle has been honored to share her insights as a speaker at PI Live and Affiliate Summit West, and to join industry peers on podcasts such as Always Be Testing and Affiliate Nerd Out. In addition, she has served as a judge for the U.S. Partnership Awards for the past two years, an experience that has reinforced Noelle’s appreciation for the innovation and excellence within the performance marketing field.

Noelle feels this industry has given her so much—knowledge, opportunity, and a network of incredibly talented peers that she is proud to call colleagues and friends. She believes the PMA is at the heart of what keeps this community connected and thriving, and is honored to serve on the Board of Directors and contribute to its continued growth and impact.

Ceres Cueva is the SVP, Global Publisher Partnerships at Rakuten Advertising. Her role focuses on the advancement of the company’s global strategic partnerships while increasing publisher and client collaboration. With over 15 years of expertise in affiliate and marketing partnerships, she has led award winning teams focused on global strategies and synergies across supply and demand relationships.