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rtRobin Thüs
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Senior Product Manager · E-commerce · AI

Product thinking, with an engineer’s hands.

I’m Robin. For seven years I have led product teams at Kaufland e-commerce, one of Europe’s largest online marketplaces. Before that I wrote code. Today I help teams of any size decide what to build, ship it, and prove that it works.

Talk about your projectSee selected work

Düsseldorf, Germany · remote across Europe

Portrait of Robin Thüs, smiling, outdoors in front of green trees

Right now

Search, filters and product tiles for shops in 9 countries

years in product management, after years as a software engineer
7+
countries where my products run, most recently Spain and the Netherlands
9
more product reviews written, after we made reviewing simple
+500%
more interactions on the homepage within three months
+100%

Where I have worked

  • Kaufland e-commerce
  • real.digital
  • StriveCast
  • Heinrich Heine Consulting

How I help

Where I can make a difference for you

I bring the view of a product manager and the hands of an engineer. That mix helps most when a product has to work for customers, for the business and for the team that builds it.

  • Product strategy and roadmaps

    A vision, a strategy and a roadmap your team believes in. I help you decide what to build next, and just as important, what not to build.

    • Vision
    • Discovery
    • Prioritization

  • E-commerce and marketplaces

    Product pages, search, product tiles, reviews, campaigns, retail media and SEO. I know where online shops win customers and where they lose them.

    • PDP
    • Search
    • SEO

  • Experiments and data

    A/B tests that answer real questions and regularly lift add-to-carts and conversion. From the first idea to the final analysis, with Optimizely, Google Analytics, BigQuery and Tableau.

    • A/B testing
    • Tracking
    • Analysis

  • AI in products and teams

    AI features customers actually notice, and AI workflows that save your team hours every week. MCP servers, Claude skills and careful prompt work.

    • LLM features
    • MCP
    • Automation

  • Prototypes and MVPs

    From an idea to a working product in days, not months. Built with Next.js, TypeScript and Go, deployed and measurable from day one.

    • Next.js
    • TypeScript
    • Go

  • Teams and stakeholders

    Clear priorities across engineering, design, legal, marketing and management. Remote and international teams are my daily work.

    • Alignment
    • Remote
    • Communication

Big or small

Pick the size that fits your project

Some questions need one good conversation. Others need a few weeks of focused work. Both are welcome.

  1. 1 to 2 hours

    Sparring

    A fresh look at your idea, roadmap, product spec, A/B test or AI plan. You leave with clear next steps.

    • Roadmap review
    • Idea check
    • Second opinion
  2. 1 to 6 weeks

    Project

    A focused piece of work with a clear goal: discovery, a prototype, an experiment program or an AI workflow.

    • Discovery sprint
    • Clickable prototype
    • Shop review
  3. Monthly

    Ongoing

    A product partner on call. Regular sessions with founders, product leads or your team, for as long as it helps.

    • Advisory
    • Coaching
    • Interim support

Not sure what fits? Send me two or three sentences about your project. I’ll tell you honestly if I can help.

Ask me

Selected work

Results from seven years of product work

Most of my work happens at Kaufland e-commerce, where a lot of traffic means every change counts and most changes get an A/B test. A few examples of problems my teams solved.

Product reviews

+500%

more reviews collected

2019 – 2024

Making reviews easy to write and worth reading

The problem
Few shoppers wrote reviews, and the ones that came in were checked by hand. That was slow for customers and expensive for the company.
What we did
We cut the review flow down to what really matters and tested every step with A/B tests. A data science model took over the clear cases of moderation. Later we added photos, a better sort order and, in a one-week hackathon, AI summaries of reviews.
The result
Six times as many reviews as before. 60% of new reviews are moderated automatically. The new sort order had a significant positive effect on sales.
  • A/B testing
  • Data science
  • LLM
Retail media

Ad revenue

a new income stream from sponsored product and brand ads

2020 – 2025

Turning shop traffic into ad revenue

The problem
A marketplace with a lot of traffic can earn well from ads, but only if they fit into the pages where people shop.
What we did
Together with colleagues from retail media and marketing and with an external partner, we built sponsored product ads into product pages and other places in the shop, and sponsored brand ads into the list pages.
The result
A new advertising revenue stream for the company. Sponsored product ads and sponsored brand ads are now a normal part of the shop.
  • Sponsored ads
  • Partners
  • Retail media
Campaigns · Black Week

1,500+

sellers in the first weeks

2025

A campaign tool that sellers actually use

The problem
Sales campaigns were hard to set up and hard for sellers to join. Customers had trouble finding the deals.
What we did
We planned and built a campaign tool for both sides: sellers join campaigns in a few clicks, customers find campaign products in the shop. I led the work for Black Week 2025 together with legal, marketing, key account management, seller support and other tech teams.
The result
More than 1,500 sellers joined in the first weeks. The shop showed about 80% more discounts, and campaigns grew strongly in importance, also outside Germany.
  • B2B and B2C
  • Stakeholders
  • International
AI in shop and team

4,000+

categories with AI-sorted filters

2026

Using AI where shoppers and teams feel it

The problem
Every category in a big shop needs its own filters in a sensible order, and shoppers don’t always have the right words for what they are looking for.
What we did
Together with the search team I used search data and iterative prompt engineering to let an LLM suggest the filter order for every category. We also launched image search, so shoppers can search with a photo. For daily work I built an MCP server that connects our A/B testing tool to Claude, plus custom Claude skills for the team.
The result
Better filters in more than 4,000 categories, a new way to search the shop, and a team that asks questions about experiments in plain words instead of digging through dashboards.
  • LLM
  • Image search
  • MCP server
Product detail pages

Code → PM

one page, two roles

2019 – today

The same page, from two sides

The problem
The product detail page is where shoppers decide. The old one was rendered in PHP, hard to change and slow to test.
What we did
As an engineer I helped rebuild it with REST APIs and a modern frontend. Then I took over as product manager and shipped the relaunch, the first big project after the team went fully remote. Since then the page improves in small, tested steps.
The result
A significant positive effect on sales and GMV. Since then, regular winning A/B tests that lift add-to-carts and conversion.
  • Relaunch
  • Conversion
  • Remote
Homepage

+100%

interactions in three months

2024

A homepage people want to use

The problem
The homepage got a lot of visits, but too few people did anything there. It showed a lot, and little of it felt relevant.
What we did
Small, quick changes, each one measured. We used machine learning to improve product recommendations and tested new modules step by step.
The result
User interactions on the homepage more than doubled within three months.
  • Personalization
  • ML
  • Iteration

More I delivered

  • Eight new countries

    My teams’ products launched in Czechia, Slovakia, Poland, Austria, France, Italy, Spain and the Netherlands.

  • Search engine optimization

    Ongoing SEO work for the shop, together with colleagues.

  • Price rules, fully automated

    Strike-through prices that follow German price law (PAngV), built with the legal team.

  • Accessible shopping

    A large shop made ready for the European Accessibility Act.

  • Wishlist

    Planned, built and launched from scratch.

  • One product tile

    Many separate versions merged into one shared tile for the whole shop.

  • Personal delivery times

    Delivery dates based on the shopper’s postcode, collected in a legally sound way.

  • Loyalty coupons

    Coupons from the loyalty program that shoppers activate right on the product page.

How I work

Four things you can count on

  1. Problem first

    Before we talk about solutions, I want to know who has the problem and why it matters.

  2. Small steps, real data

    Ship small, measure, learn. Opinions are a good start. Data decides.

  3. Close to the code

    I wrote production code for years. I talk with engineers as a peer and know what is hard.

  4. Plain words

    Clear documents, honest updates, no buzzwords. Everyone knows what we do and why.

About

From writing code to leading products

I grew up in Düsseldorf and found software through video games. I studied computer science, built peer-to-peer video streaming at a startup and moved from engineering into product management at a large marketplace. I never fully left the code behind.

  1. 2026 – today

    Senior Product ManagerSearch pages and product tiles

    Kaufland e-commerce

    Two teams. Better filters with search data, new features like image search, product tiles with image galleries and color variants, and AI workflows for the whole team. Launches in Spain and the Netherlands.

  2. 2024 – 2025

    Senior Product ManagerList pages, product tiles and inspiration

    Kaufland e-commerce

    Three teams. Homepage, deals and newsletter, a new campaign tool and Black Week, sponsored brand ads, a shop redesign, a wishlist and the launch in France and Italy.

  3. 2023 – 2024

    Senior Product ManagerProduct pages and reviews

    Kaufland e-commerce

    Split one team into two and set up a new team for customer content. Launches in Czechia, Slovakia, Poland and Austria.

  4. 2019 – 2023

    Product ManagerProduct pages and reviews

    real.digital, later Kaufland e-commerce

    Led an international team through the product page relaunch, sponsored product ads, six times as many reviews and the move to fully remote work.

  5. 2019

    Software EngineerProduct pages

    real.digital, Cologne

    Moved the product page from PHP templates to REST APIs and a modern frontend. That is where I got curious about product work.

  6. 2017 – 2019

    Software Engineer

    StriveCast

    Deep-tech startup for peer-to-peer live video streaming, later acquired by Google. Go, JavaScript, Google Cloud and Kubernetes.

  7. 2016 – 2019

    Student consultant, Head of IT

    Heinrich Heine Consulting

    Led a team of six building software to manage members. Client projects, hackathons and recruiting.

I still build

Side projects that keep my hands busy

Building things myself keeps me honest about what is easy and what is hard. My public projects get tests, analytics and SEO from day one. With AI coding agents, an idea on Monday is often live by Friday.

A typical evening

ls ~/projects. copperwick rt-analytics thues.eu. wetter-im-kalender wichtelhut. cd rt-analytics && npm test. ✓ all tests passed. git tag v0.5.0 && git push --tags. ✓ Released rt-analytics 0.5.0 to npm

  • Web app · live

    Wetter im Kalender

    Featured on iFun.de

    The 10-day forecast of the German Weather Service as all-day entries in your calendar. Works with Apple, Google and Outlook, free and without an app or account.

    • Next.js
    • DWD data
    • iCalendar
    wetter-in-kalender.de

  • Open source · npm package

    rt-analytics

    Free web analytics for Next.js that you own. Events go into your own BigQuery, with no cookies and no third-party service. This website uses it.

    • TypeScript
    • Next.js
    • BigQuery
    GitHubnpm

  • Web app · live

    Wichtelhut

    Secret Santa draws for friends, families and offices, with personal links for everyone. In German and English, with guides that help people find it in search.

    • Next.js
    • Firestore
    • SEO
    wichtelhut.de

  • World of Warcraft add-ons

    Copperwick

    Free add-ons for World of Warcraft: Forever that make playing with friends easier. They show gear upgrades in tooltips, items your friends need, and deeds you can only earn together. Tested like real software.

    • Lua
    • Next.js
    • Automated tests
    copperwick.vercel.app

  • AI tools

    MCP servers

    Small servers that give AI assistants new skills. At work, one connects our A/B testing tool to Claude, so the team can ask about experiments in plain words.

    • MCP
    • TypeScript
    • Claude

  • Home Assistant

    Smart home

    Lights, motion sensors and automations at home, plus an AI assistant that I can ask in plain words what is going on.

    • Home Assistant
    • Automations
    • AI agent

Away from the keyboard

What keeps me going

Good products need energy and a clear head. I get both outside. My 2026 so far: more than 1,100 km of running with 12,000 m of climbing, a half marathon in 1:46 and three trail races.

  • Trail running

    First marathon in Cologne 2025 in 4:02. This year it went up the mountains: Zugspitz trail, Obertauern and Heidelberg.

  • Bike trips

    Multi-day tours with friends since 2020, through Germany and across islands abroad.

  • Bouldering

    Started during university. Great for solving problems that look impossible at first.

  • Healthy cooking

    Sport led me to nutrition. Today I plan and cook most meals myself, simple and fresh.

  • Games

    Video games with friends, from Baldur’s Gate to Anno, and Magic: The Gathering at the table.

  • Reading

    Fantasy and science fiction, plus tech news, markets and politics with my morning coffee.

Contact

Big project or small question? Let’s talk.

Tell me in a few sentences what you are working on and where you are stuck. I reply within two working days, and I will tell you honestly if I am the right person for it.

Helpful to mention

  • What you are building, and for whom
  • Where you are stuck right now
  • What a good result would look like
  • Your timeline, if there is one

Robin Thüs

Usually replies within 2 working days

Or find me here