Executive Media Director Job at GSD&M in Austin

DEPARTMENT: Media

REPORTS TO: CEO

TRAVEL: 20-30%

FLSA STATUS: Exempt

SUPERVISORY RESPONSIBILITIES: Yes

LOCATION: Austin

At GSD&M, we're on a mission to build First & Only brands, meaning the first to do it and the only ones who can. We're able to do this because we set a high bar for ourselves and our work. We care about what we put out in the world. We're humans who like other humans. Our ideas make a difference. Shift culture. Create a smile. Inspire change. Initiate belly laughs. Deepen our understanding of the world and ourselves. We grow. We learn. We get better. We do it all over again. Because that's what it takes to build and be First & Only.

We are looking for an Executive Media Director who can make our media team an integral part of our mission to build First & Only brands. Someone who can seamlessly blend creative acumen, deep audience understanding, and data-driven performance to deliver First & Only results for our clients.

The Executive Media Director will lead the Consumer Engagement Group across audience strategy, comms strategy, media (digital, traditional, and investment), and analytics.

This position will work directly with agency executives (CEO, President, Creative, and Strategy) to further enhance our capabilities and ensure media integration within the agency. They will drive collaboration and communication across agency teams to ensure channels and messaging work harmoniously to deliver clients' business objectives. Experience from an agency handling annual billings of $250 million+ (with $150 million+ in digital) is preferred.

As the Executive Media Director, you will not just lead a team but define the future of media at GSD&M. We're looking for a visionary leader who can inspire a team and show them how media can be a force for integration, collaboration, and creativity within a creative agency.

We are looking for someone who believes:

• The integration of creativity and media can be a force multiplier for brands.
• That data and deep audience understanding are the backbone for delivering impactful plans and creative ideas.
• The future of media requires a new way of thinking, given the vast array of new channels, platforms, and opportunities within the media landscape.
• In the future of technology and AI and the power of what it can do for brands driving results.

In this role, the Executive Media Director will be directly responsible for:

• Creating and communicating a POV that establishes the standards for media, analytics, and audience analysis as an agency function.
• Creating a communicable vision for media that can be productized and sold to existing clients and new business prospects.
• Media's collaboration with brand strategy, account management, creative, and production; serving as a connective tissue between all groups where appropriate.
• Assessing the resources and internal groups needed to build an effective, future forward, Media discipline at the agency.
• Proactively providing thought leadership and perspective on the significance and implications of new technologies, media landscape changes and cultural shifts that can impact a client's business.
• Actively future-proofing the agency for shifts in the media & communications landscape.
• Building and maintain senior client, prospective client, and industry relationships.
• A hunter of new business opportunities and effectively sell our unique media capability.

For this role, the Executive Media Director must be proficient in:

• An audience-first approach leveraging all 1st, 2nd, 3rd party data sets to identify the most valuable consumers.
• Digital-first experience, but with the ability to understand and communicate how digital strategies work in harmony with offline strategies (especially local and national television).
• Delivering on "data-driven" marketing investment decisions; demonstrate delivery against business objectives.
• A fundamental understanding (at a minimum) of how traditional channels (national television, local television, OOH, print) are planned, purchased and measured.
• Industry trends for conversion & eCommerce tracking, programmatic buying & RTB tools, site analytics, retargeting, viewability, attribution & verification technology.
• Deep familiarity with Prisma, DCM, walled gardens (Google, Facebook), in-platform programmatic buying (such as DV360), Google Analytics 360, comScore, data visualization platforms (Datorama preferred), A/B testing, dynamic creative.
• Expertise in the ecosystems of digital media technology including: DSPs/trading desks, DMPs/data aggregators (ideally Neustar), verification tools, tag management systems, site analytics platforms & search engine management platforms
• Cross channel attribution and measurement experience.
• Preferred extensive department management experience for department of 60+ individuals.