Senior Planner, Media Planning

Publicis Groupe; Toronto; Hybrid; CAD 55,000 - 65,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Wellness & Tech benefits

Birthday leave

Learning & Development opportunities

Job summary

Starcom Canada is seeking a Senior Media Planner to join our Toronto team. You will analyze marketing data, develop media plans, and work with clients to align objectives with strategies.

The role emphasizes analytics, negotiation, and cross‑functional collaboration within Publicis Groupe. Ideal candidates have 2+ years in media strategy, strong Excel and PowerPoint skills, and the ability to manage budgets and stakeholder expectations.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree preferred in advertising, marketing, business administration, or communications.
• 2+ years in a Media Strategy role.
• Experience building blocking charts to support media planning and execution.
• Experience with planning tools such as Prisma, Mediatool (or similar platforms).
• Strong written and verbal communication and presentation skills.

Responsibilities

• Gather and analyze marketing, industry, and human insights data to determine the client’s advertising and media needs.
• Develop understanding of client’s business and competitive landscape.
• Assist in developing budget allocations across media resulting in strategic and effective media plans.
• Present plans to the client brand group, with assistance of more senior media team.
• Clearly communicate media objectives, strategies and executional guidelines to execution teams.
• Work closely with agency partners.
• Maintain strong relationships with media suppliers and stay abreast of market conditions.
• Campaign maintenance ensuring quality control and adherence to overall media plan objectives.

Skills

Analytical skills

Math proficiency

Negotiation skills

Communication skills

Team player

Attention to detail

Education

Bachelor’s degree

Tools

Prisma

Mediatool

MS Excel

PowerPoint

Job description

Company description

About Us: With a history that dates back over 80 years, Starcom is a global communications planning and media leader. We are an agency still grounded in our founding principle that people are at center of all we do. Each day, we apply this belief to harness the transformative power of data and technology to inspire and move people and business forward. With more than 7,000 employees in over 100 offices around the world, Starcom partners with the world's leading marketers and brands.

Within Canada, Starcom is a part of Publicis Media within Publicis Groupe, one of the world’s leading communications groups. Our team spans across our Windsor, Toronto and Montreal offices. We truly love the world of Media and Advertising. We see the planning and buying process as art. However, it is an art that is always best when backed by the science of empirical data.

You will be joining a well recognised agency with credentials:

• Great Places to Work certified three years in a row
• Only communications company to be ranked in LinkedIn’s Top 25 Great Places to Work
• 2022 Media Agency of the Year
• 2023 Media Agency of the Year finalist

What we Offer:

• Work Your World program enabling you to experience working from anywhere in Canada or overseas for up to 6 weeks a year
• Extended long weekends throughout the year with an additional day off each long weekend
• Wellness & Tech benefits to support what’s most important to you
• Birthday leave
• Extensive Learning & Development opportunities, including more than 15,000 learning programs via our online learning platform as well as a Professional Development Allowance
• Local and Global Mobility within the Publicis Groupe network

Overview

As a Senior media planner at Starcom, you are an important member of a broader Strategy team, which pursues and activates against meaningful human insights with the goal of driving measurable business outcomes. The Senior Media Planner’s key skill set includes deep analytical skills, math proficiency, and significant creativity, a solid understanding of consumer behavior, strong negotiation skills and great attention to detail.

Starcom has experienced an incredible growth rate over the past years. The network has transformed and moved at the pace of culture. As the Human Experience company, we are pleased to offer the opportunity to work from anywhere.

Responsibilities

• Gather and analyze marketing, industry, and human insights data to determine the client’s advertising and media needs
• Develop a firm understanding of marketing objectives and strategies, the human–product relationship and human–media relationship
• Develop understanding of client’s business and competitive landscape
• Assist in developing budget allocations across media resulting in strategic and effective media plans
• Present plans to the client brand group, with assistance of more senior media team
• Clearly communicate media objectives, strategies and executional guidelines to execution teams
• Work closely with agency partners
• Maintain strong relationships with media suppliers and stay abreast of market conditions
• Campaign maintenance ensuring quality control and adherence to overall media plan objectives. Develop campaign performance documents, including online campaigns
• Utilization and knowledge of syndicated media, research, and other data resources
• Take an active role in client education of the evolution of the media landscape
• Active participation in internal and external status meetings
• Develop/assist with development of POVS
• Active participant in the overall financial process - responsible for collecting and inputting data and ensuring monthly billing is accurate and delivered on deadline

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree; degree or concentration in advertising, marketing, business administration, and communications preferred
• 2+ years in a Media Strategy role
• Experience building blocking charts to support media planning and execution
• Experience working with planning tools such as Prisma, Mediatool (or similar platforms for campaign planning and budget tracking)
• Strong written and verbal communication and presentation skills
• Demonstrated experience in negotiating
• Able to work successfully within a team, handling high volume workload, and meeting tight deadlines under pressure
• Demonstrated critical thinking and problem-solving abilities
• Strong analytical abilities & proficiency in math
• Ability to effectively utilize media research and reporting resources
• Technical proficiency, particularly with media systems and MS Excel, Word and PowerPoint

Additional information

Transparency matters to us. The salary range for this position is $55 000 to $65 000 per year. Actual compensation within this range will be based on a variety of factors, including relevant experience, knowledge, skills, and applicable certifications. This range reflects what we reasonably expect to offer based on current market data.

Starcom is an equal opportunity employer with a strong commitment to diversity and inclusion. We create and nurture a vibrant work environment that celebrates, values and leverages all aspects of diversity and inclusiveness, attracts world-class talent and serves as the industry benchmark for best practices.

We encourage applications from all qualified individuals and will provide appropriate accommodation for candidates with disabilities or accessibility needs throughout the recruitment process, upon request.