Global Performance Director

Group M Worldwide Inc.; London; On-site; GBP 60,000 - 100,000; Full time

Job summary

An established industry player is seeking a highly skilled Global Performance Director to lead digital media initiatives. This role requires a strategic thinker with a passion for performance optimization and a strong background in digital media strategy. You will work collaboratively with global teams to drive impactful results and enhance client relationships. The ideal candidate will have a proven track record in the media industry, demonstrating expertise in biddable media and audience planning. Join a dynamic team committed to continuous learning and innovation, where your contributions will shape the future of marketing for global brands.

Benefits

Health Insurance

Flexible Working Hours

Professional Development Opportunities

Wellness Programs

Employee Discounts

Remote Work Options

Team Building Activities

Qualifications

• In-depth experience in digital media planning and activation with a focus on performance.
• Strong knowledge of programmatic, social, search, and retail media networks.

Responsibilities

• Drive strategic implementation and optimization of digital media initiatives.
• Collaborate with teams to test and deploy addressable audiences across platforms.

Skills

Digital Media Strategy

Biddable Media

Audience Planning

Performance Optimization

Data Analytics

Client Relationship Management

Cross-Channel Marketing

Communication Skills

Education

Bachelor's Degree in Marketing or Related Field

Master's Degree (Preferred)

Tools

Google Analytics

PowerBI

Tableau

Meta Ads

Google Ads

Campaign Manager

DV360

TradeDesk

Job description

Global Performance Director, EssenceMediacom – Worldwide, London (12-month FTC)

EssenceMediacom is GroupM’s newest and largest agency, committed to delivering marketing breakthroughs for brands. It has disrupted the old models across media, creative, innovation and analytics to find new opportunities for advertisers and deliver truly integrated media solutions.

Born out of two pioneering agencies, EssenceMediacom fuses Essence’s performance, data, analytics, and creative technology DNA with MediaCom’s scaled multichannel audience planning and strategic media expertise.

As part of WPP, the world's largest marketing communications services group, and GroupM, WPP’s consolidated media investment management arm, we have access to the richest data, most robust benchmarks, and most advanced capabilities in the market. This helps us provide comprehensive solutions to all marketing challenges.

Our ‘breakthrough’ ambition is underpinned by our commitment to ‘continuous learning.’ We aim to ensure our people fulfil their potential by investing in their whole-person wellbeing, careers, and capabilities, which in turn helps grow our clients’ businesses.

EssenceMediacom, with 10,000 people across 120 offices in 96 markets, is one of the world’s leading communications specialists, with billings of more than US$21 billion (Source: COMvergence, 2021). Its global client roster includes adidas, Coca-Cola (TCCC), Dell, Google, Mars, NBC Universal, Richemont, and Sony.

Reports to: Global Segment Lead

The role

Mars Wrigley has globally recognized brands through the combination of products, communications, and connections to audiences, moments & culture that help drive relevance. They are a company built on a legacy of scientifically proven principles for how brands grow that is facing a dynamic, fast-paced digital world putting pressure on the speed of action, trial, and change that massive CPGs tend to struggle with. Together we are on a journey of transformation to implement changes to how we use data, how we plan for audiences, media & content, and how we drive faster measurement & optimization to move the organisation forward in an environment of changing media consumption habits and digital disruption.

The Global team at EssenceMediaCom supports Mars Wrigley across their portfolio of brands in understanding how to drive growth and relevance in markets where there are varying challenges around changing consumption behaviour, increased competition, and sustainability. The biggest transformation areas we focus on are driving investment & optimization in biddable channels, creating advantages with addressable media & content, and building integrated brand experiences that bring together marketing and sales within media & content to connect with consumers wherever they are in the non-linear journey.

We are seeking a highly skilled and motivated Global Performance Director to join our team. This role will work directly with the internal and external global/regional account and digital leadership teams and EssenceMediacom local markets and will be expected to provide support, counsel, and inspiration to the wider team. They will be responsible for driving the strategic implementation and optimization of digital media initiatives across regional and local markets. The ideal candidate will collaborate with various stakeholders to test and deploy addressable audiences, expand addressability approaches, and operationalize performance dashboards. Additionally, this role will steward the global learning agenda, ensuring alignment with global priorities and driving continuous improvement in ways of working across regional hubs.

Accountabilities

Relationship Building:

• Develop and maintain relationships with client leaders including Global Media Director, Global Performance Media Director, and Horizon (Mars Measurement) leaders.
• Create and maintain regular relationships and connections with EMC global and regional leaders including Global Account Director, Global Strategy Director, Engagement Team, Regional Account Leads & Regional Biddable Leaders.

Supporting Addressability Testing and Deployment:

• Collaborate with regional and local teams to test pre-defined global addressable audiences within biddable platforms. Developing a comprehensive database of successful audiences from learnings.
• Expand the addressability approach to demonstrate implementation across broader channel planning, encompassing both online and offline channels.
• Participate and bring expertise to media data strategy development, deployment and scaling.

Global Learning Agenda Stewardship:

• Set up the global learning agenda for success through clear rollout and expectation setting with key regional stakeholders.
• Drive agenda and action with biddable hubs and leads in regions & markets to build out test & learn plans and increase the speed and sharing of best cases and best practices to scale.
• Maintain a consistent focus on global test topics, ensuring core priorities appear in local test hypotheses to gather impactful learnings.

Performance Dashboard Operationalization:

• Operationalize the Mars Wrigley global performance dashboard across the OD team for analyses, optimization, and reporting.
• Identify ongoing enhancements required to maximize engagement and impact.

Global Partnerships Programme Support:

• Serve as a team member and connector to Mars Inc. JBP leaders for MW-specific JBP requirements, strategic value adds and collaboration with global, regional and local teams to ensure EM and MW can maximize the partnerships and value across the planning and activation process.

Biddable Ways of Working:

• Drive continuous improvement in ways of working and process effectiveness across regional biddable hubs.
• Ensure alignment of global priorities at regional and local levels.

Performance Focussed Thought Leadership:

• Serve as Performance Media Leadership across regions and with global & regional clients by providing thought leadership and partnering on capability building internally and externally in the areas of biddable, addressable, and full-funnel media experiences.
• Train teams on both EssenceMediacom and Mars Wrigley sides for ‘how to drive performance improvement through the planning and activation process including roles, ways of working, tools, and decision making.

Requirements

• Have in-depth experience within the media industry and been in a dedicated digital/biddable planning and/or activation role with performance as a priority where you had responsibility for key senior client relationships.
• Have a depth of knowledge of planning and buying across programmatic, social, search, and retail media networks.
• Be highly confident and skilled at using and applying relevant tools and resources (e.g. Audience Planning Tools, PowerBI, Tableau, Google Analytics, comScore, LookerStudio) that impact biddable/digital and addressable plans & optimization, including partner-level activation platforms (Meta, Google Ads & Campaign Manager, DV360, Amazon, TradeDesk, etc.)
• Have previous experience working on major global/multi-market accounts, working with multi-disciplinary agencies (i.e., creative, digital, PR, shopper) and with local market teams. CPG experience is desirable but not required.
• Be confident in leading and working on thought leadership responses and POVs to clearly articulate an engaging response.
• Have strong experience working closely with digital & analytics tools, audience tools, and client data to identify buyable audiences, performance results, and communications opportunities that can be leveraged to plan or optimize to deliver client growth.
• Have excellent written & verbal English language skills; a great storyteller.
• Be organised and structured, with strong attention to detail; an effective, efficient working style.
• Have a high level of competence with Microsoft Excel, Word, and PowerPoint.
• Demonstrable record of digital performance accomplishment – new business success, positive client feedback, award recognition.

Personal Attributes

• Be comfortable, confident, and assertive working with senior global clients and agency partners; communicate with authority and gravitas in writing, in speech, and in person.
• Be genuinely curious and interested; ask the right questions, show a passion for understanding our clients’ ambitions, audiences, businesses, and brands.
• Be highly collaborative with internal teams, external partners, and clients across multiple disciplines including (but not limited to) communication planning, digital and biddable, addressable content & DCO, measurement & analytics, performance marketing and optimization, media strategy, and audience planning, data strategy and 1PD; a welcome, valued presence on every call/in every meeting.
• Be calm, measured, and resolute under pressure.
• Be ambitious & motivated, willing to take proactive ownership of high-profile projects and tackle significant client challenges.
• Have the ability and desire to ‘own the room’ – a confident, authoritative, and engaging presenter.
• Have a clear understanding of performance media requirements across the Mars Wrigley business.
• Identify relevant specialist resource requirements throughout MediaCom, to enable the delivery of brilliant performance media plans.
• Provide internal thought leadership and seek out inspiration from the outside world, to enhance the capabilities of the wider account team.

Key Performance Indicators:

• Achieve consistently high client evaluation scores.
• Receive positive feedback from your internal stakeholders including regional hub and global colleagues.
• Produce award-winning work that is recognised across the business and wider industry.
• Deliver key initiatives and workstreams to clients and markets balancing strategic and tactical direction.
• Engage with channel experts regularly to influence activation and have a depth of knowledge of biddable & addressable tactical plans across markets to readily share and scale.
• Build a network and community of high-performing biddable & addressable leaders across local markets and regional hubs, sharing and reapplying best practices.

About the Team

EssenceMediacom has worked with Mars for many years, and we have continued to grow and evolve our relationship to encompass all global markets planning & buying as well as shopper media, identity, data, and analytics. Mars Wrigley is the largest segment within Mars with major brands such as M&Ms, Snickers, Orbit/Extra, and Skittles. We currently have global leaders, regional teams, and local media planning and buying in more than 30 markets globally including large markets such as the US, China, UK, Germany, France, Australia, and Mexico, and developing markets in Central Eastern Europe, Africa, LATAM and APAC.

Due to the nature of the EssenceMediacom assignment for Mars, the Global team is split across London and Chicago and operates at a senior level working with both Global and regional client leads as well as our local market teams across the network.

Mars is a very high-profile account within Essence Mediacom, GROUPM and WPP.

About GroupM

GroupM is the leading global media investment management operation serving as the parent company to WPP media agencies including Mindshare, Wavemaker, EssenceMediaCom, and each global operations in their own right with leading market positions. GroupM’s primary purpose is to maximize performance of WPP’s media agencies by operating as leader and collaborator in trading, content creation, sports, digital, finance, proprietary tool development and other business-critical capabilities. GroupM’s focus is to deliver unrivalled marketplace advantage to its clients, stakeholders and people.

GroupM and all its affiliates embrace and celebrate diversity, inclusivity, and equal opportunity. We are committed to building a team that represents a variety of backgrounds, perspectives, and skills. We are a worldwide media agency network that represents global clients. The more inclusive we are, the more great work we can create together.

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