Senior Strategist

MATTA; Greater London; Hybrid; GBP 60,000 - 85,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Annual leave: 23 days +

MATTA Sports Day

Sabbatical policy

Health & financial wellbeing

Regular socials

Hybrid working

Discounts

Dog friendly office

Job summary

MATTA is seeking a Senior Strategist to turn audience, cultural and commercial insight into clear, inspiring strategies that unlock great creative work. You will shape integrated campaign directions and lead the strategic process on major projects from brief to recommendations, contributing to pitches and new business.

You’ll collaborate with clients, creatives and the wider team to craft coherent strategies across social, digital, content and PR, measuring effectiveness and guiding future work.

Qualifications

• Proven success in a strategy or planning role within a creative, advertising, brand or marketing agency.
• Experience developing brand and/or campaign strategies, from research and insight through to creative briefing.
• An understanding of how brand partnerships and sponsorships can contribute to wider marketing objectives, and how to develop creative campaigns that make those partnerships meaningful.

Responsibilities

• Developing insight-led strategies: Researching audiences, markets, competitors and cultural trends to uncover meaningful insights and opportunities.
• Shaping brand and campaign direction: Helping clients define propositions, target audiences and the strategic foundations of their marketing activity in category contexts.
• Developing partnership strategies: Identifying how a brand partnership with a sports organisation can support wider marketing objectives, and developing the strategic thinking that turns the partnership into compelling creative work.
• Developing integrated channel strategies: Shaping strategies that connect social, digital, content and offline activity into a coherent campaign approach.
• Applying social and digital insight: Understanding how audiences behave across social platforms and digital environments, and using platform, content and performance insights to inform campaign strategy, creative development and optimisation.
• Writing inspiring creative briefs: Apply your broad cultural knowledge to translate complex business and marketing challenges into clear, single-minded briefs that give creative teams a strong platform for ideas.
• Partnering with creative teams: Working collaboratively throughout the creative process, providing constructive challenge and ensuring ideas remain strategically relevant and effective.
• Understanding sport and fitness audiences: Exploring how people participate in, consume and connect with sport, from grassroots communities to elite competition, and from fitness participation to fan culture.
• Leading client conversations: Presenting strategic recommendations, facilitating workshops and building trusted relationships with senior client stakeholders.
• Measuring effectiveness: Helping establish campaign objectives and success measures, and using research and results to inform future strategy.
• Contributing to agency growth: Supporting pitches and new business opportunities, sharing knowledge and helping develop the strategic capabilities of the agency.

Skills

Strategy

Planning

Digital literacy

Brand & campaigns

Presentation

Client management

Analytical thinking

Creative thinking

Tools

PowerPoint

Excel

Audience insights

Job description

Here at MATTA, we believe that sports have the power to change people and communities for the better. We are passionate about making brands and campaigns matter to more people, more often, by engaging fans with big, bold creative thinking and world-class execution.

We are an independent creative agency built specifically for sports and lifestyle brands. Our work has won multiple awards (from Clios to Sports Industry Campaigns of the Year), we have been Agency of the Year several times over, and we are one of the most exciting sports businesses in the country.

We are looking for a Senior Strategist to help shape the thinking behind our work. This is an opportunity for someone who combines intellectual curiosity, strong strategic instincts, digital fluency and sharp marketing acumen to make a meaningful contribution to our clients and our creative output.

The role:

You will turn audience, cultural and commercial insight into clear, inspiring strategies that unlock great creative work. Working closely with clients, creatives and the wider agency team, you will help define the problems we need to solve, identify the opportunities that matter and develop compelling strategic directions for campaigns and brands.

You will also help shape integrated campaign strategies, understanding how social, digital, content, PR, experiential and other channels can work together to create a coherent and effective audience experience.

You will be comfortable leading the strategic process on significant projects, from interrogating the initial brief through to presenting recommendations and evaluating effectiveness. You will also contribute to pitches, new business and the development of our strategic thinking as an agency.

What you’ll be doing:

Developing insight-led strategies: Researching audiences, markets, competitors and cultural trends to uncover meaningful insights and opportunities.

Shaping brand and campaign direction: Helping clients define propositions, target audiences and the strategic foundations of their marketing activity in category contexts.

Developing partnership strategies: Identifying how a brand partnership with a sports organisation can support wider marketing objectives, and developing the strategic thinking that turns the partnership into compelling creative work.

Developing integrated channel strategies: Shaping strategies that connect social, digital, content, experiential, PR and other channels around a clear audience journey and campaign objective.

Applying social and digital insight: Understanding how audiences behave across social platforms and digital environments, and using platform, content and performance insights to inform campaign strategy, creative development and optimisation.

Writing inspiring creative briefs: Apply your broad cultural knowledge to translate complex business and marketing challenges into clear, single-minded briefs that give creative teams a strong platform for ideas.

Partnering with creative teams: Working collaboratively throughout the creative process, providing constructive challenge and ensuring ideas remain strategically relevant and effective.

Understanding sport and fitness audiences: Exploring how people participate in, consume and connect with sport, from grassroots communities to elite competition, and from fitness participation to fan culture.

Leading client conversations: Presenting strategic recommendations, facilitating workshops and building trusted relationships with senior client stakeholders.

Measuring effectiveness: Helping establish campaign objectives and success measures, and using research and results to inform future strategy.

Contributing to agency growth: Supporting pitches and new business opportunities, sharing knowledge and helping develop the strategic capabilities of the agency.

Requirements:

You are an experienced creative marketing strategist or planner who can combine rigorous thinking with creativity and commercial understanding. You know how to move beyond interesting observations to find insights that genuinely make a difference to the work.

You bring:

• Proven success in a strategy or planning role within a creative, advertising, brand or marketing agency.
• Experience developing brand and/or campaign strategies, from research and insight through to creative briefing.
• An understanding of how brand partnerships and sponsorships can contribute to wider marketing objectives, and how to develop creative campaigns that make those partnerships meaningful.
• Strong digital and social media literacy, with a clear understanding of how different platforms, formats and audience behaviours influence creative strategy.
• Experience developing or contributing to integrated marketing strategies, with the ability to connect social, digital, content and offline activity into a coherent campaign approach.
• Excellent analytical and research skills, with the ability to turn complex information into clear, compelling recommendations.
• Strong creative judgement and an ability to inspire, challenge and collaborate with creative teams.
• Confidence presenting strategic thinking and building relationships with clients.
• A good understanding of marketing effectiveness and how strategy contributes to measurable outcomes.
• The ability to manage multiple projects, take ownership and work independently at a senior level.
• A genuine curiosity about sport, fitness and the cultures and communities that surround them with the ability to cross fertilise thinking from beyond sport into the category

Experience working with sport, fitness, lifestyle or consumer brands, or on sponsorship and brand partnership campaigns, would be useful. However, we are equally interested in people who bring a fresh perspective and can demonstrate a strong understanding of how to connect brands with different audiences.

What we offer:

• Generous annual leave (23 days, increasing by 1 day per year, plus 3 days extra at Christmas).
• MATTA Sports Day: an extra day off every year for the purpose of either watching or playing sport.
• Sabbatical Policy: providing options to travel, volunteer, study or generally have a reset.
• Health & Financial Wellbeing: we’ve got you covered with a holistic support package that includes comprehensive health and dental insurance, 24/7 virtual GP access, and a range of financial tools, from life assurance and income protection to expert advice platforms.
• Regular Socials: quarterly team events, Thirsty Thursday drinks, and PayDay Pizza at the end of each month.
• Hybrid Working: staff can enjoy the comfort of working from their own home and from our London Bridge offices.
• Discounts: exclusive access to our benefits platforms with hundreds of discounts on shopping, food, beauty, travel and much more.
• Dog friendly office.

Making It MATTA:

Our clients are some of the most recognised and prestigious global brands in sport and lifestyle and include UEFA, ICC, Clinique, Budweiser, ATP Tour, The Ryder Cup, England Football, England Rugby, England Cricket, LTA, to name just a few.

We’ve launched fitness equipment, kits, and nutrition brands. We’ve created new competitions, leagues, and tournaments - as well as rebranding, revitalising and repositioning existing ones. We’ve sold out multiple World Cups and European Championships, pushed women’s sports forward (we created the Lionesses), driven participation, and led campaigns for equality and against discrimination and drugs.

We’ve worked up close and personal with some of the most iconic sports stars and sports teams on the planet, shooting campaigns all over the world.

At MATTA you can expect a fast-paced, but relaxed atmosphere, where everyone is passionate about sport in some way. We believe happy and healthy people produce the best work - which is why you’ll get private health insurance, regular team away days - and generous annual leave.

We believe sport has the power to change the world. Come and work somewhere where, whatever you do - it matters.

What’s next?

If you think that MATTA could be the place where you grow professionally, and produce your best work, then we really want to meet you, and we'll get back to you as soon as possible.