Senior Manager, Marketing Science

Icon Media Direct; Los Angeles (CA); On-site; USD 180,000 - 240,000; Full time

Job summary

Icon Media Direct seeks a Senior Manager, Marketing Science to lead measurement methodology and models across attribution, incrementality, and media mix modeling. You will design, build, validate, and productize analytical capabilities, partnering with Data Engineering and Analytics Product Strategy.

This role requires deep modeling skills and the ability to defend results to clients and executives. You will define standards, validate outputs, and drive AI-enabled improvements while mentoring

Qualifications

• 7+ years in marketing science, media analytics, or a closely related field.
• Ownership of attribution, incrementality and lift testing and/or media mix modeling.
• Advanced SQL and proficiency in Python (or R) for modeling and automation.
• Strong grounding in statistics and causal inference with experimental design and time-series analysis.
• Experience with cloud data environments; Snowflake preferred.
• Understanding of media planning, buying, and optimization across linear TV, CTV, and digital.
• Ability to explain complex methodology clearly to non-technical audiences.

Responsibilities

• Own design, build, and validation of measurement models (attribution, lift, MMM, forecasting).
• Set methodology standards for model specification, testing, validation, and documentation.
• Define measurement design for client tests (geo-lift, holdout, matched-market, in-platform experiments).
• Pressure-test results and defend numbers before clients; ensure defensibility.
• Evaluate new data sources, vendors, and methods; advise investments.
• Collaborate with Data Engineering on data requirements and production readiness.
• Prototype analyses in SQL/Python and hand off to Engineering for productionization.
• Translate methodology into product features and validate analytics logic for releases.
• Lead AI/automation efforts in measurement and analytics workflows.
• Mentor analysts and develop team capabilities; document models and code.

Skills

Marketing science

Media analytics

Attribution

Incrementality

Lift testing

Media mix modeling

Forecasting

SQL

Python

R

Snowflake

Tableau

Sigma

Education

Bachelor’s degree in Statistics, Mathematics, Economics, Computer Science, or another quantitative field

Tools

Snowflake

Tableau

Sigma

Job description

Icon Media Direct is seeking a Senior Manager, Marketing Science to join our Data Intelligence team, reporting to the SVP of Data Intelligence. This role is Icon’s senior technical and methodological authority on measurement — designing, building, and validating the models that explain how media drives business outcomes, and turning those methods into repeatable, productized capability rather than one-off analysis.

The Senior Manager owns how our measurement works, whether it is sound, and whether what reaches our client teams can be trusted. This role partners closely with the Director, Analytics Product Strategy & Growth, who owns what we build, how it is positioned, and how it is adopted, and with Data Engineering, who own the pipelines and platform the analytics run on. Together they cover the full path from methodology to market, with this role accountable for analytical rigor and for the validation gate in front of Client Services.

The ideal candidate is an uncommon combination of hands-on modeling depth, real technical capability, and a working understanding of how media is actually planned and bought. Someone who can design a model, build it, defend it in front of a client, and hand it to Engineering as a clear specification.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities:

Marketing Science & Model Development

• Own the design, build, and validation of Icon’s measurement models — attribution, incrementality and lift, media mix modeling, forecasting, and audience analytics.
• Set methodology standards across the team: how models are specified, tested, validated, documented, and refreshed.
• Define measurement design for client tests (geo-lift, holdout, matched-market, and in-platform experiments) including power analysis and test readiness criteria.
• Pressure-test results before they reach clients, and own the defensibility of the numbers we publish.
• Evaluate new data sources, vendors, and methodologies, and recommend where Icon should invest.

Analytical Data & Technical Partnership

• Define the analytical data requirements behind measurement (model inputs, custom client data builds, and the transformations that feed them) and specify them clearly for Data Engineering.
• Partner with Data Engineering, who own pipelines, platform architecture, integrations, and production data quality, on what moves from analysis into the production platform.
• Build and prototype analysis in SQL and Python against Snowflake, and hand proven logic to Engineering to productionize rather than maintaining production pipelines directly.
• Own analytical data quality, validating that model inputs and outputs are correct, and raise platform-level issues to Engineering for resolution.
• Establish reusable code, templates, and documentation standards so analyses are repeatable rather than rebuilt each time.

Analytics Product Development

• Translate proven methodology into product capability, turning models and analyses that work into features of our measurement products.
• Serve as the technical and methodological owner for product features: specification, analytical logic, validation, and quality.
• Build prototypes and proofs of concept that de-risk new capability before full development begins.
• Partner with Engineering to productionize analytical logic and keep methodology consistent between ad hoc analysis and the product.
• Partner with the Director, Analytics Product Strategy & Growth, who owns roadmap, positioning, and adoption, while this role owns whether what gets built is sound and works as intended.

Product Validation & Client Services Assurance

• Own the validation gate between product output and Client Services, confirming that what our products produce is methodologically sound and accurate before it reaches client teams.
• Review and sign off on analytical logic and results for each product release and major data refresh.
• Define validation standards and checks (reconciliation, benchmarks, and anomaly thresholds) and automate them wherever possible.
• Serve as the escalation point when Client Services or a client questions a number, and lead the diagnosis and resolution.
• Equip Client Services to interpret product output correctly — what the numbers mean, what they do not, and where the limits are.
• Feed validation findings back into the roadmap with the Director, Analytics Product Strategy & Growth, so recurring issues are fixed in the product rather than in each delivery.

Client Services & Media Analytics

• Serve as the senior analytics partner on complex Client Services requests; custom data builds, bespoke modeling, and measurement questions that require both data depth and media understanding.
• Support quarterly business reviews and annual planning with the analytical read behind the recommendations.
• Partner with the digital and advanced media teams on cross-channel performance measurement across linear TV, CTV, streaming, programmatic, paid search, and paid social.
• Translate analytical findings into media optimization recommendations and present them credibly to technical and non-technical audiences alike.
• Work with the SVP to prioritize incoming analytics requests against team capacity and business value.
• Lead the application of AI to measurement and analysis — agentic analytics, automated model refresh, AI-assisted quality assurance, and natural-language access to analytical outputs.
• Identify and automate the manual work in analytical delivery, reducing time to insight and freeing capacity for higher-value work.
• Prototype and evaluate emerging AI methods against real client problems, and bring proven approaches into the team’s standard practice.
• Partner with the Director, Analytics Product Strategy & Growth on AI capability that belongs in client-facing products.
• Stay current on developments in measurement, causal inference, and applied AI, and share what matters with the team.

Team & Capability Development

• Mentor analysts and raise the analytical bar across the Data Intelligence team.
• Lead deliberate cross-training so methodology and technical knowledge are shared across the team rather than concentrated in any one person.
• Document models, code, and decisions to a standard that lets others run and extend the work.
• Represent Data Intelligence’s technical point of view in cross-functional forums with Client Services, Media, and Engineering.
• Responsible for any additional tasks or responsibilities that may arise in support of the role’s objectives.

Education/Qualifications/Experience:

Required

• 7+ years in marketing science, media analytics, data science, or a closely related field, with deep hands-on modeling experience.
• Demonstrated ownership of attribution, incrementality and lift testing, and/or media mix modeling in a media or marketing context.
• Advanced SQL and proficiency in Python (or R) for modeling, analysis, and automation.
• Strong grounding in statistics and causal inference — experimental design, hypothesis testing, time-series analysis, and significance.
• Working knowledge of cloud data environments; Snowflake preferred.
• A real understanding of how media is planned, bought, and optimized across linear TV, CTV, and digital.
• Ability to explain complex methodology clearly and credibly to non-technical clients and executives.
• Bachelor’s degree in Statistics, Mathematics, Economics, Computer Science, or another quantitative field.

Preferred

• Experience in a media agency or direct-response marketing environment.
• Experience building or contributing to an analytics product rather than only one-off analyses.
• Experience applying AI or LLM tooling to analytical workflows.
• Familiarity with ACR-based TV measurement, pixel-based digital measurement, or panel-to-national extrapolation.
• Experience with BI and visualization platforms (Tableau, Sigma, or comparable).
• Experience mentoring analysts or leading a small analytical team.

Other Considerations:

• Salary based on skills and experience
• Skills will be tested upon interview
• All applicants are subject to background checks and offers of employment will be pending the verification of information listed on application
• All applicants will need to provide a list of professional references

Icon Media Direct is an Equal Opportunity Employer

For more information, please visit our website at: IconMediaDirect.com