Manager of Audience Strategy & Operations

Job Description

ESC has an exciting opportunity for a Manager of Audience Strategy & Operations to support a growing retail media organization. This contract-to-hire role is ideal for an experienced audience strategy or digital media professional with expertise in first-party data, audience activation, and AdTech/MarTech platforms .

\n

\n

The Manager will serve as a subject matter expert for audience targeting and activation, partnering with internal teams and external agencies, technology providers, and publisher partners.

\n

\n

Responsibilities:

\n

• Lead audience strategy, targeting, segmentation, and activation across campaigns

\n

• Translate advertiser objectives into actionable audience recommendations

\n

• Partner with Sales, Account Management, Product, Data, and Measurement teams on audience strategy and campaign planning

\n

• Own the end-to-end audience workflow from development and distribution through activation, maintenance, and retirement

\n

• Manage day-to-day operations and relationships with agency, technology, and publisher partners

\n

• Establish audience workflows, documentation, governance, naming standards, and activation best practices

\n

• Monitor audience readiness, platform hygiene, and activation issues, escalating and resolving challenges as needed

\n

• Identify opportunities to improve audience capabilities, operational efficiency, and campaign performance

\n

• Evaluate emerging audience technologies, data sources, and industry trends and recommend new capabilities or tests

\n

• Lead cross-functional initiatives related to audience operations, process improvement, and capability development

\n

\n

Must Have Qualifications:

\n

• Bachelor’s degree in a related discipline preferred

\n

• 5+ years of experience in retail media, digital advertising, audience strategy, media activation, AdTech, data strategy, or related field

\n

• Experience developing and executing audience strategies using first-party data

\n

• Strong understanding of audience segmentation, identity, activation, syndication, and digital media ecosystems

\n

• Experience with audience management platforms, identity providers, or AdTech/MarTech solutions

\n

• Experience managing external agency, technology, publisher, or other partners

\n

• Strong analytical, project management, communication, and problem-solving skills

\n

• Proficiency in Microsoft Excel and PowerPoint

\n

\n

Nice to Have Qualifications:

\n

• Retail media, retailer, media agency, publisher, or AdTech experience

\n

• Experience with LiveRamp, Adobe CDPs, SAS, clean rooms, audience marketplaces , or similar technologies

\n

• Experience developing audience taxonomies or segmentation frameworks

\n

• Experience with omnichannel activation, measurement, attribution, or retail media analytics

\n

• Experience leading cross-functional initiatives or process improvements

\n

• Experience developing client-facing audience recommendations and presentations

\n

• Familiarity with privacy, identity, and first-party data practices