Associate Director, Marketing

MSD • Rahway, NJ

17h • Hybrid

About The Position

Associate Director, Companion Animal Marketing, Parasiticides will support and drive commercial growth for our parasiticide portfolio in the United States, partnering across Brand, Digital, Field Sales, Commercial Operations and external agencies. The Associate Director Parasiticides role requires deep direct-to-consumer (DTC) marketing capabilities with broad multi‑channel commercial experience (veterinary channel, distribution, e-commerce and retail) and people leadership responsibilities. The reports to the Director, Parasiticides Marketing and will be an integral member of the brand and cross‑functional teams. At our company's Animal Health, you’ll join a team that’s passionate about the human–animal bond and committed to caring for animals across the full spectrum of care—from prevention and protection to treatment and lifelong well-being. Our culture is grounded in science and fueled by collaboration: we work side-by-side with veterinarians, customers, and partners to help preserve and improve the health, well-being, and performance of animals worldwide. If you’re energized by bold thinking and want to make a meaningful impact, you’ll thrive in an environment that stays agile, visionary, and responsive to what animals and the industry need next.

Requirements

• Bachelor's degree in marketing, Business, Communications, or related field.
• Minimum 7 years of relevant marketing experience with demonstrable consumer-facing (DTC) campaign development and execution.
• Proven experience in media planning and buying, including working with media agencies and managing media budgets.
• Experience marketing across multiple channels including direct-to-veterinarian programs, distribution partnerships, e-commerce and retail.
• Demonstrated experience managing agencies and external vendors (creative, media, performance).
• Prior people management experience (direct reports) or clear evidence of leadership capability.
• Strong project management skills, with the ability to manage multiple initiatives and cross-functional stakeholders in a matrixed organization.
• Strong communication skills (written, verbal, presentation) and ability to translate technical content into customer friendly messages.
• Solid financial acumen: experience managing budgets and tracking ROI.
• Willingness to travel up to 20–25% as needed.

Nice To Haves

• Experience in animal health, veterinary channel marketing, or pharmaceutical/consumer healthcare marketing.
• MBA or advanced degree preferred.
• Experience working with field-based brand teams or sales representatives.
• Familiarity with marketing measurement tools and analytics platforms (e.g., Google Analytics, programmatic/demand-side platforms, CRM tools).
• Additional background in veterinary science or animal health is a plus.

Responsibilities

• Lead development, planning and execution of consumer-facing campaigns across paid, owned and earned channels (creative brief development, audience segmentation, messaging, channel mix).
• Own campaign measurement and optimization: set campaign KPIs, work with analytics to monitor performance and iterate to maximize ROI.
• Manage media planning and buying end-to-end (channel selection, budget allocation, vendor negotiation, performance reporting).
• Select, onboard and lead creative, media and performance agencies; manage scopes of work, timelines, quality and budgets.
• Serve as the primary internal partner for agency partners and external vendors, providing clear direction, feedback, and approvals.
• Develop and execute channel-specific strategies for e-commerce and retail to align with overall brand objectives.
• Partner closely with retail team, sales leadership and other partners to enable synchronized tactics that drive awareness, consideration and adoption in consumer audiences while emphasizing the importance of veterinary care.
• Support e-commerce. home delivery and retail initiatives (site merchandising, promotions, digital shelf, partner integrations) to drive conversion and repeat purchase.
• Contribute to leadership of portfolio brand planning including positioning, messaging, strategies and value propositions for parasiticide brands and pipeline products.
• Lead direct-to-consumer creative development and ensure compliance with legal, regulatory and scientific review processes.
• Participate in cross-functional launch teams to help ensure commercial launch excellence.
• Build portfolio as well as product strategies & marketing plans to leverage products within a brand, while extending leverage and advantage across the companion animal portfolio
• Contribute to achievement of portfolio and business unit gross and net revenue targets annually
• Manage an allocated marketing budget including A&P and Gross to Net spend working closely with Finance to track monthly expenses and meet company targets.
• Contribute to a leveraged business unit P&L through understanding leverage drivers, including optimizing product margin
• Oversee project timelines, deliverables and cross‑functional dependencies to ensure timely execution.
• Define success metrics and partner with analytics/insights teams to measure campaign, channel and product performance; identify and implement corrective actions.
• Assess market research needs and use competitive and market intelligence to inform strategy.
• Lead and develop a small marketing team (direct reports), set clear objectives & priorities, coach for performance, implement development plans, and build cross-functional collaboration skills.
• Foster an inclusive, high-performing team culture and manage resource allocation to meet business priorities.

Benefits

• medical, dental, vision healthcare and other insurance benefits (for employee and family)
• retirement benefits, including 401(k)
• paid holidays, vacation, and compassionate and sick days.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Manager