Digital Media Director

Ken Media•Austin, TX

4d•Onsite

About The Position

KEN is seeking a senior, client-facing digital media leader to lead digital and retail media across its client roster, from planning through final reporting. Based in KEN’s Austin office, the Director will identify digital and commerce opportunities in client briefs, incorporate them into media plans, and ensure campaigns are delivered and measured effectively. The Director will serve as the senior digital point of contact for clients and partner with the Head of Media on digital elements of pitches, RFPs, and integrated client strategies. They will work with the digital execution team to translate approved plans into actionable briefs, oversee campaign quality and optimization, and communicate performance insights to clients. The role also builds KEN’s internal digital capabilities by developing standards, playbooks, and training, while supporting the growth of the agency’s digital and retail media offering.

Requirements

At least 7 years of digital media experience at an agency or in-house, including at least 3 years in a senior, client-facing role.
At least 2 years planning and managing retail media programs, including hands-on Amazon Sponsored Ads and Amazon DSP management through tentpole events such as Prime Day, plus experience with at least one other major retail media network.
Experience contributing to the digital components of pitches and RFPs.
Familiarity with planning and running campaigns on major platforms such as DV360, The Trade Desk, Amazon DSP, CM360, SA360, Meta, TikTok, Reddit, Pinterest, Google Ads, Spotify, and Vistar.
Experience designing cross-channel media plans for clients with complex KPIs, including sales and retail metrics such as ROAS, iROAS, ACOS, TACOS, and new-to-brand.
Experience mentoring junior team members.
A degree or diploma in business, marketing, or communications, or equivalent industry experience.
Strong working knowledge of on-site and off-site retail media, including Sponsored Products, Sponsored Brands, Sponsored Display, keyword and bid strategy, retail DSPs, closed-loop measurement, clean rooms, and the relationship between retail media and brand and upper-funnel media.
Ability to build and maintain strong relationships with stakeholders in complex agency environments.
Strong presentation skills and ability to translate technical and data concepts into clear business value for senior clients.
Ability to write concise, complete briefs that another team can execute.
Solid understanding of attribution, incrementality, tracking, and reporting.
Ability to collaborate across client-facing, creative, and technical teams.
Strong organization and prioritization skills, including the ability to manage multiple accounts and pitches through completion.
Interest in coaching and helping colleagues develop.
Curiosity about digital advertising and willingness to keep learning as the industry changes.

Nice To Haves

Experience formally managing direct reports.
Hands-on experience with clean rooms such as Amazon Marketing Cloud.
Experience across three or more retail media networks.
Experience in an embedded or hub agency model.
Platform certifications such as Amazon Ads, Google, Meta, or The Trade Desk.

Responsibilities

Serve as the senior digital point of contact for clients, presenting strategy and results, guiding updates, and recommending relevant channels and products.
Partner with the Head of Media to align digital plans with each client’s overall media strategy and contribute to pitches, RFPs, account priorities, and integrated presentations.
Lead retail media planning and help develop KEN’s retail media offering across on-site and off-site inventory and retail media networks.
Develop retail media strategies that connect brand building with sell-through; plan joint business plans and co-op investments; and use sales data and clean rooms to measure incremental sales and connect retail media to broader plans.
Own Amazon strategy, budgets, pacing, tentpole flighting, Sponsored Ads, and Amazon DSP planning and optimization; report performance and brief creative partners on required assets and specifications.
Contribute digital and retail media recommendations to new-business and organic-growth pitches, including scoping deliverables, budgets, and timelines.
Set digital retention and growth goals for accounts and identify opportunities to expand client programs.
Review incoming client opportunities and develop cross-channel digital plans aligned with KEN’s broader media strategy, audience work, and consumer journey mapping.
Advise clients on first-party data, audience activation, conversion APIs, clean room work, privacy requirements, and signal loss.
Package approved plans into complete briefs for strategy and activation teams, including objectives, audiences, channel budgets, flowcharts, KPIs, measurement frameworks, creative specifications, and timing.
Coordinate with Bakery Agency on digital and retail creative specifications, asset timelines, and testing plans.
Coordinate campaign budgets, scope, asset collection, reviews, and launches with the execution team; oversee quality and in-flight optimization and deliver actionable performance insights to clients.
Build and maintain digital campaign playbooks, pacing documents, optimization logs, naming conventions, and dashboards.
Lead post-campaign reporting and quarterly business reviews; advise on attribution modeling, incrementality testing, and multi-touch attribution.
Track digital opportunities, pitch and account status, spend, and results, and report regularly to relevant agency and partner leadership and the execution team.
Mentor and train planners, strategists, buyers, and assistants; review their work and help develop their platform skills.
Recommend digital, retail media, and AI tools that improve planning, measurement, and efficiency, and help evaluate their return on investment.
Escalate complex technical issues to strategy and technology teams and translate their guidance into clear client value.
Improve workflows among KEN, clients, Bakery, and the execution team, including by using AI to automate repeatable work.
Monitor industry developments in platforms, inventory, retail media networks, privacy, and AI, and bring relevant ideas to clients.