Director of Marketing and Sales - American Shakespeare Center

Warren Whitney • Staunton, VA

2d • $55,000 - $65,000 • Onsite

About The Position

The Director of Marketing & Sales leads the American Shakespeare Center’s strategy for growing audiences, driving ticket sales and earned revenue, and building lasting relationships between patrons and ASC. The Director develops and executes the annual marketing and audience strategy across performances, education programs, institutional marketing, paid media, and audience development.

Reporting to the Executive Artistic Director, the Director leads an established marketing team with expertise in communications and content, CRM and ticketing, audience data, and marketing operations. The role works across Artistic, Learning & Engagement, Development, Finance, and patron-facing teams to connect programming and institutional priorities with effective audience and revenue strategies. The Director is expected to develop consumer-facing campaigns, use data to improve performance, lead people and projects, and respond to opportunities and changing sales conditions.

The position is full-time, exempt, and based primarily on-site at ASC’s offices and the Blackfriars Playhouse in Staunton, Virginia. The schedule requires flexibility for occasional evening and weekend responsibilities tied to performances, opening weekends, events, and other organizational activities. Occasional travel is required, primarily in Central Virginia, with opportunities to attend relevant industry conferences or networking events.

Compensation is $55,000–$65,000 annually, commensurate with experience. Full-time employees are eligible for ASC’s benefits package, including employer-subsidized health insurance; optional vision, dental, and life insurance; paid holidays; complimentary ASC performance tickets; and a discount on Blackfriars Playhouse Gift Shop merchandise, in accordance with ASC policy.

Requirements

• At least 4 years of progressively responsible marketing experience, or equivalent experience.
• Demonstrated success developing consumer-facing campaigns that drive sales, attendance, enrollment, audience growth, or other measurable outcomes.
• Experience with integrated marketing and paid media, including using audience and performance data to evaluate results and adjust strategy.
• Comfort working with budgets, sales or revenue goals, and performance metrics.
• Experience leading projects, campaigns, staff, vendors, or cross-functional teams.
• Strong strategic judgment, communication, collaboration, and organizational skills.
• High school diploma or GED/equivalent.

Nice To Haves

• Experience in performing arts, live events, entertainment, hospitality, tourism, attractions, sports, education, or another consumer-facing field.
• Experience with ticketing or admissions, CRM-driven marketing, audience segmentation, memberships or subscriptions, or customer lifecycle strategy.
• Bachelor’s degree in Marketing, Communications, Business, or a related field.

Responsibilities

• Develop and execute ASC’s annual marketing and audience plan across performances, education programs, institutional marketing, paid media, partnerships, and other earned-revenue activities.
• Lead audience and ticket-sales strategy, translating earned-revenue goals into coordinated approaches for audience acquisition, pricing and promotion, ticket sales, group sales, memberships and packages, and other audience-based earned-revenue activities.
• Monitor sales pace, enrollment, audience behavior, and campaign performance; identify opportunities and risks and adjust strategy, targeting, messaging, offers, channels, and investment accordingly.
• Lead audience acquisition, retention, and re-engagement strategies that build pathways from first-time participation to repeat attendance and deeper engagement with ASC.
• Partner with CRM and ticketing expertise on pricing, promotions, segmentation, forecasting, sales analysis, and patron behavior; establish and track sales goals and inform revenue strategy.
• Lead institutional marketing and positioning for ASC and the Blackfriars Playhouse, strengthening ASC’s visibility as a cultural institution and destination theatre.
• Build relationships with tourism, community, media, and cultural partners to expand ASC’s reach locally, regionally, and beyond.
• Partner with Learning & Engagement on marketing and enrollment strategies for student matinees, camps, workshops, adult learning, and other education programs.
• Work with Development to create pathways from audience participation and loyalty to deeper institutional and philanthropic engagement.
• Lead paid media and promotional strategy; manage related vendors and external partners and ASC’s marketing and advertising budget; evaluate campaign effectiveness and return on investment.
• Provide strategic direction for campaigns, messaging, communications, public relations, and brand, while communications and content staff lead day-to-day execution.
• Lead and develop the marketing team by establishing priorities, goals, responsibilities, workflows, deadlines, and measures of success.
• Serve as ASC’s lead marketing strategist in organizational planning and communicate audience, sales, and campaign performance to organizational leadership and, as appropriate, the Board of Trustees.

Benefits

• Employer-subsidized health insurance.
• Optional vision, dental, and life insurance.
• Paid holidays in accordance with the Employee Handbook.
• Complimentary ASC performance tickets.
• Discount on Blackfriars Playhouse Gift Shop merchandise, in accordance with ASC policy.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Director
• Education Level: High school or GED