VP Brand Marketing - Merrell

Wolverine Worldwide•Rockford, MI

About The Position

For over 40 Years, Merrell has been trying to share the simple power of the being outside with everyone. We believe in the positive benefit of the outdoors to restore individuals and communities. As a result, we want to fuel the growth of outdoor participation through the creation of awesome products and amazing stories that encourages people to get outside everyday whether in the city or on the trail. To help drive this journey, we are looking for a VP Brand Management who will report directly to the Chief Marketing Officer. This individual will set the strategic direction for all brand marketing stories that will deliver the brands short-term and long-term growth goals. This individual’s success will be based on their ability to be consumer-centric, creative, and drive change that elevate our integrated marketing efforts and gets more people to love and seek out our brand and products. Leadership Capabilities: As an influential strategic business leader, you will build strong partnerships across the Merrell brand including serving as a vital voice of the consumer and brand with senior leaders, brand strategists, marketers, customers, agency partners, product teams, and designers. Brand Strategy: Partner with key members of the Merrell leadership team to bring the brand vision and mission to life through research, business analysis, ideation, innovation, development, and commercial execution. Lead the development of long-term brand marketing strategies that helps define and build a path to growth by aligning key priorities and areas of optimization and transformation for the portfolio. Influence and drive decisions across long-term and annual business strategies, innovation strategy and development, revenue growth management strategies and marketing execution optimization. Act as the brand steward collaborating with internal multi-functional team (Consumer Insights, Design, Finance, Product PR, etc) and external partners to drive comprehensive brand plans to be executed by markets around the world. Drive on going evolution and refinement of Merrell brand strategy: positioning and architecture (in conjunction with Consumer Insights). Ownership of the US marketing strategies for Merrell; develop 360 strategy for all launches. Partner with the product team to generate a 3 Year Innovation Pipeline by helping the team to unlock powerful consumer insights that translate into disruptive and incremental innovations boosting revenue and profit for the business lines. Track record of translating business priorities into brand objectives, strategies, and plans. Work with Consumer Insights, Strategy and Lead markets to develop consumer grounded, high business potential and sustainable innovation architecture and road map. Integrated Marketing Development: Oversee the development of strategic global integrated marketing big idea platforms that unify our brand communication center in our purpose. Lead a structured and organized approach to craft engaging integrated marketing campaigns that drives consumer interest and demand and grows overall sales. Lead the development of omni-channel marketing strategies that drive both brand engagement and sell-through at retail. Direct and coordinate integrated marketing campaigns across various channels, including print, digital, social media, influencers, events, and collaborations. Oversee the alignment of media planning and investment to ensure the right balance between brand and performance channels. Partner closely with Retail Marketing to ensure seamless integration of brand campaigns across owned retail, wholesale, and digital channels. Understand how to effectively inspire and delight consumers through product performance, pricing, and positioning of brand’s key franchises. Create campaign briefs and partner with agencies to develop advertising, credibility and consumer engagement campaigns. Collaborate with media and retail partners to optimize campaigns for awareness, conversion and in-store traffic. Collaborate with regional marketing teams to develop and implement execution plans for global campaigns, including facilitating information sharing and to drive alignment across regions and troubleshoot issues. Direct team in the creation of Toolkits and Playbooks to facilitate the implementation of key marketing initiatives. Monitor competitive activity and provide regular competitive intelligence updates. Orchestrate and drive multifunctional teams towards same vision and goals in an absence of direct reporting relationships. Manage the development of marketing budget (forecast, value analyses, brand profitability, development costs, etc.) as well as the budgets for key programs. Identify opportunities to continue to enhance the customer experience through an omnichannel approach focusing on new customer acquisition & to ultimately drive sales. Consumer-centric Business Analysis and Annual Operation Planning: You will provide leadership and feedback in the development across a range of Insights & Analytics agenda of standards and capabilities. Own the overall development and activation of Merrell’s Learning agenda to reflect the most important consumer questions for the business in support of top tier growth goals Building and aligning business stakeholders on the annual Learning agenda. Relentlessly drive toward a 360-degree understanding of our consumers across the consumer journey; provoking continuous improvement and motivating adoption of tools to further this effort. Serve as subject matter expert for team in designing, explaining, and providing recommendations in consumer research. Building out marketing reporting framework to track monthly/ quarterly marketing performance and drivers of the brand and sharing outcomes and key actions and insights with marketers, brand, and leadership. People Leadership: Giving direct reports proper guidance on their projects, meeting their calendar milestones, and utilizing systems, while keeping them "on track" in terms of their professional development. Lead the training and development, talent assessment, coaching and mentoring to develop the talent and elevate the team capacity and build on the positive and inclusive working environment to support the long-term business needs. Ensuring timely performance discussions and individual development plans. Continuously check / adjust to drive clarity and maximize team performance. Simplifying complex decisions for direct reports and team and demonstrate strong rationale. Establish relationships with key agency partners to deliver breakthrough marketing that will drive market share. Work fluidly in a matrixed global environment across functions. Performs duties consistent with the company’s AAP/EEO goals and policies. Performs other duties as required/assigned by manager.

Requirements

Bachelor's degree in marketing, communications, or a related field, MBA preferred.
10+ years of professional experience in brand marketing, and 5 years people leadership.
Strong content background, with a track record of developing successful marketing campaigns.
Experience managing integrated marketing campaigns across multiple channels, including social media and digital platforms, and effectively filters through and identifies the best ideas to pursue.
A track record driving brand impact through innovative and creative marketing initiatives with a passion and curiosity around best-in-class marketing story telling.
Strong understanding of paid media planning and measurement across traditional and digital channels.
Skilled in building and maintaining trust-based relationships with teams, stakeholders, and agencies to ensure alignment and continuous improvement.
Passion for creative and good eye for design and detail.
Experience managing relationships with media partners to deliver integrated programs that connect storytelling to commercial outcomes.
Looks ahead to reasonably anticipate business opportunities and obstacles.
International marketing experience and a passion for expanding brands into new markets.
Fosters an environment of excellence and personally champions break through initiatives and continually raises the bar for performance and helping others to succeed.
Operates effectively in matrix relationships across organizational boundaries.
Demonstrates the courage and conviction needed to drive large scale change initiatives.
Proficiency in analyzing marketing performance metrics to optimize strategies.
Exceptional organizational skills, balancing structure, and creativity.
Performance-driven with a test-and-learn mindset, and a focus on critical thinking to assess, interpret, and integrate learning from multiple sources to drive better results in an agile way.
Strong leadership and team management abilities, with a focus on developing high-performing teams.
Great written and verbal communication and can successfully spread marketing best-practices throughout the organization, especially new ideas, concepts to internal and external stakeholders.
Availability to travel domestically and internationally.
Since it is a global role, need to be comfortable working across time zones (e.g., meetings late evenings and early mornings, travel to different global locations).

Responsibilities

As an influential strategic business leader, you will build strong partnerships across the Merrell brand including serving as a vital voice of the consumer and brand with senior leaders, brand strategists, marketers, customers, agency partners, product teams, and designers.
Partner with key members of the Merrell leadership team to bring the brand vision and mission to life through research, business analysis, ideation, innovation, development, and commercial execution.
Lead the development of long-term brand marketing strategies that helps define and build a path to growth by aligning key priorities and areas of optimization and transformation for the portfolio.
Influence and drive decisions across long-term and annual business strategies, innovation strategy and development, revenue growth management strategies and marketing execution optimization.
Act as the brand steward collaborating with internal multi-functional team (Consumer Insights, Design, Finance, Product PR, etc) and external partners to drive comprehensive brand plans to be executed by markets around the world.
Drive on going evolution and refinement of Merrell brand strategy: positioning and architecture (in conjunction with Consumer Insights).
Ownership of the US marketing strategies for Merrell; develop 360 strategy for all launches.
Partner with the product team to generate a 3 Year Innovation Pipeline by helping the team to unlock powerful consumer insights that translate into disruptive and incremental innovations boosting revenue and profit for the business lines.
Track record of translating business priorities into brand objectives, strategies, and plans.
Work with Consumer Insights, Strategy and Lead markets to develop consumer grounded, high business potential and sustainable innovation architecture and road map.
Oversee the development of strategic global integrated marketing big idea platforms that unify our brand communication center in our purpose.
Lead a structured and organized approach to craft engaging integrated marketing campaigns that drives consumer interest and demand and grows overall sales.
Lead the development of omni-channel marketing strategies that drive both brand engagement and sell-through at retail.
Direct and coordinate integrated marketing campaigns across various channels, including print, digital, social media, influencers, events, and collaborations.
Oversee the alignment of media planning and investment to ensure the right balance between brand and performance channels.
Partner closely with Retail Marketing to ensure seamless integration of brand campaigns across owned retail, wholesale, and digital channels.
Understand how to effectively inspire and delight consumers through product performance, pricing, and positioning of brand’s key franchises.
Create campaign briefs and partner with agencies to develop advertising, credibility and consumer engagement campaigns.
Collaborate with media and retail partners to optimize campaigns for awareness, conversion and in-store traffic.
Collaborate with regional marketing teams to develop and implement execution plans for global campaigns, including facilitating information sharing and to drive alignment across regions and troubleshoot issues.
Direct team in the creation of Toolkits and Playbooks to facilitate the implementation of key marketing initiatives.
Monitor competitive activity and provide regular competitive intelligence updates.
Orchestrate and drive multifunctional teams towards same vision and goals in an absence of direct reporting relationships.
Manage the development of marketing budget (forecast, value analyses, brand profitability, development costs, etc.) as well as the budgets for key programs.
Identify opportunities to continue to enhance the customer experience through an omnichannel approach focusing on new customer acquisition & to ultimately drive sales.
You will provide leadership and feedback in the development across a range of Insights & Analytics agenda of standards and capabilities.
Own the overall development and activation of Merrell’s Learning agenda to reflect the most important consumer questions for the business in support of top tier growth goals Building and aligning business stakeholders on the annual Learning agenda.
Relentlessly drive toward a 360-degree understanding of our consumers across the consumer journey; provoking continuous improvement and motivating adoption of tools to further this effort.
Serve as subject matter expert for team in designing, explaining, and providing recommendations in consumer research.
Building out marketing reporting framework to track monthly/ quarterly marketing performance and drivers of the brand and sharing outcomes and key actions and insights with marketers, brand, and leadership.
Giving direct reports proper guidance on their projects, meeting their calendar milestones, and utilizing systems, while keeping them "on track" in terms of their professional development.
Lead the training and development, talent assessment, coaching and mentoring to develop the talent and elevate the team capacity and build on the positive and inclusive working environment to support the long-term business needs.
Ensuring timely performance discussions and individual development plans.
Continuously check / adjust to drive clarity and maximize team performance.
Simplifying complex decisions for direct reports and team and demonstrate strong rationale.
Establish relationships with key agency partners to deliver breakthrough marketing that will drive market share.
Work fluidly in a matrixed global environment across functions.
Performs duties consistent with the company’s AAP/EEO goals and policies.
Performs other duties as required/assigned by manager.