Account Director-Experiential

Account Director-Experiential | Careers | VML

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Account Director-Experiential

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Brand: VML

Capability: Client & Business Leadership

Location: Detroit, MI, United States

Last Updated: ${ new Date('2026-09-23T22:51:56-04:00').toLocaleDateString() }

Requisition ID: 18554

Who We Are

VML is a global creative company that combines brand experience, customer experience, and commerce to create connected brands that drive growth. Guided by a Human First philosophy, VML is known for its innovative work for brands and consistently ranks among the world's leading creative companies, including the WARC Creative 100. VML's global network spans 55+ markets with principal offices in Buenos Aires, Kansas City, London, New York, São Paulo, Shanghai and Singapore.

VML is part of WPP, the trusted growth partner for the world's leading brands. Powered by exceptional talent and our agentic marketing platform WPP Open, WPP unites cutting-edge media intelligence and data solutions, creativity, production, enterprise solutions and expert strategic counsel.

For more information, please visit www.vml.com and follow along on  LinkedIn #WeAreVML.

WHO IS HUDSON ROUGE?

Hudson Rouge is an integrated luxury boutique marketing and communications agency within WPP that works solely on luxury brands and is the exclusive agency of record for the Lincoln Motor Company business across all channels. We combine brand strategy, media strategy, activation, digital, social, earned media, production, and analytics to provide exquisitely crafted creativity. We are a small group of people, spread across several offices - New York, Detroit, Shanghai, Toronto, Mexico City - and we care for each other as much as we care for our clients. We are an agency that prides itself on creating irrational desire for luxury brands, and we look for uniquely talented people who are excited about doing their best work and want to grow with us.

THE OPPORTUNITY

The Account Director, Experiential leads overall agency services across experiential marketing accounts, brand activations, and strategic partnerships. This role is responsible for driving account growth, managing agency financial results, and directing the development of client engagement personnel through ongoing coaching in Marketing Excellence, Ownership, Intelligence, and Innovation.

Externally, the Account Director builds and maintains trusted relationships with senior client leadership, establishing Hudson Rouge as an industry leader in experiential marketing. The Account Director must be a proactive champion and innovative thinker for experiential marketing-serving as the practice's biggest advocate both internally across agency disciplines and externally with senior client partners. Grounded in operational rigor and a deep understanding of the luxury automotive business, they relentlessly pursue creative excellence, shift brand perception, and drive measurable business impact.

What you'll do:

Strategic Client Leadership

• Lead the overall experiential media and activation strategy for a luxury automotive client, ensuring strategic alignment, flawless execution, and strong senior client partnerships.
• Proactively champion the strategic value of experiential marketing to senior clients, pitching innovative, forward-thinking concepts that elevate the brand and deliver superior business results.
• Serve as the primary senior client contact across experiential initiatives, establishing credibility through visionary leadership, sound judgment, and proactive communication.
• Drive account growth by expanding experiential capabilities, introducing emerging event technology, and securing groundbreaking brand partnerships.
• Maintain expert, forward-looking knowledge of the client's business, luxury consumer behavior, automotive industry trends, and competitive landscape.

Experiential Program Leadership & Vision

• Drive innovative, outside-the-box thinking to conceptualize and execute unique experiential deliverables that achieve client business objectives and shift consumer perception to elevate the brand image.
• Lead the annual Go-To-Market (GTM) experiential strategy and activation roadmap, aligning event programs with Lincoln's integrated multi-channel campaigns.
• Provide executive oversight across the full lifecycle of complex experiential programs, auto shows, brand partnerships, and high-touch consumer experiences.
• Maintain the highest standards of craft, production value, operational execution, and post-event ROI measurement.
• Proactively present strategic recommendations, new concepts, and activation innovations to senior client leadership.

Cross-Functional Collaboration & Integration

• Champion experiential internally, inspiring and aligning cross-functional teams (Creative, Strategy, Media, PR, and Production) to integrate physical activations as a core pillar of brand campaigns.
• Direct vendor and supplier strategy, overseeing contract negotiations, budget compliance, and partner evaluation.
• Lead senior client briefings, inter-agency partner meetings, and executive strategy sessions.

Team Management & Development

• Supervise, mentor, and foster the career growth of account and project management personnel within the experiential team.
• Establish clear annual goals, conduct performance evaluations, and provide continuous coaching in luxury service delivery and strategic thinking.
• Promote a high-performance culture grounded in accountability, cross-functional collaboration, and creative excellence.

Operational & Financial Stewardship

• Establish process and timeline discipline, holding both internal teams and client partners accountable to milestone delivery dates.
• Understand operational workflows deeply enough to adapt or compress processes for aggressive deadlines, clearly communicating trade-offs, operational risks, and consequences to stakeholders.
• Own overall account financial performance, including revenue forecasting, monthly billing, staffing resourcing, and budget tracking.
• Manage workflow allocation and timeline feasibility across all active experiential workstreams.
• Keep the Group Account Director regularly informed on business status, growth opportunities, and executive escalation points

What you bring:

• Process Rigor & Adaptive Execution: Highly process- and timeline-oriented leader skilled at holding internal teams and client partners accountable to delivery dates; adept at flexibly restructuring workflows to meet aggressive deadlines while clearly advising on risks and operational trade-offs.
• Innovative Thinking & Brand Transformation: An outside-the-box creative thinker capable of conceiving unique, high-impact experiential deliverables that shift consumer brand perception and drive business results.
• Experiential Advocacy & Proactive Drive: A passionate, proactive advocate for experiential marketing who relentlessly drives results, pushes for creative excellence, and champions the discipline both internally across agency teams and externally with clients.
• Strategic Leadership & Growth: Strategic thinker with a proven track record of managing high-profile client accounts, driving business growth, and delivering measurable results.
• Experiential & Luxury Expertise: In-depth knowledge of experiential marketing, large-scale event production, automotive activations, luxury brand positioning, and immersive experience design.
• Integrated Agency Collaboration: Demonstrated ability to lead cross-functional agency teams and align creative, strategy, media, public relations (PR), and production around unified activation goals.
• Financial & Operational Mastery: Solid financial management skills, including budget oversight, resource forecasting, and margin tracking.
• Executive Communication & Presentation: Polished, persuasive presenter and communicator capable of articulating strategic vision to senior client leadership.
• Problem-Solving & Agility: Calm and decisive under pressure, with strong crisis-management skills during live event executions.

What you'll need:

• Education: Bachelor's degree or equivalent experience in Marketing, Communications, Event Management, or a related field.
• Professional Experience: 8 to 12 years of progressive marketing experience in an agency or client-side setting, with a dedicated focus on experiential strategy, event production, and / or account management.
• Industry Focus: Experience working on luxury and/or automotive accounts is strongly preferred, including managing high-profile brand partnerships, auto shows, or lifestyle activations.
• Leadership Experience: Proven experience leading and developing account and project management teams in an integrated agency environment.
• Operational & Workplace Requirements: Ability to travel to event locations as needed for on-site support, with flexibility to work evenings and weekends during program execution.

This role will be based in our Detroit office.

The base salary range for this position at the time of this posting is indicated below. Individual compensation varies based on job-related factors, including location, business needs, level of responsibility, experience, and qualifications. We offer a competitive benefits package, click WPP Benefits for more details.

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$75,000-$180,000 USD

We believe the best work happens when we're together, fostering creativity, collaboration, and connection. That's why we've adopted a hybrid approach, with teams in the office an average of four days a week. If you require accommodations or flexibility, please discuss this with the hiring team during the interview process.

WPP (VML) is an equal opportunity employer and considers applicants for all positions without discrimination or regard to characteristics. We are committed to fostering a culture of respect in which everyone feels they belong and has the same opportunities to progress in their careers.

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When you click "Submit Application", this will send any information you add below to VML. Before you do this, we think it's a good idea to read through our Recruitment Privacy Policy. California residents should read our California Recruitment Privacy Notice. This explains what we do with your personal data when you apply for a role with us, and, how you can update the information you have provided us with or how to remove it.

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