Associate Director, Paid Search

We are OMD, Cannes Lions 2024 Media Network of the Year, RECMA''s Best-Performing Media Network Globally, and COMvergence''s #1 Global Agency Network. As the world's largest media network, with more than 12,000 people working in over 100 countries, we excel at making better decisions, faster. By combining innovation, creativity, empathy, and evidence, we help clients move faster, reach further, and take smarter risks in a world full of opportunities

We pride ourselves on being a people-obsessed, outcomes-focused business that applies evidence and data-based solutions, married with the practice of empathy, to drive performance and growth. When working with our clients, we put ourselves in the shoes of the consumer in order to see the world through their eyes. We focus on finding greater empathy with the consumer so as to uncover insights and opportunities that deliver more valued and valuable connections.

Role Overview

The Associate Director, Paid Search is responsible for overseeing the day-to-day management, optimization, and performance of paid search programs. This role translates client business objectives into strong paid search execution, ensuring campaigns are properly planned, launched, managed, measured, and optimized.

The Associate Director partners with Directors and Senior Directors on strategic initiatives while owning tactical implementation, performance analysis, client communication, financial stewardship, and junior team development.

A successful candidate will bring strong paid search expertise, analytical rigor, attention to detail, and the ability to turn performance data into clear recommendations. This role requires someone who can manage complexity, lead junior team members, identify growth opportunities, and help clients understand how paid search contributes to broader business and retail performance goals.

Key Responsibilities

• Paid Search Planning & Strategy: Partner with senior leads to develop paid search plans aligned to client business goals, campaign objectives, retail priorities, and performance KPIs. Translate strategic direction into actionable campaign structures, testing plans, audience approaches, bidding strategies, and budget recommendations.
• Campaign Management & Optimization: Oversee day-to-day paid search execution across Google Ads, Microsoft Ads, SA360, and other relevant platforms. Ensure campaigns are launched accurately, optimized regularly, and managed against performance goals such as revenue, ROAS, CPA, conversion rate, traffic quality, and customer acquisition.
• Retail & Ecommerce Performance: Manage paid search programs with an understanding of retail and ecommerce dynamics, including promotions, seasonality, product/category performance, inventory signals, shopping campaigns, Performance Max, and feed-based optimization.
• Data Analysis & Insights: Analyze campaign, platform, site, and business performance data to identify trends, risks, and opportunities. Translate reporting into clear insights, explaining what happened, why it happened, what it means, and what should happen next.
• Testing & Innovation: Develop and manage test-and-learn agendas across bidding, keywords, match types, creative, shopping formats, landing pages, automation, AI-powered campaign types, and measurement approaches. Evaluate new platform features and betas based on client relevance and business value.
• Client Communication: Serve as a key day-to-day client contact for paid search performance, campaign updates, reporting, optimization recommendations, and issue resolution. Present plans, results, insights, and next steps clearly to clients and internal stakeholders.
• Team Leadership: Manage, mentor, and train junior team members. Assign work, review deliverables, provide feedback, and ensure consistent executional quality across campaign builds, optimizations, reporting, pacing, and QA.
• Financial Management: Oversee budget pacing, forecasting, billing inputs, and investment allocation across paid search campaigns. Identify risks related to overspend, underdelivery, inefficiency, or shifting business conditions, and recommend corrective action.
• Quality Assurance & Operations: Act as a quality assurance lead for campaign launches, account changes, tracking, reporting, deliverables, and client-facing materials. Ensure work follows platform best practices, client requirements, naming conventions, trafficking standards, and measurement protocols.
• Cross-Team Collaboration & Thought Leadership: Work with broader investment, strategy, analytics, retail media, social, programmatic, creative, and commerce teams to ensure paid search is connected to broader media and business priorities. Contribute to POVs, best practices, platform updates, and client education materials.

Qualifications

• Relevant post-secondary education, training, or equivalent experience.
• 5-7 years of relevant paid search experience, preferably with retail, ecommerce, or performance-driven accounts.
• 2+ years of experience managing, mentoring, or overseeing junior team members.
• Strong hands-on experience with Google Ads and Microsoft Ads.
• Experience with bid management platforms such as SA360, Skai, Marin, or similar tools.
• Experience managing shopping campaigns, Performance Max, AI-powered campaign formats, and product/feed-based search programs.
• Strong understanding of paid search campaign management, keyword strategy, match types, bidding, budgets, QA, optimization, and measurement best practices.
• Experience with analytics platforms such as Google Analytics, Adobe Analytics, or similar tools.
• Ability to analyze data and translate findings into actionable recommendations.
• Experience managing budgets, pacing, forecasting, reporting, and performance readouts.
• Familiarity with search retargeting, retail media, social, video, and broader digital advertising opportunities.
• Experience troubleshooting conversion tracking, site tags, feeds, or platform measurement issues.
• Comfort using scripts, automation, or workflow tools to improve account management efficiency.
• Strong communication and presentation skills, both written and verbal.
• Ability to manage multiple projects, timelines, stakeholders, and priorities in a fast-paced agency environment.
• Strong management, mentorship, coaching, and team development skills.
• Proactive, detail-oriented, commercially minded, and comfortable making recommendations.
• Test, learn, and scale mindset.

Preferred Certifications

• Google Ads Search Certification
• Microsoft Advertising Certification
• Google Search Ads 360 Certification
• Google Ads Shopping Certification
• AI-Powered Shopping Ads Certification
• AI-Powered Performance Ads Certification
• Google Analytics Certification

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This is the pay range the Company believes it will pay for this position at the time of this posting. Consistent with applicable law, compensation will be determined based on relevant experience, other job-related qualifications/skills, and geographic location (to account for comparative cost of living). The Company reserves the right to modify this pay range at any time. For this role, benefits include: health insurance, vision insurance, dental insurance, 401(k), Healthcare Flexible Spending Account, Dependent Care Flexible Spending Account, vacation days, sick days, personal days, paid parental leave, paid medical leave, and STD/LTD insurance benefits.

Compensation Range

$90,000-$125,000 USD

This role is hybrid, requiring three (3) days per week in the office. The remaining two (2) days may be worked remotely. Specific in-office days will be discussed during the interview process, with flexibility to align with team needs. Please note that the number or required in-office days may be adjusted over time, potentially increasing the number of required in-office days based on business needs.

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