Senior Director, Industry Strategy (Creative Effectiveness)

Zappi is looking for a senior advertising effectiveness and creative development expert to help strengthen our authority, differentiation, and commercial success in the advertising research and creative effectiveness space.

This person will serve as both:

• A trusted expert, educator, and industry advocate externally

• A strategic, cross-functional SME and connective layer internally

We are looking for an experienced advertising and marketing professional with a strong understanding of creative development and advertising program building. The ideal candidate will bring a marketing-led perspective, with experience working in/with brands, agencies or advertising platforms, and understand how data and technology can be leveraged to inform better advertising decisions.

While an understanding of consumer insights and advertising effectiveness is valuable, this is not primarily an insights or research methodology role.

You should be credible with senior Marketing, Brand, Media, Creative, Commercial, Strategy and Insights leaders, and able to connect a practical understanding of advertising with a modern, scalable approach to advertising research and creative effectiveness.

What you'll do

Serve as an industry expert

• Bring strong expertise in advertising, marketing strategy, creative development, campaign planning and advertising programmes, with an understanding of how brands and agencies develop effective advertising.

• Act as a senior subject matter expert on creative development, advertising effectiveness, campaign performance and the role of data and technology in informing creative decisions.

• Understand how large enterprise organisations operate, including process, politics, agency dynamics, decision-making, budget pressures, stakeholder complexity, and media and creative timelines.

• Stay ahead of emerging trends in advertising effectiveness, AI-generated creative, synthetic respondents, creative volume, digital and social testing, predictive models, and connected learning systems.

• Function as a trusted internal advisor across the organisation.

## Help drive cross-functional GTM readiness

• Work closely with Sales, Customer, Product, Product Marketing, Marketing, and Research Science teams on strategic narratives and customer engagements.

• Help Product Marketing build messaging, frameworks, demos, POVs, enablement, competitive guidance, and customer-facing materials when expertise-level knowledge is needed.

• Support enterprise opportunities as a strategic expert and advisor, speaking directly to customers and prospects when senior advertising expertise is needed.

• Clarify where Zappi’s advertising solutions fit within the creative development lifecycle, from early creative exploration through evaluation, optimisation and campaign learning.

• Own the competitive intelligence programme for advertising research and creative effectiveness, translating market, competitor, customer, and industry shifts into internal guidance and external-facing content.

Build external credibility

##

• Develop a visible external voice in the advertising effectiveness and creative development space.

• Create thought leadership on the future of advertising research, better creative decision-making at scale, AI in creative development, synthetic methods in ad testing, and connected creative learning.

• Speak at conferences, webinars, customer events, and industry forums.

• Engage with analysts, strategic customers, and industry communities.

• Co-create customer education materials and programmes with Customer Marketing.

Influence product and strategy

##

• Translate customer realities, workflow needs, agency dynamics, and competitive gaps into actionable product and GTM recommendations.

• Partner closely with Product, Research Science, and Commercialisation teams.

• Align with Product Marketing, Product, and Commercialisation to pressure test emerging AI, synthetic, predictive, diagnostic, and connected-learning capabilities from both methodological and commercial perspectives.

• Bring a practical advertising and marketing perspective to product and commercial strategy, ensuring product direction aligns with the needs of marketers, brand teams, agencies and the realities of creative development.

• Serve as a second voice outside of Product to help ensure product direction aligns with real-world customer workflows, buyer expectations, and unmet needs.

What success looks like

##

• Zappi has a stronger, clearer, and more differentiated point of view in advertising effectiveness, creative development, and modern creative decisioning.

• GTM teams are more confident and effective in advertising conversations, with stronger discovery, sharper positioning, and better objection handling.

• Zappi’s advertising offerings are easier for Sales and Account teams to position as a strategic growth opportunity, not simply a set of point solutions or individual ad tests.

• Enterprise buyers increasingly view Zappi as a strategic partner for advertising effectiveness, creative development, and connected campaign learning.

• Product and GTM strategy are more closely aligned to customer realities, creative development workflows, competitive dynamics, and emerging market needs.

• Zappi builds greater external authority through thought leadership, customer education, industry participation, and expert-led advertising narratives.

What we’re looking for

• 10+ years of experience in advertising, marketing, creative development, brand strategy, campaign strategy or advertising effectiveness, ideally gained within an agency, advertising platform, ad tech business or in-house brand or marketing team.

• A strong understanding of how advertising is developed and how creative development and advertising programmes support broader marketing objectives.

• Experience working with brands, agencies, advertising platforms or marketing teams, with an understanding of their priorities, workflows and challenges.

• An understanding of how data, consumer insights and technology can be leveraged to inform creative development and improve advertising decisions, without being primarily focused on research methodology or data analytics.

• Experience working with enterprise brands and senior stakeholders across Marketing, Brand, Media, Creative, Commercial, Strategy or Insights teams.

• Strong understanding of how enterprise teams make advertising decisions, manage creative risk, and connect consumer insight to campaign performance.

• Ability to translate complex advertising concepts and capabilities into clear commercial narratives, sales guidance, executive-level storytelling, and customer-facing POVs.

• Experience supporting strategic sales, enterprise customer conversations, thought leadership, or consultative growth motions.

• Exceptional communication, presentation, and storytelling skills, with comfort representing a company externally as a senior industry expert.

We are particularly interested in candidates with backgrounds in advertising and marketing, rather than those whose experience has been predominantly focused on consumer insights or research methodology. Relevant backgrounds include:

• Creative, advertising or media agencies, with experience in advertising strategy, creative development, campaign planning or effectiveness.

• Advertising and media platforms, such as TikTok or YouTube, with experience understanding advertiser needs and how platforms support advertising development and performance.

• In-house brand, marketing, media or creative teams at major advertisers.

• Ad tech or marketing technology businesses, particularly where the role involves helping brands or agencies leverage technology to improve advertising.

• Advertising research, market research or creative effectiveness businesses, where the candidate also brings a strong practical understanding of advertising, marketing and creative development.

Why join us

-