Sr. Director, Media and Planning

About the role

The Sr. Director, Media & Planning owns every paid media dollar deployed against an assigned brand. This role is accountable for translating brand and pod strategy into a measurable, ROAS-disciplined paid media plan that drives transactions, loyalty acquisition, and same-store traffic. The position installs the ROAS discipline, channel mix, partnership activation, and pod integration that the assigned brand's Chief Brand Officer will measure pod throughput against.

Responsibilities

• Own the end-to-end paid media plan for the assigned brand across paid social, paid search, programmatic, YouTube, and emerging channels.
• Set ROAS standards by channel for the assigned brand; publish to the Chief Brand Officer, franchisee leadership, and the marketing-investment governance committee.
• Manage the working- vs. non-working-dollar split for the assigned brand's marketing investments to a fiduciary standard of franchisee accountability.
• Manage agency relationships for all assigned-brand paid media partners, including SOWs, scope, and performance reviews.
• Integrate paid media as a pod input alongside IMC, owned channels, loyalty, and creative.
• Deploy partnership channels for the assigned brand, including third-party loyalty/acquisition partners currently underutilized.
• Collaborate with Marketing Science on MMM and attribution methodology connecting paid spend to traffic, same-store sales, and EBITDA.
• Build and lead the assigned brand's paid media team.
• Manage budgets in accordance with approved plans and the Company's brand-funded marketing investment standards.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Marketing, Business, Analytics, or a related field, or equivalent professional experience.
• 10+ years of paid media leadership experience.
• Deep paid social, paid search, and programmatic expertise across Meta, TikTok, Google, YouTube, and DSPs.
• Demonstrated experience building ROAS and attribution measurement frameworks.
• Demonstrated experience operating within franchise marketing investment funds or co-op marketing structures.
• Demonstrated partnership channel experience, including scaling third-party acquisition partners with published ROI standards.
• Demonstrated MMM and multi-touch attribution literacy.
• Multi-brand, franchise, or portfolio context preferred.

Skills

• Strong cross-functional credibility with creative, owned channels, CRM, loyalty, and brand teams.
• Builder's mindset; demonstrated track record of building paid media operations from the ground up.
• Strong executive presence; able to operate at the senior level with brand, franchisee, and committee audiences.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills.
• Sound judgment in managing brand-funded marketing investments to fiduciary standards.

Travel Requirement

May be required to travel up to 25% of the time.