Vice President, Online Communities Panels
About the role
The VP of Panel Management will lead the strategy, health, and operational excellence of our global quantitative proprietary panels. You will be responsible for the end-to-end lifecycle of our panelists—from recruitment and engagement to retention and data quality—ensuring we maintain a "gold-standard" respondent pool that supports complex, multi-market research initiatives.
Key Responsibilities
- Strategic Global Leadership
- Panel Roadmap: Influence and support the development of a 3-year strategic roadmap for global panel expansion, focusing on high-growth markets and niche B2B/Consumer segments.
- Budget & P&L Ownership: Manage panel budgets, optimizing the balance between recruitment costs, incentive spend, and panel lifetime value.
- Commercial Support: Act as a subject matter expert during the sales process, advising clients and internal teams on feasibility, sampling methodology, and panel capabilities for large-scale bids.
- Operational & Executional Excellence
- Sampling & Fielding: Optimize automated sampling protocols to ensure representative delivery while minimizing "panel fatigue."
- Process Standardization: Standardize operational workflows across regional teams to ensure consistent data quality and delivery speed.
- Fraud Mitigation: Implement and evolve advanced fraud detection (digital fingerprinting, bot-trap integration, and behavioral pattern analysis).
- Data Privacy: Ensure 100% compliance with global data protection regulations, including GDPR, CCPA, and industry standards like ESOMAR and CASRO.
- Panel Health Metrics: Establish rigorous KPIs for panel "freshness," churn rates, and response accuracy.
- Engagement & Retention Strategy
- Incentive Management: Design and manage localized incentive structures that drive high response rates while remaining cost-effective.
- Member Experience (UX): Improve the panelist journey through mobile-first survey design, community features, and streamlined support systems.
Required Experience & Qualifications
- Experience: 10+ years in market research operations, with at least 5 years in a leadership role managing large-scale global panels.
- Technical Proficiency: Deep experience with panel management software (e.g., Cint, Forsta/Confirmit, Qualtrics, or proprietary builds) and data visualization tools (Tableau, PowerBI).
- Global Fluency: Proven track record of managing panels across diverse international markets, understanding the nuances of recruitment in emerging vs. mature markets.
- Quantitative Expertise: Strong grasp of statistical sampling methods, weighting, and data cleaning techniques.
What's In It For You
- Career Development
- Exceptional benefits package (including generous PTO, healthcare plans, wellness benefits)
- A flexible workplace policy
- A strong collaborative culture
About Ipsos
Ipsos is one of the world’s largest research companies and currently the only one primarily managed by researchers, ranking as a #1 full-service research organization for four consecutive years. With over 75 different data-driven solutions, and presence in 90 markets, Ipsos brings together research, implementation, methodological, and subject-matter experts from around the world, combining thematic and technical experts to deliver top-quality research and insights.
About the SMX Communities team
The SMX Communities team gives clients real-time access to their consumers via an engaging, social platform. Research activities include quant and qual – and regardless of approach, always encourage proactive, in-depth feedback through asking, listening, discussing, and co-creating.