Media Planning Activation Lead Southern Africa

Location: La Lucia Ridge / Johannesburg

MAIN JOB PURPOSE:
- Effective and efficient Media planning and investment.- Breakthrough innovation.- Functional excellence with a strong balance between digital media and traditional Media expertise and competency sets.

JOB SUMMARY / RESPONSIBILITIES:
- Responsible for development of BU media plans and budget setting & tracking for holistic plans that cover all media and all platforms including retailer media- Manages media activation based on marketing plan / activity calendar incl. mobilising / coordinating with digital hub channel specialists to deploy locally.- Collaborates with dComm lead to ensure the full end-to-end plan works on and offline with key customers.- Works with the agencies / external partners to bring to media plan execution to life on time and in full.- Maximise efficiencies via value extractions with external partners / agencies.- Drive Best in class Holistic Media Planning and execution:
- Lead and coordinate and deliver best in class holistic media plans (offline and online) for the BU that fully leverage data and insights to target media effectively, that are accountable for building brand power- Responsible for driving digital media execution together with the digital hub team in particular relating data driven marketing (including the use of 1P,2P,3P data), search and performance marketing.- Work with the Performance marketing / retailer media experts in the Hub to drive optimisations both on and off the retailer.- Drive efficiencies through rigour and relationships:
- Work with agency to ensure external media owners deliver the very best value for Unilever across all levers - price (annual deals, budget complexities, sponsorship deals), innovation, and best practice.- Management of media agency team with core elements of media trading and contractual delivery, third-party audits, and management of resource and capability review.- Drive best practice and thought leadership:
- Dock into key cross functional disciplines (Uni-Ops, and CMI (Consumer and Market Insights). Land core cross functional capabilities and best practice with the brand teams- Drive Media and digital media innovation - pioneering the future of media and data driven marketing through a continuous test, learn and scale approach. Areas will include connected TV, live streaming, social commerce, podcasts, DTC etc- Key interfaces: Digital Marketing, Media and Commerce team; Brand teams; Cross-functional teams

KEY REQUIREMENTS- Relevant Marketing / Business degree- Minimum 5 years of relevant experience in the following areas:
- Ability to advice on all thing’s media and data driven marketing to internal stakeholders through in-depth of media knowledge, providing expertise on specific channels and opportunities, and by explaining complex information in an easily digestible way.- Collaboration skills that encourage multi-stakeholder projects to thrive- A pioneer spirit to drive and embed innovation into our media and data strategies and plans- Problem solving mindset, able to work with agility and adapt to a changing media and market conditions.- Strong analytical skills to define, interpret and respond to data insights.- Outstanding communication skills to focus stakeholders and embed best practices.- Holistic brand communication management experience at a large brand. Or, cross-brand leadership experience at an agency.- Advertising/Media budget management experience- Experience in handling complex stakeholders across matrixed organisations- Some experience in data driven marketing and performance / ecommerce