Director, Brand Experience

About the teamZillow Experience Design (ZxD) is a multidisciplinary team shaping the experiences that help people discover, buy, sell, and rent homes. Within ZxD, the Design Foundations team defines the systems, standards, and practices that elevate quality across our product ecosystem. We focus on accessibility, design systems, brand experience and content standards.
The Brand Experience, specifically, team leads our visual design practice within product design — shaping our visual language and how Zillow’s brand comes to life across our apps, website and other digital experiences.

About the role

 The most powerful expression of Zillow’s brand lives inside our product.

We are looking for a Director of Brand Experience to shape that expression — bringing clarity to our visual language, elevating craft within product, and ensuring our brand scales with clarity, consistency, and craft.

At Zillow, we believe our brand is our product. The experiences customers have in our apps and on our website are critical to their impression of our brand. This leader embeds brand expression into the core of how we design and build — shaping our visual language from the start, not at the end.

As we accelerate product development through AI-enabled workflows, this role is critical to ensuring that increased speed does not erode quality. You will help define how visual standards are integrated into tooling and AI systems so that brand and craft remain foundational as the way we design and build evolves.

Reporting to the Senior Director of Design Foundations, you will lead the evolution of our product visual language and our Visual Design practice, and partner closely with Design Systems, Content Design, Brand Strategy and our Marketing design studio to deliver cohesive, high-quality experiences at scale. You’ll lead a small, high-impact team of visual design specialists.

In this role, you will

Shape and evolve Zillow’s product visual language

• Define and evolve the visual language and brand experience principles across Zillow’s digital products

• Ensure our brand personality is expressed consistently and cohesively in product experiences

• Engage early in product strategy and planning to embed brand thinking from the start

• Identify opportunities — both transformative and incremental — to elevate craft across the ecosystem

Raise the standard for visual craft

• Mature our visual design practice and elevate skills within our product design org

• Establish clear standards and guidance for visual execution within product

• Integrate visual standards and principles into design systems, engineering workflows, AI-enabled tooling, and our new brand hub

• Show what great looks like through rituals and resources

• Safeguard quality and cohesion as we increase speed and scale

Lead and develop a high-performing team

• Inspire, coach, and grow a team of visual designers across identity, motion, and illustration

• Provide strong creative direction and thoughtful feedback

• Build a culture of excellence, accountability, and collaboration

Partner and influence across the organization

• Partner closely with Brand on strategy, priorities and execution

• Collaborate closely with Design Systems to embed brand into shared components and tooling

• Partner with Content Design to align visual and verbal expression

• Partner with Studio Z to ensure cohesive brand experiences across marketing & product

• Work closely with experience design leaders to support their teams and work

• Influence senior stakeholders through strong storytelling and sound judgment 

This role has been categorized as a Remote position. “Remote” employees do not have a permanent corporate office workplace and, instead, work from a physical location of their choice, which must be identified to the Company. U.S. employees may live in any of the 50 United States, with limited exceptions.

In California, Connecticut, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Washington state, and Washington DC the standard base pay range for this role is $231,000.00 - $369,000.00 annually. This base pay range is specific to these locations and may not be applicable to other locations. In Colorado, Hawaii, Illinois, Minnesota, Nevada, Ohio, Rhode Island, and Vermont the standard base pay range for this role is $219,500.00 - $350,600.00 annually. The base pay range is specific to these locations and may not be applicable to other locations.

In addition to a competitive base salary this position is also eligible for equity awards based on factors such as experience, performance and location. Actual amounts will vary depending on experience, performance and location. Employees in this role will not be paid below the salary threshold for exempt employees in the state where they reside.

Who you are

• A mission-driven design leader with a clear POV on how brand comes to life in digital products

• Brings strong visual design craft and brand expertise with fluency in tech or product environments

• Sweats the details from visual design to motion to iconography and illustration concepts

• Able to translate vision into execution and ensure ideas are fully realized

• Defines visual direction through their team and translates it into principles, standards, and systems that scale across tooling and AI-enabled workflows

• Comfortable shaping direction early and proactively identifying opportunities, rather than engaging only at the end of the process

• Committed to raising the bar across the design organization by up-leveling visual design capabilities, through education and upskilling

• Intentional about how to structure and tailor partnerships with peers and their teams to maximize impact

• Builds strong teams by giving clear feedback and creating environments where designers raise the bar together

• Shapes clear, compelling narratives that bring senior leaders along and move work forward

Qualifications

• Preferred background in graphic design, visual communication, or a related field

• 7+ years of experience leading and developing design teams; min 5 years of managing

• 10+ years of experience in visual, brand, or digital design, including experience defining visual language within digital product experiences

• Experience working within technology or product-led organizations and partnering closely with product and engineering teams

• Experience shipping digital products and bringing design work from concept through execution

• Experience working across complex, cross-functional environments and aligning a broad set of stakeholders to move work forward

• Experience translating visual standards into scalable systems, tooling, or workflows

• Portfolio demonstrating how you lead teams and shape work, with examples that reflect strong craft and execution

• Nice to have: experience in teaching, mentoring, or other forms of practice leadership

Get to know us

At Zillow, we’re reimagining how people move—through the real estate market and through their careers. As the most-visited real estate platform in the U.S., we help customers navigate buying, selling, financing and renting with greater ease and confidence. Whether you're working in tech, sales, operations, or design, you’ll be part of a company that's reshaping an industry and helping more people make home a reality.

Zillow is honored to be recognized among the best workplaces in the country. Zillow was named one of FORTUNE 100 Best Companies to Work For® in 2025, and included on the PEOPLE Companies That Care® 2025 list, reflecting our commitment to creating an innovative, inclusive, and engaging culture where employees are empowered to grow.

No matter where you sit in the organization, your work will help drive innovation, support our customers, and move the industry—and your career—forward, together.

Zillow Group is an equal opportunity employer committed to fostering an inclusive, innovative environment with the best employees. We are committed to equal employment opportunity regardless of race, color, ancestry, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, age, citizenship, marital status, disability, gender identity or Veteran status. If you have a disability or special need that requires accommodation, please contact your recruiter directly.

Qualified applicants with arrest or conviction records will be considered for employment in accordance with applicable state and local law.

Los Angeles County applicants: Job duties for this position include: work safely and cooperatively with other employees, supervisors, and staff; adhere to standards of excellence despite stressful conditions; communicate effectively and respectfully with employees, supervisors, and staff to ensure exceptional customer service; and follow all federal, state, and local laws and Company policies. Criminal history may have a direct, adverse, and negative relationship with some of the material job duties of this position. These include the duties and responsibilities listed above, as well as the abilities to adhere to company policies, exercise sound judgment, effectively manage stress and work safely and respectfully with others, exhibit trustworthiness and professionalism, and safeguard business operations and the Company’s reputation. Pursuant to the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance, we will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records.