The Media Director – Cross Channel, Digital Paid Media role leads the strategy, planning, execution, and performance optimization of paid digital marketing campaigns across search, social, display, video, programmatic, and emerging media channels across various clients.
This role oversees client and vendor relationships, manages significant media budgets, drives customer acquisition and engagement initiatives, and collaborates with cross-functional stakeholders to achieve business objectives.
This role is remote and is supported by a team with varying skills including media managers, ad operations managers, and analysts. This position may require occasional travel for industry events and client meetings. Flexibility in working hours is expected, particularly during major campaign launches.
Strategic Leadership
- Develop and implement comprehensive paid digital media strategies aligned with organizational goals.
- Identify growth opportunities across customer acquisition, retention, and brand awareness initiatives.
- Provide thought leadership on emerging digital marketing trends, technologies, and platforms.
- Establish media measurement frameworks and performance benchmarks.
Campaign Management
- Oversee paid media campaigns across platforms such as:
- Paid Search: Google Ads, Microsoft Ads
- Paid Social: Meta, LinkedIn Ads
- Programmatic display via DSP
- Video channels (streaming & CTV/OTT) via DSP
- Digital audio
- Ensure campaigns meet KPIs related to ROAS, CPA, CAC, conversion rates, lifetime value and revenue growth.
- Lead testing initiatives including audience segmentation, creative optimization, and bidding strategies.
Budget & Financial Management
- Manage monthly, quarterly, and annual media budgets, often ranging from several million to tens of millions of dollars.
- Monitor media spend efficiency and forecast campaign performance.
- Present budget recommendations and investment strategies to executive leadership.
Analytics & Reporting
- Analyze campaign performance using analytic tools like Google Analytics or Adobe Analytics, in-platform reporting, data visualization platforms and attribution platforms
- Develop executive-level and detailed performance reports for weekly, monthly, and quarterly business reviews.
- Translate complex data into actionable business recommendations.
Team Leadership
- Lead, mentor, and develop digital media managers, analysts, and specialists.
- Manage agency partnerships and external vendors.
- Foster a culture of innovation, accountability, and continuous improvement.
Cross-Functional Collaboration
- Partner with marketing, analytics, account management, creative, CRM, and sales teams.
- Collaborate with compliance, legal, and risk management teams when required, especially in regulated industries such as financial services, healthcare, or insurance.
Qualifications
Required
- Bachelor's degree in marketing, Business, Communications, or related field.
- 8–12+ years of digital marketing experience.
- 5+ years managing paid media teams and budgets.
- Deep expertise in:
- Paid Search (SEM)
- Paid Social
- Programmatic Advertising
- Display and Video Advertising
- Attribution and Measurement
- Deep expertise in all Google properties, Meta, Live Ramp and Microsoft Ads.
- Experience managing custom audiences within media platforms.
- Strong analytical and financial expertise.
- Experience presenting to senior executives.
- Experience leading a team in various time zones.
- Experience in financial services, banking, insurance, healthcare, or other regulated industries.
Preferred
- MBA or master's degree.
- Experience with other types of marketing (i.e. owned, earned) and its impact on paid media channels.
- Experience with The Trade Desk DSP.
- Professional certifications such as:
- Google Ads Certifications
- Meta Blueprint Certification
The typical base pay range for this role across the U.S. is USD $120,000 - $200,000 per year.
For more information on benefits and what we offer please visit us at https://www.exlservice.com/us-careers-and-benefits
The posted range is the hiring range for this role — a subset of the broader range available to employees over time — and reflects base salary across our national hiring scale.
Final offers are based on several factors, including the candidate's skills and experience, internal pay equity, work location, market conditions for the role, and the specific scope and responsibilities of the position.
The top of the range is reserved for candidates who notably exceed the requirements; the lower end applies to those with less experience or fewer preferred qualifications. For positions based in higher-cost zones (e.g., California, New York, New Jersey), actual compensation may exceed the posted range; your recruiter will share specifics during the process.
Skills Required
- Bachelor's degree in Marketing, Business, Communications, or related field
- 8-12+ years of digital marketing experience
- 5+ years managing paid media teams and budgets
- Deep expertise in Paid Search (SEM)
- Deep expertise in Paid Social
- Deep expertise in Programmatic Advertising
- Deep expertise in Display and Video Advertising
- Deep expertise in Attribution and Measurement
- Deep expertise in Google properties, Meta, LiveRamp and Microsoft Ads
- Experience managing custom audiences within media platforms
- Strong analytical and financial expertise
- Experience presenting to senior executives
- Experience leading a team across various time zones
- Experience in regulated industries (financial services, banking, insurance, healthcare)
- MBA or master's degree
- Experience with owned and earned marketing and its impact on paid media
- Experience with The Trade Desk DSP
- Google Ads Certifications
- Meta Blueprint Certification
What We Do
Choosing a digital partner is about more than capabilities — it’s about collaboration and character. Unrealistic overhauls and off-the-shelf products ignore what matters most — your unique needs, culture, goals, and your legacy data and technology environments. At EXL, our collaboration is built on ongoing listening and learning to adapt our methodologies. We’re your business evolution partner—tailoring solutions that make the most of data to make better business decisions and drive more intelligence into your increasingly digital operations. Whether your goals are scaling the use of AI and digital, redesign operating models, or driving better and faster decisions, we’re here to partner with you to help you gain—and maintain—competitive advantage with efficient, sustainable models at scale. Our expertise in transformation, data science, and change management helps make your business more efficient and effective, improve customer relationships and enhance revenue growth. Instead of focusing on multi-year, resource- and time-intensive platform designs or migrations, we look deeper at your entire value chain to integrate strategies with impact. We use our specialization in analytics, digital interventions, and operations management—alongside deep industry expertise — to deliver solutions that help you outperform the competition. At EXL, it’s all about outcomes—your outcomes—and delivering success on your terms. Share your goals with us and together, we’ll optimize how you leverage data to drive your business forward. For more information, visit www.exlservice.com.
