Media Operations Manager

Overview Experience

the possibilities of our progressive, omnichannel approach to beauty retail. At Ulta Beauty, our Marketing team is applying the latest technologies to personalize the buying experience of true beauty enthusiasts—in ways that surprise and delight. Building love and loyalty, one communication, one experience, one brilliant idea at a time. We represent the perfect blend of strategy and creativity. Of tactics and analytics.

To make Ulta Beauty a brand guests will advocate for. Growing share of heart. Delivering with disciplined consistency. Whether your deepest passion is for design or content, strategy or data, or some combination of all things marketing, Ulta Beauty will provide significant latitude to explore your talents and passions, with opportunities to stretch and deepen, to grow and build. Truly, the possibilities are beautiful.

The Media Operations Manager is the operational backbone of our paid media function. This role owns the systems, processes, tools, and workflows that enable the media team to execute efficiently and at scale — ensuring that campaigns move from planning to activation to measurement with speed and precision.

This position will oversee the performance of external agencies and technology vendors by ensuring that SLAs are met, relevant policies and guidelines are upheld, and partners can deliver excellence and innovation

This is a highly cross‑functional role, sitting at the intersection of Marketing, Finance, and external agency and vendor partners. The right candidate is a process builder and systems thinker who thrives on bringing order to complexity.

• Build and oversee campaign planning process and standardized back‑out timing for Ulta‑Funded marketing across Paid Media Strategy including Paid Media, Affiliate, and Search.
• Design, document, and scale operational frameworks – continuously improve end‑to‑end media operations workflows – from briefing and trafficking to QA, reporting, and oversee billing operations
• Establish and maintain a campaign calendar and intake process to align media execution with integrated marketing planning cycles
• Identify bottlenecks and operational gaps; build scalable solutions that reduce manual effort and improve turnaround time
• Partner with IM Operations & larger Marketing Operations to ensure Paid Media Strategy timing is aligned to larger Integrated Marketing planning lifecycle.
• Partner with Retail Media Network (UB Media) campaign planning processes and how RMN timing connects with the Marketing enterprise
• Oversee Paid Media process for Creative Deliverables – ensuring Paid Media planning cycle aligns with Asset Planning and Production Cycles
• Hosts weekly status and planning meetings with Paid Media Team to align key milestones and action across the Media team
• Interfaces daily/weekly with Project Management agency team

• Evaluate, implement, and manage integrations between media tools and broader marketing systems (i.e. Media Tools, )
• Manage Media Tools change management internally and with finance

• Serve as the primary operational liaison with media agencies and vendors — overseeing timelines, deliverables, and accountability
• Establish agency SLAs & ensure SLAs and reporting requirements are met; elevate issues when needed
• Own onboarding and offboarding of agency and vendor relationships, including access management and contract tracking

• Partner with agency project management leaders to build and maintain operational reporting that surfaces performance, pacing, and process health for internal stakeholders
• Partner with cross‑functional partners (Strategic Analytics, Integrated Marketing) on templates including Media Plan templates, Mid‑Flight and Post‑Campaign Reporting Templates, Hindsight, etc.
• Oversee calendar and expectations for key ET deliverables including Sales Lock, GTM, Quarterly Performance Review (ensuring teams know schedule and expectations)
• Create standardization across internal & external agency parties including documentation, naming conventions, etc.