VP of Paid Media – strategy

We’re Hiring: VP of Paid Media – Strategy

HYBRID:
At least 2 days a week in our office in Maidstone, Kent

Are you ready to redefine search? Reflect Digital, the award-winning agency blending behavioural science, AI-powered insights, and creative strategy, is searching for a VP of Paid Media – Strategy to lead our future. This pivotal role goes beyond traditional Paid Media, tasking you with expanding our clients’ presence across the entire discovery ecosystem – from search engines to LLMs and emerging answer platforms.

Join us and shape the next generation of digital performance.

Reflect Digital is an award-winning, behavioural science-led digital marketing agency. Since 2011, we have been connecting our clients with their audience by understanding customer motivations to deliver exponential growth. Our strategies seamlessly blend behavioural science, AI-powered insights, and marketing creativity to deliver next-generation search experiences, earning us multiple accolades, including Agency of the Year 2024 and Employer of the Year 2025

• We’re a Family – An inclusive, caring environment where we support, challenge and look out for each other.
• Love our Craft – We are passionate about digital strategy and development, putting education at the forefront.
• Going for Gold – We maintain an unwavering ambition and drive for success, remaining curious and agile.

As VP of Paid Media – Strategy, you will bridge Paid Media, Growth, SEO, Behavioural Science, and Creative to deliver unified, insight-led, full-funnel strategies. Acting as the strategic lead across our portfolio, you will champion innovation, develop new Paid Media capabilities, drive commercial opportunities, and help the department evolve into a centre of excellence.

• Oversee the strategic direction of Paid Media activity across the full client portfolio, ensuring approaches reflect emerging behaviours across search engines, LLMs, social discovery platforms, retail media, and AI-driven ad ecosystems.
• Hold regular strategic reviews with Paid account managers to elevate cross-channel thinking, embed audience and behavioural insights, and ensure innovation and best practice.
• Stay close enough to client objectives to step in as Paid account lead if required.
• Introduce new channels, AI-powered optimisation techniques, creative testing frameworks, incrementality studies, and behavioural-led Search experiments.
• Review all Quarterly Business Plans and strategic presentations, ensuring strong narrative and strategic rigour.
• Collaborate deeply with SEO, Content, Behavioural Science, Digital PR, the Strategy Director, and Head of Search to deliver holistic behavioural search strategies.

• Identify and develop cross-sell and upsell opportunities across channels, creative production, data/BI, and behavioural science-informed testing.
• Partner with the Strategy Director to lead Paid Media contributions in RFPs, proposals, pitches, and scoping.
• Represent Paid Media at key industry events, particularly around AI-driven performance, creative intelligence, and future-of-search marketing.
• Ensure forecasting, revenue modelling, planning, and commercial recommendations are accurate and progressive.

• Support Paid account managers to strengthen strategic thinking, cross-channel knowledge, creative understanding, and communication confidence.
• Share frameworks, tools, behavioural insights, industry updates, and Search knowledge to enhance strategic output.
• Lead the development of Strategy as a core pillar of the Paid Media department, building towards a larger, structured Paid Strategy function.
• Foster curiosity, innovation, cross-disciplinary collaboration, and a test-and-learn culture.

• Champion a culture of experimentation, performance innovation, and continuous optimisation across channels and workflows.
• Work closely with the Data and Innovation teams to identify tools, technologies, and AI-driven resources for predictive modelling, creative optimisation, and audience understanding.
• Maintain high…