Agency Development Lead - Independent Agencies

About AppLovin’s Consumer Team

We are powering the next wave of consumer growth. Specializing in performance advertising, we help global brands and leading consumer apps across verticals such as e-commerce, fintech, meal delivery, ride hailing, video streaming and more achieve profitable growth by connecting them to over 1 billion daily users across thousands of the world’s top mobile games apps. This scale is driven by AppLovin Ads, AppLovin’s advertising platform, which enables businesses of all sizes to find their ideal customers and maximize ROI.

AppLovin’s global Consumer Team combines people from different backgrounds and perspectives, united by a shared ambition to always pursue excellence and win together in a fast-moving market. 

About the Role

The Agency Partnerships team is a new, high-performing team within the Consumer Team that drives customer success by partnering with a wide range of agency partners. We are looking for an Agency Development Lead to build and own partnerships with independent agencies based in North America. This is a unique, zero-to-one opportunity to define how one of the world’s largest performance advertising platforms shows up, engages and grows with the independent agency community to establish AppLovin Ads as a core performance channel across their client rosters.

This is a highly visible, externally facing role for someone who thrives on building influential relationships and turning them into measurable revenue growth for clients, partners and AppLovin. You will focus on winning new agency partnerships and expanding AppLovin’s footprint within existing agency partners. You will build relationships with agency leadership and activate programs around co-marketing, technology integration, enablement and joint business planning, while developing a deep understanding of each agency’s business, media strategy and growth priorities. You will serve as a consultative, executive-level growth partner who earns trust with agency leadership and the client teams they represent. You will also work alongside dedicated Agency Success Managers on the Agency Partnerships team to support client onboarding, spend growth and retention. 

Responsibilities

●    Own full-cycle sales opportunities across North American independent agency prospects and existing partners, building trusted relationships with senior agency leadership, pod leads and media buyers that lead to multi-client activation and durable revenue growth
●    Build and manage a strong pipeline of qualified agency partner opportunities through strategic account planning, targeted prospecting, executive referrals, inbound demand and industry events and conferences
●    Lead joint business planning conversations with agency partners to understand their client portfolio, commercial priorities, media planning process and practice areas where AppLovin Ads can play a role in driving their broader growth strategy
●    Partner closely with Agency Success Managers and cross-functional teams to ensure new agencies and their clients launch successfully on the platform
●    Expand agency partnerships by identifying and activating net-new clients within their roster, working alongside Agency Success Managers who own growth of clients already spending on the platform
●    Serve as the trusted primary point of contact, escalation point and thought leader for your agencies
●    Design and deliver scaled enablement programs, including trainings, workshops, certifications and roadshows, that build agency fluency in AppLovin Ads and in performance best practices for creative, measurement and campaign setup
●    Partner with the Consumer Business Development team to connect agency relationships to direct brand opportunities, ensuring a coordinated experience for both agency and brand partners
●    Drive co-marketing, thought leadership and case study programs with agency partners to establish AppLovin as the best full-funnel performance advertising channel opportunity in the market
●    Bring the voice of the agency to AppLovin by translating partner feedback, competitive intelligence and market trends into prioritized business cases that inform the product roadmap and agency offering
●    Represent AppLovin at industry events, agency summits and executive briefings
●    Mentor and develop Agency Partnerships team members, raise the bar on best practices and playbooks and help build the team as the channel grows

Basic Qualifications

●    10+ years of experience in digital advertising, with significant experience in agency development, agency sales or agency partnerships at a leading ad tech, paid social, search, e-commerce or technology company
●    A consistent track record of winning new agency business and expanding existing partnerships for performance-focused products and/or services
●    Deep understanding of agency operating models, economics and how media planning and channel decisions are made across independent agencies of all sizes
●    Established network of senior relationships across North American independent agencies
●    Executive presence and outstanding communication, storytelling, negotiation and presentation skills, with the ability to build credibility from practitioner to C-suite
●    Strong prospecting and account-planning skills, with the judgment to prioritize the opportunities, relationships and actions most likely to create material growth
●    Analytical, data-driven operating style, with the ability to manage a high-volume, high-value portfolio of agency relationships
●    A builder mindset: you thrive in early-stage business settings, operate well with ambiguity and minimal direction and can stand up programs from scratch

Preferred Qualifications

●    BA/BS degree preferred
●    Direct agency management experience at a performance advertising platform such as a paid social, search, mobile or programmatic company
●    Experience structuring and negotiating commercial agreements, joint business plans or incentive programs with agency partners
●    Experience building scaled agency partnership, certification and training programs from an early stage
●    Agency-side experience in media planning, investment or performance marketing
●    Understanding of the mobile advertising ecosystem and performance advertising for e-commerce
●    Travel expected as and when possible

CA Base Pay Range 202500 - 247500 USD