Lead Creative Strategist

Paid Creative Strategist (w/ a Sense of Humor)

Shinesty · Boulder, United States (Hybrid) · Full-time · Posted 2026-09-24

Salary: USD 90,000–110,000

Workplace: hybrid

Department: Marketing

Description

At Shinesty, our mission is to force the world to take itself less seriously. We make people laugh first and sell second. Our mothers don't always approve of what we do, but the millions of people we've entertained over the years do.

Our paid ads are the front door to all of that. They're entertaining enough that people can’t turn away, and clear enough about the product that they want to buy. Balancing both of those at once, every week, at scale, across dozens and dozens of new ads per week is the job.

The role

We're looking for a Lead Creative Strategist to own paid creative at Shinesty: what gets made, why, in what order, whether it worked (or not) and what we do next as a result. Photo and video, in-house and agency, Meta first and all other channels second. You report directly to our co-founder and CMO, and you lead our in-house paid creative producer(s) plus the agencies that contribute ads to our account.

This is a player/coach role, and we mean both halves. You'll set the creative roadmap, run the testing pipeline, and manage the people and partners producing against it. You'll also personally concept, script, and likely ship most of the best ads in the account.

The person we want has an unfair amount of ideas and the grit to get them produced and tested. But ideas alone don't cut it here. You have to love the numbers as much as the comedy and ad creativity: reading creative analytics, spotting what's scaling and why, helping killing what isn't, and turning both into the next round of tests. If you find yourself reaching for the spreadsheet and the storyboard with the same enthusiasm, keep reading.

And yes, you need a sense of humor. Not "I enjoy a good meme" humor. The kind where you can take a pair of underwear with a pouch for your balls and write ten different ways to sell it that make people laugh and still land the need-to-knows about the product.

Requirements

What you'll do

Own the creative roadmap

• Set and prioritize the paid creative pipeline: which products, angles, formats, and hooks get made, in what order, and why.
• Concept new ads from scratch, from big campaign ideas to quick iPhone hook tests, and write scripts and copy in Shinesty's voice.
• Build a real testing system: hypotheses, variables, volume, and a cadence that keeps fresh creative hitting the account and scaling.

Read the numbers and act on them

• Live in creative analytics. Know which ads are scaling and why, which are fading, and what to do about both.
• Diagnose underperformers at the component level (hook, body, offer, format, landing page match) and fix them rather than just pulling them.
• Turn winners into families: iterate on what's working with new hooks, cuts, lengths, formats, and angles before they fatigue.
• Report clearly on what shipped, what worked, what didn't, and what's next. Our attribution runs through Northbeam and our own dashboards, not the Meta ads manager's opinion of itself.

Lead the people making the creative

• Manage and coach our in-house paid creative producer(s), designers, and editors: set priorities, review concepts and cuts, give feedback that makes the work, and the people, better.
• Manage the agencies contributing ads to our account: briefs, feedback loops, performance reviews, and deciding who earns more of the budget, who should be cut, who else we should add and test with, etc.
• Work hand-in-hand with our photographer/videographer, designers, editors, and media buyers so ideas move from brief to live ad without bottlenecks.
• Source and direct creators, UGC, and on-set talent when the concept calls for it.

Ship, personally

• Be a strong individual contributor. Some of the best-performing ads in the account should have your fingerprints on them.
• Use AI creative tools aggressively to move faster, prove concepts, and get more shots on goal.
• Stay on top of what's working across Meta and the broader paid landscape, and bring it back to the team before it's stale.

Who you are

• Left brain and right brain, both switched on. You can pitch a concept that makes the room laugh, then explain in plain numbers why it beat the control. One without the other doesn't work here.
• An endless well of ideas. You have more concepts than you'll ever get to make, and it doesn't bother you to cut the weak ones. You know a good idea is worth nothing until it's scaling efficiently in our accounts.
• Fluent in creative analytics and paid KPIs. Hook rate, hold rate, thumbstop, CTR, CPA, ROAS, MER, nCAC, incrementality, and especially spend as a signal. You know which ones matter for which decision, and you know when the platform's numbers are probably lying to you.
• Meta-native. You know Meta creative best practices inside and out and when to call “ BS” on them: what works in feed vs. Reels vs. Stories, how to structure a first 3 seconds, how to build creative for Advantage+ and broad targeting, how to keep a winner alive. Familiarity with YouTube, CTV, TikTok, AppLovin, and linear TV creative is a big plus.
• A player/coach. You've managed people, agencies, or both, and you're still producing great work yourself. You give feedback that improves the ad and the person making it.
• Gritty. You get things made. Sourcing talent, shot-listing, directing on set, shooting a hook test on your phone, chasing an editor for a cut, whatever it takes to get the test live this week instead of next.
• Funny, with range. You can write in Shinesty's voice, and you can write in a creator's voice for a UGC script without it sounding like a brand wearing a costume. You know the difference between funny and funny-that-sells.
• A clear communicator. You brief agencies cleanly, give producers direction they can act on, and report to leadership without burying the point.
• Experienced. Typically 5+ years in paid creative strategy, growth creative, or performance marketing for a DTC or e-commerce brand, with real spend behind your work. Managing agencies and/or direct reports for at least some of that.

Where the work runs

Meta is the main event and where most of your creative thinking will go. We also run creative across YouTube, CTV, linear TV, TikTok, AppLovin, and other channels as they earn budget, so you'll be adapting concepts and formats for each rather than copy-pasting the Meta cut everywhere. On the measurement side you'll work with Northbeam, our internal attribution dashboards, in-platform creative reporting, and post-purchase survey data. You'll have access to any AI creative tool that makes you faster.

Don't have the exact experience?

Convince us you can do the job anyway. Titles vary wildly in this corner of marketing, and we care a lot more about whether you:

• Make us laugh
• Get the brand
• Can show us ads you've made or led, and tell us what the numbers did
• Can explain how you'd run our creative pipeline in your first 90 days
• Have the tenacity to champion an idea, and the humility to kill it when the data says so

Compensation and benefits

• Salary: $90,000–$110,000, depending on experience
• Hybrid schedule, majority of days in office (we have spaces in both Boulder and Denver). 
• Relocation assistance offered if you’re not already local.
• Laptop plus whatever other equipment you need
• Access to any AI or other creative platforms that will make you better at your job
• Medical, dental, and vision insurance
• Flexible PTO: no accrual, take what you need
• Flexible working hours: get your work done and generate results
• Dog-friendly office
• Discounted and occasionally free products from Shinesty.com
• Work with a insanely smart, motivated, creative, and fun group of people

Apply

Apply at Shinesty

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