OverviewReporting to the Senior Director of Business Development and Strategy - Social Commerce, the Associate Director of Strategy - Influencer is a senior individual contributor and strategic partner to the sales and business development team. This role develops compelling, insight-led strategies and proposals for prospective clients across influencer, creator, affiliate, and social commerce. The Associate Director translates business objectives and market intelligence into differentiated, measurable solutions, with a primary focus on pre-sales strategy, research, proposal development, solution design, thought leadership, and persuasive client presentation rather than day-to-day account ownership or campaign execution.
Responsibilities- Partner with sales and business development leaders to respond to prospective-client opportunities, briefs, RFPs, and proactive pitches.
- Translate prospective clients' business objectives, priority audiences, category dynamics, and commercial needs into differentiated influencer and creator commerce strategies.
- Develop strategic narratives, pitch materials, proposal content, program recommendations, and executive-ready presentations that clearly articulate the opportunity and CJI's approach.
- Design creator commerce programs across the customer journey, including awareness, consideration, conversion, acquisition, and loyalty.
- Develop TikTok Shop strategies, with particular emphasis on TikTok Shop Affiliate, including creator recruitment and segmentation, product seeding, commission strategy, content volume, promotional moments, paid amplification, and performance optimization.
- Recommend the appropriate roles for subaffiliate and creator commerce platforms, including LTK and ShopMy, based on the client's audience, category, objectives, operating model, and measurement requirements.
- Conduct in-depth competitive, category, creator, platform, and market research within the influencer and social commerce ecosystem.
- Turn research, platform intelligence, and performance data into clear insights, strategic opportunities, and actionable recommendations.
- Build strategic frameworks, audience and creator segmentation approaches, channel recommendations, content territories, creator briefs, activation roadmaps, measurement plans, and test-and-learn agendas.
- Develop business cases and opportunity assessments that connect creator activity to measurable outcomes such as engagement, traffic, customer acquisition, conversion, revenue, GMV, ROAS, affiliate sales, and incrementality, where appropriate.
- Partner cross-functionally with influencer, account management, media, analytics, creative, commerce, and operations teams to ensure proposed programs are innovative, differentiated, measurable, operationally feasible, and appropriately scoped.
- Present strategies and proposals clearly and persuasively to prospective clients, senior client stakeholders, and internal leadership.
- Participate actively in pitches and respond confidently to strategic, platform, measurement, and activation questions.
- Support scope development by identifying the capabilities, resources, dependencies, assumptions, deliverables, and measurement requirements required to execute the proposed strategy.
- Identify strategic risks, platform dependencies, operational constraints, and potential gaps before recommendations are presented to a prospective client.
- Stay current on creator economy trends, social commerce developments, platform capabilities, affiliate models, measurement practices, relevant platform policies, and emerging technologies.
- Help CJI develop reusable strategic frameworks, proposal tools, case studies, points of view, and thought leadership that improve the quality and efficiency of business development.
Qualifications- Approximately 7 or more years of relevant experience in influencer marketing, creator marketing, affiliate marketing, social commerce, digital strategy, integrated marketing, e-commerce, or a related discipline preferred.
- Demonstrated experience developing influencer or creator strategies for brands, agencies, platforms, retailers, or commerce organizations.
- Experience contributing to or leading new-business proposals, RFP responses, pitch development, and client presentations.
- Strong working knowledge of TikTok Shop, particularly TikTok Shop Affiliate strategy and creator-led commerce.
- Familiarity with affiliate and subaffiliate platforms and ecosystems, including LTK and ShopMy.
- Understanding of creator discovery, segmentation, compensation and commission models, product seeding, shoppable content, paid amplification, usage rights, and performance measurement.
- Ability to conduct rigorous competitive research and synthesize complex information into concise, differentiated recommendations.
- Strong analytical fluency and the ability to connect channel metrics to broader business and commercial outcomes.
- Excellent written, verbal, visual storytelling, presentation, and executive communication skills.
- Ability to develop persuasive PowerPoint presentations and work effectively with data, research, and performance-reporting tools.
- Strong collaboration and stakeholder-management skills in a fast-paced, deadline-driven new-business environment.
- Sound strategic judgment, intellectual curiosity, attention to detail, and the ability to balance creative ambition with operational and commercial realities.
- Comfort working through ambiguity and developing strategic recommendations when prospective-client information is incomplete.
- Bachelor's degree or equivalent relevant professional experience.
Additional informationThis is a hybrid role requiring 3 days a week in office.
