Client Partner

Dentsu is an integrated growth and transformation partner to the world’s leading organisations. Founded in 1901 in Tokyo, Japan, and now operating in over 145 countries and regions, we bring together the power of a global network of leadership brands to deliver impactful, end-to-end growth solutions.

With over 120 years of innovation at our core, we empower brands to create meaningful progress through integrated services across Media, Customer Experience Management (CXM), and Creative. Our business transformation (BX) mindset, combined with a focus on experience transformation (EX), drives sustainable growth for brands, people, and society. Our commitment to innovation, collaboration, and diversity enables us to continuously evolve, pushing boundaries while delivering measurable impact in a fast-changing world.

About Merkle: Merkle, a dentsu company, powers the experience economy. For more than 35 years, the company has put people at the heart of its approach to digital business transformation. As the only integrated experience consultancy in the world with a heritage in data science and business performance, Merkle delivers holistic, end-to-end experiences that drive growth, engagement, and loyalty. Merkle’s expertise has earned recognition as a “Leader” by top industry analyst firms, in categories such as digital transformation and commerce, experience design, engineering and technology integration, digital marketing, data science, CRM and loyalty, and customer data management. With more than 16,000 employees, Merkle operates in 30+ countries throughout the Americas, EMEA, and APAC.

As Client Partner, you will provide strategic leadership across a portfolio of high-value, complex client accounts. You will shape long-term client success strategy, lead senior-level relationships, and drive commercial growth while ensuring excellence in delivery and operational performance. This role elevates dentsu’s position as a trusted strategic partner by guiding and influencing cross-functional teams, and proactively identifying opportunities to deepen engagement, expand the value we add and drive growth.

The role is ideal for a senior client leader who thrives on building strong partnerships, solving complex client challenges, driving commercial outcomes, and elevating team capability across the client leadership function. You will own the Key Account Plan focused on driving account growth through strategic planning, client engagement, and proactive problem solving. This role is integral in strengthening dentsu’s partnerships, ensuring delivery of client outcomes, and enabling long-term client retention and growth.

This role is responsible for developing and delivering work across a portfolio of flagship financial clients.

• Lead strategic direction and planning across a portfolio of high-value accounts, ensuring alignment to client business strategy and dentsu’s growth ambitions.
• Act as the senior strategic advisor to senior client stakeholders, influencing long-term plans, priorities, and multi-solution opportunities across digital, data, CRM and CX.
• Oversee, coach, and develop Account Directors and Account Managers, ensuring high performance, consistent delivery, and clear succession pathways.
• Drive commercial growth, including renewals, contract expansions, upsell initiatives, forecasting, and portfolio-level revenue planning.
• Own overall client health, using data-led insights to monitor performance, proactively mitigate risk, and strengthen partnership longevity.
• Lead cross-functional collaboration with Strategy, Growth, Delivery, Media, CX, and Data teams to ensure seamless, integrated delivery.
• Oversee resolution of escalations, ensuring issues are handled swiftly, transparently, and with minimal disruption to client outcomes.
• Champion client excellence and operational standards, driving continuous improvement across engagement models, onboarding, reporting, and governance.
• Represent your portfolio internally, influencing strategic decisions, capability planning, and cross-practice alignment to support client success.

• Deliver strong retention, renewal performance and growth, meeting or exceeding targets across the portfolio.
• Achieve exceptional client satisfaction, demonstrated via improved NPS, deeper senior relationships, and reduced escalations.
• Drive commercial outcomes, including revenue growth, profitable delivery, and expanded multi-solution engagement.
• Demonstrate leadership impact, shown through team development, retention, and performance progression across Account Directors and Managers.
• Enhance operational excellence, measured by onboarding success, delivery consistency, reporting quality, and strong governance practices.
• Promote a high-performing, collaborative culture, supporting knowledge sharing, psychological safety, and cross-functional partnership.

• Significant experience in senior account leadership, client success, or portfolio management roles within digital, data, CRM or CX within the Financial Services sector.
• Proven ability to manage complex, multi-solution client portfolios and influence senior client stakeholders.
• Demonstrated success in leading and developing large or multi-layered account teams.
• Strong commercial acumen with experience forecasting, budgeting, and driving revenue growth.
• Exceptional communication, negotiation, and relationship-building skills at executive levels.
• Ability to navigate ambiguity, problem-solve strategic challenges, and drive change across teams.
• Track record of delivering consistent, scalable client success processes and operational excellence.

• Experience working in global or multi-market account structures.
• Deep understanding of digital transformation, CRM, marketing technology, or media ecosystems.
• Knowledge of client health analytics, retention modelling, or multi-solution engagement frameworks.
• Exposure to consulting, strategy development, or enterprise-level transformation programmes.

This is a permanent role. The team is based from our London office on a hybrid working basis. As well as a competitive salary, the candidate will enjoy a benefits package that they can tailor to their needs which includes:

At dentsu, we care deeply about our people. Our flexible benefits package supports your health, wellbeing, and financial future with company-funded private medical insurance, virtual GP access, and an employee assistance programme. Enjoy 25 days of annual leave plus extra days for your birthday, wellbeing, and volunteering. From discounted gym memberships and retail perks to electric car leasing and travel insurance, dentsu empowers you to thrive both at work and in life.

At Dentsu, we embrace diversity and inclusion, valuing the unique perspectives and contributions of every individual. We believe that diversity fuels creativity and innovation, benefiting our employees, partners, and communities. We welcome applications from all individuals, regardless of race, ethnicity, nationality, religion, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, disability, marital status, or any other protected characteristic. Beyond recruitment, we strive to create an environment where everyone feels respected, supported, and empowered to bring their authentic selves to work. We recognize the importance of work-life balance and are open to discussing flexible working arrangements for all roles. If you need reasonable adjustments due to a disability or medical condition during our recruitment process, please contact us at accommodations@dentsu.com, quoting the reference number of the role that you are applying for. Your needs will be handled with respect and confidentiality to ensure an inclusive and accessible experience.

This job description is a summary of the essential functions of the job, not an exhaustive or comprehensive list of all job responsibilities, tasks, and duties. The responsibilities, tasks, and duties of the jobholder might differ from those outlined in the job description. Other duties, as assigned by the supervisor, might be part of the job.