GAIN Performance - Business Director in London

Business Unit: Performance: We help globally ambitious brands turn visibility into measurable growth – appearing where it matters, when it matters, to the people who matter most.

Team: Client Services

Reporting to: Client Partner

Location: London / hybrid

ABOUT GAIN is a creative-led, insight-driven company that blends data, tech, and creativity. We believe the best ideas emerge where intelligence and creativity unite, where insight sparks imagination, and where innovation turns possibility into progress. We are explorers of new frontiers, shaping bold strategies that move people, brands, and businesses forward. Individually and together, our specialist teams provide the vision, data, and confidence brands and organisations need to make braver, more impactful decisions. Today as GAIN, we work as a united force, using data to fuel creativity, and technology to unlock new possibilities. As imagineers we don’t just embrace innovation - we engineer it, transforming information into action, and ideas into breakthroughs. This is where rebel thinking, smart technology, and data-driven creativity shape the future. Through our five specialist teams: Creative Studio, Conversion, Customer Science, Experience, and Performance, we work to fuel brand growth and deliver measurable impact.

THE ROLE As a Business Director, you are a senior leader driving one of GAIN's newest and most strategically important accounts – a high potential land and expand opportunity with the foundations already in place for huge growth. You will be accountable for successfully onboarding the client, establishing the right cadence and senior relationships, deeply understanding their ways of working, and defining what success looks like for both sides. This role requires an experienced senior leader who combines commercial sharpness, operational excellence, and strong performance marketing & digital expertise. Reporting to the Client Partner, you will act as a trusted senior advisor to the client while also shaping the long‑term strategic direction of an account with immediate and significant growth potential, including partnerships and cross‑portfolio opportunities. You will build and lead a high‑performing team responsible for delivering outstanding work, cultivating deep client trust, and expanding GAIN's remit. This is a rare opportunity to shape a flagship relationship from day one, creating the foundations, setting the tone, and steering its evolution into a major portfolio.

RESPONSIBILITIES

• Senior client leadership & relationships: With the Client Partner, lead the onboarding and establishment of this new strategic account, setting the relationship and delivery foundations for long‑term partnership and growth. Build deep, trusted connections with senior stakeholders, developing a clear understanding of their business model, priorities, decision‑makers, and ways of working. Set the relationship cadence (governance, rituals, communication standards) that ensures clarity, momentum, and transparency from day one. Act as a senior strategic partner to the client, providing proactive counsel across performance marketing, digital strategy, and broader communications. Anticipate client needs, challenges, and growth areas shaping solutions before issues arise and positioning GAIN as indispensable. Represent GAIN with authority and confidence in all senior interactions, establishing our credibility as a long‑term partner from the outset.
• Portfolio ownership & strategic direction: Responsibility for the strategic direction, performance, and future growth of this developing portfolio. Define and evolve the strategic roadmap for the account, ensuring all work is insight‑driven, effective, and aligned to client ambitions. Serve as the organisation's senior voice of the client, ensuring agency teams remain close to the client's real commercial and category challenges. Identify and drive organic growth opportunities across performance media, digital experience, content, creative and measurement. Lead expansion conversations with sister agencies and cross network partners, shaping a unified and scalable growth strategy. Support new business efforts informed by early successes and case studies developed from this relationship.
• Commercial leadership & accountability: Own commercial performance from day one, including forecasting, revenue management, account planning and profitability, working closely with finance and ops. Establish commercial routines and transparency with the client early in the relationship, building trust around scope, value, and investment. Define clear billing and scope management processes that protect margin while supporting the pace and ambition of the client's plans. Identify commercial risks early and present proactive solutions to maintain stability and long‑term health. Lead pricing strategy, cost estimates, delivery models and third‑party negotiations to ensure value and operational clarity.
• Leadership & team development: Build and structure the account team required to deliver excellently for this new client, ensuring the right mix of skills, experience and attitude. Mentor and develop the team, empowering them while you focus on senior influence, strategic development and portfolio growth. Foster a culture of ownership, accountability, curiosity and collaboration across your team. Champion GAIN's values and ways of working, becoming a cultural touchstone for both your team and the wider business. Play a key role in departmental talent planning as the account scales.
• Delivery excellence & governance: Create the conditions for teams to deliver work on brief, on time and on budget, while pushing for strategic and best‑in‑class delivery that exceeds results. Maintain senior oversight of all workstreams, stepping in when needed to unblock, refocus or elevate. Ensure excellence in scoping, briefing, timelines and governance, especially important during the early scaling phase. Champion quality control across all outputs, ensuring GAIN consistently shows up with clarity, intelligence and ambition. Lead the creation of strong case studies that demonstrate value and effectiveness, unlocking further growth and credibility.
• Agency contribution & thought leadership: Actively contribute to shaping the agency's approach to performance marketing, digital transformation, and client onboarding frameworks. Share insights, industry trends and category knowledge to raise the strategic intelligence of the wider team. Collaborate across Business Units to strengthen GAIN's proposition and ways of working. Act as a role model for leadership, curiosity, resilience and ambition.

REQUIREMENTS

• 9–12+ years' experience in a progressive digital agency, with proven senior client leadership.
• Demonstrable experience managing large, complex client portfolios (£1m+) with commercial accountability.
• Strong people leadership experience, including managing and developing senior account teams.
• Highly strategic thinker with the ability to translate ambition into practical, deliverable plans.
• Commercially astute, financially confident and comfortable owning forecasts, margins and growth targets.
• Exceptional communication, presence and influencing skills at all levels, including senior client stakeholders.
• Calm, credible and decisive under pressure, with a solutions‑focused mindset.
• Curious, proactive and passionate about building brands, teams and long‑term partnerships.

HOW YOU'LL WORK

• Constant curiosity: You can think critically and understand the data, knowing where you need to take action. You’re analytical with the ability to investigate and resolve.
• Pushing boundaries: You’ll make the most efficient use of technology, suggesting process improvements.
• The power of our imagination: You’re a problem solver who goes the extra mile. You’ll know the best approach to take with clients to get results.
• Making it happen: You’re proactive and you know you can make a difference. You use your sound judgement when making decisions and you take responsibility for your decisions and actions.
• Putting people first: You’ll build effective relationships with people, internally and externally, understanding both business and client needs.

BENEFITS

• Private Medical Insurance
• BUPA Life Assurance
• Income protection
• Employee Assistance Programme
• Cycle to Work salary sacrifice scheme
• Tech & Wearables salary sacrifice scheme
• Octopus EV Scheme
• Discounts and deals on a range of items from hotels, holidays and hormone testing to cinema, gyms and will writing.

GAIN is an equal opportunities employer and positively encourages applications from suitably qualified and eligible candidates regardless of sex, race, disability, age, sexual orientation, gender reassignment, religion or belief, marital status, or pregnancy and maternity.