Head of commercial partnerships

Salary: £91,000 - £100,000

Location: London

Drive advertising growth and brand partnerships across a major podcast and audio business. BBC Studios Audio is an end‑to‑end podcast studio growing monetised networks of premium audio and audio‑visual content aligned with the BBC’s values and reputation. BBC Studios Audio are recruiting a Head of Commercial Partnerships to the team. This new role will report directly to the Commercial & Content Partnerships Director and support the senior management team in delivering the department’s overall strategic commercial objectives.

The successful applicant will lead the global advertising strategy for the business, growing revenue year‑on‑year, and identify and deliver new commercial partnerships which support our vision. With an entrepreneurial mindset, the role will research and develop partnership opportunities and manage critical relationships with advertisers and other content funders. Leading a small, specialist team who shape and execute our commercial and advertising partnership deals, and working more broadly with our content and production teams, the role will build new business partnership models to help drive commercial innovation, acquire new customers and deliver revenue growth for the business.

The role will share advertiser insights in order to support the development of exploitable IP and will develop and implement initiatives to maximise its value with global advertising partners.

Your key responsibilities and impact:

• Set the Advertising strategy for the business in collaboration with the Commercial Director, the Director of Audio and Regional Sales Directors, prioritising transformative and sustainable year‑on‑year growth.
• Communicate and execute that strategy and clearly‑defined targets with in‑house and external sales partners to ensure the operational sales plan for the business is implemented and maintained.
• Define our multi‑platform product offering and design a go‑to‑market strategy by territory; oversee media placements, creative executions, ad operations and measurement tools to ensure smooth sales and delivery processes.
• Ensure product pricing is competitive, determining cost‑of‑sale and package pricing frameworks with sales partners.
• Continually review revenue yield potential across portfolio – including RSS, YouTube, social platforms, newsletters and other distribution routes to market.
• Collaborate with creative production teams to develop and produce content that aligns with advertiser need, working with podcast producers and presenters to execute campaigns.
• Ensure successful delivery of such projects against agreed KPIs, using campaign measurement tools, analytics and reporting to communicate campaign success metrics and case studies.
• Support sales team relationships with clients, helping to identify leads and turn one‑off deals into returning business partnerships.
• Identify opportunities for new and innovative solutions to drive revenue from categories which meet market demand and align with the strengths of BBC brands and assets.
• Work within BBC Advertising and Sponsorship frameworks, ensuring editorial and advertising standards and compliance are continually maintained.
• Monitor advertising and podcast market trends – including responsible uses of AI - to provide essential business intelligence to the Advertising and Audio leadership teams, to help shape our future content and product portfolio.
• Lead trade marketing strategy and identify key forums to help raise the profile of our podcast business in key markets, demonstrating public‑facing thought leadership on behalf of the organisation.
• Coach and develop a small team of direct line reports, tasking them with key objectives to contribute to the delivery of our overarching Commercial Partnerships strategy.

Your skills and experience:

Essential criteria:

• Extensive experience of strategic and commercial success gained at a senior level within the digital media or podcasting industry.
• Extensive advertiser relationships and sales/negotiating experience in UK or US.
• Ability to develop powerful partnership proposals, and pitch confidently and appropriately.
• Extensive experience of delivering integrated creative solutions for advertising clients, working with editorial teams to produce and execute campaigns.
• Experience managing critical and sometimes complex stakeholder relationships.
• Experience of client servicing, in a client service role or account handling remit.
• Good knowledge of contractual and copyright matters.
• A capable and empathetic leader with considerable line management experience, able to foster a collegiate and high‑performing culture where staff can deliver their best work.

We welcome and encourage applications from candidates who are under‑represented in the creative industries.