Account Director in London

Why join us

Joining Sainsbury\’s as an Account Director means leading our zest team to deliver strategic and creative excellence. You\’ll play a pivotal role in leading client relationships, collaborating with internal stakeholders, and championing creativity as a catalyst for market change. With a deep understanding of our clients\’ challenges and objectives, you\’ll have the opportunity to propose innovative solutions, nurture enduring partnerships, and shape brand strategies. As part of a dynamic and collaborative team, you\’ll be immersed in a diverse range of projects, leading discussions, and inspiring creative work that exceeds expectations. With a focus on growth and development, you\’ll be part of an agency that values curiosity, resilience, and passion for delivering outstanding results. Join us and contribute to our success while fostering enduring client relationships in a fast-paced, ever-evolving industry.
What you\’ll do

As the Account Director you will play a crucial role in leading client relationships, driving strategic and creative excellence, and ensuring client satisfaction. Focused on key brands within the Sainsbury\’s business, you will have a deep understanding of the clients\’ market challenges and context, their business objectives, and how strategy and creative work can contribute to their success. You will collaborate with Strategic Planners to develop and implement strategic responses, being not only able to understand but also interrogate creative and comms strategy providing meaningful feedback to our planning team. As an expert in creative communications, you will champion creative excellence, ensure creative work fully aligns to our strategic direction, and drive seamless integration of work across multiple channels, understanding the importance of best practice for all our channels. You will develop strong partnerships with external agencies, and facilitate collaboration. As a leader, you will nurture your direct reports through mentoring and coaching, and demonstrate behavioural flexibility, emotional intelligence, influence, and creative problem-solving skills in the way you develop partnerships with the wider zest agency. Your ability to make strong decisions on client leadership, strategy, project scope, and external agency partnerships will drive the success of Sainsbury\’s.
Who you are

As an Account Director within the Marketing & Loyalty division, you are a highly skilled professional with experience in overseeing similar strategic/creative accounts and gravitas with senior marketing and external agency leaders. Your strategic thinking, creative acumen, and leadership abilities enable you to collaborate seamlessly with internal teams, external agencies, and stakeholders to develop innovative campaigns that exceed client expectations. With a strong focus on client satisfaction, commercial acumen, and creative excellence, you contribute to the success of Zest as the go-to agency for our key brands within the Sainsbury\’s business.

Essential Criteria

Agency Experience: Experience working in an integrated creative agency.

Channel Experience: Demonstrated ability to manage the full channel ecosystem, driving growth across multi-channel outputs.

Strategic Insight: Expertise in leading and managing account strategy.

Client Experience: Proficiency in managing multiple clients and projects simultaneously within an integrated creative agency.

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