Digital Strategy Lead

Company Description

Performics UK is the performance marketing arm of Publicis Media, committed to exceeding business goals by blending Data, Tech, Ops, and Talent to accelerate performance impact daily. With over two decades of experience, we harness technology and innovation to generate and convert consumer demand across search, social, display, and commerce channels. Embracing a deep understanding of consumer intent and behaviour, we thrive on data-driven insights, guiding our planning and optimisation processes through rapid trials, real-time enhancements, and intelligent analytics. As the world’s first Performance Orchestration agency, we have a proven track record of driving performance impact across diverse sectors and markets, leveraging our industry expertise to innovate and transform swiftly. Performics is dedicated to delivering award-winning results and empowering all Publicis Media UK clients.

Job Description

As the Digital Lead, you will be responsible for shaping and driving the digital agenda for one of Sky’s priority business units – TV, Connectivity, or Content. You will lead the digital strategy, champion innovation, and act as a key senior partner for stakeholders, ensuring digital, data, and AI thinking are embedded into the vertical. You will orchestrate and guide how digital media is planned and executed. You will empower Digital Directors (Trade campaigns) and the Vertical Planning team (Brand campaigns) to deliver the plans, while you focus on connecting strategy, tools, and transformation. You will work closely with the Vertical Strategist to turn audience strategies into actionable data strategies, partner with the Digital, Data & Tech Lead and Next Lab to drive strategic projects, and lead responses to digital strategy briefs whilst working closely with channel specialists to deliver market-leading media plans, ensuring that the strategic vision is executed tactically within each channel. By aligning efforts with Sky's business objectives and fostering strong stakeholder relationships, you'll deliver innovative, data-driven solutions that ensure measurable success.

Responsibilities

• Act as the senior point of contact for digital strategy within your vertical, building strong relationships with senior client stakeholders.
• Lead digital strategy briefs and projects, ensuring alignment with client business priorities.
• Drive adoption of AI, data-led approaches, and new digital tools across your vertical, championing innovation and embedding transformation into everyday practice.
• Collaborate with the Digital, Data & Tech Lead and Next Lab to deliver innovation programmes, pilots, and strategic test-and-learn initiatives.
• Partner with the Vertical Strategist to translate audience strategy into actionable data strategies, ensuring activation is rooted in insight and precision.
• Collaborate with channel specialists to develop innovative and forward-thinking paid media strategies aligned with the clients' objectives and KPIs.
• Orchestrate delivery of digital media plans, ensuring Digital Directors (Trade) and Vertical Planners (Brand) have clear strategic guardrails.
• Identify testing and innovation opportunities in the paid space and turn them into actionable initiatives.
• Coach channel team to drive innovation, testing and performance improvement.
• Lead cross channel strategies in response to briefs and QBRs as required across all lines of business.
• Advise internal and external stakeholders on industry trends and developments that impact client businesses.
• Guide and inspire Digital Directors and their teams, ensuring digital excellence, best practice, and innovation are embedded at every stage.

Qualifications

The successful candidate will be a digital strategist with significant experience in shaping transformation within large, complex organisations. You will combine deep knowledge of digital channels with the ability to embed new tools, technologies, and practices across multiple stakeholders and teams. Experience across one or more paid media channels would be advantageous, but this is not a primarily hands-on role. You must be a strong communicator, skilled at building relationships across senior client and internal stakeholders, and comfortable leading projects that sit at the intersection of media, data, and technology.

Must Have

• Experience in a digital-focused planning or strategy role, with proven ability to drive innovation and transformation.
• Experience in a digital focused planning role, with proven experience in project management and strong digital performance knowledge across Paid Search, Programmatic & Paid Social.
• Strong leadership and communication skills; confident managing senior stakeholder relationships.
• Proven experience translating business challenges into clear digital and data strategies.
• Ability to orchestrate multiple teams and stakeholders, ensuring strategic consistency across outputs.
• A critical thinker with a proactive, solutions-oriented mindset, able to navigate complexity and drive change.
• Be strategic and commercially minded in planning goals for your teams, as well as being able to shape and develop paid media strategy with client’s business goals in mind.

Will Ideally Have

• Exposure to leading-edge digital innovation (AI applications, marketing automation, or data-driven strategies).
• Knowledge of Paid Search, Programmatic, Paid Social, and how they connect with cross-channel ecosystems.
• Strong knowledge of digital paid media landscape and digital media trends.
• Understanding of measurement approaches such as attribution, MMM, and test-and-learn frameworks.
• Experience on a large telco and/or entertainment client.

Additional Information

Publicis Media offers a wide range of benefits to support our employees. Full details are shared when you join, but highlights include core benefits such as Pension, Life Assurance, and Private Medical cover, alongside enhanced policies like Reflection Days and Shared Parental Leave. You’ll also have access to a range of additional initiatives, including: Publicis Groupe works primarily from the office or our clients' office four days per week. At Publicis Media, we are proud to be an equal opportunities employer. We welcome and encourage applications from people of all backgrounds, and do not discriminate on the basis of race, ethnicity, nationality, religion or belief, disability, age, citizenship, relationship status, sexual orientation, gender identity, or any other protected characteristic. We are committed to providing a fair, accessible, and inclusive recruitment process. If you have any access needs - for example, related to disability, neurodivergence, or a health condition - please let us know. We’ll work with you to ensure the process works for you. Sharing this information will never impact your application. Guided by our values, we listen with empathy, uplift each other, take responsibility, and embrace change – building a culture where everyone feels seen, respected, and genuinely included.