Associate Director, Data Strategy & Analytics

Job description

ABOUT DARKROOM Darkroom is the leading next-generation growth marketing firm engineering the brands of tomorrow. Founded in 2017, we set out to redefine what a modern agency could be, by replacing the inertia of legacy advertising behemoths with a model built for speed, intelligence, and measurable impact. At our core, Darkroom is a human services company powered by Shadow, a universal AI commerce layer that integrates executive-level strategy with proprietary agentic technology. This fusion enables our teams to deliver outsized returns by enhancing creative output, operational efficiency, and revenue generation across every stage of the customer journey. Our track record speaks for itself: billions in attributable revenue driven across e-commerce marketplaces, media networks, DTC ecosystems, and social commerce platforms. Every engagement feeds into our proprietary data infrastructure, enabling a continuous feedback loop that accelerates growth, improves margins, and compounds results across our client portfolio. What began as a boutique design studio has evolved into one of the fastest-growing private companies in America and among the most effective performance media agencies of the 2020s. Our founders were recognized by Forbes 30 Under 30 for advancing the intersection of technology, marketing, and advertising, cementing Darkroom's role as a defining player in the future of media innovation. ABOUT THE ROLE Part senior growth marketer, part data scientist, part applied-AI builder — you turn the way elite marketers think into the data models, metrics, and schemas that power Shadow's intelligence layer. The majority of your time (roughly 75%) is spent on the product: designing the metric logic, data schemas, and analytical models Shadow's agents reason with, and working directly with marketing teams to translate what they actually do into structure the product can act on. The remaining time (roughly 25%) is spent on measurement of live media programs — guiding incrementality testing, power analysis, and MMM work, and partnering with Paid Media and Growth Strategy to turn test results into budget decisions. This is for someone who's spent years in the work and now wants to lean into the technology — leveraging hard-won marketing experience to build, not to manage accounts. The product side of this role is not client-facing; the measurement side is internal-facing too, working through Darkroom's own media teams rather than owning client relationships directly. WHAT WE'RE BUILDING We're empowering small teams with technology that makes it easier to market and grow businesses. Our current focus is to help consumer brands shift from "workflow automation" to "agent management" within their marketing operations. Shadow is the AI coordination layer — providing shared AI memory, centralized agent control, and model orchestration for marketing teams. THE AGENCY BEHIND THE PRODUCT Shadow is built alongside Darkroom — a performance marketing agency that's been operating for 10 years, employs 100+ people, runs 100+ clients at a time, and has worked with over 1,000 consumer brands. That's our edge: Shadow isn't a generic AI wrapper; it's a decade of real campaign tradecraft being codified into a system. Darkroom is both our proving ground and our first user. This role plugs directly into that knowledge and turns it into product. WHAT YOU'LL OWN Product - Design the analytical models and metric logic the agent reasons with — contribution margin (CM3), acquisition truth (aMER, NCAC), cohort LTV/payback, ad spend efficiency and marginal-return analysis, incrementality testing (geo lifts, conversion-lift, MMM calibration) — from raw platform data to decision-ready insight. - Define the schemas that encode marketing tradecraft: how creative, channel, financial, and customer data connect into a queryable picture of a brand. - Own accuracy and judgment — what's load-bearing vs. noise, where attribution lies, how to compute metrics that survive operator scrutiny. - Spec the model; partner with data eng to build the pipeline and the AI team to wire it into agent skills. Measurement of media programs - Guide incrementality testing strategy across Darkroom's paid media programs — geo holdouts, matched-market tests, and conversion-lift studies — and run the power analysis to size tests correctly before spend is committed. - Support MMM strategy, vendor evaluation, and model calibration where programs need it. - Partner with Paid Media and Growth Strategy teams to design tests up front and translate results into clear, executive-ready budget recommendations. MUST HAVES - Ran growth at one or more high-growth DTC / omni-channel consumer brands — you've managed paid media tactically, not just supervised people who did. - Fluency across the full marketing mix (Meta + Google, plus TikTok, email/SMS, marketplace, organic) — you think in MER/CM/LTV/iROAS, not platform ROAS. - Real data science chops: SQL + Python/notebooks, statistical reasoning, building and validating metric models against messy real-world data. - Ability to translate between marketer intuition and rigorous structure — and a strong opinion about which metrics actually matter. - Hands-on experience designing and interpreting incrementality tests — geo holdouts, matched-market testing, conversion lift — including power analysis/pre-test sizing. - Experience with MMM, either hands-on or through vendor/partner management. - Strong written and verbal communication — you can explain measurement tradeoffs and model logic clearly to non-technical executives and marketers. NICE TO HAVE - Familiarity with modern warehouse/analytics stacks (BigQuery, dbt) — enough to design schemas and collaborate with eng. - Agency or multi-brand background (pattern recognition across accounts). - Built attribution models, forecasting/MMM, or internal analytics dashboards. - Experience with CDPs, server-side tracking, clean rooms, exposure logs, or other privacy-safe measurement environments. CULTURE FIT - A power AI user. You've embedded AI into every workflow you touch and you think in systems — not one-off prompts, but repeatable structures that compound. - Entrepreneurial. You don't need much direction to move fast, you pivot when the situation demands it, and what you ship is production-grade, not a prototype you hand off for someone else to finish. Not the bar: deep data-engineering/infra ownership, or leading day-to-day client relationships. We're hiring for science, judgment, and product craft — not pipeline plumbing or account management. WHAT IT'S LIKE TO WORK AT DARKROOM Darkroom is not a typical agency. We are looking for A players who want to build something great. We move fast, think deeply, and expect every team member to bring insight and rigor to everything they touch. We hold a high bar for performance, creativity, and ownership — but we also support each other relentlessly. No egos, no red tape — just world-class talent building something remarkable. We believe in autonomy with accountability, truth over comfort, and outcomes over optics. - Unlimited PTO + US holidays: Rebooting is part of the work. Take the time you need to stay sharp. - Remote-First Culture: Many roles are fully remote. Employees based in or near our New York or Lisbon HQs are expected to work hybrid with weekly in-office time. Hub locations include Brazil and Spain. - Health & Wellness: Company-sponsored medical, dental, and vision coverage. - Finances, growth, and retirement: Darkroom offers a robust 401(k) program with company match and profit-sharing opportunities to help you save and grow as the company grows. - Parental Leave: Flexible parental leave to support new parents during this important transition. - Growth: Our interdisciplinary model gives every Darkroomer exposure far beyond their core role. Grow your skills, expand your influence, and stay at the forefront of the industry. EQUAL OPPORTUNITY STATEMENT Darkroom is an equal opportunity workplace — we are dedicated to equal employment opportunities regardless of race, color, ancestry, religion, sex, national orientation, sexual orientation, age, citizenship, marital status, disability, gender identity, or Veteran status. We also consider qualified applicants regardless of criminal histories, consistent with legal requirements.