VP, D2C Creative, Product and Campaign Strategy (Fan Engagement)

Job description

**About Sony Music Entertainment** At Sony Music Entertainment, we fuel the creative journey. We’ve played a pioneering role in music history, from the first-ever music label to the invention of the flat disc record. We’ve nurtured some of music’s most iconic artists and produced some of the most influential recordings of all time. Today, we work in more than 70 countries, supporting a diverse roster of international superstars, developing artists, songwriters, producers, and creators. Across our business, we are building the next generation of music commerce, fan engagement, and direct-to-consumer experiences globally. **The Role** Sony Music is seeking a VP, D2C Creative, Product and Campaign Strategy to join the global Sony Music D2C organization. Reporting directly to the Head of Sony Music D2C, this role will lead the D2C Creative, Product and Campaign Strategy team within The Greenhouse, Sony Music’s centralized D2C division. The purpose of this team is to make D2C marketing a constant, evergreen discipline for labels that today focus their effort on the release cycle. It is a central, cross-label team that acts as an extension of label digital marketing and international market execution — providing D2C expertise, filling execution capacity gaps, and building the frameworks that let others work well — while leaving artist narrative and campaign strategy with the label. This is deliberately a small centre rather than a large production function. Labels resource their own D2C people for their own repertoire; this team supplies the toolkit, standards and process that unlock the value those teams create. Where a label does not yet have that capability, the team carries more of the work early and steps back as the label staffs up. There is no embedded headcount — the team operates as a shared service across labels and territories. The VP is accountable for the quality and commercial performance of D2C creative, product and campaign activity across the roster, and for the relationships that make it work: with label marketing, creative and commerce teams, with the international marketing team, and with partners across The Greenhouse. Much of the work is proposing rather than deciding — the label approves throughout — which makes credibility, judgement and influence without authority central to the role. The role leads a team of five to six, organised around three pillars: creative, covering design systems, production and D2C visual standards; product, covering D2C product management, pricing and lifecycle; and campaign, covering CRM, fan acquisition and marketing operations. The ideal candidate combines strong D2C product instincts, fan marketing expertise, creative sensibility and operational rigour, with a deep understanding of how fans engage with artists, music, merchandise and culture across global markets. **How This Team Operates** - **A small centre, not a production house.** Labels resource their own D2C people; this team supplies the toolkit, standards and process that let them create value. - **Proposes rather than decides.** Recommendations are put to the label for approval. The team holds no authority independent of the label, and labels retain final say on every D2C decision. - **Reuses and refines rather than originates.** Artist narrative and campaign concept sit with the label. The team adapts existing creative for D2C — merchandise creative is the one area where it originates. - **Depth varies by situation.** On a frontline release the team is advisory. Between release cycles, on evergreen catalog, it is the primary owner of D2C activity with label approval. On superstar campaigns it is fully engaged alongside label and international teams. - **Depth also tapers by label.** Heavier engagement early where D2C capability is thin, lighter as the label staffs up — every label lands in the same place. - **Always-on, not campaign-by-campaign.** Label marketing works per release; international marketing works per market, per release. This team spans releases and keeps D2C running between them. **What You’ll Do** **Creative** - Build the D2C design system — templates, asset taxonomies and scalable creative frameworks that let labels and territories execute high-quality D2C creative at volume across markets. - Establish D2C visual and email standards, including motion templates, content hierarchy, build quality and testing practice, with labels supplying artist voice and brand direction. - Produce merchandise and D2C product creative that labels do not produce in-house — pack shots, product mockups, banners and bundle imagery. - Produce D2C social assets and CRM builds when label teams lack the capacity, and refine or extend existing creative for D2C where core assets are limited. - Create pitch decks and D2C creative concepts that help label teams sell campaign ideas internally and to artist teams. - Resolve international asset adaptation, where D2C creative differs meaningfully by territory and is today handled late and inconsistently. - Supply campaign creative and merchandising direction to the Store Experience team, who build and run the storefronts. **Product** - Establish the process linking D2C with marketing, sales and merchandising — the coordination gap labels consistently identify as their biggest constraint, where marketing learns of product and release decisions too late to build a proper campaign. - Develop D2C product insight across bundles, exclusives, premium formats and drops, proposed to the label for approval. - Own D2C pricing and promotional recommendations across markets, with label approval and international input from the commercial strategy team. - Run competitor scanning, launch retrospectives and evergreen product ideation, bringing trend and net-new format thinking to label and commerce teams. - Build lifecycle and scarcity frameworks — pre-order windows, limited editions, flash drops, live-show tie-ins, gated access and evergreen replenishment. - Ensure D2C approaches are globally consistent where scale matters and locally adapted where fan behaviour, language, pricing, territory, chart rules or fulfilment realities require it. - Partner with operations on launch readiness, product setup and localisation, and supply demand signals into the forecasting and insights team. **Campaign, CRM & Marketing Operations** - Train label teams to think D2C natively — what assets are needed, at what cadence, and which products fit which moments. - Build the D2C campaign cadence, framework and schedule that keeps label campaigns on track — a named gap where no one currently owns the rhythm of D2C activity across a release. - Own domestic D2C CRM and lifecycle marketing across the full fan journey — email, SMS and owned channels — including automated journeys that keep fans engaged between release moments, not only campaign sends. - Develop a fan segmentation framework spanning casual fans, active fans and superfans, enabling more personalised communication and experiences across every channel. - Build the first-party data strategy that captures fan preferences and behaviours to create richer fan profiles, and own domestic fan acquisition. - Provide D2C budget deployment and retargeting guidance, developed with the label. - Create D2C paid media best-practice frameworks across Meta, TikTok and Google, with clear guidance on campaign structure, audience strategy and measurement. D2C performance marketing is a distinct discipline from awareness and engagement advertising and is not resourced consistently across labels today. - Define flywheel analytics, channel health standards and reporting — tracking acquisition, engagement, retention and monetisation, and how fans move from streaming, social and owned properties into D2C channels. - Establish best practice for loyalty and VIP programmes that reward engagement rather than purchase alone, social commerce integrations, and creator and affiliate partnerships — with labels executing against those standards. - Advise label teams on preorder strategy, launch timing, segmentation, local market messaging and campaign optimisation, and drive a test-and-learn culture across creative and messaging. - Over time, develop predictive audience modelling to identify high-value fans and churn risk, and prepare the design system and asset taxonomy for AI-assisted asset generation. **Partnership & Interlock** - Serve as the central D2C creative, product and campaign partner to labels, artist teams and territories — including Columbia, RCA, Epic and the UK — and to Ceremony of Roses, The Orchard and merchandise partners. - Define and operate the interlock with the international marketing team, who own market localisation and in-territory execution for US repertoire. This role owns the domestic equivalent and sets the global standard; the handoff between the two requires clear, agreed triggers. - Work across The Greenhouse with the Store Experience, Business Operations, Commercial Strategy and Customer Satisfaction functions, whose scope adjoins this team’s at multiple points. - Build the relationships and credibility to influence without authority across a highly matrixed global organisation. **Who You Are** - 10+ years across fan engagement, D2C marketing, CRM, eCommerce, merchandising or digital marketing in a high-volume, multi-stakeholder environment; music or entertainment experience strongly preferred. - Deep understanding of music fan behaviour, artist marketing, D2C commerce and fan engagement ecosystems. - Track record of enabling distributed teams — building playbooks, standards and frameworks that others execute — rather than only running work centrally. Comfortable moving between doing the work and teaching it. - Able to operate through influence rather than authority, and to build the trust that makes label teams want to work with a central function. - Strong knowledge of lifecycle marketing, CRM platforms, email and SMS execution, segmentation and first-party data strategy. Familiarity with Shopify ecosystems and D2C storefront operations. - Practical experience with D2C performance marketing — paid media planning, audience targeting and return on ad spend — or the judgement to build that capability. - Strong creative instincts and experience collaborating across design, marketing, merchandising and product functions, with the credibility to work alongside label creative teams. - Experience building scalable campaign workflows, design systems and operational best practice in high-volume environments. - Global mindset and sensitivity to local market nuance — fan behaviour, pricing, language, cultural context, release priorities, chart rules and fulfilment realities. - Passion for music, fandom, culture and evolving consumer experiences. **What We Give You** - An opportunity to shape the future of global music commerce and fan engagement at scale. - Collaboration with industry-leading artists, labels and entertainment executives. - A dynamic and entrepreneurial culture within one of the world’s leading entertainment companies. - Investment in professional growth and long-term career development. - Competitive compensation package including salary, bonus eligibility, comprehensive benefits and additional Sony Music perks. Sony Music is committed to providing equal employment opportunity for all persons regardless of age, disability, national origin, race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity/expression, pregnancy, veteran or military status, marital and civil partnership/union status, alienage or citizenship status, creed, genetic information, or any other status protected by applicable federal, state, or local law. The anticipated annual base salary does not include any other compensation components or other benefits that an individual may be eligible for. The actual base salary offered depends on a variety of factors, which may include as applicable, the qualifications of the individual applicant for the position, years of relevant experience, specific and unique skills, level of education attained, certifications or other professional licenses held, and the location in which the applicant lives and/or from which they will be performing the job. New York Pay Range $200,000—$250,000 USD