Lifecycle and Retention Marketing Director - Contract to hire - job 1 of 2

Director of Lifecycle and Retention Marketing We are looking for a highly talented and experienced Director of Lifecycle and Retention Marketing to drive profitable growth across all retention and lifecycle marketing for the company... You will become an expert on our customer base (who they are and what they want) and target their needs at each stage – whether they’re coming in as a lead, first-time buyer, repeat customer, or lapsed customer. This candidate will leverage on-site tactics, popups, email, SMS, direct mail catalogs, and postcards to overcome hurdles – converting prospects and customers across all stages of the customer lifecycle. The ideal candidate must be an email and SMS expert obsessed with growth, who stays updated on the latest trends and best practices, and is eager to crush performance goals. The ideal candidate will be well-rounded, both as a strong product marketer with a creative eye, as well as a highly strategic and analytical thinker. Success in this role will be primarily measured by KPIs and performance goals – such as email and SMS revenue, year-over-year growth, list growth, customer retention rates, and LTV growth. Duties/Responsibilities - Own the strategy, execution, and optimisation of the customer lifecycle by nurturing prospects into customers and first-time customers into repeating customers - delivering the right message to the right person, at the right time. - Own the end-to-end management of all emails, SMS, and direct mail, including strategy, campaign, and automation setup and performance. - Utilize advanced segmentation strategies across email, SMS, and direct mail to deliver the best messages at the best times to prospects and customers. - Methodically develop the email and SMS testing and experimentation roadmap (testing subject lines, creative, copy, send times, landing pages, etc), track performance, and provide recommendations for improvement by leaning into most effective tactics over time. - Ensure world-class execution of all emails and SMS sends, including full QA for spelling, grammar, link testing, landing pages, segmentation, and scheduling. - Partner with the growth marketing team to develop and execute a playbook to leverage paid marketing to drive subscriptions, increase repeat customer rates, and grow customer LTV. - Manage promo code strategy across all retention channels, working in conjunction with the web team to achieve sales margin goals. - Stay informed of industry best practices, technologies, and vendors related to lifecycle and retention marketing. Analytics / Budget Management - Core KPIs include subscription rates and list growth, email and SMS engagement rates, revenue, year-over-year growth, customer repeat purchase rates, and LTV. - Responsible for weekly, monthly, and quarterly channel performance reporting as well as tracking KPIs and forecasts. - Measure and optimize deliverability, open and clicks rates, revenue per recipient, and other email/SMS performance KPIs. - Responsible for budget management of all retention programs (email, SMS, and direct mail) as well as negotiations and fees for paid services (Klaviyo etc). List Growth / Popups - Manage the growth of SMS and email subscriber lists, working cross-functionally with web, creative, and marketing teams to design, deploy, and optimize on-site overlays. - Work cross-functionally with the ecom team to leverage on-site tactics such as landing pages and site overlays to acquire prospects, overcome hurdles, and convert visitors into customers. Campaigns - Develop and manage the email and SMS marketing calendar, balancing product launches, sales and promotions, restock alerts, partnerships, and brand-building initiatives – all with the goal of maximizing sales and profitable growth. - Work cross-functionally with marketing, brand, and creative teams to achieve all scheduled email and SMS sends, and ensure that all creative assets are approved and scheduled in advance. Automations / Flows - Continuously A/B test, improving email and SMS triggered flows and automations (such as welcome, browse and cart abandon flows) based on best practices and in close collaboration with our brand and creative teams. - Optimize tools like Elevar and Retention.com to increase automation send volume and maximize sales, and evaluate ROI of these services. Qualifications/Skills - 4+ years of lifecycle and retention marketing experience, with email marketing experience - DTC/Ecommerce/Retail experience - Understands nature of large product catalogs - Experience in email, sms, automations and key flow series - Email obsessed with increasing LTV, Rev per session - Eye for creative, levelling up experience - Loves to A/B test to find improvements - Up with trends and best practice - Well versed in copy writing - Experience working with Klaviyo (email) & Burst (SMS) - Fitness, Training and Apparel experience is a plus