This week we’re looking at 36,076 marketing jobs live in the U.S., up 6.7% year over year.

Senior marketing jobs are holding up well, with 5,191 roles at Director level and above, up 16% year over year.

Meanwhile, 58.7% of job ads include salary information, and median advertised pay across those roles is $98,509 - nearly $100K.

Median advertised salary by seniority

Top hiring metros

 Now, let’s get to what you came for: this week’s pick of marketing jobs paying over $200K: the Trade Desk wants to be loved, American Dream wants tourists. Jägermeister wants young people to choose the green bottle. Socure’s CEO wants to be found and marketing are on the hook for it happening. All four are hiring someone to solve a problem that began long before the help-wanted plea went up. Each one is a confession.

^{This newsletter is getting more edgy. So here’s a wee disclaimer.}

The Trade Desk wants to be “inescapable, unmistakable, and loved.”  The ambition is wonderful. (Well, maybe not inescapable?) But asking people to love The Trade Desk feels a bit like asking them to love SAP or Workday. I’m sure someone does but I hope they have other interests.

At GroupM I worked with thousands of Programmatic Traders across 90 different countries. Cultures and languages vary, but the job is copy/paste everywhere. Media traders need coverage, results, a nice UX, and some confidence that their client’s ad won’t appear next to something Elon might repost.

“Loved” is clever, and will catch the roving eye of ambitious creatives reading the advert, though I suspect customers would settle for a platform that makes their working day easier and their media investments easier to defend.

For readers outside programmatic advertising, The Trade Desk provides software that helps agencies and brands buy digital ads across streaming TV, websites, apps and other media. Its independence is central to the pitch: it doesn’t also own a giant social network or online shop.

For a while, my baseline advice to marketing grads who wanted a career in media (at GroupM) was: “Go take the TTD courses. They’re free.” Puzzled looks, then acceptance. The grads I spoke to hadn’t heard it mentioned in their lectures, even though people doing the jobs they wanted were using it every day. Maybe some of that creative budget should go towards making sure the next generation of media buyers knows what the heck it is.

We covered Sarah Gavin’s appointment as CMO in June. At the time, we wrote: “Jeff Green needs someone to convince buyers that independence is worth the complexity.” Gavin now needs a VP of Brand and Creative to help strengthen that case.

The business has had a very rough few months. Second-quarter revenue grew just 3%, and its guidance for the third quarter implied a decline of roughly 12%. In September, it announced plans to cut about 15% of its workforce. The share price had fallen roughly 90% from its December 2024 peak by the time of the September report. That gives the promise to make this “the best place to be a creative” some additional work to do.

Customer retention remained above 95%. OK, nice. But an advertiser can keep using your platform while putting more of its budget somewhere else. The incoming VP needs to spend time with customers who shifted budget elsewhere and hear why.

Jeff Green has pointed to pressure on advertisers from tariffs and oil prices, alongside shortcomings in the company’s own execution. A better campaign can help explain the offering. It will have a harder time fixing the experience if the product or service fails to deliver on it.

The role itself has proper breadth. You report to Gavin and own the brand story, identity, campaign strategy and the in-house teams covering copy, design, video and production. You also have to prove that the work creates more value than it costs. Fair enough. An advertising technology company ought to be able to have that conversation about its own advertising, don’t you think?

The brief asks you to hold the standard for every piece of work without becoming a bottleneck. Anyone who has run an internal creative team knows how quickly that can turn into 12 people waiting for feedback while sales needs a deck by lunchtime. I’d ask to see how work gets assigned and whether the team has enough people left to deliver it.

If Taligence had this search, I’d look closely at large agency and specialist B2B shops top creative leaders with global experience, including APAC, who have made complicated businesses easy to understand. The advert explicitly welcomes that background. I’d start with creative leaders at Stein, Transmission and Twogether. The specialist B2B shops deserve a proper look here. I’d also look at Code and Theory, particularly people behind its Amazon Ads work.

Canva would be on my list. Duolingo would be on my list. Many marketers I talk to on B2C side want to try their hands at B2B and it should happen more easily and more often than it does.

If TTD really wants to be loved, interview someone who has made people voluntarily pay attention to a software brand.

Visa would be another call. Its marketers have to make a largely invisible service feel valuable. That experience could travel well to a business whose technology sits behind the advertising everyone sees.

They would also need to enjoy building an in-house team. A portfolio of beautiful campaigns won’t tell you whether someone can keep good people interested through a difficult year. I’d ask what happened to their team when budgets tightened.

The advertised base salary is $191,200 to $350,600, with potential stock-based compensation. Might not be enough to get the top creatives. I’m running a similar search today in New York, where the top end of the range is $450,000, feel free to reply to this email to hear more.

This is a worthwhile creative challenge. The Trade Desk has a complicated argument to make to busy people under pressure and surrounded by alternatives.

Before accepting, I’d ask Sarah where she thinks weak creative has cost them business and if the play is more protect ground, regain it, or win in new places. I’d want to hear about a specific account. That would help me judge whether she’s giving this hire a problem they can solve.

American Dream is hiring someone to persuade people to visit America and spend money. The president has been working quite hard on fucking that up.

For readers outside the US, American Dream is an enormous shopping and entertainment complex in East Rutherford, New Jersey. It has a Nickelodeon theme park, a DreamWorks water park, an ice rink and luxury shops. You can take the children swimming and browse Gucci afterwards, assuming anyone still has the money or the will.

The original ambition was 40 million visits a year, half from tourists. Being near New York and its millions of visitors featured heavily in the pitch. It takes some serious mental gymnastics to assume that someone who has traveled across the world to see Manhattan will want to spend a day in a New Jersey shopping center.

The numbers stink but not in a “marketing let the whole team down” kind of way. A 2017 forecast put rental and attractions revenue at $527m for 2023. The actual figure was $204m. That is a $323m hole in the spreadsheet. Marketing can make a promise, but it cannot address footfall when tourists are giving the whole country a wide berth.

COVID wrecked the launch. The entertainment complex opened in October 2019, shortly before the pandemic shut it down. Completion and tenant occupancy subsequently ran 18 to 24 months behind the developer’s projections.

By June 2026, the trustee could cover only $14.1m of a $26.7m interest payment on one set of bonds, even after using reserves. That is the sort of background I like to have before an employer starts explaining my performance bonus.

Now add Trump.

People have plenty of places to take a holiday. Threatening to annex their country is a peculiar way to invite them. Canadian visits to the US fell 20% in 2025, with Reuters linking the retreat to Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats. Even kicking a football about in the country left hoteliers disappointed and with missed expectations.

People are traveling, just not to the US. In 2025, America’s foreign visitor numbers fell 5.5%, and their spending fell 4.6%. Overseas arrivals, excluding Canada and Mexico, then dropped another 5.8% in the first 8 months of 2026. Tourism Economics expects US policies to keep depressing demand. All year, I’ve seen a spike in US travel and hospitality leaders forwarding me their resumes and looking for clues. American businesses and their employees get to live with the consequences.

The most recent CMO I can identify is Adam Petrick, who spent more than two decades at Puma and became its Global Chief Brand Officer. He was still being quoted as American Dream’s CMO in August. He was hiring a Director of Social Media as recently as September and talking about plans for 2027. His post spells out the challenge – teens, families, luxury shoppers and tourists, each needing a different reason to visit.

Now there’s an October advert for its “senior-most marketing leader.” I haven’t found a departure announcement, so I’d ask what’s changed. If I were considering this job, a conversation with the person who last did it would be much higher up on my list than a complimentary go on the waterslide.

Which brings us to your assignment.

“Represents Marketing to ownership (Triple Five).”

I stopped there. Triple Five is the Ghermezian family’s property group, and this job puts you in the room explaining whether marketing is delivering. You would be presenting to owners who have family members with their own marketing credentials and convictions. They have considerable experience to draw on, and considerable money at risk.

As well as being lead explainer in that room, as SVP of Marketing, you will lead the whole function across retail, attractions, food and drink, luxury shopping and the performing arts center. You will drive attendance and ticket sales, support tenants, manage the brand and turn media, content and physical space into sponsorship income.

That’s a lot of explaining.

The tenants need different things from you. Primark and Gucci don’t share an agenda. Saks Fifth Avenue announced the closure of its luxury anchor here during its parent company’s bankruptcy. A family coming for waterslides does not automatically become a customer for an expensive handbag.

If I had this search, I would look for someone who has run marketing for a large attraction or resort and spent plenty of time with operations and finance. Someone who understands ticket yield, repeat visits and the cost of filling a venue through discounts.

The advertised starting salary is $250,000. Before discussing what you could do with the brand, I would ask for the attraction-level accounts, the funded marketing budget and the assumptions behind the targets. Then I would ask what happened the last time someone told ownership its forecast was unrealistic.

I’d want a detailed answer before putting “American Dream” on my CV.

Jägermeister wants to be young again. Relatable.

The company is hiring a Head of Marketing to lead its “rejuvenation in America,” which is a very honest thing to put in a job advert, hinting that it may have been human-authored.

For anyone who has somehow avoided it, Jägermeister is the German herbal liqueur in the green bottle. This brief is firmly committed to the ice-cold shot. Your assignment is to give the next generation of legal-age drinkers a reason to choose it.

The numbers on American drinking are grim. Gallup’s July 2026 survey found that 54% of adults drink alcohol, matching the lowest reading in its long-running series. In 2023, it was 62%. Skip the nostalgia. Prioritize finding out what a good night looks like to the people buying their first legal drinks now.

The green bottle can still sell. Global Jägermeister volumes rose 7.7% to 9.2 million 9-litre cases in 2025. Those worldwide figures do not tell us how the US performed, but they show the brand is not dead. As someone who has tasted the drink once, I’m impressed.

The most interesting part of this brief is its attention to bartenders. Success includes stronger advocacy behind the bar, a consistent serve and relationships in local communities. It gives the new hire 3 years to make steady progress. Someone has already figured out that you cannot commission a subculture on Monday and demand the sales results on Friday.

I like this part. A bartender has limited time and plenty of bottles to reach for. If they don’t want to recommend yours, an expensive cultural partnership just gives the marketing team somewhere enjoyable to stand.

The company calls its approach “Subcultural Mainstream.” I think I need a drink to fathom that. Which communities already welcome the brand? What does Jägermeister contribute? And would anyone miss it if the sponsorship money disappeared?

You’ll report to the US CEO, with a dotted line to the global CMO, Dougal McGeorge who joined in 2025. Team size is 20. Consumer marketing covers Jägermeister; trade marketing also includes Teremana. This is based in White Plains, with around 30% travel.

If I had this search, I’d spend a lot of time outside the drinks industry. Plenty of experienced drinks marketers are available, and I’m sure the shortlist could fill itself quickly. But Jägermeister is asking someone to make it relevant to a new generation of adult drinkers. I’d target talent who have earned that audience’s attention in music, gaming, fashion or entertainment.

We covered former TikTok marketing chief Nick Tran when he joined Cîroc and Lobos 1707 last year. His team has since taken Cîroc into daytime sport, food and social occasions through its Athletic Club. No sales figures yet, but at least someone is asking where the brand belongs, and yes, it’s always culture.

I’d look for a version of him and make sure the team around him was excellent at the drinks-trade stuff. You need distributors and bartenders behind you, but you also need someone willing to deal with the sacred cows.

Base pay is $250,000 to $315,000, with a 40–50% target bonus.

Before interviewing, I’d visit a few bars in their priority markets and ask the staff who orders Jägermeister now. Then I’d take those answers into White Plains and see how surprised everyone looked.

Reading this, I imagined Socure’s CEO asking ChatGPT who does identity verification best, seeing a competitor named first and becoming red-faced and absolutely unbearable for the rest of the week.

I have no evidence that this happened at Socure. But “make Socure the answer” comes first in the responsibilities, and beating named competitors in AI citations comes first in the success measures. Someone clearly cares a great deal about this.

Socure sells digital trust. It also gave $100,000 to Trump’s inaugural committee, which is an interesting expression of judgment from a company whose business is spotting fraud.

Its customers include banks and fintechs whose enthusiasm for rapid user onboarding tends to fade when the new customer turns out to be someone based out of a disused factory in Myanmar.

The company wants a Head of Digital Marketing & AI-Driven Growth. Base salary is $230,000 to $260,000, plus bonus and equity, with a hybrid arrangement around its San Francisco, Miami or New York hubs.

Your first assignment is to get AI assistants to recommend Socure. Obviously, while you’re fixing that, you can also run paid media, rebuild the website and teach the team to operate AI agents. There’s a lifecycle program to automate. Attribution needs sorting out, too. You’ll be building working prototypes yourself.

Then I looked into the person running marketing, and the brief became more interesting.

Colton Pond joined as CMO in March from LoanPro. His work there included the Salt Flats Summit, a gathering in Utah described as “Fintech Burning Man.” He also co-founded Fintech NerdCon. Getting financial-services executives excited about a trip to a salt flat is an interesting brag, but at least he knows how to create attention. 

Founder and CEO Johnny Ayers approached him through LinkedIn. Pond’s announcement promised that people who didn’t know Socure soon would. He subsequently announced 24 new marketing positions, including growth engineers and specialists in paid and organic digital marketing. His complaint was that the company’s story wasn’t being told at the scale it deserved.

At least Socure is growing. It ended Q2 with $364 million in annual recurring revenue, up 63% year on year. Its October update said it was tracking towards approximately $450 million by year-end. Pond is building a marketing operation to go after more of it.

The AI emphasis also extends beyond the job advert. In August, Socure acquired Fravity, which automates fraud, risk and compliance operations. Teaching marketers to work with agents fits what the company is selling.

I suspect we’ll see plenty more of these roles. CEOs will ask an assistant about their category and discover that its shortlist differs from the one in their investor presentation. Marketing will get an email or a shouty meeting or both.

I get it. A company needs to appear where potential buyers do their research. LLMs are a new frontier of discovery. Pond’s investment suggests he takes it seriously. We couldn’t verify a spectacular SEO record at LoanPro, so I won’t pretend this is a proven search playbook moving to its next platform.

This is a tale as old as your first Facebook fan page. You invest in being discoverable, learn what the platform rewards and start depending on the traffic. Then organic efforts play second fiddle to pay-to-play.

Socure’s brief already covers organic AI citations and sponsored placements inside conversational assistants. You could spend months learning how to become the answer, then find a competitor has bought the space above it. Presumably the agent will be asked to sweat more tokens.

There are sensible expectations. The first year calls for working lifecycle automation and a process that turns market news into content, with documented review controls. Better demo conversion is also on the list. Candidates can ask what those measures look like today and judge whether the proposed improvement is realistic. To be honest, this is exactly the kind of pondering, dot connecting and judgment that AI is shit at, and humans are good at.

Accuracy will be unforgiving. Socure wants to respond to regulatory changes and fraud trends within hours. A bank’s risk team is an unfortunate audience for something the language model thought sounded about right.

If Taligence had this search, I’d look for a digital leader from a complex B2B business who has personally built systems that are still running. I’d ask them to show me one and explain where it went wrong. Someone who can describe the repairs would be more convincing than someone with a polished presentation about the future of AEO.

The advertised salary buys a senior leader with hands-on technical expectations and reflects the popular doer-delegator archetype of the season. The attraction is a growing business and a CMO who has publicly committed to building a sizeable team.

Before accepting, I’d ask Colton to show me which of those 24 positions have been filled and who will help deliver this brief. That would tell me how literally to take the promise of “executive air cover.”