Retail Media - Ad Ops Lead

Retail Media - Ad Ops Lead

Contract type: Permanent

Location: Hatfield (Hybrid working - 3 days in the office)

Working hours per week: 40 hours

Level: Lead

About us

Our mission is to deliver joy in every shop, through unbeatable choice, unrivalled service, and reassuringly good value. We’re also on a mission to empower our business with smart technology; we've recently launched our AI Academy, providing a tailored AI learning journey for every colleague.

We’re Ocado Retail, a market-leading joint venture between Ocado Group and M&S, and the world’s largest dedicated online supermarket, ocado.com. Not only is Ocado the only place to shop a full range of M&S food online, it’s also the home to the widest online supermarket range in the UK and champion of small, independent brands. We’re also the brains behind Zoom by Ocado, our same-day grocery delivery service.

About the team and the role

We want to make the shopping experience for our customers as simple, smart and inspiring as possible, whilst hitting commercial goals.

As the Retail Media - Ad Ops Lead you will be responsible for maximising monetisation opportunities onsite through cohesive management of the sitemap. You will ensure flawless execution via robust Ad Ops, including finding automation opportunities and working with product teams to deliver self serve programmatic technology to aid delivery.

What you’ll do

• Commercial & E-commerce Synergy: Partner with the Commercial/Buying and wider E-commerce team to ensure ad placements enhance, rather than disrupt, the customer journey. You will lead the commercial guardrails strategy, balancing revenue potential with UX integrity.

• Media return optimisation: Track and understand media placement performance, optimising component performance and holding teams accountable for individual performance of placements.

• Creative & Brand Governance: Collaborate with Creative teams to define technical specifications and aesthetic standards for all supplier-funded media, ensuring that it looks and feels like a native part of the Ocado experience.

• Unified Strategy Execution: Bridge the gap between the high-level business strategy and execution, identifying all monetisation opportunities in forward merchandising plan, ensuring that all executions are aligned with Ocado’s long-term retail media and customer experience ambitions.

• Campaign Design: Work closely with Ocado Ads team to create onsite campaign packages, that balance the needs of the customer and Ocado Ads teams, ensuring a seamless journey for customers whilst optimising supplier returns.

• Rate Card Management: Recommend proposed rate card for media placements, reviewed annually, taking into account traffic shifts and return on placements.

• SLA Management: Establish and maintain strict Service Level Agreements (SLAs) for campaign turnaround times, creative approvals, and troubleshooting.

• End-to-End Workflow Ownership: Design, implement, and govern the full Ad Ops lifecycle from briefing to tracking to execution. You will ensure that the process remains frictionless for both internal teams and external brand partners.

• Vendor management with Ad servers, working closely with Product and Tech teams to ensure all requirements are met.

• Efficiency Gains: identify manual bottlenecks in the current campaign lifecycle and work with IT and Product teams to select and deliver relevant solutions.

• Test and Learn: Engage across Ecommerce Product and Merchandising to understand new site functionality, creating the testing and optimisation plan to ensure strong returns

• Team Leadership: Manage and mentor the SFM / Ad Ops team responsible for the end-to-end setup, execution, and QA of all media placements.

• Ocado Ads partnering: collaborating and defining the execution of creative media partnerships for brands.

Who you are

• You will hold a deep understanding of the retail media ecosystem

• You will have experience managing Ad Ops or Campaign Management in a high growth environment

• You will be an experienced leader, with experience in an online or e-commerce role, within a retail business.

• You will have a deep understanding and experience of optimising customer journeys.

• Customer focused, with a great commercial acumen and understanding.

• Strong analytical and data skills.

• Highly organised with a collaborative working style, able to influence at a senior leadership level.

• Excellent communication skills and a good decision maker.
  

What’s in it for you

By joining Ocado Retail, you’ll have the chance to experience life at the world’s largest online retailer, work with an amazing bunch of people who challenge what’s possible each day, and grow your skills and career in online retail. You'll also be part of our AI Academy, a dedicated learning journey designed to empower every colleague with the smart technology skills of the future.

If that’s not enough to tempt you, you’ll also get access to loads of great benefits to sweeten the deal. Here’s a taste of what we offer:

Health & Wellbeing: Private medical insurance with option to add your family, Digital GP appointments, market-leading family policies, mental health support, discounted gym memberships, dental insurance, and more.

Spend & Save: Annual bonus scheme split between personal and business objectives, recognition with reward platform, up to 7% matched pension contributions, 15% Ocado discount, 20% M&S discount, free breakfast every day in the office, electric vehicle leasing scheme, and free shuttle bus from Hatfield station to the office.

Never miss the moments that matter: Hybrid working, 26 days holiday plus 8 flexible bank holidays, options to buy extra holiday, 2 weeks work from anywhere, and lifestyle break opportunities.

Our Hiring Process

Lucky for us, we receive a high volume of applications and genuinely appreciate the time and effort invested by every candidate. To ensure a fair and thorough process, every application is reviewed by a member of our team. If your skills and experience are a strong match, a Talent Partner will contact you to discuss the role and guide you through the next steps of our hiring process.

Your Application and AI

In the spirit of innovation, we welcome you to use AI tools in your application, just as we use them in our own business at Ocado Retail. However, as you leverage this technology, please don't lose sight of the most important element: your unique self. Your experiences, passions, and personality are what truly set you apart. Ensure that your application still authentically conveys who you are and why you're a great fit for us.

Everyone’s welcome

We’re an equal opportunities employer, which means that we make sure all potential colleagues are treated fairly and equally. We want to ensure everyone has a fair chance to apply; if you need this job description in an alternative format (e.g., larger print, different document type, etc.), please reach out to us at [email protected] and we'll be happy to assist you, and if you require reasonable adjustments during the recruitment process, please let us know on the application form.