Influence Business Director

Influence Business Director
Large Technology Brand
 

Department: PR & Influence
Location: London
Contract Type: Fixed-Term (12 months)
Full Time/Part time: Full Time
Reporting into: Managing Partner / Client Partner 

About Ogilvy:

Ogilvy UK has been creating iconic ideas that deliver impact at scale for clients ever since David Ogilvy founded the company in 1948. The agency specialises in bringing together brand advertising, customer experience marketing, PR, influence and consulting, all fuelled by Behavioural Science. Our world-class award-winning creative campaigns deliver solutions for clients including Sainsbury’s, Lloyds Banking Group, Madri, Unilever and Mondelēz International. 

Ogilvy’s influencer marketing practice is the largest globally; we are proud to be the most awarded influencer agency for six years running and the recipient of the Cannes Grand Prix for Social & Creator for two consecutive years.  

Ogilvy UK also hosts the world’s biggest festival of behavioural science and creativity, Nudgestock – which is now in its 12th year. James Murphy is the CEO of Ogilvy Group UK, which includes Ogilvy UK and New Commercial Arts (NCA), a boutique creative agency he co-founded in 2020, recently acquired by WPP. 

 

The Role:

As an Influence Business Director, you will lead the strategic direction and integrated delivery of our full suite of influence activity for one of the world's most iconic and dynamic technology brands within the UK market. This role demands a forward-thinking, data-driven leader who can navigate the complexities of tech marketing and leverage the power of influence to drive brand reputation, product launches, and cultural relevance at scale across the UK.

You will sit at the intersection of influence-first thinking, culture-led marketing, and integrated agency delivery. Your mission will be to ensure that influencer campaigns, events, social content, and advertising work seamlessly together to create maximum impact across diverse UK audiences for our tech client. This pivotal role places you at the heart of our operations within a dedicated, integrated agency model, exclusively focused on delivering ground-breaking solutions for this client.

Your remit will span from the initial spark of ideation - identifying emerging influencer trends, creator opportunities, and innovative event activations through the meticulous development of cutting-edge, data-backed strategies tailored to UK market nuances and brand objectives. You will lead the charge on defining compelling creative narratives and content frameworks for creators, ensuring brand consistency and breakthrough engagement. Subsequently, you will oversee flawless execution, transforming strategy into impactful activations across various platforms and key product launch moments within the UK.

This role demands a holistic leader capable of driving innovation, leveraging data for strategic advantage, navigating complex client relationships, and delivering measurable results within a dynamic UK agency environment.

Key Responsibilities:

• Client Leadership & Stakeholder Management:
• Act as the senior day-to-day client lead for the UK teams of our leading tech client, building trusted, long-term partnerships at senior levels.
• Provide strategic counsel across brand building, product launches, reputation management, cultural activation, and the evolving influence landscape in the UK.
• Lead complex stakeholder management across the client's UK teams and key internal stakeholders, ensuring alignment and clear communication.
• Ensure the tech client benefits from consistent, senior-level leadership fully embedded in their UK business objectives and challenges.
  
  
• UK Influence Strategy Development:
• Lead the creation of UK influence strategy toolkits, frameworks, and playbooks that balance brand consistency with platform specifics.
• Embed influence-first thinking, ensuring creator-led content, partnerships, and social activations are foundational not additive to campaign planning.
• Partner closely with creative, media, and strategy leads to shape culturally relevant, insight-led ideas powered by influencer insights and data for the UK market.
• Drive the strategic integration of paid, earned, and owned influence channels to maximise reach and impact within the UK.
  
  
• UK Market Intelligence & Performance:
• Oversee market engagement across the UK.
• Act as a central connector between the tech client's UK teams and local activation partners/stakeholders.
• Ensure clients are consistently informed on emerging influencer trends, platform shifts, competitor influence activity, and data-driven insights into UK audience behaviour.
• Utilise advanced analytics and reporting to demonstrate campaign effectiveness, optimise performance, and articulate ROI for influence investments in the UK.
  
  
• UK Events & Integrated Campaigns:
• Lead the influence strategy and delivery for key UK brand moments, product launches, and events, ensuring alignment and maximum creator engagement.
• Play a central role in developing and activating high-impact influencer partnerships, embedding them seamlessly into integrated campaign narratives for the UK.
• Work with market and agency leads to bring these partnerships and events to life in locally relevant, culturally resonant, and impactful ways across the UK.
  
  
• Team Leadership & Integration:
• Directly manage a London-based team of influence specialists, fostering their growth and development.
• Foster a collaborative, high-performance team culture grounded in integration, shared ownership, and a passion for influence.
• Lead integration across influence, advertising, social, and content teams – ensuring truly joined-up delivery and a holistic client approach within Ogilvy.

What Makes This Role Different:

• 100% dedicated tech client focus, allowing for deep brand immersion, long-term strategic thinking, and the opportunity to shape the future of influence for a global leader within the UK.
• Deeply partnership-led, with influencer collaborations and strategic event activations embedded into the core brand strategy.
• Strong emphasis on influence-first, data-driven, culture-first marketing, influencing how integrated campaigns are built from the ground up.
• Sits within a fully integrated agency model, requiring constant collaboration across disciplines to deliver holistic influence solutions.

 

Key Leadership Competencies:

• Proven experience in UK-specific leadership roles within influence marketing, digital marketing, or related fields, ideally within the technology sector or for large-scale consumer brands.
• Exceptional stakeholder management skills – this role is heavily relationship-driven and requires confidence navigating complex, multi-layered client organisations.
• Strong understanding of how major brands operate across the UK market
• Demonstrated experience working in integrated agency environments across influence, advertising, social, content, and data & analytics.
• A passion for culture-led, data-driven, influence-first marketing and its role in driving brand relevance and business impact.
• Strategically minded and commercially astute, comfortable operating at a senior client level and driving significant business growth.
• A genuine interest in – and affinity for – the technology sector, its innovations, and the rapidly evolving influence landscape.
• Highly organised and process-driven, capable of designing and managing complex LONG-TERM influencer programs efficiently and effectively.
• Proven ability to leverage data and analytics to inform influence strategies, measure campaign impact, identify trends, and optimise performance for continuous improvement.
• Extensive and established network within the influencer industry, including leading creators, talent agencies, platforms, and industry thought leaders, specific to the UK market.
• Communication & Collaboration: Defines and communicates the overarching vision for the Influence practice. Develops communication strategies that align the department with agency leadership and fosters a culture of open dialogue and mentorship for senior leaders.
• Organisation & Resource Management: Architects the department's operational structure to support profitability and growth. Oversees P&L, leads resource forecasting, and ensures the practice is structured to handle complex, large-scale business needs.
• Responsibility & Accountability: Holds accountability for the teams commercial and creative performance. Empowers directors to lead their teams while maintaining transparent, high-level communication with executive leadership on business progress and challenges.
• Problem Solving & Decision Making: Acts as the final point of authority on the most critical business issues. Makes high-stakes decisions that protect the agency's commercial interests and mentors directors in strategic problem-solving.
• Growth & Development: Champions and funds a departmental learning culture. Defines the long-term talent strategy, creates career pathways for all levels, and builds a best-in-class team through senior hiring and mentorship.
• Ogilvy Values & Behaviours: Acts as the ultimate custodian of the agency's values within the team. Embeds these values into the practice's core processes, from recruitment and client management to performance recognition.

 

Personal Qualities:

• Extensive and proven experience in a senior leadership role (e.g., Senior Account Director or Business Director) within a top-tier agency.
• Strategic yet pragmatic
• Culturally curious and globally minded
• Confident, collaborative and calm under pressure
• Energised by complexity, scale and partnership-driven work
• Demonstrated track record of P&L ownership and delivering significant, year-on-year business growth.
• Proven success in leading and winning multi-million-pound new business pitches.
• Exceptional leadership skills with experience in shaping departmental culture and developing senior talent.
• Strategic visionary with the ability to anticipate market trends and define a clear, forward-looking path for the business.
• Outstanding commercial acumen and sophisticated negotiation skills.

How we help you Thrive:

• 25 days annual leave + 1 Volunteer Day
• Bupa Healthcare
• Enhanced Maternity, Adoption and Shared Parental Leave
• Flexible Working Model with core working hours: 10am – 4pm
• A 1.5:1 Matching Pension Structure
• Wellbeing and Health: Up to £25.00 per month towards physical or online exercise class membership, Unmind membership, LifeWorks tool and annual eye tests.
• Season Ticket Loan and Cycle to Work Scheme
• Life Assurance
• Our ambition is to attract the very best diverse talent to Ogilvy, and to be the employer of choice in the UK. We want everyone to feel welcome when they join us, and once they’re here, for them to want to stay with us, grow their career, and to feel they belong with us.