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Key Responsibilities and Required Skills for Ad Sales Manager

💰 $70,000 - $140,000

SalesAdvertisingMediaDigital Marketing

🎯 Role Definition

The Ad Sales Manager is a revenue-focused media sales leader responsible for developing and executing advertising sales strategies across digital and linear platforms, managing key client relationships, and driving quota attainment. This role combines consultative selling, campaign strategy, ad operations coordination, and cross-functional collaboration with marketing, product and analytics teams to maximize advertising revenue, optimize campaign performance (CPM/CPA/ROI), and expand market share for the publisher, platform, or agency.

Key focus areas: new business development, account management, programmatic and direct-sold inventory, sponsorship and custom integrations, pricing and yield optimization, forecasting and pipeline management, and partnership growth across OTT/CTV, mobile, desktop, and linear broadcast channels.

📈 Career Progression

Typical Career Path

Entry Point From:

  • Senior Sales Executive, Digital Media
  • Account Director – Advertising or Sponsorships
  • Programmatic Sales Specialist / Ad Operations Lead

Advancement To:

  • Head of Ad Sales / Director of Sales
  • VP of Revenue / Head of Revenue Strategy
  • General Manager – Advertising Business Unit

Lateral Moves:

  • Product Manager, Ad Monetization
  • Client Solutions Director (Custom Branded Content)
  • Programmatic Partnerships / Supply-Side Platform (SSP) Lead

Core Responsibilities

Primary Functions

  • Develop and execute a territory and account plan to achieve and exceed quarterly and annual advertising revenue quotas, including new business acquisition, upsell of existing advertiser relationships, and renewal strategies across programmatic and direct-sold inventory.
  • Prospect, pitch, negotiate, and close complex multi-channel advertising deals (direct, programmatic private marketplaces, PMP, sponsorships, integrated content) with brands and agencies, ensuring strong commercial terms, margin, and contract compliance.
  • Build and maintain a high-value pipeline in CRM (Salesforce preferred), forecast revenue accurately, track sales stages, and report clearly on pipeline health, closed deals, win rates, and forecast accuracy to senior leadership.
  • Lead consultative client conversations to craft campaign strategies that meet advertiser KPIs (reach, frequency, brand lift, conversions), providing media plans that align with buyer objectives and inventory availability across OTT/CTV, mobile, desktop, in-app, and linear TV.
  • Collaborate with Ad Operations, Programmatic, and Creative teams to scope campaign technical requirements, trafficking details, creative specifications, targeting rules, tracking pixels, and QA processes to ensure timely campaign launch and delivery.
  • Manage campaign performance through ongoing optimization: monitor pacing, viewability, click-through rates (CTR), completion rates (for video), and conversion metrics; recommend adjustments to bids, creatives, targeting, and frequency capping to improve ROI and meet SOV goals.
  • Negotiate and structure upfront and scatter market deals, seasonally-sensitive packages, and custom integrations (sponsorships, native content, branded experiences) that drive incremental revenue and enhance advertiser brand engagement.
  • Own relationships with agency buying teams, trading desks, DSP partners and brand marketers; act as the primary escalation for campaign issues, billing disputes, measurement questions and post-campaign analysis.
  • Partner with Yield Management and Inventory teams to develop pricing strategies (CPM floors, dynamic pricing, deal IDs) and inventory packaging that maximize monetization while protecting user experience and publisher brand.
  • Create and present persuasive sales materials, proposals, RFP responses, media kits, and post-campaign executive summaries that incorporate audience insights, first- and third-party data, verification metrics, and competitive positioning.
  • Design and implement promotional and cross-platform bundles (linear + digital + social) to increase average deal size and LTV of advertisers while aligning with seasonal sales initiatives and sponsorship calendar.
  • Lead contract negotiation and review with Legal/Finance to finalize IOs, insertion orders, MSA amendments and ensure compliance with billing cycles, revenue recognition policies, and partner SLAs.
  • Own performance and relationship KPIs for assigned accounts, including retention rates, growth vs. baseline, advertiser satisfaction, and recurring revenue; proactively identify churn risks and implement retention tactics.
  • Coordinate post-sale activation with Analytics and Data Science to set up measurement frameworks, A/B testing, incrementality studies and attribution models that validate campaign impact and support long-term advertiser investment.
  • Drive cross-functional initiatives with Product, Ad Engineering, and Analytics to inform roadmap priorities (ad formats, targeting capabilities, reporting features) based on advertiser feedback and market demands.
  • Mentor and coach junior sales staff and cross-functional stakeholders on deal strategy, negotiation tactics, and product knowledge to elevate team performance and close complex campaigns.
  • Monitor industry trends—programmatic technology, privacy/regulatory changes (GDPR/CCPA/Privacy Sandbox), CTV/OTT adoption, measurement standards—and adapt sales strategies to capitalize on emerging opportunities.
  • Manage complex RFP processes with agency groups: build competitive proposals, pricing models, audience delivery guarantees and manage timelines from pitch to signed insertion order.
  • Develop and maintain playbooks for vertical-specific offerings (automotive, CPG, finance, entertainment) including case studies, benchmarks, audience targeting strategies and performance indicators to accelerate new business wins.
  • Lead cross-sell and account expansion initiatives by identifying opportunities across content partnerships, sponsorships, events, and branded solutions that deepen customer engagement and increase revenue per advertiser.
  • Implement and enforce quality control and fraud mitigation practices, partner with verification vendors (Moat, IAS, DoubleVerify), and manage remediation for invalid traffic, viewability shortfalls, and creative delivery failures.
  • Prepare monthly and quarterly revenue reports, executive summaries and business reviews for senior leadership and key accounts, highlighting performance insights, optimization recommendations and strategic growth plans.
  • Represent the company externally at industry events, advertiser conferences, agency panels and trade shows to generate leads, foster strategic partnerships, and position the company as a preferred digital/screen advertising partner.

Secondary Functions

  • Provide ad-hoc analytics requests and collaborate with Analytics to produce custom audience insights, ROI modeling and lift studies for high-value clients.
  • Support internal pricing experiments and A/B tests for packaging and productized offerings, documenting results and recommending rollouts.
  • Maintain up-to-date knowledge base articles for sales enablement, including FAQs, pricing cheat sheets, and technical setup guides for common integrations.
  • Assist Marketing with case study development and testimonial collection to support sales collateral and thought leadership initiatives.
  • Participate in monthly sales training, product demos and cross-functional meetings to align GTM strategy and share feedback from advertiser conversations.
  • Help refine CRM workflows, opportunity stages, and automated reporting to improve pipeline hygiene and sales forecasting processes.

Required Skills & Competencies

Hard Skills (Technical)

  • Proven expertise in consultative media selling across programmatic and direct-sold inventory, including PMP, preferred deals, RTB fundamentals and deal ID management.
  • Strong fluency with CRM platforms (Salesforce highly preferred) for pipeline management, forecasting, and reporting.
  • Hands-on experience with ad serving and trafficking platforms (Google Ad Manager/GAM/DFP, Sizmek, Adform) and knowledge of creative specs for video, display and native.
  • Familiarity with programmatic stacks: DSPs, SSPs, ad exchanges, header bidding, and knowledge of bidstream, impression, and creative delivery flows.
  • Data-driven campaign optimization skills: ability to read delivery dashboards, pacing reports, viewability and verification metrics, and recommend performance-driven changes.
  • Advanced Excel/Google Sheets skills for pricing models, revenue forecasts, CM/CPA calculations, and building custom dashboards (pivot tables, VLOOKUP/XLOOKUP).
  • Experience with measurement and verification vendors (Moat, IAS, DoubleVerify) and third-party analytics platforms (Comscore, Nielsen, Google Analytics).
  • Understanding of OTT/CTV and linear TV advertising ecosystems, ad podding, ad breaks, and audience segmentation for cross-platform buys.
  • Familiarity with programmatic reporting APIs, data feeds, and tagging (pixel and server-side) to coordinate with engineering and analytics teams.
  • Contract negotiation experience: IOs, MSAs, billing terms, cancellation clauses, and revenue recognition implications.

Soft Skills

  • Strategic consultative selling and persuasive communication, able to translate business objectives into media plans and measurable outcomes.
  • Strong negotiation and closing skills with a track record of securing multi-quarter and multi-platform deals.
  • Client relationship management and stakeholder influence—builds trust with marketers, agency buyers and cross-functional partners.
  • Analytical mindset and problem-solving skills; comfortable interpreting data and making recommendations under ambiguity.
  • Project management and prioritization skills to manage multiple complex campaigns and deployments concurrently.
  • Leadership and coaching skills to mentor junior teammates and drive cross-functional initiatives to completion.
  • Resilience and adaptability in a fast-changing media landscape with evolving ad tech, privacy rules, and buyer behaviors.
  • Presentation and storytelling skills for client pitches, executive business reviews, and cross-company updates.
  • Collaborative mindset with ability to work closely with Product, Engineering, Ad Ops, and Finance to drive outcomes.
  • Attention to detail and quality control orientation to ensure campaign accuracy, billing integrity and contract compliance.

Education & Experience

Educational Background

Minimum Education:

  • Bachelor’s degree in Business, Marketing, Communications, Advertising, Media Studies, or a related field.

Preferred Education:

  • Bachelor’s degree plus coursework or certifications in digital advertising, programmatic media, data analytics, or an MBA for senior roles.

Relevant Fields of Study:

  • Marketing
  • Business Administration
  • Communications
  • Media Studies
  • Data Analytics / Statistics

Experience Requirements

Typical Experience Range:

  • 3–7 years in media sales, digital advertising sales, or programmatic account management for mid-level Ad Sales Manager roles.
  • 7+ years for senior or enterprise-focused Ad Sales Manager roles responsible for strategic accounts and larger quotas.

Preferred:

  • Demonstrated track record meeting or exceeding revenue quotas in a publisher, agency, or ad tech environment.
  • Experience selling across digital (display/video/native), OTT/CTV, and linear TV or multi-platform environments.
  • Prior experience with CRM-driven sales processes, complex contract negotiations, and cross-functional campaign activation.
  • Experience with leading RFP responses, building vertical-specific playbooks and mentoring junior sellers.
  • Familiarity with privacy regulations (GDPR, CCPA) and their implications for targeting, measurement and data partnerships.
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