Key Responsibilities and Required Skills for Advertising Consultant

🎯 Role Definition

The Advertising Consultant partners with brands, client teams, and internal stakeholders to design, execute, and optimize results-driven advertising strategies across search, social, display, video and programmatic channels. This role combines media planning, performance marketing, analytics and client-facing consulting to improve ROI, increase brand reach, and translate business goals into measurable advertising programs. The successful candidate will be fluent in ad tech, campaign measurement, budget allocation, creative strategy, and cross-functional project delivery.

Keywords: advertising consultant, digital advertising, programmatic, media planning, campaign strategy, performance marketing, Google Ads, Meta Ads, programmatic buying, audience segmentation, advertising analytics, ROI.

📈 Career Progression

Typical Career Path

Entry Point From:

Digital Marketing Specialist or Paid Media Associate
Media Planner or Junior Account Executive from an agency
Search Marketing / Social Ads Coordinator

Advancement To:

Senior Advertising Consultant / Senior Paid Media Manager
Media Director or Head of Performance Marketing
Client Strategy Director or VP of Advertising

Lateral Moves:

Account Director (agency-side)
Product Marketing Manager (in-house)
Programmatic Trading Lead

Core Responsibilities

Primary Functions

Develop and lead end-to-end advertising strategies that align with client business objectives, audience insights, and KPIs across search (SEM), social, display, video and programmatic channels.
Build detailed media plans and budget allocation models that optimize spend by channel, creative, and audience segment to maximize ROI, LTV and conversion rates.
Manage day-to-day campaign setup, trafficking and optimization in ad platforms including Google Ads, Microsoft Advertising, Meta Business Manager, DV360, The Trade Desk and other DSPs.
Use advanced targeting and audience segmentation (first-party, second-party and third-party data, lookalike models, CRM audiences) to refine reach and improve conversion efficiency.
Design and execute A/B and multivariate tests for creatives, landing pages, bidding strategies and audience segments to drive measurable performance improvements.
Implement and validate tracking, conversion tags, pixels and server-side measurement to ensure accurate attribution, audience capture and reporting (Google Tag Manager, GA4, Facebook Pixel, Conversions API).
Conduct ongoing bid management and bid optimization (manual and automated bidding strategies) to meet CPA, ROAS, CPM and CTR targets while controlling spend pacing.
Lead programmatic buying strategy including private marketplace deals (PMPs), preferred deals, direct IOs and header bidding partnerships to secure premium inventory and brand-safe placements.
Create and present persuasive client-facing proposals, media recommendations, pitch decks and RFP responses that clearly connect media tactics to business outcomes and forecasts.
Prepare executive-level performance reports and dashboards using data visualization tools (Looker, Tableau, Power BI) and translate results into actionable insights and next-step recommendations.
Conduct weekly/monthly/quarterly performance reviews with clients and internal teams to align on performance, roadmap, optimizations and testing agendas.
Oversee creative development and ensure ad copy, creative assets and landing pages are optimized for audience, channel and measurement — provide creative briefs and QC.
Manage procurement and vendor relationships with ad platforms, exchanges, publishers and data providers; negotiate rates, IO terms and value-added services to improve ROI.
Troubleshoot and resolve campaign delivery issues, inventory discrepancies, tracking mismatches, and billing inquiries in partnership with technical teams and platform support.
Advise on cross-channel attribution modeling, incrementality testing and media mix modeling to better understand contribution and optimize channel investment.
Forecast campaign performance and produce media pacing plans, spend reconciliation, and budget reallocation recommendations to meet or exceed client goals.
Maintain up-to-date knowledge of privacy regulations (GDPR, CCPA, privacy sandbox changes) and ensure campaigns and data practices comply with legal and platform policies.
Mentor junior consultants and paid media associates through hands-on coaching, training sessions and campaign reviews to build a high-performing media team.
Collaborate with product, sales and analytics teams to feed advertising insights into product improvements, audience strategies and broader marketing initiatives.
Drive operational improvements by documenting processes, developing templates for reporting/pitches, and implementing automation (scripts, rules, APIs) to increase team efficiency.
Monitor industry trends, emerging ad formats (connected TV, audio, programmatic DOOH), and new platform capabilities to identify opportunities for client innovation and competitive advantage.
Build and maintain strong client relationships as a trusted advisor, regularly aligning media tactics with evolving business priorities, seasonal plans and product launches.
Conduct competitive and market analyses to identify share-of-voice opportunities, pricing sensitivity, and creative differentiators that can inform media strategy.

Secondary Functions

Support go-to-market and new business efforts by contributing media strategy sections to proposals and participating in pitches.
Assist sales and account teams with scoping and pricing recommendations for media services and campaign executions.
Participate in cross-functional sprints or project teams to integrate advertising technology, CRM and measurement solutions.
Contribute to internal training materials and run workshops on platform best practices, creative testing, and measurement frameworks.
Represent the organization at industry events, webinars and client workshops to build thought leadership and network with partners.

Required Skills & Competencies

Hard Skills (Technical)

Expert-level experience with Google Ads (search, display, video), certified in Google Ads preferred.
Proficiency in Meta Ads / Facebook Ads Manager, with experience in conversion API implementation and Meta measurement strategies.
Hands-on experience with programmatic platforms / DSPs (DV360, The Trade Desk, MediaMath) and RTB ecosystems.
Practical knowledge of analytics and measurement tools: Google Analytics 4 (GA4), Firebase, conversion tracking and attribution platforms.
Experience setting up and troubleshooting tags and tracking via Google Tag Manager, pixel implementation and server-to-server tracking.
Familiarity with data visualization and reporting tools (Looker, Tableau, Power BI) for stakeholder reporting and dashboard creation.
Competence with bid management, audience-based bidding strategies, and automated bidding tools and scripts.
Strong Excel / Google Sheets modeling skills, including pivot tables, VLOOKUP/XLOOKUP, and scenario modeling for budget forecasts.
Understanding of SEO fundamentals and search engine marketing best practices to coordinate paid and organic strategies.
Working knowledge of CRM platforms (Salesforce, HubSpot) and marketing automation tools for audience activation and measurement.
Experience with A/B testing platforms (Optimizely, Google Optimize or equivalents) and experimentation methodologies.
Familiarity with privacy, consent management platforms (CMPs), and implications of cookieless advertising environments.
Basic SQL skills for querying performance datasets and joining cross-channel metrics (preferred).
Experience with creative trafficking and ad specs across channels, including responsive, video, and rich media formats.

Soft Skills

Exceptional client-facing communication and presentation skills; ability to translate complex data into concise recommendations.
Strong strategic thinking and commercial acumen with a results-oriented mindset.
Excellent problem solving and analytical reasoning to identify root causes and propose scalable solutions.
Project and time management skills to manage multiple campaigns, deadlines and client expectations simultaneously.
Collaboration and stakeholder management: effective at coordinating cross-functional teams (creative, analytics, engineering, sales).
Adaptability and continuous learning orientation to stay current with fast-moving ad tech and platform changes.
Attention to detail and quality control mindset to ensure accurate reporting and flawless campaign execution.
Persuasive negotiation skills for media buys and vendor contracts.
Coaching and mentoring ability to develop junior staff and scale best practices across the team.
Resilience under pressure and the ability to prioritize in periods of high campaign activity.

Education & Experience

Educational Background

Minimum Education:

Bachelor's degree in Marketing, Advertising, Communications, Business, or a related field.

Preferred Education:

MBA, Master’s in Marketing, or advanced certifications (Google Ads Certification, Meta Blueprint, IAB programmatic certifications).

Relevant Fields of Study:

Marketing
Advertising
Business Administration
Communications
Data Analytics / Statistics

Experience Requirements

Typical Experience Range:

3–7 years of progressive experience in advertising, performance marketing, or media planning; agency experience or in-house paid media roles preferred.

Preferred:

5+ years with demonstrable experience managing cross-channel campaigns, programmatic buying, and client consulting.
Proven track record of improving ROAS, lowering CPA, and meeting performance KPIs at scale.
Experience working with enterprise clients, handling multi-million dollar media budgets and cross-regional campaigns.