We are recruiting an exceptional opportunity for an accomplished marketing professional to join our clients Channel Development department. Pivotal to the success of sales within the retail channel, the successful candidate will provide marketing support to the Head of Retail and his team with both new sales propositions and established accounts.

This is a challenging, commercial role requiring a comprehensive understanding of the both the retail sales channel and the underpinning sales process. You will be expected to demonstrate a successful retail portfolio of effective, honed techniques, proving that you can provide an efficient service to your colleagues in the channel.

You will be working as part of a recently restructured team, based at in Manchester, although you will be supporting an external sales team covering retail accounts nationwide. As such, you must be prepared for occasional travel across the country to attend business meetings and customer visits.

The successful candidate should be adaptable to the continually developing needs of the business and keen to prove their abilities in a challenging and vigorous channel.

Objective:

* To work alongside the Head of Channel Development to create the best channel support service possible for the business, including close liaison with sales.

Main Tasks:

* To work with the Retail Channel Manager to build quarterly (or more frequent) channel-specific communications plans to meet the unit and margin expectations set out by Business Planning.

* To assist with the coordination of channel activity into a considered, consistent, company-wide channel strategy.

* To assist in the control and reporting of the expense budgets associated with channel activity.

* To use the output from Business Planning as an input to quarterly and ad-hoc planning and marcoms activity.

* To analyse and measure activity to provide informed opinion to the business, including providing ROI and effectiveness reports as necessary.

* To work alongside external agencies to produce consistent marketing communications in line with Channel Plan.

* To liaise with specific channel partners and sales teams to plan, advise, execute and measure marketing activity with the objective of generating sales and meeting unit plans in a brand-positive fashion.

* To act as a guardian of what constitutes appropriate spend for any channel activity with the authority to decline any activity that does not meet standards or strategic direction.

Requirements

Essential

* Educated to degree level in relevant discipline

* Solid background in retail, with a comprehensive understanding of the channel

* Experience of planning and executing full product life cycles

* Capability to take ownership of projects and campaigns

* Proven experience of analysing, measuring and reporting on specific campaigns

Desirable

* Experience of building close working relationships with a sales team

* Exposure to customer meetings and associated sales pitches

* Strong presenting and analytical abilities