Paid Media Specialist

Role Purpose

As David Jones builds its paid media capability in-house, this role is the operational backbone of the team. The Paid Media Specialist (Operations & Activation) ensures every campaign is built to brief, tracked correctly, and delivered without error — creating the foundation that allows the broader paid media team to focus on strategy, optimisation, and commercial outcomes. This is a role for someone who takes pride in precision, thrives in a fast-moving environment, and understands that flawless execution is what turns great media strategy into measurable results.

Key Accountabilities

• Own the end-to-end setup, trafficking and quality assurance of all paid media campaigns across search, social and programmatic platforms — ensuring every campaign goes live on time, on brief and error-free
• Maintain rigorous QA processes across all campaign builds, including ad copy, creative assets, targeting parameters, tracking tags and UTM structures before every launch
• Manage tag implementation and tracking infrastructure across all paid media platforms, ensuring accurate data capture and clean attribution from campaign to conversion
• Partner with the wider team to translate campaign briefs into technically sound campaign builds that meet performance objectives
• Monitor live campaigns for delivery, pacing and technical issues, escalating promptly and resolving trafficking-related problems with minimal disruption to campaign performance
• Maintain organised and consistently applied campaign naming conventions, account structures and documentation to support reporting accuracy and team efficiency
• Support the Performance Coordinator with data pulls, campaign exports and reporting inputs to enable timely and accurate performance analysis
• Continuously improve operational processes, trafficking workflows and QA checklists to increase speed, accuracy and consistency across the team

Leadership

Leading Self - Leading self is the ability to manage your own mindset, behaviour and performance with awareness, accountability and purpose—so you can consistently show up at your best.

Decision Making

Accountable for

• Accuracy and timeliness of all campaign builds, trafficking and QA outputs
• Tag management and tracking implementation across all paid platforms
• Maintaining campaign naming conventions and account structure standards
• Identifying and resolving technical campaign issues within their remit

Influences but does not own

• Campaign strategy, channel mix and media investment decisions
• Creative and messaging direction
• Attribution methodology and reporting framework design
• Budget allocation and pacing decisions

Qualifications & Licences

• Bachelor's degree in Marketing, Business, Communications or a related field (preferred, not mandatory)
• Google Ads certification (preferred)
• Meta Blueprint certification (preferred)

Knowledge, Skills & Experience

Essential

• Hands-on experience in a campaign trafficking, ad operations or paid media execution role — with demonstrable ability to manage high volumes of campaign builds across multiple platforms simultaneously
• Proficiency in Google Ads and Meta Ads Manager campaign setup, including audience targeting, ad formats, bid strategies and tracking implementation
• Experience with tag management and UTM framework implementation, ensuring accurate tracking from ad click to conversion
• Strong QA mindset — meticulous attention to detail in reviewing campaign builds, creative specifications and tracking setups before launch
• Ability to manage multiple workstreams and deadlines simultaneously in a fast-paced environment with minimal supervision
• Clear and proactive communication skills — able to flag issues, manage expectations and collaborate effectively across a distributed team

Nice to Have

• Experience with DSPs such as DV360 or The Trade Desk
• Familiarity with SA360 or similar bid management platforms
• Exposure to retail or e-commerce campaign environments with an understanding of seasonal trading cycles
• Experience working within or transitioning from an agency environment

• How you thrive
• Our cultural foundations are the pillar of how we work.
• Customer Obsessed - We strive to understand our customer, inspire them, and deliver seamless solutions together.
• Inclusive - We foster belonging and respect, embrace diverse ideas to help our people thrive, and prioritize sustainability for our planet.
• Empowered - We act with integrity, value each other’s skills, own our decisions, learn from challenges, and celebrate successes together.
• Innovative - We seek innovative ways to inspire by listening, seeking feedback, and challenging the status quo, contributing to our business's success.