Senior Marketing Strategist, Games, Entertainment & Subscriptions
About The Position
USA TODAY PLAY is our casual entertainment platform (crosswords, puzzles, comics, horoscopes, quizzes, and more) built on a strong legacy foundation and positioned to become a major subscription revenue driver for the USA TODAY Network. We're in the early stages of a significant shift toward subscription economics, and this role sits at the center of that transformation. We're looking for a Senior Marketing Strategist who can own the full subscriber lifecycle for PLAY, from anonymous visitor through engaged, retained subscriber. You'll build the strategic framework and hands-on programs that grow the funnel, create meaningful conversion pressure, drive habitual engagement, and reduce churn. This is not a campaign execution role. You'll be expected to think in systems and programs: designing triggered engagement loops, calibrating friction across the funnel, and connecting paid, owned, and product channels into a cohesive growth engine grounded in subscriber economics. You'll report to the Senior Director of Consumer Journeys and partner closely with Product, Data, Activation, Creative, and the PLAY business unit. You'll have strong strategic support and a team environment that values rigorous thinking, experimentation, and financially grounded decision-making.
Requirements
- 5+ years in subscription growth or lifecycle marketing, with experience in gaming, entertainment, or media preferred
- Hands-on experience building paywall strategy, dynamic offer flows, and churn mitigation programs (stop-save, winback) at scale
- Proven track record designing and scaling multi-channel lifecycle programs — particularly behavior-based triggered journeys — that deliver measurable improvements in subscriber growth, conversion, and LTV
- Proficiency with A/B testing and experimentation frameworks, with the ability to translate results into scalable rollout playbooks
- Working knowledge of marketing technology ecosystems (e.g., Salesforce Marketing Cloud, Braze, CDPs, CRM platforms) and experience applying personalization and segmentation at scale
- Familiarity with paid media best practices and how acquisition channels connect to lifecycle economics (CAC, LTV, payback period)
- Strong analytical judgment — able to independently assess performance data, identify patterns and tradeoffs, and convert quantitative signals into strategic recommendations
- Strong cross-functional collaboration skills, with the ability to align multiple teams around shared outcomes within a matrixed operating model
Responsibilities
- Lifecycle Strategy & Execution: Design and operate the end-to-end lifecycle program for PLAY. Lead acquisition, registration-to-subscription conversion, onboarding, recurring engagement, upsell, and winback. Build behavior- and engagement-based triggered touchpoints that create habit formation and drive purchase intent across email, push, in-app, and web channels.
- Funnel Growth & Conversion Optimization: Own the known-to-paid funnel. Develop and iterate paywall strategy, offer sequencing, and registration gates that balance access with conversion pressure. Partner with Product to optimize user journeys, stacked subscription experiences, and account management touchpoints.
- Experimentation & Decisioning: Maintain a structured testing backlog across creative, paywall friction, offer constructs, landing pages, overlays, and lifecycle touchpoints. Run disciplined A/B and multivariate tests, publish clear readouts, and scale winners into repeatable playbooks.
- Churn Mitigation & Retention: Build and optimize winback flows, including dynamic offer logic, onsite intercepts, and coordination with account management and call center policies. Identify leading indicators of churn risk and design proactive engagement interventions.
- Paid Media & Channel Orchestration: Inform and help orchestrate paid acquisition strategy in coordination with owned channels, ensuring CAC efficiency and alignment with LTV targets. Define targeting and suppression logic within the CDP for real-time, segment-level decisioning across channels.
- Cross-Functional Partnership: Work within the PLAY–Consumer operating model to align Product, Data, Activation, and Creative on shared goals. Communicate strategy, performance, and progress to senior stakeholders with clarity and precision.
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What This Job Offers
Job Type
Full-time
Career Level
Mid Level
Education Level
No Education Listed
