Associate Vice President, Corporate Partnerships

Key Responsibilities:

• Lead the development and execution of departmental revenue strategies, asset packaging, pricing architecture, and annual go to market plans.
• Oversee the Corporate Partnerships team including the Sr. Assistant Vice President, Managers, and Coordinators to drive accountability and performance. In all areas of day-to-day work including but not limited to training, proposal pitches, and prospecting.
• Direct departmental forecasting, pacing, and revenue reporting, including quarterly business reviews with executive leadership.
• Sells advertising, sponsorships and other revenue producing opportunities as defined by the EVP, Corporate Partnerships and/or President.
• Identify and create fully integrated partnerships with global organizations and brands consisting of onsite activations, digital and social campaigns, VIP hospitality, entitlement, and presenting partnership positions and more.
• Serve as a senior leader for enterprise level partnership negotiations and complex, multi asset agreements.
• Conducts industry research on all clients and develops needs analysis for potential investment.
• Prospecting, scheduling, and conducting discovery meetings by phone or in person meetings with new businesses.
• Establish and enforce operational standards for Salesforce usage, inventory management, reporting accuracy, and workflow alignment.
• Collaborate with Operations, Creative, Marketing, and Fulfillment leadership to ensure execution quality and partner satisfaction.
• Assists with the development of local sales packages, as well as non-traditional sales packages (i.e., local flagship radio proposals).
• Prepares proposals and makes presentations in collaboration with the Director, Creative Brand Partnerships and Marketing leads.
• Develops client relationships by closing sales and honoring obligations in a professional and timely fashion, providing outstanding service.
• Provide executive oversight of major accounts and step in on renewals or escalations as needed.
• Approve strategic ROI reporting and ensure alignment of partnership outcomes with Rutgers institutional goals.
• Responsible for managing book of business to ensure timely payments by clients are received upon designated deadlines.
• Train along with the VP, Operation’s new users in the CRM system (Salesforce) to manage signed partners, pipelines, inventory, and sales projections for each fiscal year as it pertains to goal.
• Responsible for conducting proper outreach and engagement with clients throughout the year. Engagement should consist of but not limited to five (5) times per year and three (3) of those should not include asking for money.
• Responsible for providing each client with a year-end review of their return on investment.
• Represent SAMCO in high level external meetings with national brands, agencies, and industry forums.
• Works to foster positive employee relations and teamwork by:
  1. following and supporting all policies and procedures,
  2. communicating effectively with all operating units, and
  3. complying with all federal, state, and local regulations, laws, and ordinances in discharging duties.
• Ability to work events periodically for business purposes and to work long hours as department workflow necessitates.

Qualifications and Experience: 

• Bachelor’s Degree Required
• Eight (8) to ten (10) years of sales experience in the college and/or professional sports field.
• Management of a sales team with significant revenue goals
• A demonstrated track record of outstanding sales achievement (both in growth and profit) is essential. Proven ability to renew and upsell existing clients as well as sign new clients. 
• Knowledge of new collegiate landscape of Name, Image, and Likeness
• Exceptional sales skills and proven ability to pitch and close deals significant deals.
• Proven ability to manage partners with minimal attrition as a result.
• Superior communication, negotiation, and interpersonal skills
• Enthusiastic and creative with the ability to think strategically and tactically.
• Strong understanding of sales compensation plans with the proven ability to navigate compensation issues to a positive conclusion.
• Has the highest level of personal and professional integrity and ethics.
• Has a strong understanding of and passion for college and professional sports industries.
• Strong computer skills with experience operating in an environment that employs a CRM system (Salesforce) as well as the Microsoft Office suite.