Head of Performance Marketing

Are you a performance marketing expert ready to take the next leap, driving high-impact, data-powered campaigns across paid media channels with precision, creativity, and commercial intent? At PizzaExpress, we're appointing a new agency with a transformative brief, and we're looking for a results-obsessed Head of Performance Marketing to co-lead this next chapter: shaping the roadmap, working closely with our agency to scale our reach, and unlocking performance that connects directly to business outcomes.

This is a pivotal leadership role. You'll define the strategy across all digital acquisition and retention channels, from paid search and social to CRM retargeting and affiliates. You will connect this activity to our first-party data, loyalty, and analytics efforts to drive measurable value. From AI-powered bidding to automated creative testing and attribution modeling, you'll embed modern performance marketing into the heart of our business.

What You'll Do:

1. Define and own the digital acquisition and retention strategy across paid media, search, social, affiliates, CRM retargeting, and owned channels, aligning with our growth roadmap and commercial targets.
2. Lead the strategic integration of MMM, advanced attribution tools, and first-party data strategy in partnership with CRM, Loyalty, Digital Product, and Data Science teams, both in-house and agency side.
3. Partner with our new performance agency to co-create AI-powered campaign strategies, including proprietary models, intelligent audience targeting, automated bidding, and dynamic content testing.
4. Establish, monitor, and optimize performance KPIs, taking responsibility for testing roadmaps, channel effectiveness, ROAS, CPA, LTV, and budget control.
5. Collaborate cross-functionally with Trading, Finance, Digital, and external data resources to connect marketing performance with real business outcomes.
6. Build a smart campaign taxonomy and bidding structure to enable scaling across location, audience, channel, and platform.
7. Deliver best-in-class creative and audience testing plans supported by modular content libraries and smart delivery technology.
8. Drive innovation through automation, AI, and proprietary tools while maintaining strong measurement frameworks.
9. Own stakeholder communications, reporting, and storytelling, surfacing insights on what's working, future plans, and value creation.

What You'll Need:

1. Deep experience in a senior-level performance marketing role, ideally in hospitality, retail, or digital-first environments.
2. Proven ability to lead across Paid Search (Google, Microsoft), Paid Social (Meta, TikTok, YouTube), Programmatic, Display, Affiliates, and aggregator ads (Uber Eats, Deliveroo, Just Eat).
3. Expertise with modern marketing stacks, dynamic creative platforms, and MMM/attribution solutions.
4. A strong track record of delivering measurable business impact, from ROAS and customer acquisition to long-term retention and LTV.
5. Experience partnering with external agencies to drive strategy and operational excellence, holding them accountable for performance and innovation.
6. Familiarity with audience design, privacy-centric media targeting, and data integration across CRM and loyalty platforms.
7. Confidence managing multi-£m media budgets, forecasting, reporting, and spend optimization.
8. Collaborative, commercially minded, and curious, with the ability to unify teams around performance, insights, and priorities.
9. Experience with delivery platforms and analysis of aggregator performance spend is beneficial.

Who We Are:

Where those who love pizza can be their true selves. Since 1965, we've been bringing pizza to the UK and growing into a multichannel, international brand. At PizzaExpress, we believe you should always be able to express yourself.

Our culture is built on three core values: use your head, show your heart, and create a home. This means:

• Head - being customer-centric, commercially driven, and obsessed with performance
• Heart - showing honesty, vulnerability, and leading through our people
• Home - creating a welcoming environment where everyone can express themselves daily

Inclusivity and respect are central to our business and valued by our teams, customers, and suppliers. PizzaExpress and Milano are places where everyone is welcome and belongs. We assess each application based on aptitude to do the job, nothing else.