Interim Digital Marketing Manager - Retention

About JR Cigar and the Role

JR Cigar is looking for an experienced Digital Marketing Manager to temporarily head our retention marketing efforts while covering for parental leave. This role focuses on managing and enhancing our email, SMS, and customer lifecycle marketing strategies to boost client retention, increase frequent purchases, and maximize customer lifetime value.

Key Responsibilities

• Oversee retention marketing campaigns across email and SMS channels.
• Implement and refine lifecycle marketing initiatives including welcome messages, cart abandonment prompts, post-purchase follow-ups, loyalty rewards, and win-back campaigns.
• Handle audience segmentation, personalization efforts, campaign scheduling, and experimentation methods.
• Track and analyze campaign performance, delivering data-driven insights and improvement suggestions.
• Lead a small team focused on retention marketing activities.
• Collaborate with Creative, E-Commerce, Analytics, IT departments, and external vendors to ensure seamless campaign delivery.
• Maintain high standards of campaign quality, regulatory compliance, message deliverability, and subscriber list health.
• Document processes, outcomes, and work priorities to facilitate an efficient handover after the assignment.

Required Qualifications

• A minimum of 5 years in retention, lifecycle, CRM, digital, or e-commerce marketing roles.
• Direct experience managing email and SMS marketing within e-commerce or direct-to-consumer settings.
• Demonstrated leadership and team coaching capabilities.
• Proficient with segmentation, personalization, lifecycle automation, A/B testing, and performance tuning.
• Strong grasp of retention metrics such as customer lifetime value, repeat purchase rates, conversion rates, and customer reactivation.
• Analytical expertise to convert data into actionable business insights.
• Excellent skills in project management, communication, and cross-team collaboration.
• Ability to rapidly assume responsibility for an existing program and work autonomously.

Preferred Qualifications

• Hands-on experience with Listrak platform preferred.
• Familiarity with tools like Google Analytics, Power BI, Salesforce, Shopify, BigCommerce, or Yotpo.
• Experience managing loyalty, subscription, replenishment, or customer reactivation programs.
• Previous contract, consulting, interim, or leave-coverage marketing roles are an advantage.

Education

Bachelor’s degree in Marketing, Business, Communications, Analytics, or related discipline preferred; equivalent experience considered.

Work Environment and Physical Demands

This position involves primarily working at a computer and participating in virtual or in-person meetings. Effective communication is essential, as is the ability to work for extended periods with computer equipment.