Senior Manager, Marketing Strategy & Planning | Irvine, CA

Team Name:

Job Title:

Senior Manager, Marketing Strategy & Planning | Irvine, CA

Requisition ID:

R027626

Job Description:

The Senior Manager, Marketing Strategy & Planning, is a strategic leader and analytical partner to Blizzard’s International Marketing team. This role owns key strategic planning processes and frameworks that directly inform international marketing priorities, investment decisions, and global growth outcomes.

This role translates market, player, competitive, cultural, and performance data into decision-ready insights and drives those insights through to execution.

Success means bringing structure to ambiguous questions, building rigorous models and business cases, and delivering clear recommendations that shape decisions, guide execution, and improve measurable marketing impact at a global scale.

This role is anticipated to be a hybrid work position. The potential home studio for this role is Irvine, CA.

YOUR MISSION
Own and drive international marketing strategy and planning by delivering market intelligence, investment recommendations, and scalable frameworks that define where to play, how to win, and how Blizzard grows globally.

Responsabilities

Strategy & Decision Leadership

• Partner with International Marketing, Strategy, Finance, Analytics, Business Development, Product Marketing, and regional teams to define growth priorities, evaluate investment options, and guide strategic decision-making.
• Lead cross-functional alignment on strategic recommendations and drive decisions through to execution across international markets.
• Frame ambiguous business questions, define analytical approaches, and synthesize findings into clear, actionable recommendations for senior leadership.
• Own prioritization frameworks that inform resource allocation, investment trade-offs, and market focus.
• Partner with senior leadership to support annual and long-range planning processes.

Market & Opportunity Analysis

• Assess global markets, audience segments, cultural dynamics, competitors, and ecosystem trends to identify and prioritize international growth opportunities.
• Size opportunities using TAM/SAM/SOM, segmentation, and scenario analysis to inform investment and resource allocation decisions.
• Monitor performance signals and external trends to proactively surface risks, gaps, and emerging opportunities impacting growth.

Business Case Development & Financial Modeling

• Own development and validation of financial models, forecasts, and investment cases in partnership with the Director of International Growth, Finance, and cross-functional stakeholders.
• Evaluate expansion initiatives, partnerships, and new business models through scenario planning, sensitivity analysis, and key assumption testing.
• Translate financial and strategic analysis into clear implications and decisions that inform marketing planning, budgets, and growth targets.
• Ensure alignment between strategic recommendations, financial models, and execution plans.

Insights to Action & Performance Impact

• Turn marketing, player, and business performance data into prioritized actions, hypotheses, and test-and-learn strategies.
• Identify performance drivers, trends, and anomalies, and drive adoption of insights into execution across global and regional teams.
• Ensure reporting outputs are directly connected to decision-making, execution plans, and measurable improvements in marketing effectiveness and growth.
• Drive continuous optimization loops across planning, execution, and performance learning.

Planning Frameworks & Scalable Operating Models

• Own and evolve global planning frameworks for market prioritization, resource allocation, and investment decision-making.
• Define operating cadences, governance, and planning processes that enable consistent, data-driven decision-making across markets.
• Design global and reactive marketing frameworks that enable teams to act on real-time signals while balancing global consistency with local market flexibility.
• Build and implement scalable operating models that clarify what to scale, iterate, or stop across international markets.
• Ensure adoption and consistent application of frameworks across regional teams.

Leadership & Cross-Functional Influence

• Lead cross-functional teams and initiatives without direct authority, driving accountability, alignment, and execution across stakeholders.
• May manage or mentor team members or contribute to team development and capability building where applicable.
• Act as a key strategic partner to senior stakeholders, influencing decision-making at the functional and organizational level.

Experience

• 8+ years of experience in strategy, analytics, marketing planning, business operations, finance, consulting, or related roles.
• Bachelor’s degree in Business, Economics, Marketing, Finance, or a related field, or equivalent practical experience.
• Experience translating complex data and ambiguous business questions into structured recommendations that influence senior stakeholders and business outcomes.

Knowledge and Skills

• Strong financial modeling, forecasting, quantitative analysis, and business case development skills.

Key attributes

• Proven ability to lead cross-functional initiatives and drive execution in complex, matrixed environments.
• Strong executive communication, storytelling, and data visualization skills.

Extra Points

• Experience in gaming, entertainment, technology, digital commerce, or management consulting.
• Familiarity with international markets, regional consumer behavior, cultural insights, or global go-to-market planning.
• Experience with marketing analytics, audience segmentation, campaign measurement, and performance optimization.
• Exposure to digital commerce, platform ecosystems, payments, or fintech models.
• Advanced proficiency with Excel/Sheets, BI or data visualization tools, and presentation/storytelling tools.

Your Platform
At Blizzard Entertainment, we pour our hearts and souls into everything we create. Best known for iconic video game universes including Warcraft, Overwatch, Diablo, and StarCraft, we’ve been creating genre-defining games for millions of players around the world for more than 30 years. We’re on a quest: bring our dreams to life and craft the most epic entertainment experiences…ever. Hard work, iteration, and polish go into the Blizzard “secret recipe,” but the most important ingredients come from talented people who share our vision. If that sounds like you, join us.

Our World
Best known for iconic video game universes including Warcraft®, Overwatch®, Diablo®, and StarCraft®, Blizzard Entertainment, Inc., a division of Activision Blizzard, which was acquired by Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT), is a premier developer and publisher of entertainment experiences. Blizzard Entertainment has created some of the industry’s most critically acclaimed and genre-defining games over the last 30 years, with a track record that includes multiple Game of the Year awards. Blizzard engages tens of millions of players globally across PC, console, and mobile platforms.

We are committed to fostering a diverse and inclusive environment where everyone can thrive and contribute to creating world-class entertainment experiences.

Rewards

We provide a suite of benefits that promote physical, emotional and financial well-being for ‘Every World’ - we’ve got our employees covered!  Subject to eligibility requirements, the Company offers comprehensive benefits including:

• Medical, dental, vision, health savings account or health reimbursement account, healthcare spending accounts, dependent care spending accounts, life and AD&D insurance, disability insurance;
• 401(k) with Company match, tuition reimbursement, charitable donation matching;
• Paid holidays and vacation, paid sick time, floating holidays, compassion and bereavement leaves, parental leave;
• Mental health & wellbeing programs, fitness programs, free and discounted games, and a variety of other voluntary benefit programs like supplemental life & disability, legal service, ID protection, rental insurance, and others;
• If the Company requires that you move geographic locations for the job, then you may also be eligible for relocation assistance.

Eligibility to participate in these benefits may vary for part time and temporary full-time employees and interns with the Company.  You can learn more by visiting https://www.benefitsforeveryworld.com/.

In the U.S., the standard base pay range for this role is $116,800.00 - $216,000.00 Annual. These values reflect the expected base pay range of new hires across all U.S. locations. Ultimately, your specific range and offer will be based on several factors, including relevant experience, performance, and work location. Your Talent Professional can share this role’s range details for your local geography during the hiring process. In addition to a competitive base pay, employees in this role may be eligible for incentive compensation. Incentive compensation is not guaranteed. While we strive to provide competitive offers to successful candidates, new hire compensation is negotiable.