YoungLA is seeking a Creative Strategist, Audience & Insights, to lead creative strategy and testing for paid media and to support email and SMS messaging across YoungLA For Him and YoungLA For Her. This person will figure out who we should be talking to, what we should say to them, and how to prove it works. They will turn customer research, market insights, and performance data into clear test ideas, then work with our teams to test new concepts, messages, and audiences that drive new customers and growth.
Working closely with Performance Marketing, Lifecycle, Social, the Athletes and Creators team, agency partners, and each brand’s Creative team, the Creative Strategist will connect what we learn about our customers to the ads and messages they see. They will bring audience insights and test results to the teams who make our ads and campaigns, so every team can build on what’s working. They will also partner closely with our organic social teams, who own how YoungLA shows up organically, sharing what’s working in paid and learning from what resonates in organic.
The ideal candidate is a culturally fluent performance creative strategist who loves both the data and the idea. They understand fitness, bodybuilding, streetwear, and internet culture, write hooks that stop the scroll, and can explain why an ad worked. This role starts as an individual contributor with real ownership and influence. It may also manage a graphic designer and work with freelancers and contractors as the team grows.
ABOUT THE ROLE
YoungLA is seeking a Creative Strategist, Audience & Insights, to lead creative strategy and testing for paid media and to support email and SMS messaging across YoungLA For Him and YoungLA For Her. This person will figure out who we should be talking to, what we should say to them, and how to prove it works. They will turn customer research, market insights, and performance data into clear test ideas, then work with our teams to test new concepts, messages, and audiences that drive new customers and growth.
Working closely with Performance Marketing, Lifecycle, Social, the Athletes and Creators team, agency partners, and each brand’s Creative team, the Creative Strategist will connect what we learn about our customers to the ads and messages they see. They will bring audience insights and test results to the teams who make our ads and campaigns, so every team can build on what’s working. They will also partner closely with our organic social teams, who own how YoungLA shows up organically, sharing what’s working in paid and learning from what resonates in organic.
The ideal candidate is a culturally fluent performance creative strategist who loves both the data and the idea. They understand fitness, bodybuilding, streetwear, and internet culture, write hooks that stop the scroll, and can explain why an ad worked. This role starts as an individual contributor with real ownership and influence. It may also manage a graphic designer and work with freelancers and contractors as the team grows.
KEY RESPONSIBILITIES
Creative Strategy for Paid Media
- Own the paid creative testing roadmap across YoungLA For Him and YoungLA For Her: what we test, why, in what order, and what we learned.
- Identify what to test in paid media, including audiences, angles, hooks, and messaging, based on audience insights and performance data.
- Partner with each brand’s Creative team, in-house designers, creators, and athletes to plan new ads and ad variations for testing, sharing the audience insight and goal behind each test.
- Write scripts and prompts for athlete and creator content used in paid media, in partnership with the Athletes and Creators team.
- Maintain a living library of winning and losing concepts by audience, angle, and format so every team can build on what works.
Lifecycle Messaging Support (Email and SMS)
- Partner with the lifecycle team and each brand’s team on email and SMS campaign messaging, bringing audience insights and paid test learnings to inform their plans.
- Help develop and test subject lines, SMS copy, and campaign angles with each brand’s team, and share results so everyone can build on what works.
- Help keep messaging consistent across paid, email, and SMS for product drops, collaborations, and major commercial moments, including Black Friday.
Audience Insights and Market Research
- Run YoungLA’s customer and audience survey program, including recurring audience surveys, brand tracking, and post-purchase surveys.
- Stay closely connected to trends and conversations across fitness, bodybuilding, fashion, streetwear, sports, creators, and internet culture.
- Monitor competitors, consumer behavior, and emerging market opportunities.
- Use customer feedback, reviews, social listening, performance data, and market research to understand who our customers are, why they buy, and who we’re missing.
- Turn findings into short, actionable insight readouts that inform messaging, testing, and planning across Growth.
Audience Expansion and Testing
- Find adjacent audiences, communities, and markets where YoungLA has room to grow, and recommend which to test.
- Develop a test plan for each new audience, partner with Creative on the ads to test, and work with Performance Marketing and agency partners to launch and read each test.
- Recommend which audiences, messages, and concepts to scale based on new-customer growth and acquisition cost, not just short-term return.
Cross-Functional Execution and Performance
- Run a weekly creative performance review with Performance Marketing and agency partners, and turn the results into the next round of tests.
- Keep tests and research projects organized and on schedule in Asana, and keep partners across Growth, Creative, and agencies aligned on timelines and next steps.
- Share test results and audience insights with Creative, Social, and Lifecycle partners so each team can see what’s resonating with customers.
- Track and report on what we’ve tested, how often new concepts beat our current best ads, and how many new customers our tests bring in.
- Present insights, test learnings, and recommendations to Growth leadership.
- May manage a graphic designer for paid ads, including assigning work, setting priorities, and reviewing ads against each test plan.
- Work with freelancers, contractors, and agencies on ad variations, research, and other projects, including scoping work, managing timelines, and reviewing deliverables.
Additional Support
- Support community events, brand activations, and key moments as needed, including audience insights, messaging, and cross-functional planning, especially during launches and peak periods.
QUALIFICATIONS
- 5+ years of experience in creative strategy, performance creative, consumer insights, growth marketing, or a similarly scoped role, ideally at a direct-to-consumer brand.
- A track record of developing and testing paid social creative, especially on Meta and TikTok, with examples of tests that shaped what a brand did next.
- Hands-on customer research experience (writing surveys, digging into reviews and social listening, or talking to customers) and a knack for turning findings into ideas the team can act on.
- Strong analytical skills, including comfort digging into ad performance data, spreadsheets, and dashboards, and turning research and test results into clear, concise recommendations.
- Strong understanding of audience strategy and messaging, including how the ad itself (who’s in it and what it says) shapes who sees it on today’s ad platforms, plus real curiosity about who else YoungLA could be for.
- Excellent copywriting skills, especially hooks, short-form video scripts, email subject lines, and SMS copy.
- A collaborative partner to creative and channel teams, with experience sharing insights and test results in ways that help designers, creators, and marketers do their best work.
- Strong organizational skills and comfortable working independently, influencing cross-functional teams, and taking ownership of results.
Nice to Have
- Experience at an apparel, fitness, fashion, lifestyle, sports, or culturally relevant consumer brand.
- Experience with creative analytics tools such as Motion.
- Experience with survey and brand tracking tools such as Pollfish, Typeform, Qualtrics, or Fairing.
- Experience sizing and testing new audiences or market opportunities.
- Experience with email and SMS platforms such as Klaviyo or Attentive.
- Experience managing a designer or directing freelancers and contractors.
ADDITIONAL REQUIREMENTS
- Full-time, in-office position based at YoungLA’s headquarters in Northridge, California.
- Ability to travel and attend events as needed.
- Flexibility to provide occasional evening and weekend support for launches, events, and important brand moments.
- Availability during peak business periods, including Black Friday.
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