Director, Companion Animal Global Marketing – Canine/Dog Vaccines

Job Description

The Companion Animal (CA) Business unit leads strategy development and execution across markets throughout the world. It drives global marketing strategies and activities to drive successful key company CA launches and maximizes the value of in-line products. our company's Animal Health (MAH) has a robust pipeline of new products and initiatives providing customer benefits and driving business growth. 

In this new position, the Director, Canine/Dog Vaccines and Total Portfolio Marketing will lead the brand and product portfolio management for the respective canine vaccines and overall range, the marketing strategy, campaign, and key message development to drive successful global strategic launches of major new products. The franchise marketing teams are expected to drive innovation to capture the most value at the customer level in alignment with division’s strategic initiatives.

This position requires a marketing director with vision, market understanding, leadership and influencing skills. You will be responsible for crafting the direction for new and existing vaccine products and have responsibility for influencing category growth, the company’s category portfolio strategy and synergies across franchise products.  Further, in conjunction with Research and Development, you will help support the future pipeline direction utilizing your deep understanding of the needs of customer segments and motivators that drive behavior.

This position reports directly to the Head of Global Companion Animal Marketing and develops and directs product marketing plan, positioning, campaign creation, and development of key differentiated messaging. The role is based in Rahway, New Jersey.
 
This role is an essential interacting and influencing at all levels of the company as needed (including Senior Executives) and working closely with Regulatory, Legal, Manufacturing, Technical Transfer, Supply Planning and Global Customer Marketing and Commercial Execution to ensure optimized and successful Companion Animal strategic launches.

Primary Activities:

Accountable to lead brand, product and customer strategies, understand competitive dynamics above product level, identify growth opportunities, define competitive advantages, and set a work standard of excellence.
•    Direct, oversee and develop customer and marketing/commercial strategies for all canine vaccines as well as for the entire portfolio management in collaboration with the feline vaccine marketing lead, ensuring alignment with and integration of regional and key local market needs and growth opportunities. 
•    Develop and gain company agreement for plans to drive category growth, the company’s vaccine strategy, and synergies between all products within the bios franchise.
•    Craft key content messaging and positioning in conjunction with Scientific Medical Affairs; conduct competitive and market analysis to determine and highlight key differentiators.
•    Build and further develop growth for our company's Animal Health in market leadership for companion animal.
•    Direct planning, creation, and launch creative campaigns that resonate targeted audiences.
•    Establish goals marketing deliverables and metrics; work with marketing directors to establish team and individual goals and metrics.
•    Be an effective leader and ensure all marketing campaigns are timely, successful, metrics-driven, and goal-oriented to support regional/marketing implementation. 
•    Communicate, collaborate, and align actions with key stakeholders within the organization on core marketing launch strategies and address local launch and post-launch needs. 
•    Prepare annual 5-year plan forecasts, annual marketing plan and oversee budget allocation for Global Marketing promotional expenses.
- Build and leverage deep insight at segment level
•    Collaborate and partner with regions, markets, and customers to gain insights.
•    Share learnings with the local team and internal partners.
•    Leverage proprietary customer segmentations (vets and pet owners) to elaborate content and messages customized to targeted populations.
•    Understand and use key sources of information working with Competitive Intelligence resources to understand dynamics of category.

Education Minimum Requirement:  

Bachelor’s Degree

Preferred: Master’s Degree, MBA or Advanced degree in marketing, product management Life sciences, veterinary medicine, animal science, or medical marketing.

Required experience and skills:

- Minimum of 10-15 years of broad work experience in marketing, product management, leadership, and related sales support activities.

- Experience leading teams from diverse countries and business backgrounds.
- Skilled in navigating and influencing within an international matrix organization, driving rapid growth, and elevating market position, aligned with global and regional objectives. 
- Demonstrated marketing experience of global product launches with measured results with set of clear metrics.
- Experience managing multimillion-dollar budgets across multiple initiatives.
- Marketing acumen and experience within new product planning and brand positioning.
- Strong ability to plan and manage marketing planning workflow.
- Familiarity of the Animal Health or related industry, marketing, and commercial Operations. Familiarity with the vaccine business is a plus. 
- Experience in creating, defining, and leveraging segmentation, positioning, and messaging strategies based on market research, competitive analysis, and an unwavering focus on the customer. 
- Interpersonal skills that will help in developing and building strong internal and external relationships with key stakeholders to collaborate and drive results for business unit.
- Ability to work in matrix organization and work with people in across multiple time zones and locations. 
- Excellent written and verbal communication and presentation skills.
- Able to travel up to 40% of time including Europe, Asia, and South America.

Required Skills:

Agile Methodology, Brand Messaging, Cross-Cultural Teams, Direct Marketing, Leadership, Marketing, Marketing Planning, Market Research, Portfolio Management, Pricing Strategies, Professional Networking, Strategic Planning, Strategic Thinking

Preferred Skills:

Current Employees apply HERE

Current Contingent Workers apply HERE

US and Puerto Rico Residents Only:

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As an Equal Employment Opportunity Employer, we provide equal opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment and prohibit discrimination on the basis of race, color, age, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, protected veteran status, disability status, or other applicable legally protected characteristics.  As a federal contractor, we comply with all affirmative action requirements for protected veterans and individuals with disabilities.  For more information about personal rights under the U.S. Equal Opportunity Employment laws, visit:

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The salary range for this role is

$190,800.00 - $300,300.00

This is the lowest to highest salary we in good faith believe we would pay for this role at the time of this posting. An employee’s position within the salary range will be based on several factors including, but not limited to relevant education, qualifications, certifications, experience, skills, geographic location, government requirements, and business or organizational needs.

The successful candidate will be eligible for annual bonus and long-term incentive, if applicable.

We offer a comprehensive package of benefits.  Available benefits include medical, dental, vision healthcare and other insurance benefits (for employee and family), retirement benefits, including 401(k), paid holidays, vacation, and compassionate and sick days. More information about benefits is available at https://jobs.merck.com/us/en/compensation-and-benefits.

You can apply for this role through https://jobs.merck.com/us/en (or via the Workday Jobs Hub if you are a current employee). The application deadline for this position is stated on this posting.

San Francisco Residents Only: We will consider qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records for employment in compliance with the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance

Los Angeles Residents Only: We will consider for employment all qualified applicants, including those with criminal histories, in a manner consistent with the requirements of applicable state and local laws, including the City of Los Angeles’ Fair Chance Initiative for Hiring Ordinance

Search Firm Representatives Please Read Carefully 
Merck & Co., Inc., Rahway, NJ, USA, also known as Merck Sharp & Dohme LLC, Rahway, NJ, USA, does not accept unsolicited assistance from search firms for employment opportunities. All CVs / resumes submitted by search firms to any employee at our company without a valid written search agreement in place for this position will be deemed the sole property of our company.  No fee will be paid in the event a candidate is hired by our company as a result of an agency referral where no pre-existing agreement is in place. Where agency agreements are in place, introductions are position specific. Please, no phone calls or emails. 

Employee Status:

Regular

Relocation:

Domestic/International

VISA Sponsorship:

Yes

Travel Requirements:

50%

Flexible Work Arrangements:

Hybrid

Shift:

Not Indicated

Valid Driving License:

No

Hazardous Material(s):

N/A

Job Posting End Date:

10/14/2026

*A job posting is effective until 11:59:59PM on the day BEFORE the listed job posting end date. Please ensure you apply to a job posting no later than the day BEFORE the job posting end date.