VP, Business Development

• Serve as the senior business development lead for Excel Brand Marketing, owning pipeline growth from prospecting through close.
• Build and execute a targeted outreach strategy, leveraging an established network to generate brand conversations, meetings, pitches, and RFPs.
• Bring a strong network of senior level brand and property relationships to the organization.
• Drive the RFP response process, including the integration of key support functions across strategy, creative, production, measurement, hospitality and account management. 
• Lead the team responsible for the full business development cycle — identifying and targeting prospects, conducting outreach, preparing materials, drafting scopes of work, and coordinating onboarding with finance and legal.
• Partner with Excel's broader sales organization to identify existing relationships across the organization that can accelerate introductions and close new business.
• Maintain and evolve Excel Brand Marketing's new business pipeline in Salesforce, ensuring real-time visibility and disciplined tracking.

• Own revenue targets and conversion metrics across new business efforts.
• Develop long-term commercial frameworks that support durable, scalable client partnerships.
• Play a leading role in high-priority pitches and RFP responses, ensuring Excel's integrated offering is compellingly positioned.

• Demonstrate a command of all Excel Brand Marketing service areas — strategy, activation, measurement and analytics, talent, creative, digital, social, experiential, and hospitality — and connect those capabilities to client business needs.
• Understand how Excel Brand Marketing services can bring solutions to new business prospect challenges, briefs, and opportunities. 
• Bring deep knowledge of sports, culture, and the brand marketing landscape to identify emerging opportunities and craft differentiated partnership narratives.

• Support execution of select short-term, project-based engagements once secured, managing internal coordination and external client communication with precision.
• Play a key role in ramping up new projects alongside the account management function, ensuring smooth handover for execution

• Manage and mentor teammates up, down, and across the group — fostering a culture of accountability, curiosity, and exceptional client service.
• Contribute to agency-wide strategy and the ongoing evolution of the Business Development function within Excel Brand Marketing.
• Develop strong relationships with colleagues in other divisions, including Properties, Talent, and Search
• Maintain and grow an active executive network across brands, properties, agencies, and the broader sports and marketing industry.
• Represent Excel Brand Marketing externally in client-facing and industry settings.

• Bachelor's degree required; MBA preferred.
• 10+ years of direct experience in sponsorship marketing, brand marketing strategy, or agency business development.
• Proven track record of securing new revenue and identifying organic growth within existing client portfolios.
• Prior experience in sports marketing or agency business development strongly preferred.
• Demonstrated success developing and implementing sponsorship marketing strategy and activation on behalf of a client or company.
• Experience managing day-to-day relationships with clients, properties, and agency partners.

• Deep understanding of the business development process within a creative or sports marketing agency environment.
• Exceptional commercial instincts and a proven ability to identify, pursue, and close new revenue opportunities.
• Executive presence with the ability to build trust and influence senior and C-suite brand stakeholders.
• An established network of brand relationships and a genuine desire to grow and activate that network over time.
• Outstanding communicator — written and verbal — with the ability to craft and deliver compelling brand narratives.
• Strategic thinker who balances long-term partnership vision with near-term commercial realities.
• Proficient in PowerPoint, Excel, and Word, with the ability to build and lead the development of high-impact presentations.
• Proactive, action-oriented, and self-directed — equally effective driving independently and as part of a dynamic team.
• High emotional intelligence, with the ability to read a room, adapt communication style, and connect authentically across audiences.
• Uncompromised ethics and integrity, always focused on doing what is right for clients and the agency.

Excel Sports Management provides equal employment opportunities (EEO) to all employees and applicants for employment without regard to age, color, national origin, citizenship status, physical or mental disability, race, religion, creed, gender, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity and/or expression, genetic information, marital status, status with regard to public assistance, veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state or local law.  This policy applies to all terms and conditions of employment, including recruiting, hiring, placement, promotion, termination, leaves of absence, compensation and training.