Sales Strategy & Operations Lead, Agency Sales

Overview

You're a strategic operations lead partnering with Pinterest's agency sales organization. Agency sales means selling through media buyers at agencies like GroupM, Publicis, Omnicom who control ad budgets for major brands. You spend half your time on planning (sales territories, headcount models, comp design) and half on execution (weekly forecasts, QBRs, tool fixes). You report to Jason Huang and work closely with agency sales VPs.

Role Snapshot

Company Context

Stage: Public company (NYSE: PINS)

Size: 7,000+ employees, Pinterest is a major player in social advertising

Growth: Agency sales is a core channel for Pinterest (agencies control ~70% of digital ad spend). This role is being created to support 2026 growth priorities, suggesting they're scaling the agency sales org.

Market Position: Pinterest is established in display/social ads but fighting for agency wallet share against Google, Meta, TikTok, Snap. Agencies have existing relationships with these competitors.

GTM Reality

Who You Support:

• Agency sales reps selling Pinterest ad products to media agencies
• Agencies then place those ads for their brand clients (CPG, retail, automotive, etc.)
• Deals often involve RFPs, quarterly business reviews, annual upfronts

Sales Model:

• Agency relationships = recurring revenue
• Mix of hunting (new agency partners) and farming (growing existing agency spend)
• Complex multi-stakeholder deals (agency media buyer, brand CMO, procurement)

Your Scope:

• Likely supporting 20-40 agency sales reps across different verticals/regions
• Partner with Jason Huang (manager) and agency sales leadership
• Cross-functional work with finance, legal, product, marketing

Competitive Landscape

Pinterest's Position: 482M monthly users, strong in lifestyle/shopping categories. Competes for agency spend against:

• Meta (Facebook/Instagram): Dominant player, bigger reach
• Google (YouTube, Display Network): Largest ad platform
• TikTok: Hot platform agencies are shifting budgets to
• Snap: Similar visual/mobile audience
• Amazon: Growing fast in CPG/retail categories

Agency Reality: Media buyers have existing relationships and annual contracts with Pinterest's competitors. Your sales team is fighting for incremental budget or steal share. You'll need to understand win/loss patterns to help reps compete.

What You'll Actually Do

Time Breakdown

Strategic Planning (30%) | Forecasting/Analytics (25%) | Operational Execution (25%) | Stakeholder Management (20%)

Key Activities

• Annual/Quarterly Planning: Build territory plans, set quotas, model headcount needs. You're in Excel building scenarios: "If we hire 10 more agency reps, what's the revenue impact?" This is high-stakes work—get quotas wrong and reps quit or sandbag.
• Forecasting & Pipeline Management: Weekly pipeline calls with agency sales leaders. You present the numbers, highlight risks ("$5M slipped to Q2"), and propose solutions. You're the data person in the room telling VPs if their team will hit the quarter.
• Sales Compensation Design: Partner with finance and HR to design/update comp plans. This is complex: base/commission splits, accelerators, SPIFs, multi-year agency deal crediting. Expect endless debates about fairness.
• Salesforce & Tools: Ensure CRM hygiene for the agency team. Fix workflow issues, train reps on new features, manage integrations with planning tools. You're not a full-time admin but you're expected to solve ops problems.
• Business Reviews: Prepare QBR decks for agency sales leadership. Slide after slide of performance metrics, win/loss analysis, competitive insights. You're storytelling with data.
• Territory & Routing Design: Decide which reps cover which agencies/regions. This is political—changing territories means changing comp, and reps will push back. You need to balance coverage optimization with team morale.
• Cross-functional Projects: Lead initiatives like new product launches (getting agency teams trained on CTV/tvScientific), tool implementations (new commission system), or market expansions ("Should we hire in APAC?").
• Ad-hoc Fire Drills: Agency client threatened to churn. Deal stuck in legal for 6 weeks. Rep says Salesforce won't let them close a deal. You're the person who unblocks these issues.

The Honest Reality

What's Hard

• You're in the middle: Sales wants higher quotas and more headcount. Finance wants efficiency and lower costs. You're negotiating between them constantly and someone's always unhappy with your recommendation.
• Agencies are complex: Multi-stakeholder, long sales cycles, annual contracts. Forecasting is messy because one big agency can make or break a quarter. You'll spend hours explaining variance.
• Change management: Any change you make (new comp plan, territory realignment) will piss off some reps. You need thick skin and strong communication skills to push through resistance.
• It's a big company: Pinterest has layers of approvals. Getting buy-in for a new initiative takes months. You'll spend a lot of time in alignment meetings.
• Lead = player-coach: You're doing the work AND providing direction. You might have 1-2 analysts reporting to you, but you're still hands-on in the data. It's not pure management.
• 2026 priorities are shifting: tvScientific acquisition means CTV is a focus. Agency teams are learning new products. You'll be supporting a sales team that's also figuring things out.

What Success Looks Like

• Agency sales team hits/exceeds revenue targets (you're measured on their success)
• Forecast accuracy within 5% each quarter
• Sales comp plan runs smoothly with minimal disputes
• You launch 2-3 strategic initiatives that improve productivity (better territories, new tools, scaled training)
• Sales leadership trusts your recommendations and you have a seat at the table for big decisions
• You're not drowning in operational fires—your processes are humming

Who You Work With

Direct Partners:

• Jason Huang (your manager): Aligns you on priorities, reviews your plans, escalates blockers
• Agency Sales VPs/Directors: You're their strategic partner. Weekly check-ins, monthly QBRs, constant Slack messages asking for data.
• Sales Reps: You don't manage them, but you field their questions (comp issues, Salesforce problems, territory disputes)

Cross-functional:

• Finance: Monthly forecast reviews, annual planning, comp plan approvals
• HR/Talent: Hiring plans, headcount budget, comp benchmarking
• Product/Marketing: Launch readiness for new ad products (CTV, new formats)
• Legal: Contract approvals, deal structure guidance
• Other SS&O Leads: Alexis L.'s team, programmatic ops lead. You'll collaborate on company-wide initiatives.

Requirements

• 6-8 years in sales operations, strategy, or business operations (ad tech or media sales preferred)
• Deep understanding of agency media buying (how agencies work, RFP processes, annual upfronts)
• Experience building sales comp plans, territories, and quota models
• Strong financial modeling and forecasting skills
• Expert-level Excel/Google Sheets and Salesforce
• Experience managing cross-functional projects with executive stakeholders
• Data-driven but also able to influence without authority (sales leaders don't report to you)
• Comfortable with ambiguity and rapid change (Pinterest + tvScientific integration is ongoing)
• Bonus: Experience with CTV/programmatic advertising or social media ad platforms
• Player-coach mentality: willing to roll up sleeves and do the work, not just delegate