The Economist Group
Head of Trading
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Head of Trading
About The Economist Group
Since 1843, The Economist Group has championed independence, excellence, and openness, helping people understand and tackle the critical challenges shaping the world. Today, we are building on that legacy as a global media and information-services company powered by digital innovation, analytical rigor, and evidence-based insight.
Across our three businesses—The Economist, Economist Enterprise, and Economist Education—we deliver trusted analysis and insights to individuals and organizations in more than 170 countries. United by a shared purpose to drive progress, we empower decision-makers to make sense of change and chart a course through an increasingly complex world.
As a colleague, you will be part of a culture that values ideas, encourages ownership, and holds itself to high standards. We invest in people who are curious, thoughtful, and adaptable, whether they are launching new products, reporting on global events, or harnessing emerging technologies such as AI to improve how we work. Here, fresh thinking is taken seriously, ambition is matched by integrity, and great work is recognized. Working across disciplines, geographies, and perspectives, we are united by a commitment to innovation, excellence, and creating meaningful impact.
Want to discover more about life at The Economist Group? Follow @EconomistCareers on Instagram to discover the people, stories, and opportunities that make TEG unique.
The Role
We are seeking a strategically minded Head of Trading to lead commercial performance management of The Economist’s B2C subscription business. This role owns the trading rhythm for subscription performance, providing clear, actionable insight and recommendations, identifying risks and opportunities, and enabling decisions that deliver sustainable subscriber and revenue growth. It is not a channel-marketing role; its value lies in connecting performance across acquisition, conversion, retention, engagement, and customer lifetime value into a single commercial view.
Working closely with Marketing, Retention and Engagement, Product, Propositions, Analytics, and Finance, the Head of Trading will own performance oversight across markets, channels, and products. They will be a trusted commercial partner to the Managing Director, bringing both challenge and recommendations to senior decision-making. The role reports to the Managing Director, The Economist B2C, with a team of two reporting into it.
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Key Responsibilities
Trading Performance and Insight
- Own the weekly and monthly subscription trading cadence: covering acquisition, conversion, churn, subscriber net growth, and customer lifetime value.
- Lead the analysis of daily, weekly, and monthly subscription performance across products, channels, and markets.
- Diagnose performance movements, identifying emerging risks and opportunities, and recommending specific commercial interventions.
- Translate complex performance data into concise, decision-ready narratives for senior stakeholders.
- Establish and maintain a clear set of commercial KPIs, targets, and performance thresholds.
- Oversee dashboards, reporting, and performance tools in partnership with Business Intelligence, Insights & Analytics, and Finance—ensuring reporting is accurate, timely, and aligned to business priorities.
Commercial Planning and Forecasting
- Partner with Finance to set commercial targets, develop forecasts, and maintain an accurate view of performance against plan.
- Lead scenario analysis and quantify the expected commercial impact of proposed initiatives, pricing changes, and investment decisions.
- Inform trading decisions on pricing, offers, promotions, packaging, and other commercial levers, working with the relevant accountable teams.
- Ensure that short-term performance actions support longer-term subscriber value and sustainable growth.
Experimentation and Performance Improvement
- Partner with Conversion Rate Optimisation (CRO), Product, Marketing, and Analytics teams to shape and prioritize an evidence-led experimentation roadmap.
- Ensure tests across acquisition, paywall, checkout, onboarding, engagement, retention, and cancellation are evaluated consistently and translated into scalable actions.
- Challenge initiatives constructively, using commercial evidence to focus resources on the highest-value opportunities.
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Experience and Skills
- Strong judgement, intellectual curiosity, and the confidence to provide constructive challenge to senior stakeholders.
- Significant experience in trading, commercial analytics, performance management, or commercial planning within a digital subscription, ecommerce, consumer-media, or similarly data-rich business.
- Strong understanding of subscription economics, including acquisition, conversion, retention, churn, pricing, customer lifetime value, and forecasting.
- Highly analytical, with a proven ability to turn complex data into clear commercial recommendations.
- Excellent communication and storytelling skills; able to distill complex performance issues into a compelling decision narrative.
- Experience partnering across Finance, Analytics, Product, and Marketing, with the credibility to influence without direct ownership of all delivery teams.
- Experience leading, developing, and motivating analytically focused teams.
- Proficiency with Tableau, Looker, Power BI, or similar reporting and analytics tools.
Working Arrangements
The majority of our roles operate on a hybrid working pattern, with 3+ days office attendance required.
What We Offer
Our benefits package is designed to support your wellbeing, growth, and work-life balance. It includes a highly competitive pension or 401(k) plan, private health insurance, and 24/7 access to counseling and wellbeing resources through our Employee Assistance Program.
We also offer a range of lifestyle benefits, including our Work From Anywhere program, which allows you to work from any location where you have the legal right to do so for up to 25 days per year. In addition, we provide generous annual and parental leave, as well as dedicated days off for volunteering and even for moving home.
You will also be given free access to all The Economist content, including an online subscription, our range of apps, podcasts, and more.
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