Advertising account manager vs account director

The differences between advertising account managers and account directors can be seen in a few details. Each job has different responsibilities and duties. While it typically takes 4-6 years to become an advertising account manager, becoming an account director takes usually requires 6-8 years. Additionally, an account director has an average salary of $114,728, which is higher than the $75,431 average annual salary of an advertising account manager.

The top three skills for an advertising account manager include lead generation, sales presentations and account management. The most important skills for an account director are account management, project management, and work ethic.

Advertising account manager vs account director overview

	Advertising Account Manager	Account Director
Yearly salary	$75,431	$114,728
Hourly rate	$36.26	$55.16
Growth rate	10%	5%
Number of jobs	105,277	132,260
Job satisfaction	-	-
Most common degree	Bachelor's Degree, 81%	Bachelor's Degree, 80%
Average age	39	46
Years of experience	6	8

What does an advertising account manager do?

An advertising account manager works at advertising agencies where they are in charge of communicating with clients and managing accounts, building positive client relationships in the process. They coordinate directly with creative teams, ensuring that operations adhere to the clients' budgets, preferences, guidelines, and project requirements. There are also instances when they must secure the clients' advertising needs by liaising with external parties, purchasing advertising spaces, and researching new advertising opportunities. Moreover, an advertising account manager answers inquiries and updates the clients regularly.

What does an account director do?

An account director is responsible for managing client accounts, monitoring budgets, and sales forecasting. Their goal is to maintain stable account management strategies, meet clients' demands, develop healthy professional partnerships that would generate revenues, increase profitability, and achieve the organization's long-term goals objectives. Account directors supervise the account management staff, ensuring the project's successful completion with the highest efficiency and accuracy. An account director also plans training programs to maximize their performance and productivity, especially when dealing with deadlines and clients' requests.

Advertising account manager vs account director salary

Advertising account managers and account directors have different pay scales, as shown below.

	Advertising Account Manager	Account Director
Average salary	$75,431	$114,728
Salary range	Between $50,000 And $112,000	Between $82,000 And $158,000
Highest paying City	San Francisco, CA	San Francisco, CA
Highest paying state	Nevada	New Jersey
Best paying company	Microsoft	BuzzFeed
Best paying industry	Internet	Professional

Differences between advertising account manager and account director education

There are a few differences between an advertising account manager and an account director in terms of educational background:

	Advertising Account Manager	Account Director
Most common degree	Bachelor's Degree, 81%	Bachelor's Degree, 80%
Most common major	Business	Business
Most common college	Northwestern University	University of Southern California

Advertising account manager vs account director demographics

Here are the differences between advertising account managers' and account directors' demographics:

	Advertising Account Manager	Account Director
Average age	39	46
Gender ratio	Male, 42.5% Female, 57.5%	Male, 50.9% Female, 49.1%
Race ratio	Black or African American, 3.4% Unknown, 4.7% Hispanic or Latino, 12.0% Asian, 7.6% White, 71.9% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.4%	Black or African American, 3.2% Unknown, 4.4% Hispanic or Latino, 9.8% Asian, 4.1% White, 78.2% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.2%
LGBT Percentage	10%	7%

Differences between advertising account manager and account director duties and responsibilities

Advertising account manager example responsibilities.

Manage company website and client Facebook accounts to optimize brand promotion.
Manage copywriting and spot production scheduling
Negotiate advertising purchase contracts, respond to RFP's and maintain client relations to ensure effective ROI are delivered.
Support client's paid search and SEO efforts with data reporting and analysis.
Provide accounts marketing solutions through expert knowledge of market trends for advertising keys, with expectation of providing profitable ROI.
Conduct regular account appraisals to accelerate customer adoption by working closely with the customer to educate and assess cloud technology needs.

Account director example responsibilities.

Manage coordination with HCP agencies for launch.
Manage the development and creation of print and broadcast advertising and in-store merchandising.
Manage relationships with all GPO pharmacy, medical device, and physician preference teams.
Manage client accounts as well as introducing cross selling into other verticals to increase the portfolio.
Manage RFP / RFI process and drive all opportunities that provide a consultative, long-term solution and support.
Increase clients SEO rankings and achieve first page placement both locally and nationally for highly search phrases for a client.

Advertising account manager vs account director skills

Common advertising account manager skills

Lead Generation, 10%
Sales Presentations, 9%
Account Management, 8%
PowerPoint, 7%
Campaign Performance, 7%
Digital Marketing, 7%

Common account director skills

Account Management, 9%
Project Management, 7%
Work Ethic, 7%
Healthcare, 7%
Digital Marketing, 5%
Email Marketing, 4%

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Advertising Account Manager
Advertising Account Manager vs Account Director

Updated January 8, 2025

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