How To Become A Director Of Retail Marketing: What It Is and Career Path

What is a director of retail marketing and how to become one

Updated January 8, 2025

3 min read

Quoted experts

Tobias Sellier,

Richard Tate

The director of retail marketing is chiefly responsible for overseeing the marketing activities conducted in retail stores. Since retail stores play a significant role in developing brand awareness and company reputation, a director of retail marketing has a substantial contribution to the success of a business.

That said, their duties revolve around developing strategies alongside the marketing team, overseeing the results of campaigns in action, conducting market research, analyzing current trends, and coming up with strategies to optimize the marketing aspect of retail stores.

A director of retail marketing typically has a degree in marketing, as well as extensive experience in the industry. Furthermore, they have a deep understanding of how retail marketing works and are knowledgeable in marketing trends, customer behaviors, customer service, and many other aspects of retail marketing.

With this job, one can earn an average of $57 per hour or about $118,000 a year. For directors of retail marketing in bigger companies, the average salary can go well beyond $100,000.

What general advice would you give to a director of retail marketing?

Tobias Sellier

Senior Director, American Public Power Association

There are exciting opportunities to work for community-owned, not-for-profit, hometown public power. From engineers and customer service representatives to lineworkers and administrative professionals, there are many opportunities. And utility employees, being essential workers, even during these challenging times, there are still many jobs that will need to be filled.

ScoreDirector Of Retail MarketingUS Average

Salary

8.3

Avg. Salary $127,546

Avg. Salary $59,228

Stability level

7.5

Growth rate 10%

Growth rate 0.3%

Diversity

3.1

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 0.23%

Asian 8.15%

Black or African American 3.04%

Hispanic or Latino 8.67%

Unknown 5.32%

White 74.58%

Gender

female 49.31%

male 50.69%

Age - 38

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 3.00%

Asian 7.00%

Black or African American 14.00%

Hispanic or Latino 19.00%

White 57.00%

Gender

female 47.00%

male 53.00%

Age - 38

Stress level

7.5

Stress level is high

7.1 - high

Complexity level

9.0

Complexity level is advanced

7 - challenging

Work life balance

3.5

Work life balance is poor

6.4 - fair

Key steps to become a director of retail marketing

Explore director of retail marketing education requirements

Most common director of retail marketing degrees

Bachelor's

72.6 %

Master's

11.8 %

Associate

10.1 %

Start to develop specific director of retail marketing skills

Skills	Percentages
Digital Marketing	32.84%
ROI	5.54%
Marketing Mix	5.54%
Marketing Campaigns	4.18%
Channel Marketing	3.23%

Complete relevant director of retail marketing training and internships

Accountants spend an average of 1-3 months on post-employment, on-the-job training. New directors of retail marketing learn the skills and techniques required for their job and employer during this time. The chart below shows how long it takes to gain competency as a director of retail marketing based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data and data from real director of retail marketing resumes.

Research director of retail marketing duties and responsibilities

Improve ROI analysis and reporting process for annual budget to provide decision support data to achieve long term goals.
Rehabilitate Salesforce implementation that lead to proper pipeline management, sales forecasting, and customer communication.
Utilize POS data for market research.
Execute in-store POS signage on a seasonal basis.

Get director of retail marketing experience

Generally, it takes 8-10 years to become a director of retail marketing. The most common roles before becoming a director of retail marketing include marketing director, brand manager team lead and marketing manager.

Prepare your director of retail marketing resume

When your background is strong enough, you can start writing your director of retail marketing resume.

You can use Zippia's AI resume builder to make the resume writing process easier while also making sure that you include key information that hiring managers expect to see on a director of retail marketing resume. You'll find resume tips and examples of skills, responsibilities, and summaries, all provided by Zippi, your career sidekick.

Choose from 10+ customizable director of retail marketing resume templates

Build a professional director of retail marketing resume in minutes. Browse through our resume examples to identify the best way to word your resume. Then choose from 10+ resume templates to create your director of retail marketing resume.