Marketing Manager – Automotive | Digital, Performance & Brand
KAR Auto Parts / KAR Auto Sales
Mississauga, ON
Full-Time | In-Person
Salary: $55,000–$65,000 per year, based on experience
About the Opportunity
KAR is looking for a hands-on Marketing Manager to take ownership of marketing across two growing automotive businesses: KAR Auto Parts and KAR Auto Sales.
This is not a traditional corporate Marketing Manager position, and it is not simply a social media role.
We are looking for someone who can build, execute, measure and improve.
You will be the first dedicated member of what we intend to develop into an internal marketing department. Initially, you will be hands-on across digital advertising, lead generation, social media, content, email/SMS marketing, promotions, analytics and brand development.
As you demonstrate measurable ROI and identify opportunities where additional resources make business sense, you will have the opportunity to help build a team around you and grow into a larger marketing leadership role.
How We Think About Marketing
We care about followers, impressions, clicks and engagement when they help us understand performance — but they are not our end goal.
Our end goals are customers, sales, revenue and profitable growth.
For KAR Auto Sales, we want to understand the complete funnel:
Marketing Spend → Lead → Appointment → Show → Vehicle Sold → Revenue / Gross Profit
For KAR Auto Parts, marketing supports two distinct customer groups:
- Commercial/B2B customers including repair shops, dealerships and fleets
- Retail/B2C customers purchasing automotive parts
We want someone who is curious about what happens after a lead, click, email or promotion — and who continually uses that information to improve the next campaign.
Your First Priority: KAR Auto Sales
Our dealership depends on a consistent flow of qualified leads.
Your immediate responsibility will be to take ownership of our existing digital marketing infrastructure and ensure our core lead-generation channels continue operating while you begin improving them.
Our current objectives include:
- Social media lead cost
- Social lead-to-sale conversion %
- Consistent qualified lead volume
- Improving cost per appointment, cost per sale and overall marketing ROI
We understand that you are inheriting an existing system. We don't expect everything to be perfect in your first week.
We expect you to get it working, establish the data, test, learn and improve.
What You'll OwnPerformance Marketing & Lead Generation
You will manage and continuously improve digital lead generation across channels including Meta, Google and our websites.
You'll develop campaigns, audiences, offers and creative; monitor budgets and performance; test new approaches; and follow results beyond the initial lead.
You will work closely with our Sales Manager to understand lead quality, appointment rates, show rates and vehicle sales.
Dealership Marketing Programs
You will proactively develop marketing programs designed to generate dealership traffic and vehicle sales.
This could include:
- Finance-focused campaigns
- Vehicle and inventory campaigns
- Trade-in campaigns
- Customer reactivation
- Referral programs
- Seasonal promotions
- Aging-inventory campaigns
- Previous-customer marketing
- Weekend/event campaigns
You will collaborate closely with dealership management while taking responsibility for ensuring marketing programs are launched, tracked and continuously improved.
Social Media & Brand
You will take ownership of our social presence across both companies and help develop recognizable KAR brands.
We want consistent, relevant content — not content created simply to fill a calendar.
You should be comfortable developing concepts, writing copy, creating graphics, shooting content and publishing across major social platforms.
Photography, Video & Content
This is a hands-on position.
You should be comfortable using a phone/camera to capture quality content and producing/editing short-form video.
Content will include:
- Vehicle and dealership content
- Customer deliveries
- Customer testimonials
- Staff and behind-the-scenes content
- Promotional videos
- Automotive educational content
- KAR Auto Parts products and brands
- Commercial/B2B content
- Retail automotive content
Standardized inventory photography for our vehicle listings is handled separately.
One of your early projects will be establishing a process where, whenever possible and with customer permission, vehicle deliveries are photographed or captured for social content.
The goal is to create systems that allow content to be generated consistently — even when you aren't personally holding the camera.
Email, SMS & Customer Database Marketing
A major objective for this role is building KAR-owned marketing databases.
You will help develop and segment email and SMS audiences across both businesses and create campaigns for prospects, existing customers, previous customers, inactive customers and other relevant audiences.
We want our customer databases to become increasingly valuable marketing assets over time.
KAR Auto Parts – Commercial/B2B
Commercial customers represent the largest part of KAR Auto Parts.
You will work with our sales and operations teams to create marketing that helps our representatives win and grow accounts.
This includes:
- Promotional flyers
- Sales collateral
- New product launches
- Seasonal campaigns
- Commercial email/SMS campaigns
- Customer reactivation
- Sales promotions
- Brand/vendor campaigns
- Marketing materials for our outside sales team
We want our sales representatives to consistently have professional reasons and materials to engage their customers.
KAR Auto Parts – Retail/B2C
Retail represents an important growth opportunity.
You will help develop our retail marketing strategy through social media, Google, local search, digital advertising, promotions, educational content, database marketing and other opportunities you identify.
Longer term, this role will also participate in the relaunch and growth of our automotive e-commerce and Amazon channels.
Analytics & Accountability
You should be comfortable with numbers.
We don't expect you to be a data scientist, but we do expect you to understand whether your marketing is working.
You should be able to report on metrics such as:
- Marketing spend
- Cost per lead
- Lead quality
- Appointment and show rates
- Conversion rates
- Customer acquisition cost
- Sales/revenue attributed to campaigns
- Return on marketing investment
When something isn't working, we want someone who wants to understand why.
What Your First Several Months Could Look Like
Week 1: Stabilize and take ownership of KAR Auto Sales' core social, Google and website lead-generation channels. Keep leads flowing, establish initial tracking and begin testing.
Week 2: Meet with key people across KAR Auto Sales and KAR Auto Parts. Understand each department's needs and develop a marketing roadmap separating baseline requirements from growth opportunities.
Month 1: Establish the marketing baseline. Core accounts and channels should be functioning, data should be collected, campaigns should be running and testing should be underway.
Month 2: Optimize. Use the initial data to improve campaigns, creative, targeting, lead quality, content, database marketing and departmental programs.
Month 3: We want to see a noticeable difference. Marketing should feel organized, active and measurable, with clear evidence that we're moving in the right direction.
Months 5–6: If the results support it, begin identifying opportunities to add resources and build out the marketing department.
Around Month 8: Participate in the planned relaunch and growth of KAR Auto Parts' e-commerce and Amazon channels.
Who We're Looking For
You don't need 10+ years of management experience.
We are more interested in someone who has actually done the work.
You may currently be a Digital Marketing Specialist, Performance Marketing Specialist, Senior Marketing Coordinator, Growth Marketer or Marketing Manager who is ready for greater ownership.
We would like to see experience with several of the following:
- Meta Ads Manager
- Google Ads
- Lead-generation campaigns
- Google Analytics / digital tracking
- Social media management
- Email/SMS marketing
- Canva and/or Adobe Creative Suite
- Photography/video
- Short-form video editing
- Website/landing-page management
- CRM/database marketing
- Marketing analytics
- E-commerce
Automotive experience is an asset, but strong marketing ability, business sense and a willingness to learn the automotive industry are more important.
The Person Who Will Succeed Here
You're comfortable being both strategic and hands-on.
You don't need an agency to launch every campaign.
You like testing ideas and measuring what happened.
You care about whether leads turn into customers.
You can move quickly without needing everything to be perfect.
You can collaborate with salespeople and managers while still taking ownership of your responsibilities.
You see a flyer for a commercial sales representative, a Meta campaign for vehicle leads and a customer-delivery Reel as different pieces of the same job: helping the business grow.
Most importantly, you want the opportunity to build something.
Growth Opportunity
We are not hiring someone to inherit a large marketing department.
We are hiring someone who may have the opportunity to build one.
Initially, this is a player/coach position where you will personally execute much of the work.
If you demonstrate measurable ROI and can show that additional resources will generate meaningful returns, KAR is prepared to invest in building the marketing function.
For the right person, this position has the potential to grow significantly alongside the businesses.
Compensation
$55,000–$65,000 per year, based on experience
Full-time, in-person position in Mississauga, Ontario.
Applying
Please submit your resume along with examples of marketing work you have personally contributed to.
We're particularly interested in hearing about campaigns where you can explain:
What was the objective? What did you personally do? What did it cost? What happened? What did you learn or change based on the results?
Portfolio examples, advertising results, social content, video, creative work or campaign case studies are welcome.
Pay: $48,960.37-$65,000.00 per year
Benefits:
- Casual dress
- Dental care
- On-site parking
Experience:
- Digital marketing: 2 years (required)
Work Location: In person
