Japan Growth Marketing Lead

About the company

About the Group/Team

We're Canva's Japan team, part of our International Supergroup. Our job is to make Canva feel truly local for people across Japan, working across marketing, partnerships and localisation. We're based in Shibuya, in the heart of Tokyo's creative scene, and we work closely with teams around the world, including our global HQ in Sydney. We're growing quickly, and there's real appetite to invest in the market and do the best work of our lives here.

Full job description

About the Role/Specialty

As Growth Marketing Lead, you'll own Canva Japan's growth marketing end-to-end, from awareness and acquisition through to activation, conversion, retention and revenue, building data-driven strategies across the full customer journey. You'll directly manage our digital advertising channels in-house rather than through an agency, so you're close to the data and in control of every lever. You'll pair deep, practical advertising expertise with an experimental mindset and a genuine understanding of Japanese consumers, and you'll work with local and global marketing, creative, product, data and localisation teams to find and scale what works.

Goals you’ll achieve

0-6 month goals

• Take full, hands-on ownership of Japan's digital advertising channels, running day-to-day setup, optimisation and budget management directly in-platform.

• Build a clear view of the Japan funnel from acquisition to revenue, and identify the highest-impact growth opportunities from customer behaviour, market trends and campaign data.

• Stand up a structured testing roadmap across channels, audiences and creative concepts, with clear goals and measurement in place.

6-12 month goals

• Improve core efficiency metrics (CAC, CPA, ROAS and conversion rate) and show measurable incremental lift from paid investment.

• Scale the channels and campaigns that work, reallocating budget based on performance, incrementality and business impact.

• Partner with local creative to ship truly local ad concepts that lift conversion with Japanese audiences, and establish a clear read on which messages and formats drive results.

What you’ll do (responsibilities)

• Develop and execute Canva Japan's growth marketing strategy across acquisition, activation, conversion, retention and revenue growth.

• Manage the marketing budget and allocate investment based on performance, incrementality and business impact.

• Directly manage all digital advertising in-house across Meta, Google, YouTube, TikTok, X, Apple Search Ads and other relevant platforms, owning campaign setup, daily optimisation, performance analysis and budget management.

• Run campaigns across brand, consideration, app acquisition, website conversion, subscription and revenue objectives, defining audience, bidding, placement, attribution and measurement strategies.

• Track, analyse and report on performance against metrics like CAC, CPA, ROAS, conversion rate, video completion rate, revenue and incremental lift, and turn that data into clear budget and investment decisions.

• Build and run a structured testing roadmap across channels, audiences, creative concepts, landing pages and campaign objectives.

• Partner with the local creative team to develop and evaluate advertising concepts built specifically for Japanese audiences.

• Collaborate with local and global marketing, creative, product, data and localisation teams to identify and scale growth opportunities.

Qualifications and requirements

What we're looking for

• Around 7 or more years in growth, performance or digital marketing, with hands-on experience managing significant advertising budgets directly in-platform (across search, app, web, social and video) rather than overseeing an agency.

• Strong knowledge of attribution, analytics, experimentation, conversion optimisation and incrementality measurement.

• Strong analytical and business judgment, using performance data to make confident budget and investment calls that grow users and revenue.

• Proven ability to run campaigns end-to-end and independently, from developing the strategy and setting up campaigns to managing bids and budgets, analysing performance and implementing optimisations.

• A deep understanding of Japanese consumers, their media behaviour and the local digital platform landscape, and the ability to translate that into campaigns that resonate.

• A curious, proactive self-starter who thrives in a fast-paced, evolving environment, is comfortable navigating ambiguity, takes measured risks and communicates effectively with both local and global stakeholders.

• Native-level Japanese and business-level English (both essential for this role).

Additional information

What you will learn and how will you develop at Canva

• Build Canva Japan's in-house growth marketing engine from a position of genuine ownership, shaping how we invest and grow in one of our priority markets.

• Sharpen your craft in incrementality, experimentation and measurement, backed by meaningful budgets and strong global data and creative support.

• Grow into a market-level growth leader, working across local and global teams and helping set the standard for how Canva grows in Japan.

What we're looking for

• Around 7 or more years in growth, performance or digital marketing, with hands-on experience managing significant advertising budgets directly in-platform (across search, app, web, social and video) rather than overseeing an agency.

• Strong knowledge of attribution, analytics, experimentation, conversion optimisation and incrementality measurement.

• Strong analytical and business judgment, using performance data to make confident budget and investment calls that grow users and revenue.

• Proven ability to run campaigns end-to-end and independently, from developing the strategy and setting up campaigns to managing bids and budgets, analysing performance and implementing optimisations.

• A deep understanding of Japanese consumers, their media behaviour and the local digital platform landscape, and the ability to translate that into campaigns that resonate.

• A curious, proactive self-starter who thrives in a fast-paced, evolving environment, is comfortable navigating ambiguity, takes measured risks and communicates effectively with both local and global stakeholders.

• Native-level Japanese and business-level English (both essential for this role).

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