Position: Director of Marketing and Public Relations
Job Category: Marketing
Location: Mississauga and Oakville Ontario
Salary: Based on experience
Job-Type: Full-time
Websites: http://basicfunerals.ca/ and http://www.sparacapital.com/

Overview

This is a joint listing for a Director of Marketing and Public Relations for both Basic Funerals and Cremation Choices and Spara Capital Partners.

Basic Funerals and Cremation Choices is a licensed funeral home, and the first to provide the complete convenience of making funeral arrangements over the phone, online and in person in Ontario. As a licensed funeral home, Basic Funerals can provide any type of service and its licensed funeral directors are available at any time to guide clients through the entire arrangement process, and provide a service that is right for their family.

Spara Capital Partners Inc. is a mid-market investment and merchant banking firm that provides strategic, transactional, and financial advisory services to shareholders and managers of private and small-cap public companies with revenues in the range of $10 to $250 million. Spara's merchant banking arm, Spara Merchant Capital Corp, is currently an investment partner in Basic Funerals and Cremation Choices.

Additional consideration will be given to the candidate for travel costs between the two companies (amounts to approximately 30 minutes driving time).

The Role:

As the Director of Marketing and Public Relations, you will be responsible for creating and executing marketing strategies to achieve profitable sales growth on an annual and long-term basis. You will also be charged with using your leadership skills and abilities to enhance the brands of both firms by communicating and influencing internal/external stakeholders, professional associations and the public on a regular basis.

Responsibilities:

Marketing Planning: Coordinate development of marketing plans and service/product positioning. You will assess new business opportunities and product improvement. Ensure the Marketing Department adheres to best practices including budget processes and marketing launch plans.

Marketing Implementation: Coordinate the development and provide direction of short and long term marketing plans and programs. Coordinate, monitor and evaluate service/product enhancements along with competitive information, market trends and identify customer needs.

Marketing Analysis: Measure effectiveness of marketing programs through various levels of sales data. Coordinate and conduct market research to ensure optimal market comprehension.

Public Relations: Develop and maintain the reputations of both companies as a responsible, high quality partner, employer, and corporate citizen.

Job Experience/Skills:

• Degree in marketing and/or business.
• Five years of progressive senior product/management experience.
• Experience in contract negotiations.
• Keen knowledge and experience in outdoor, television advertising options and pricing.
• Experience and comfort with facilitation of committee meetings.
• Solid creative copy writing and editing.
• Strong graphic design skills.
• Sound problem solving and organizational skills; attention to detail.

Requirements:

• Lead PR campaigns incl. media releases and follow up with media publications.
• Design new collateral to support sales (brochures, graphical sales material).
• Develop and manage branded profiles/initiatives on popular social and web media sites i.e. Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn.
• Perform preliminary creative and collaboration with the founders
• Demonstrate POP (proof of performance) auditing and accounting.
• Event planning and execution.
• Strong initiative, high energy/flexibility, pleasant persona and customer service orientation.
• Willingness to travel domestically and in the U.S.
• Computer literate with advanced experience in a Windows Office environment.

*Experience in financial services industry is considered an asset.