Marketing Intelligence Manager - Retail Support Center, Marshall, MN

Join Runnings as our Marketing Intelligence Manager and play a key role in shaping data-driven decisions that fuel growth across the business. In this high-impact role, you'll uncover customer insights, measure marketing performance, optimize vendor-funded programs, and partner with leaders across Marketing, Merchandising, Finance, and IT to drive results. This is an opportunity to make a visible impact on a growing retail organization.

Why This Role Is Special

• Partner with Top Brands: Evaluate and optimize vendor-funded marketing programs while helping strengthen relationships with key supplier partners.
• Shape the Future Runnings: Help define how data and analytics are used to drive growth across a rapidly evolving retail organization
• Growing Retailer: Join a respected and expanding retailer where your contributions can make an immediate and lasting impact.

About the Position

The Marketing Intelligence Manager delivers data-driven insights and optimization strategies that improve marketing performance, promotional effectiveness, customer engagement, and business growth. This role partners with Marketing, Merchandising, Buying, Finance, IT, and vendor partners to transform data into actionable recommendations that support informed business decisions.

The position is responsible for marketing analytics, customer and category insights, competitive intelligence, and performance reporting. The role works directly with Buyers, vendor partners, and the Marketing team to evaluate opportunities, optimize co-op investments, and maximize the effectiveness of vendor-funded marketing programs. Through data-driven analysis and strategic recommendations, this position helps increase vendor participation, improve return on investment, and drive revenue growth.

Primary responsibilities include

• Marketing Performance & Insights
• Customer & Category Understanding
• Promotional Effectiveness
• Trade, Co-op & Advertising
• Competitive Intelligence
• Cross-Functional Collaboration

This is a hands-on role for someone who values clarity, accountability, and results .

Essential Job Functions

The essential job duties include the following. Additional duties may be assigned as business requires.

• Marketing Performance & Insights
• Build and maintain trusted data sources ("sources of truth") across Marketing, IT, Merchandising, and Finance
• Analyze and interpret data to generate actionable insights that improve business performance
• Develop and manage dashboards tracking campaign, channel, and promotional performance
• Customer & Category Understanding
• Identify and refine customer segments and shopping behaviors
• Analyze categories and products that drive store traffic and sales
• Provide insights that inform merchandising and marketing priorities
• Trade, Co-op & Advertising
• Lead the analysis, and performance measurement of vendor co-op and trade advertising programs.
• Develop reporting and performance metrics to evaluate the effectiveness and return on investment of vendor-funded marketing activities.
• Establish and maintain strong relationships with key vendor partners, alongside Buyers, to identify, secure, and maximize co-op funding and participation in promotional programs.
• Align vendor investments with promotional priorities and business objectives.
• Promotional Effectiveness
• Evaluate print circular performance, including product- and page-level impact
• Measure effectiveness of digital and agency-driven campaigns
• Assess performance across in-store, print, digital, broadcast, and sponsorship channels
• Competitive Intelligence
• Analyze internal, syndicated, and secondary data to assess market position
• Develop insights to support competitive strategy and growth
• Cross-Functional Collaboration
• Partner with Merchandising, Finance, IT, and Customer Engagement teams
• Facilitate structured, data-informed discussions
• Present findings and recommendations to stakeholders and leadership
• Support special projects and strategic initiatives

Success Metrics

• Increased vendor participation in co-op and trade advertising programs.
• Achievement of annual co-op funding and utilization goals.
• Improved return on investment of vendor-funded marketing activities.
• Increased adoption of reporting tools and actionable insights by business partners.
• Timely delivery of performance reporting, analysis, and recommendations.
• Improved understanding of customer behavior, promotional effectiveness, and competitive positioning.

Qualifications

• 5+ years of experience in marketing analytics, retail analytics, or competitive intelligence
• Proven experience building dashboards, reports, or performance tracking tools
• Experience analyzing marketing campaign effectiveness across multiple channels
• Demonstrated ability to generate actionable business insights from data
• Experience working cross-functionally with marketing, merchandising, finance, or IT teams
• Bachelor's degree in Marketing, Business, Merchandising, or related field (MBA preferred)
• Experience in a promotion-driven retail environment preferred
• Background in farm, fleet, outdoor, hardware, or specialty retail is a plus

Required Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities

• Strong analytical skills with the ability to translate data into clear, actionable insights
• Proficiency with data visualization and reporting tools (e.g., Power BI, Tableau, Excel)
• Understanding of retail performance metrics (sales, margin, sell-through, traffic drivers)
• Ability to communicate insights effectively across verbal, written, and visual formats
• Ability to facilitate and contribute to cross-functional discussions
• Strong organizational skills with the ability to manage multiple priorities and deadlines
• Collaborative, solution-oriented approach with a focus on business outcomes

Work Environment

• This position primarily operates in an office environment and involves extended periods of computer use and collaboration with internal teams.
• This role is based onsite due to the need for close collaboration and access to internal systems. Reasonable accommodations will be considered in accordance with applicable laws.

Equal Opportunity & Accessibility

Runnings is an Equal Opportunity Employer and is committed to fostering an inclusive workplace. We provide reasonable accommodations to qualified individuals with disabilities in accordance with applicable laws. If you require assistance or accommodation during the application process or in performing essential job functions, please contact Human Resources.