Job Title: Business Development Director
Job Description:
Milk is an award-winning, independent visual effects studio based in London, Bordeaux, Dublin
and Barcelona. In 2022 we welcomed Lola Post Production to the Milk Group. We create innovative
and complex sequences for high-end episodic television and feature films. Our work ranges from
invisible effects and environments, strange and wonderful creatures, engaging world building and
everything in between.
Our focus is to create incredible and innovative visual effects that bring stories to life on screen.
We have a culture where people can do their best work; we nurture the next generation of talent;
we want to make our industry more inclusive and accessible. We strive to innovate with emerging
technologies to enhance creative opportunities.
We are ambitious and have exciting plans to continue to grow our business.
The Business Development Director leads the Business Development function for the group. The
position reports directly to the Group Managing Director, the Chief Business Development
Director and is a member of the Senior Leadership Team. The Business Development Director is
responsible for achieving revenue growth globally. They collaborate with senior leadership on the
development of Milk’s strategy, represents Milk at external events, engages with current and
potential production partners, as is responsible for sourcing new business and winning work.
We are looking for an engaging leader, who is ambitious and will bring new thinking and an
entrepreneurial spirit to the Business Development team. They will lead the marketing
communications, business development and bidding functions as part of an integrated and
coordinated approach.
Responsibilities:
To work for the CBDO/MD and the Board to position Milk for growth in a fast
developing VFX market.
- Continually assess current and new markets, capture strategies to engage and enhance
Milk’s positioning with the selected studios and production companies. - Ensuring a systematic and proactive approach to generating leads and connections with
projects, production companies and associated production crew such as VFX Supervisors
and Producers. - Lead Milk’s efforts to enhance its brand and reputation with both existing and potential
clients and creative talent by cultivating excellent relations with key production studios and
actively participating in industry-related events. - Collaborating with the CBDO, MD, Milk’s VFX Supervisors, the Bidding team and other
senior talent on a coherent and creative pitch approach to bidding when appropriate. - Directly supervise, train, and coach those involved in the full life cycle of new business
development. - Ensuring that we communicate regularly with our target market and that they are kept up
to date with who we are, what we do. - Creating consistent points of communication with these targets throughout the year, both
event driven and otherwise. - Liaising and building relationships with potential clients and maintaining relationships with
existing and previous clients. - Leading the Bidding and Marketing Communication team.
- Being responsible for our branding, messaging and positioning across all media- website,
decks, social, events, press, internal, talent recruitment. - Being aware of all upcoming projects/productions where VFX might be required through
the use of database systems, networking etc, to filter these and develop plans to engage
with these opportunities. - Ensure business intelligence from across the organisation is smoothly integrated into the
lead capture, and bid process. - To showcase Milks work and key talent at key industry and market events including
providing a bespoke support to senior talent on panels and trade PR. - Attend key industry events in order to target prospective clients.
- Generating and responding to opportunities, engaging with bidding processes, negotiations
and converting business. - Keeping the senior management updated on all leads, sales and bidding related activities
and preparing and updating the leads and new business tracker pipeline. - Analysing and managing new business budgets and financial information.
Must have:
Substantial experience as a New Business Director within the Film or VFX Industry and/or a
background as a VFX Supervisor or VFX Producer.
- Impeccable attention to detail and accuracy.
- Experience selling creative services.
- Experience in business development.
- A commercial mind, with strong analytical skills.
- Ability to build rapport with new contacts; experience in building effective
working relationships and communicating with clients. - Excellent people management, communication and organisational skills.
- A knowledge of MS Office applications, particularly Excel
About you:
- Passionate about film & episodic television
- A proven leader with the ability to motivate and lead a team with enthusiasm and clarity
- Great relationship skills
- Smart, and detail-oriented
- Strategic thinker
- Organised, proactive and a self-starter
- A collaborative team working style
- Calm under pressure and capable of delivering to short deadlines
- Analytical, logical and methodical in your approach
- A strong, clear communicator and effective negotiator
- A positive, can-do attitude.