Job Description

The Nationwide brand was relaunched in October 2023, and now two and half years on, has market leading broadcast comms, winning Kantar's Brand Z Brand of the Year for 2025.

We now want to bring the same standards of creative excellence and brand distinctiveness to our own channels - email marketing, in app marketing, customer comms, in branch marketing, and our websites.

As Owned Channels Creative Director, you will be responsible for ensuring creative excellence and defining our brand across all Nationwide owned and personalised channels. These channels sit at the heart of our day-to-day brand customer relationships, and you will be playing a pivotal role in ensuring that every communication presents a single, brilliant, joined up customer brand narrative.

You will ensure our tone of voice is consistently implemented in all owned channel communications and content. You will be accountable for the governance process that underpins this activity, both in terms of its effective management and ongoing evolution.

As an experienced creative leader, you will champion creative control and excellence within the business. Working closely with other senior leaders across the organisation, you'll ensure that our owned communications are best-in-class and position Nationwide as a leading financial services institution.

Additionally, you will be joining an exceptional brand and marketing team made up of talented, passionate individuals who have a proven track record of delivering market defining results. The addition of an Owned Channels Creative Director will help us to elevate our brand even further.

If you are obsessed with writing and copy, have worked in a CRM environment, and are curious about the role of AI in enabling personalised content, this is the perfect opportunity for you.

This is a 12 month Fixed Term Contract.

At Nationwide we offer hybrid working wherever possible. More rewarding relationships are supported through our hybrid approach, bringing colleagues together across our UK wide estate, whilst also supporting generous access to home working. We value our time in the office to solve problems, to learn, and to feel connected.

For this job you'll spend at least two days per week, or if part time you'll spend 40% of your working time, based at either our Swindon or London office. If your application is successful, your hiring manager will provide further details on how this works. You can also find out more about our approach to hybrid working here.

If we receive a high volume of relevant applications, we may close the advert earlier than the advertised date, so please apply as soon as you can.

Responsibilities

What you'll be doing

You will oversee the creation of outstanding customer communications across our owned channels, ensuring they consistently align with brand guidelines and drive brand distinctiveness. As a copywriting and tone of voice expert, you will champion best practice across the business, helping to maintain high standards across every communication we send to our customers and drive improvement over time.

You will be accountable for managing a robust governance process that ensures owned communication excellence and quickly identifies areas where improvement is required. You will be the driving force behind a culture of continuous improvement, facilitating the ongoing evolution of our direct communications.

Furthermore, you will lead a team of experienced copywriters, providing oversight, guidance, and development to facilitate exceptional communication standards. You will also work closely with a range of senior stakeholders across the business to provide holistic oversight of all communications, ensuring consistency across all activity.

As a member of the Nationwide Brands and Marketing Leadership Team, you will have a deep understanding of the Nationwide brand and how this shows up for customers, being viewed as an expert by colleagues throughout the business.

About you

As a minimum you will have/be:

• Excited by copywriting and tone of voice, with a demonstrable background in copywriting in CRM environments. You will be obsessed with writing, words and communication in every form. Novels, plays, headlines, political slogans, the power of words to inspire, move, persuade, and communicate
• Passionate about financial services
• A proven track record of implementing and managing brand guidelines across owned channels with measurable results
• Excellent leadership skills, with a track record of leading high-performing teams
• Technical expertise covering brand stewardship, creative control, copywriting and tone of voice
• A strategic thinker with the ability to identify challenges and develop solutions
• A collaborative leader who is analytical, creative, and confident but works to create brilliant teams
• Excellent communication skills, both verbally and in writing and being able to present information to senior executives and the wider team
• Exceptional influencing skills, with the confidence to challenge constructively and secure team and senior leader alignment

Our customer first behaviours put customers and members at the heart of how we work together. They are the set of behaviours that every colleague needs to display, in every role:

• Feel what customers feel - We step into our customers' shoes, using their feedback and insights to empathise with them and to understand their needs, so that every decision we make starts and finishes with our customers in mind
• Say it straight - We are brave in speaking out and saying what we think - we're honest and direct with good intent, openly sharing diverse perspectives to reach the best conclusions and using language everyone can understand
• Push for better - We don't settle for mediocrity, we challenge the status quo, taking responsibility for continuous improvement and personal development
• Get it done - We prioritise what will have the greatest impact, we are decisive, and we take accountability for delivering brilliant customer outcomes

You can strengthen your application by showing how our customer first behaviours resonate with you, and where you may have already demonstrated these.

Qualifications

The extras you'll get

There are all sorts of employee benefits available at Nationwide, including:

• 30 days holiday, pro rata
• Access to private medical insurance
• A highly competitive pension to help you build a strong foundation for retirement
• Access to an annual performance related bonus
• Training and development to help you progress your career
• A great selection of additional benefits through our salary sacrifice scheme
• Life assurance to provide peace of mind for you and your loved ones in the event of your death
• Wellhub - access to a range of free and paid options for health and wellness
• Up to 2 days of paid volunteering a year

Banking - but fairer, more rewarding, and for the good of society

We forge our own path at Nationwide.

As a mutual, we're owned by our members - those customers who bank, save or have a mortgage with us. We challenge the financial sector status quo. We don't see customers as the engine of our own profit. We share our profits with them and put their needs first. Always there when they need us. Supporting them and their lives.

If you're inspired by fairer finances, passionate about making a meaningful impact, and truly care about our customers, you're one of us.

At Nationwide, you are challenged to grow and rewarded for doing so. Valued. Recognised. Inspired to be your best. As a community we want our working lives to count. As a team, we celebrate what we achieve. As a standard-setter, we work for the good of customers, communities, and broader society.

We are purpose-driven. Uncompromisingly customer. Unstoppably Nationwide.

What to do next

If this role is for you, please click the 'Apply Now' button. You'll need to attach your up-to-date CV and answer a few quick questions for us.

We respond to everyone, so we will be in contact shortly after the closing date to let you know the outcome of your application.

Please note that should you be successful in securing this role the job title on our internal systems will be Head of Marketing & Corporate Affairs.