Marketing Insights & Research, Lead (San Francisco)

About Anthropic

Anthropic’s mission is to create reliable, interpretable, and steerable AI systems. We want AI to be safe and beneficial for our users and for society as a whole. Our team is a quickly growing group of committed researchers, engineers, policy experts, and business leaders working together to build beneficial AI systems.

About the role

We are seeking an exceptional Senior Director of Marketing Insights and Research to lead our strategic research function and drive data-informed decision making across all brand marketing initiatives. In this pivotal role, you will establish and oversee a comprehensive insights practice that combines rigorous research methodologies with strategic business acumen to unlock deep understanding of our audiences, markets, and the evolving AI landscape. You'll be a trusted advisor to senior leadership, asking the critical questions and providing insights that shape how we communicate Anthropic’s unique positioning in the market and commitment to building safe, reliable AI systems.

As we navigate the rapidly evolving AI industry, you'll need to balance long-term strategic thinking with the agility to deliver actionable insights quickly. This role requires someone who can build robust research infrastructure while also being scrappy enough to execute rapid-fire testing when business needs demand it.

Responsibilities:

• Define and execute a comprehensive marketing research strategy that supports Anthropic's growth objectives and deepens understanding of AI adoption patterns
• Design, implement, and manage longitudinal studies and brand tracking programs to monitor market perception, competitive positioning, and user sentiment over time
• Establish rapid-response research capabilities for quick-turn message testing, concept validation, and campaign optimization
• Lead both quantitative and qualitative research initiatives, selecting the most appropriate methodologies for each business question
• Partner with senior leadership to identify strategic research priorities and translate business challenges into actionable research questions
• Build and manage relationships with external research vendors and agencies while developing internal research capabilities
• Present compelling, strategic insights to executives and cross-functional teams, connecting research findings to business implications
• Collaborate with product, policy, marketing and communications teams to ensure research insights inform decision-making across the organization
• Develop frameworks for measuring and understanding AI safety perceptions, trust, and adoption barriers in various market segments
• Establish research governance and best practices, ensuring ethical standards and methodological rigor across all studies
• Mentor and develop a team of research professionals, fostering a culture of curiosity and strategic thinking
• Stay ahead of industry trends and emerging research methodologies, particularly those relevant to AI and technology adoption

You may be a good fit if you:

• Have 12+ years of experience in marketing research, consumer insights, or related fields, with at least 5 years in senior leadership roles
• Have deep expertise across multiple research methodologies including advanced quantitative techniques, qualitative approaches, and mixed-methods research
• Have proven experience designing and managing longitudinal studies, brand trackers, and other complex research programs
• Are skilled at rapid research execution and know when to prioritize speed versus depth
• Have exceptional strategic thinking abilities and can identify the underlying questions that drive business success
• Are an influential communicator who can present complex research findings in compelling, actionable ways to senior executives
• Have experience working in fast-paced, high-growth technology environments
• Can balance long-term strategic planning with immediate business needs
• Have a track record of building and leading high-performing research teams
• Are comfortable with ambiguity and can thrive in an evolving industry landscape

Strong candidates may also have:

• Experience researching emerging technologies, AI, or other complex technical products
• Expertise in advanced analytics, statistical modeling, or data science techniques
• Experience with global or multi-market research programs
• Knowledge of research ethics and privacy considerations, particularly relevant to AI applications
• Academic background in psychology, sociology, market research, or related fields
• Experience with behavioral research and understanding technology adoption patterns
• Track record of translating research insights into measurable business outcomes

The expected salary range for this position is:

Annual Salary:

$320,000 — $400,000 USD

Logistics

Education requirements: We require at least a Bachelor's degree in a related field or equivalent experience.
Location-based hybrid policy: Currently, we expect all staff to be in one of our offices at least 25% of the time. However, some roles may require more time in our offices.

Visa sponsorship: We do sponsor visas! However, we aren't able to successfully sponsor visas for every role and every candidate. But if we make you an offer, we will make every reasonable effort to get you a visa, and we retain an immigration lawyer to help with this.

We encourage you to apply even if you do not believe you meet every single qualification. Not all strong candidates will meet every single qualification as listed. Research shows that people who identify as being from underrepresented groups are more prone to experiencing imposter syndrome and doubting the strength of their candidacy, so we urge you not to exclude yourself prematurely and to submit an application if you're interested in this work. We think AI systems like the ones we're building have enormous social and ethical implications. We think this makes representation even more important, and we strive to include a range of diverse perspectives on our team.

How we're different

We believe that the highest-impact AI research will be big science. At Anthropic we work as a single cohesive team on just a few large-scale research efforts. And we value impact — advancing our long-term goals of steerable, trustworthy AI — rather than work on smaller and more specific puzzles. We view AI research as an empirical science, which has as much in common with physics and biology as with traditional efforts in computer science. We're an extremely collaborative group, and we host frequent research discussions to ensure that we are pursuing the highest-impact work at any given time. As such, we greatly value communication skills.

The easiest way to understand our research directions is to read our recent research. This research continues many of the directions our team worked on prior to Anthropic, including: GPT-3, Circuit-Based Interpretability, Multimodal Neurons, Scaling Laws, AI & Compute, Concrete Problems in AI Safety, and Learning from Human Preferences.

Come work with us!

Anthropic is a public benefit corporation headquartered in San Francisco. We offer competitive compensation and benefits, optional equity donation matching, generous vacation and parental leave, flexible working hours, and a lovely office space in which to collaborate with colleagues.