Chief Marketing Officer — Interactive-Entertainment Division

The mandate

This interactive-entertainment division markets a portfolio of free-to-play, premium and live-service games. Paid acquisition has become more expensive and less observable, while in-game advertising and cross-promotion offer valuable monetisation and discovery. The current model manages these levers separately. Marketing buys players by title, advertising optimises fill and price, and studios protect experience. No executive consistently evaluates the combined lifetime value and attention cost across the portfolio.

The company is creating a Chief Marketing Officer role to reset that equation. The CMO will own player and portfolio marketing, user acquisition, brand, audience strategy, advertising monetisation, cross-promotion, creator relationships and marketing effectiveness. Game teams retain product and experience authority, while data, privacy and safety leaders retain their controls. The CMO must improve profitable reach without turning games into advertising containers or using manipulative acquisition.

This planned appointment is not measured by installs, impressions or campaign return in isolation. The board expects a leader who can identify which players and markets fit each title, choose when advertising adds value to the experience, and stop spending or inventory practices whose short-term yield damages retention, community or franchise health.

Scope and operating context

The hybrid role is anchored in Seoul and influences approximately 475 employees and material partners across South Korea and a wider international region. The perimeter includes brand, performance marketing, media, lifecycle, community, creators, advertising sales or partnerships, cross-promotion and marketing analytics. Interfaces with studios, publishing, live operations, product, economy, data, privacy, trust and safety, finance and platform partners are extensive.

Title economics vary. A competitive live game may depend on a strong community and low-friction return; a casual mobile title may support rewarded advertising naturally; a premium release requires a concentrated launch and sustained franchise story. Applying one acquisition or ad-load model would ignore these differences.

Measurement is constrained by platform privacy changes, device identity and cross-channel exposure. Incrementality is difficult when organic interest and paid campaigns peak together. The CMO must use experiments, market comparisons and ranges, and must resist precision supplied by vendors whose incentives favour spend.

First-year agenda

The first ninety days will establish a portfolio marketing and attention ledger. The team will connect acquisition cost, incremental installs, activation, retention, payer and ad contribution, content cadence, cross-promotion, community and full campaign cost. Several launches and live campaigns will be reconstructed to identify where attributed return differed from portfolio value.

A title-and-player growth thesis will follow. Each game will have priority audiences, motivations, markets, lifecycle stage, brand promise and acquisition role. Marketing will identify whether the objective is launch awareness, efficient new players, reactivation, franchise growth or migration to another title. Campaigns without a specific behavioural and economic purpose will not proceed.

User acquisition will move towards incrementality and cohort contribution. Tests will include geographic holdouts, creative, channel, audience and timing where feasible. Payback will include platform fees, live-service cost, support and cannibalisation. The CMO will reduce spending that merely captures existing demand or attracts cohorts whose early behaviour cannot recover cost.

Advertising monetisation will be designed by player context. Rewarded ads should exchange clear value by choice; interstitials and placements require frequency, interruption and age suitability controls. Ad load will be tested against play, retention, purchase and sentiment, not optimised only for immediate revenue. High-value players will not automatically receive more intrusive treatment because models predict willingness.

Inventory and partner quality will receive governance. Advertisers, networks and mediation platforms must meet content suitability, fraud, privacy, latency and transparency standards. Categories inappropriate for minors or the game context will be excluded. The CMO will accept lower fill where the alternative damages safety or player trust.

Cross-promotion will be treated as scarce owned media. Placement will reflect audience fit, lifecycle and portfolio value, with experiments to distinguish genuine discovery from cannibalisation. Studios will receive transparent rules and cannot reserve the best positions solely through internal influence. Players should be able to understand promotional content and dismiss it.

Creative production will be linked to game truth. Performance advertisements that depict mechanics or rewards unavailable in the actual product may improve clicks while creating distrust and poor cohorts. The CMO will establish review and evidence, develop reusable creative capability and hold agencies accountable for both performance and representation.

Creators and communities will have long-term governance. Partnerships will disclose sponsorship, respect platform and local rules and avoid targeting minors inappropriately. Creator fit, audience, conduct, content quality and sustained effect will matter alongside reach. Community teams will feed player concerns into campaign and ad decisions.

By year-end, the division should show better incremental acquisition payback, healthier ad contribution, fewer low-quality cohorts and a transparent cross-promotion system. Marketing should be able to explain how each major investment strengthens a title or franchise beyond attributed clicks.

Leadership responsibilities

The CMO will lead portfolio marketing and advise the group sponsor on player growth, advertising and brand. They will broker choices among studios using common evidence while respecting distinct communities. Forecasts will separate attributable, incremental and uncertain value.

They will build integrated leaders across brand, performance, lifecycle, advertising and community. Incentives must prevent acquisition teams from buying poor cohorts and ad teams from harming retention. Talent will rotate through title and portfolio roles to build judgement beyond a single channel.

The executive will maintain senior relationships with platforms, agencies, ad networks and creators. Vendor algorithms and benchmarks will be challenged; data and contractual access must permit independent evaluation. Major player-trust issues require direct involvement.

Measures of success

The executive committee will track incremental acquisition, activation, cohort contribution, payback, organic lift, reactivation and portfolio cannibalisation. Advertising measures include net yield, fill, player opt-in, frequency, latency, invalid traffic, suitability and impact on retention and purchase.

Brand and community measures include awareness, consideration, sentiment, creator quality, campaign complaints and trust. Operational health covers creative cycle, experiment quality, agency cost, cross-promotion allocation and forecast accuracy. Gross installs or impressions alone will not qualify as success.

Candidate profile

Candidates should bring 22–28 years in games, consumer apps, digital media or another attention-and-lifetime-value business. They must have led scaled user acquisition and advertising monetisation while carrying product or portfolio economics. International gaming and platform experience is important.

The board will seek examples of cutting attributed but non-incremental spend, reducing ad load to protect long-term value and resolving cross-promotion conflict between titles. Candidates should understand cohorts, experimentation, ad mediation, creators, brand, privacy, child safety and game communities.

The successful CMO will combine quantitative scepticism with creative energy. They must respect game design, recognise when a campaign misrepresents the product and say no to unsafe revenue without losing commercial urgency.

Compensation and appointment terms

Annual base compensation is expected between KRW 510,000,000 and KRW 700,000,000, with annual incentive and long-term participation. Reward will balance incremental growth, responsible advertising, franchise health, player trust and leadership depth. Final terms will reflect comparable portfolio scope and verified forfeited awards.

Confidentiality

The division remains unnamed because unreleased games, acquisition economics, player cohorts and advertising partners are sensitive. Detailed information will follow identity, conflict and confidentiality review. Applicants must not submit player data, campaign accounts, unreleased creative or vendor terms from another organisation.