Senior Director, Partnership Sales

RTS is an enthusiast culture company that builds at the intersection of gaming, creators, and brands. From global live events to bespoke branded content, we exist to create meaningful connections between fans and the worlds they love. Our team brings deep expertise across partnership sales and marketing, talent management, event production, media, community building, and IP development.

As the parent company of Evo, the world’s premier fighting game tournament and community platform, RTS operates a growing global portfolio of live events, media, creator, and talent-driven experiences. As the company expands its footprint, we are continuing to invest in the commercial infrastructure, partnerships, and leadership needed to scale our revenue engine across our properties and capabilities.

Role Overview

We’re looking for a strategic, proactive, and solutions-oriented Senior Director of Partnership Sales to drive new business across RTS, Evo, and our broader portfolio of capabilities. This is not a transactional sponsorship sales role. We’re looking for an experienced seller who leads with a marketing mindset, understands how brands and agencies define success, and can translate business objectives and KPIs into compelling, integrated partnership solutions.

The ideal candidate brings a strong understanding of sponsorship sales, intellectual property, and integrated marketing across digital, media, content, experiential, creators, and live events. They will have deep experience and a proven track record of opening doors, diagnosing client challenges, building a strategic narrative, and leading a sophisticated pitch from first conversation through negotiation and close.

Reporting Structure

You will report to the VP, Partnership Sales/marketing and work closely with the Head of Sales and the broader Global Partnership Sales & Marketing team.

Key Responsibilities New Business & Revenue Growth

• Tap into individual network of live event sponsorship and media buyers to own and grow a high-quality pipeline of non-endemic brand and agency prospects.
• Prospect proactively and build relationships with senior decision-makers across brands, agencies, media buyers, and marketing organizations.
• Develop new partnership opportunities across live event sponsorship, media, content, experiential, creators, gaming programs, production, consulting, and other RTS capabilities.
• Manage the full sales cycle from prospecting and discovery through proposal development, negotiation, contracting, and handoff.
• Consistently deliver against individual revenue targets while contributing to broader team goals and commercial priorities.
• Identify whitespace across categories, markets, and client portfolios and turn those opportunities into actionable sales strategies.

Client Strategy & Solution-Oriented Selling

• Lead discovery with a strong understanding of the client’s business, marketing objectives, audience priorities, challenges, and KPIs.
• Break down client and agency KPIs to identify the role RTS, Evo, and our capabilities can play in delivering against those goals.
• Move beyond asset-led selling by developing customized, insight-driven solutions that connect client objectives to the right combination of IP, audience, platforms, and experiences.
• Build compelling sales narratives that clearly articulate the strategic 'why,' the consumer opportunity, the activation idea, and the measurable business value.
• Challenge traditional event sponsorship thinking and proactively bring clients ideas they may not have asked for but that solve a real marketing or business need.
• Balance creativity with commercial discipline, ensuring recommendations are differentiated, executable, scalable, and aligned with client budgets.

Integrated Partnerships & IP Commercialization

• Demonstrate a strong understanding of how to commercialize intellectual property and translate rights and assets into meaningful brand programs.
• Develop integrated partnership programs spanning digital, social, content, media, experiential, creators, talent, hospitality, live events, and branded activations.
• Understand the role of media, content, and experiential extensions in increasing the reach and value of a core sponsorship platform.
• Identify opportunities to connect Evo with the broader RTS ecosystem to create larger, more strategic partnerships.
• Work with internal teams to develop new commercial products, packages, and scalable offerings based on market demand and client needs.

Agency & Client Leadership

• Build trusted relationships with senior client and agency stakeholders and establish RTS as a strategic marketing partner, not simply an inventory provider.
• Navigate complex agency and client structures, including brand teams, media agencies, creative agencies, experiential agencies, and sponsorship decision-makers.
• Lead high-level presentations, strategic workshops, negotiations, and partnership discussions with confidence and credibility.
• Maintain an informed point of view on the client’s category, competitive landscape, consumer trends, and business priorities.
• Create long-term relationships that generate repeat business, renewals, upsells, and introductions across additional brands and business units.

Cross-Functional Leadership

• Partner closely with Partnership Marketing, Strategy, Creative, Production, Operations, Finance, Legal, Talent, and other internal teams to develop strong and executable solutions.
• Bring internal subject-matter experts into the sales process at the right moments while maintaining clear ownership of the client relationship and commercial opportunity.
• Provide clear, thoughtful handoffs to Partnership Marketing following the close of a deal, including client objectives, KPIs, commitments, expectations, and renewal opportunities.
• Share market intelligence, client feedback, category trends, and competitive insights to help evolve RTS’s commercial story and product offering.
• Mentor junior team members and contribute to a collaborative, accountable, high-performance sales culture.

Sales Management & Commercial Discipline

• Maintain accurate pipeline management, forecasting, opportunity stages, and next steps within the company’s CRM.
• Build thoughtful account plans for priority prospects and identify the stakeholders, timing, budgets, and business triggers required to advance opportunities.
• Prioritize opportunities based on revenue potential, strategic fit, probability, and resource requirements.
• Partner with leadership on pricing, packaging, deal structure, and negotiation strategy.
• Use data, insights, and performance learnings to continuously improve the quality and effectiveness of the sales process.

Qualifications

• 8+ years of experience in sponsorship sales, partnerships, integrated media sales, entertainment, sports, gaming, experiential, or a related commercial role.
• Proven track record of generating meaningful new business revenue and closing complex six-to-seven figure deals across multiple platforms.
• Strong understanding of sponsorship, intellectual property, integrated marketing, digital media, experiential marketing, content, and live-event sales.
• Demonstrated ability to uncover client needs, understand KPIs, and translate marketing objectives into strategic partnership solutions.
• Existing relationships with major brands, agencies, and senior marketing decision-makers.
• Strong presentation, storytelling, negotiation, and consultative selling skills.
• Ability to think like a marketer while operating with the urgency and accountability of a seller.
• Strong commercial judgment and comfort working across both strategic and executional details.
• Ability to operate effectively in a fast-paced, entrepreneurial, remote-first environment.
• Excellent collaboration skills and experience working cross-functionally across sales, marketing, creative, production, operations, finance, and legal.
• Based in the United States.
• Available for event and client-related travel.

Bonus Points

• Experience selling live events within gaming, esports, sports, entertainment, media, creator, or enthusiast-culture businesses.
• Experience representing or commercializing major live events, leagues, properties, or entertainment IP.
• Experience developing seven-figure, multi-year integrated partnerships.
• Deep relationships across major holding companies, agencies, and Fortune 500 brands.
• Passion for gaming, fighting games, live events, and the communities RTS serves.

Our Culture

We’re very proud of the culture we’ve nurtured within RTS. We enjoy a high retention rate and value the relationships our employees build with one another, even in a fully remote environment. As a senior member of the commercial organization, we want you to embody and perpetuate the following values:

• Lead with empathy — Ensure clients and colleagues feel heard, especially when navigating difficult decisions or competing priorities.
• Challenge everything — Bring critical thinking to ideas in their earliest stages, help shape them into stronger concepts, and encourage creative experimentation in a safe and supportive environment.

Compensation

The compensation for this role is $140k to $160k, plus commission.

Benefits

• Medical, Dental, Vision and Life Insurance
• 401k plan available for employee contributions
• Flexible work schedule
• Generous PTO and company-observed holidays
• Remote-first culture