Vertical Market Insights Specialist

We are seeking a Vertical Market Insights Specialist to join a newly established strategic marketing organization within a global industrial company.

This is an opportunity to help shape how the organization evaluates markets, understands customers, identifies growth opportunities, and develops strategies around where to play and how to win.

The ideal candidate brings a strong background in B2B marketing strategy, market research and insights, growth strategy, or strategic consulting and has hands-on experience applying structured frameworks or methodologies to complex business opportunities.

This is not a traditional sales or marketing communications position. The focus is on strategic market analysis, customer insights, competitive intelligence, segmentation, and growth strategy.

Key Responsibilities

• Develop market and application maps across markets, products, customer segments, applications, and geographies.
• Conduct primary and secondary market research to identify and size potential growth opportunities.
• Lead customer discovery efforts to understand unmet needs, desired outcomes, buying behaviors, decision criteria, and sources of value.
• Develop customer and market segmentation strategies based on needs, applications, economics, behaviors, and buying dynamics.
• Analyze customer buying processes, including key stakeholders, decision roles, barriers, and purchasing drivers.
• Evaluate competitors, substitutes, alternative solutions, and existing customer workarounds.
• Identify and prioritize growth opportunities based on market attractiveness, customer needs, organizational capabilities, and competitive advantage.
• Apply structured strategy frameworks and scoring methodologies to evaluate opportunities and support investment decisions.
• Translate market and customer insights into clear business recommendations.
• Support development of differentiated value propositions for priority markets, applications, and customer segments.
• Help cross-functional teams determine where to play, how to win, and what must be true for success.
• Develop executive-ready materials including market maps, segment profiles, buying-process maps, opportunity assessments, strategic recommendations, and activation plans.
• Collaborate with marketing, sales, product, strategy, and other cross-functional stakeholders.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Business, Economics, Engineering, Marketing, or a related field.
• MBA or advanced degree is preferred but not required.
• 4 years of experience in B2B market research, strategy, strategic marketing, product management, consulting, or a related commercial strategy role.
• Demonstrated experience creating or applying structured marketing strategy frameworks, methodologies, or playbooks.
• Strong experience translating market and customer insights into actionable business recommendations.
• Experience evaluating markets, customer segments, competitors, and growth opportunities.
• Strong analytical, research, storytelling, and presentation skills.
• Ability to create concise, executive-ready recommendations and presentations.
• Strong proficiency with Excel and PowerPoint.
• Ability to travel approximately 20%, primarily domestically.

Preferred Experience

• Industrial or manufacturing market experience.
• Management or strategy consulting experience.
• B2B growth strategy or strategic marketing experience.
• Customer segmentation and market opportunity assessment.
• Competitive intelligence and market sizing.
• Experience developing or implementing strategic playbooks.
• Experience with Power BI, Tableau, CRM analytics, survey platforms, or similar analytical tools.