Freelance Email Developer Jobs in New York (NOW HIRING)

Own the creative system behind how Pelago acquires members: Pelago is hiring a Creative Director, Growth to own the full creative arc of our member acquisition funnel - from campaign concept through shipped execution. Reporting to the Head of Growth, this is a true player-coach role where design is your primary craft and campaign concepting is what elevates it into strategy.

You will define what Pelago's growth surface looks, sounds, and feels like -  and hold yourself accountable for whether it converts. This is a high-ownership, high-autonomy role where the brief comes from the data, and the creative strategy comes from you.

This is a hybrid role with a high-collaboration rhythm (3 days/week in our NYC office).

Set the creative direction

• Own the campaign concepting process end-to-end, from identifying the insight (why this message, for this person, at this moment?) to translating it into a coherent campaign across email, direct mail, SMS, and the landing page.
• Evolve Pelago's growth creative voice: the visual language, messaging principles, and channel-specific standards that make our acquisition surface coherent and differentiated. You're inheriting a working foundation, not a blank page, not a finished system, and raising the bar from there.
• Develop testable creative hypotheses: not "let's try a new email," but "here's the insight, here's the message we haven't tested, here's why I think it converts."

Execute the work

• Own the messaging platform for every campaign: the insight, the angle, the hierarchy of claims across channels. The Senior Content Manager owns copy execution within that direction. You hold the quality bar and can pick up the pen yourself when the stakes are high enough to warrant it.
• You are the designer. Emails, landing page modules, direct mail layouts, campaign visuals: you build these yourself. The expectation is craft, not direction.
• Work hands-on with AI tools across copy ideation, design iteration, and A/B variant production. Not aspirational interest; active practice in your workflow today.

Run creative experimentation

• Run creative experimentation as a discipline alongside the Growth PM, Growth Ops, and Growth Engineer. Every test starts with a hypothesis you can defend, and every result should change the creative strategy underneath, not just the individual asset.
• Treat a flat conversion rate as a brief, not a verdict. If something isn't working, you generate hypotheses before you're asked to and test them in order of conviction.

Lead across the organization

• Translate business goals and funnel data into creative strategy that non-creative stakeholders can understand, question, and trust. You can present a creative rationale to leadership without relying on aesthetic language.
• Partner with Growth Marketing, Client Marketing, Content, and Product to ensure creative is integrated with campaign strategy and channel performance data, not delivered as a finished output after strategy has already been set.
• Build scalable creative infrastructure: messaging frameworks, copy templates, and visual component libraries that reduce recurring production time and give the team a foundation to move faster.
• Manage the operational side of the creative function: agency and freelancer relationships when needed, project prioritization across competing requests, and creative budget. You own the throughput of the creative process, not just the quality of the output.
• Build the creative capability of the team: At the Director level that starts with the Senior Content Manager, but the expectation is you raise the creative bar across everyone you work with, not just your direct reports.

• 6+ years of creative experience, including at least 2 years in a lead or director role setting creative direction
• Experience managing or directing a creative or content function, with direct reports preferred
• Strong hands-on design execution across email, landing pages, direct mail, and digital campaigns
• A portfolio demonstrating both strategic campaign thinking and high-quality execution
• Data-driven creative instincts, with experience measuring performance and optimizing for conversion
• Experience using AI tools within a creative workflow
• Experience in B2C, B2B2C, health tech, benefits, or subscription environments preferred
• Strong communication skills, with the ability to present and defend creative strategy to non-creative stakeholders

We have a whole host of perks for our people! From life essentials to nice-to-haves, there are more than a few good reasons to love working with us. We strive to ensure Pelago employees have equitable access to healthcare, wellbeing, time away, and then some.

• Generous and meaningful equity package 
• Full Medical, Dental, & Vision coverage 
• 401k Plan
• Unlimited PTO Policy, 10 paid holidays, & company wide "Me Time" Days
• Paid maternity, paternity & new parent leave
• Flexible working environment
• Annual Learning and Development stipend to support continued learning and career development
• Wellness Reimbursement Program 
• Access to Reproductive & Family Planning Care 
• Substance Use Support for employees and family members 

At this time, we are unable to offer visa sponsorship for this position.