Should You Hire an Adtech Specialist or a Strong Seller from an Adjacent Market?
Plenty of Adtech sales briefs arrive with a line like “minimum five years selling CTV” or “must come from programmatic”. Then the shortlist goes in, and the person the hiring manager gets most excited about is the one who sold something next door and has already carried a number into the same agency buyers the role is aimed at. The brief gets quietly rewritten somewhere around the third interview, usually after weeks of searching for someone who fits the original version.
You do not always need direct Adtech experience for a sales hire. Insist on it when the role depends on technical credibility with the buyer, when the seller has to bring in pipeline from the first month, or when the business has no capacity to support a long ramp. Consider a strong seller from an adjacent market when the buyers overlap, the sales motion is similar and the product can reasonably be learned within a quarter or two. In most briefs you need less category experience than the job description asks for, and more of three other things: relationships with the right buyers, a track record of selling the same kind of deal, and the ability to explain a technical product to a commercial audience.
What does the UK Adtech market look like now?
The categories on a product page are tidier than the market they sell into. IAB UK and mediasense’s H1 2026 Digital Adspend Study, published on 29 September 2026, put UK digital advertising at £21.2bn for the first half of the year, up 13% year on year. Retail media was the fastest-growing area, rising 32% to £2.0bn, while video grew 18% to £5.1bn, with a third of that video investment now going to TV+. Programmatic accounted for £17.2bn, which is 81% of all UK digital advertising investment and up from 78% a year earlier. IAB UK also says connected TV inventory is becoming easier to plan and buy alongside other digital formats, and that retail media is finding a place earlier in the planning process.
Two things follow for hiring. When four-fifths of digital spend is bought programmatically, the same agencies, trading desks and DSPs tend to sit across CTV, display and retail media, so a seller moving between categories is often calling on many of the same people. And the fastest-growing categories are, almost by definition, the ones with the smallest pool of people who have sold them for any length of time. Retail media is still under a tenth of that £21.2bn, so a brief that demands five years of retail media sales is asking for a very small group, most of whom are already being approached by everyone else in the market. That last point is my own reading of the figures, and IAB UK does not measure it.
Does someone selling CTV need to have sold CTV?
Often less than the job spec suggests. CTV is bought by many of the same agency and brand teams that buy online video, audio and programmatic display, and a good part of the sales conversation is about audience quality, supply, measurement and how the inventory fits into a wider plan. Someone who has sold online video, or linear TV into the same agencies, already understands how a video budget gets planned, who signs it off and what the buyer will push back on, whether that is measurement, brand safety, frequency or price. What they will not have is fluency in the specifics, such as how supply is packaged, which publishers and device makers matter and where the quality issues tend to sit. That takes a few months to pick up with a good product team around them.
There is a case for holding the line when CTV is the whole pitch and the buyer will test the seller on it in the first meeting. If the role is selling a CTV-native platform to agency trading desks that know exactly what a credible partner looks like, authority on supply and measurement is difficult to build while losing deals. The same goes for selling to publishers and broadcasters, or leading technical integrations, where credibility comes from knowing the inventory and the plumbing. A lot of briefs describe the first job and screen for the second, so decide which one you are hiring for before the brief goes out. The more useful test is whether the candidate can hold a credible conversation with your buyer within their first month, which matters more than whether the word CTV appears on their CV.
Can a strong programmatic seller move into retail media?
Usually yes, with one condition. The core selling skills carry across well: managing agency relationships, building a plan around a client’s objectives, talking credibly about audience and measurement, and forecasting a pipeline made up of many mid-sized budgets. Retail media is also where a growing share of programmatic budget conversations are heading, so the overlap in buyers is real and likely to increase.
The condition is understanding why retail media is a different commercial proposition. The data is first-party and tied to purchase, the buyer is often a brand or shopper marketing team as well as a media agency, and closed-loop measurement sits at the centre of the pitch instead of being an add-on. A seller who has only ever dealt with trading desks may find that half of their network is not in the room, and one who has only sold on reach and efficiency can find the gap steeper than expected. The strongest candidates tend to be people who have sold data-led propositions, or worked closely with retailers and consumer brands. The retailer-side relationships are the part that cannot be faked, so a good brief says whether the role is about bringing them in or building them from scratch.
Our work for Criteo is the clearest example we have. The brief was for 12 Agency Sales hires across London and Barcelona, and it was filled in three months. The case study is explicit that insisting every candidate already had direct retail media experience would have shrunk the market unnecessarily, so the search drew on Adtech, programmatic, agency sales and adjacent digital advertising, looking for people who understood agency relationships and could sell a developing proposition (Criteo case study, Project & Multi-Hire, run on an exclusive basis).
Can someone from measurement move into a platform role?
It can work well, and it is probably the move clients underestimate most, though that is my own view. People who have sold measurement, attribution or clean room products tend to be good at the part of the sale that many platform sellers find hardest, which is explaining to a sceptical buyer whether the money actually worked. They are comfortable with technical stakeholders, patient with long evaluation cycles and used to selling to analytics and insight teams as well as media buyers. That is excellent preparation for a solutions or strategic accounts seat on a platform.
The risk sits on the other side of the move. Measurement deals are often fewer, larger and slower, while platform sales frequently depend on pace and a quota built on a steady flow of media budget. Someone who has not carried a number tied to spend can take longer than expected to find their rhythm, and may be uncomfortable owning a quota that moves with the market’s buying patterns rather than a signed contract. It is worth asking how their last pipeline was built, how many deals they closed in a year and how the cycle compared with the one in your business, because those answers tell you more than their product background does. The move also works best when the buyer stays the same: a measurement seller who already calls on the agency leads who would buy your platform is learning a product, while one who sells to a different audience is learning a product and a network at once.
When does network matter more than product knowledge?
For senior sellers, more often than most hiring managers admit. A product can be learned in a few months with decent onboarding. A set of relationships with the people who control budget, built over several years and sustained by a reputation for doing what you said you would, cannot be acquired in the same way. Network wins when the number depends on a short list of buyers you could name and the product can be learned inside a quarter. Product knowledge wins when the buyer is technical, the product is new to the market, or the sale needs a credible explanation before a meeting happens at all.
The trouble is that networks are easy to claim and hard to check, and they go stale. Someone whose strongest agency relationship was three jobs ago, before the team changed, is selling a memory. A seller whose contacts sit in a different part of a client organisation, such as a trading desk when you need the brand team, has less of an advantage than their CV suggests. Two tests help. Ask the candidate to name the ten buyers they would call in their first fortnight, what each one currently buys and why that person would take the call. Then ask them to talk through two or three recent deals in detail, including who was in the room. Strong candidates answer quickly and specifically, and you will learn more from the vague answers than from another round of competency questions.
The far end of that spectrum is a first leader in a new market, who is paid for who will take their call. We saw it in the Vistar Media Country Manager search in Japan, where the case study puts commercial network and market reputation ahead of direct out-of-home experience (Vistar Media case study, Executive Search). We covered that search in more detail in our APAC leader or Country Managers post, so I will not repeat it here.
At what seniority does hiring adjacent get riskier?
The risk rises with seniority, though not evenly, and it tracks how much of the role is judgement rather than execution. At Account Executive and Senior Account Executive level, the job is mostly running deals well, the ramp is forgiving and the manager is close enough to correct course early. An adjacent hire with the right buyers and a similar deal size is often a good bet there, sometimes a better one than the specialist who arrives with a premium attached. At Director, Head of or VP level, you are paying someone to shape how the product is sold, build a team, set pricing and tell the business what the market wants, and the margin for a slow start narrows considerably.
At that point the question stops being about category experience and becomes whether the person has done this specific job before: built a team, carried a significant number and handled the board conversation that follows a miss. Our piece on CRO vs VP Sales makes a related point about scope, and it applies here too: the title matters less than whether the person has handled the size of job you are giving them. Adjacent senior hires can and do work, particularly where the business has strong product leadership around them, but that support needs to be in place before the person starts. The more common failure we would point to at that level is hiring a recognisable name from the category whose network has gone stale and whose last big win was two roles ago. The better question is what the person has to change in the first year, and then to test for that rather than for a CV that matches the old one. For senior appointments where the cost of a miss is high, a research-led Executive Search is worth considering, because it starts from who has actually done the job.
The cost of a miss does grow with seniority. In our 2026 Adtech Salary Survey the VP Sales median is £160,000, against £70,000 for an Account Director, and CIPD research cited in our Recruitment Cost Calculator puts the cost of a regretted hire at typically one to three times salary, depending on seniority.
Which way does your role lean?
Use this as a rough checklist before you write the spec. Most roles will have a foot in each column, and when several rows lean the same way you have your answer. It reflects my own view from the searches we run.
| Consideration | Points towards direct Adtech experience | Points towards an adjacent seller |
|---|---|---|
| Buyer | The buyer will test category knowledge in the first meeting | The buyer is the same person the candidate already sells to |
| Product | Technical, with a long learning curve | Can be learned within a quarter or two |
| Sales motion | Different deal size, cycle or quota structure from the candidate’s background | Similar deal size, cycle and quota structure |
| Support | Little product or enablement help around the hire | Strong onboarding and product team in place |
| Seniority | Head or Director level with a team-building remit | Mid-level, individual contributor role |
| First in a category | Nobody in the building can teach the product | Someone on the team can |
What does waiting for the perfect match cost?
If you are hiring directly and the right specialist is on your shortlist, hire them. Waiting is a sensible choice when the pool is deep and the seat is not costing you much. The cost appears when the brief is narrow enough that the search stalls, a commercial seat sits empty and the people covering it are not selling their own numbers. My commentary in our 2026 Adtech Salary Survey describes a market where experienced programmatic, solutions and commercial sellers are still hard to find and processes are moving quickly. A narrow brief in that market means the strongest candidates tend to have other offers before your third interview. We have written about what happens when a critical hire stays open for 30, 60 or 90 days, and the calculator lets you put your own salary, quota and time to hire against it.
Lowering the bar is not the answer either, because a hire who cannot ramp is expensive in its own way. What tends to help is being deliberate about which requirements are essential and which are standing in for something else, such as credibility with a particular buyer or the ability to sell a technical product. Once those proxies are clear, the brief usually widens in the right places and tightens where it counts.
Adjacent candidates also have their own view of the risk. The ones we see drop out late usually do so because nobody could describe what their first ninety days would look like, or the role sounded different in the final interview from the first. Our post on hiring commercial talent for the creator economy covers a related question in a different sector, which is when a business needs its first proper commercial operator.
Hiring adjacent only works if the business does its part. Decide what has to transfer, whether that is buyers, deal size or sales motion, and what can be taught. Set a ramp that assumes a few months of product learning, and make sure someone has the time to teach it. Agree what good looks like at ninety days. And be straight about pay: a strong seller from a neighbouring category may have been paid on a different base and commission structure, so expectations can sit above or below what you have budgeted. A candidate who brings the network deserves to be paid for it, while one who is still learning the category should not be paid as if they already know it. A salary mismatch discovered late is one of the more common reasons a promising adjacent candidate drops out, so benchmark before the brief goes out.
What do Adtech sales leaders earn in the UK?
These are UK salary figures for 2025 to 2026 from Ultimate Asset’s own 2026 Adtech Salary Survey. The survey groups roles by function and seniority, not by category such as CTV or retail media, so I cannot tell you whether a category premium exists. The sample size is not published, and it does not say whether the figures are base salary or another definition, so treat them as a guide.
| Role | Range | Median |
|---|---|---|
| VP Sales | £120,000 to £200,000 | £160,000 |
| Senior Sales Director (client direct) | £110,000 to £150,000 | £130,000 |
| Head of Agency Sales | £105,000 to £140,000 | £125,000 |
| Country Manager | £90,000 to £150,000 | £120,000 |
| Head of Programmatic | £95,000 to £140,000 | £115,000 |
| Account Director | £60,000 to £80,000 | £70,000 |
Source: 2026 Adtech Salary Survey, available through our salary survey page. Pay over the past 12 months typically moved by 2 to 5%, and programmatic, solutions and revenue-critical roles saw the most. The survey also notes continued demand for people who can work across the commercial and technical sides of Adtech, which is a useful profile to look for in an adjacent seller.
What changes across markets?
Everything above is written with the UK in mind. Relationships are local, so an adjacent seller’s network is worth less the further the role sits from where they built it, and I would apply the buyer tests more strictly outside the UK. Our pay data is UK only, so I would not quote you a salary for another market. We recruit across UK & Europe, North America & Asia, and our Hivestack case study (Project & Multi-Hire) shows what a multi-market programme looks like. For a European angle, see why Adtech and MarTech businesses are looking more closely at Spain.
Common questions
Do you need direct Adtech experience for a sales hire? Not always. Insist on it when the role depends on technical credibility with the buyer or the business cannot support a long ramp. Consider an adjacent seller when the buyers overlap, the sales motion is similar and the product can be learned within a quarter or two.
Does a CTV seller need to come from CTV? Often not. IAB UK reports connected TV inventory is becoming easier to plan and buy alongside other digital formats, and a third of the £5.1bn video spend in H1 2026 now goes to TV+, so sellers from online video or linear TV often already know the buyers. The exception is selling a CTV-native platform to buyers who will test the seller in the first meeting, or selling to publishers and leading integrations.
Can a programmatic seller move into retail media? Usually yes, particularly one who has sold data-led propositions or worked with brands and retailers. Retail media rose 32% to £2.0bn in H1 2026 (IAB UK and mediasense), and in our Criteo search direct retail media experience was not required. The retailer-side relationships are the part that cannot be faked.
Can someone from measurement move into a platform role? It can work well, because measurement sellers are good at proving value to sceptical buyers. The risk is pace: platform quotas often depend on a steady flow of media budget, so ask how their last pipeline was built and how many deals they closed in a year.
When does network matter more than product knowledge in Adtech sales? For senior sellers whose number depends on a short list of buyers, and where the product can be learned inside a quarter. Ask the candidate to name the ten buyers they would call in their first fortnight and why each would take the call.
How much do Adtech sales leaders earn in the UK? In our 2026 Adtech Salary Survey (UK, 2025 to 2026) the VP Sales median is £160,000 within a range of £120,000 to £200,000, and the Head of Agency Sales median is £125,000.
We are a recruiter agency, so you should know that a broader brief gives us more people to put in front of you. That is a fair reason to weigh our view with some care, and it is also why we would rather tell you when a tighter brief is the right one.
If you are weighing up a specialist against an adjacent hire, talk us through the role. Even if the brief has not settled yet, we can give you an honest view of who is realistically available in each camp, what they are likely to cost and how long each route is likely to take, and which requirements are worth holding firm on. And if you would rather work it out yourself first, put your own numbers into the Recruitment Cost Calculator. If the numbers say the specialist is worth waiting for, that is a perfectly good answer. You can submit a brief when you are ready, or read more about our Adtech practice.
About the author
James Johnson, Director
James leads Ultimate Asset’s Adtech practice, specialising in building go-to-market teams across sales, account management, programmatic and ad operations. He works closely with founders, CROs and senior leadership teams to help scale commercial functions, and contributed the commentary in Ultimate Asset’s 2026 Adtech Salary Survey. Ultimate Asset is a specialist recruitment firm for Adtech, MarTech, SaaS and Emerging Media, offering Executive Search, Contingent Search and Project & Multi-Hire across UK & Europe, North America & Asia. Founded in 2005, with more than 20 years in its markets.
Sources: IAB UK and mediasense, “Six Months of UK Digital Adspend Now Exceeds the Whole of 2020”, 29 September 2026; CIPD Resourcing and Talent Planning Survey 2024, as cited in our Recruitment Cost Calculator; Ultimate Asset case studies (Criteo, Vistar Media, Hivestack); Ultimate Asset 2026 Adtech Salary Survey (UK, 2025 to 2026).
