Sales & digital marketing assistant (1 year maternity cover)

Closing date for applications: Sunday 15th February 2026

Salary: £31,041 - £36,563 (depending on experience)

Location: London (Hybrid after probationary period)

Contract: Maternity cover (1 year fixed term contract)

Fluent in German and interested in publishing? Join Usborne Publishing to support sales and digital marketing for it's German-language children's books.

Usborne is an independent, family business, creating books which spark curiosity in children of all ages. These range from books for babies such as the bestselling THAT’S NOT MY®… series of touchy-feely books, to YA fiction from acclaimed authors such as Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé and Ravena Guron – with everything from Sticker Dolly Dressing to Philosophy for Beginners in between. Whilst the company is now a market-leader in children’s publishing and one of the best-known brands in children’s books globally, the company retains a friendly and familial feel. If you want to work somewhere close-knit enough for people to know your name, but which has a first-class reputation around the world, Usborne is the place for you.

The Usborne German language publishing team looks after all commercial, sales and marketing activities related to our German own-language publishing programme. The team works closely with German distributors, sales representatives, PR agencies, editorial and production teams to ensure that German editions of Usborne books are published, promoted and distributed effectively.

We are looking for a proactive, highly organised and detail-focused individual with excellent administrative, communication and digital skills to join our German language publishing team on a maternity cover basis. This role offers a varied mix of sales support, digital marketing, bibliographic administration and regulatory compliance responsibilities. While the role is based within our Foreign Language team in London, it provides day-to-day support to the German team, who are based locally in our German office. This requires regular communication and close collaboration with colleagues working remotely.

What you'll be doing

This exciting and varied role supports sales, marketing and digital activity for our German-language publishing programme.

• Supporting sales activity and external partners, including monitoring new titles, preparing advance materials and coordinating with sales, distribution and PR contacts.
• Maintaining accurate scheduling and title information, ensuring records are kept up to date and data is entered accurately.
• Assisting with digital marketing activity, including social media content creation, metadata accuracy and performance reporting, working closely with marketing colleagues.
• Preparing marketing and sales materials, including presentations, advance information sheets and catalogues (print and digital).
• Uploading and maintaining digital catalogue content and supporting online visibility of titles.
• Supporting compliance with relevant regulatory requirements, including gathering and submitting required product and packaging information.

What we are looking for

You will need to have native-level written and spoken German and excellent English language skills. This role would suit someone with experience in a busy administrative, sales support or marketing environment, with experience from within publishing or a related industry a bonus.

• Excellent organisational skills, with the ability to prioritise and manage multiple tasks.
• Exceptional attention to detail, particularly when working with metadata and bibliographic information.
• Clear, confident communication skills when liaising with internal teams and external partners.
• Ability to work independently as well as collaboratively within a small team
• Digital content creation skills, including writing engaging copy for online use.
• Confidence in interpreting and reporting on social media data.
• Ability to work independently and proactively while supporting and collaborating with a small team based remotely, building effective working relationships across locations.
• Strong IT skills, including Microsoft Office; experience with databases such as Biblio is an advantage.

This role is based in our London, Farringdon office and we work a 35-hour working week. After a successful initial induction period (where we require new staff to work in the office for 4-5 days per week) we then operate a hybrid working model of 3 days in the office and 2 days working from home subject to business need, which optimises our opportunities for creative collaboration and contact with our colleagues.

In addition to our transparent salary grading structure, for this role we also offer a range of benefits including:

• 25 days paid holiday entitlement plus bank holidays
• Industry-leading Pension Scheme and Life Assurance.
• Employee Assistance Programme and Mental Health First Aiders.
• Healthcare Cashback scheme.
• Virtual GP service.
• Enhanced Family Friendly benefits.
• Paid Volunteer Day.
• Rewards and Discount services and shopping.
• Cycle to Work Scheme.
• 75% discount on Usborne books.

We are unable to offer visa sponsorship for this role and therefore applicants must have the right to live and work in the UK at the point of application. We expect to undertake first round interviews in person from w/c 23rd February with a further interview to be held shortly after. We are looking for someone to be available to take up the post late April 2026. Please let us know if you require reasonable adjustments at any point during the application and/or recruitment process.

Usborne is dedicated to building a diverse taskforce that reflects the wide range of communities that read our books globally. Decisions are made based on the individual’s skills and experiences and we particularly encourage applications from underrepresented demographics in Publishing.

The use of AI has become more prevalent in recruitment application answers and content and whilst AI is undoubtedly a useful tool, we need to see that you're able to demonstrate your ability to originate ideas and write them in a compelling manner, not just generate them using a tool. Therefore, any suspected AI usage flagged by the Applied system may result in your application being rejected.

We welcome and encourage applications from candidates who are under-represented in the creative industries.

Please make sure that you state in your application that you found this role via Creative Access.