At National Geographic, we believe in the power of science, exploration, education and storytelling to change the world. We create engaged and impactful relationships with our various stakeholder communities, including Explorers, Educators and Students, and Key Influencers (Foundations, Policy Makers, Donors, etc.) across website, mobile and social channels. The Senior Director, Owned and Operated will play an important role in bringing this vision to life by driving engagement on our on our owned and operated platforms (website, mobile, etc.) and overseeing our digital content development and operations organizations in support of current and future digital initiatives at the Society.
The Senior Director will lead a results-oriented and audience-focused team with a creative yet practical and data-driven approach that engages and activates specific high-impact audiences across various owned and operated channels, including Web and mobile. The Senior Director will manage content development and operations teams and will work closely with various stakeholder, digital product and audience engagement teams.
The Senior Director ensures that his or her organization delivers for its primary business stakeholders, including Marketing, Education, Explorers and a variety of Impact Programs.
- Drive engagement on owned and operated platforms (website, mobile, etc). Lead and develop a team of best-in-class digital content development and operations specialists that builds, engages and serves multiple active online communities. Create a collaborative environment for the team to develop expertise and innovate in data-driven content distribution. (20%)
- Create and lead a multi-year social/digital content strategy across a variety of properties, channels and business units. Establish engaging digital content plans for each program and channel, ensuring brand and voice consistency along with performance optimization across platform-intentioned content. Collaborate with a cross-functional team in the operations of an integrated editorial calendar and associated content creation and deployment. (20%)
- Using a data-driven and collaborative approach, guide the creation, curation, optimization and deployment of owned digital content that will appeal and engage the right audience on the right channels. Define, guide and implement processes for content commissioning, creation, curation, quality assurance, ongoing maintenance and publishing. (20%)
- Use his/her deep understanding of digital content and optimization techniques to enable world-class engagement with the audiences in NGS targeted segments. Develop KPIs to measure, report, test and optimize content performance. (20%)
- Communicate and work effectively with executives and cross-functional leads in product, marketing, impact, and audience engagement teams. Participate in the ideation and creation of strategies to use content as a means to develop on-going relationships with target audiences, in collaboration with marketing, program and audience engagement partners. (20%)
Minimum Years and Type of Experience
- A minimum of 10+ relevant industry experience with at least five years of direct, hands-on experience in digital content or social media marketing, with strong related experience in digital product management or community management.
Knowledge and Skills Required
A proven Senior Director of editorial and/or content marketing, with demonstrated success planning and executing programs to build targeted, engaged and activated audiences for brands, companies or NGOs.
- Demonstrated leader with ability to supervise and manage a team
- Experience overseeing content development and operations for websites and/or mobile platforms
- Experience managing digital editorial, publishing and operations teams.
- Possessing a strong editorial sense of voice and content quality.
- Exceptional skill at clear, concise, and compelling communication.
- Highly motivated out-of-the-box thinker who has direct editorial/content experience as well as an excellent understanding of digital platforms, social media marketing and/or community management
- Experience working directly with content management, publishing and digital analytics systems.
- Experience working with business owners to develop a deep understanding of customer needs.
- Ability to collaborate and work effectively with cross functional teams in product, marketing, impact and social media groups.
- Pro-active self-starter and a “can do” problem solver who thrives with hard challenges in a fast-paced environment
- Strong analytical background to seek data-driven rigor in decision-making.
- Experienced managing and mentoring data-driven digital content and/or digital content marketing teams
- Skilled collaborator and a creative, data-driven and humble leader who thrives solving complex problems.
- Passionate about the global mission of NGS.
- Highly intelligent strategist with proven track record of successfully driving and delivering digital content and digital content marketing strategies to grow and engage audiences.
- Experience in presenting to and interacting with executives and successfully getting their buy-in, setting goals and expectations and communicating progress.
- Extremely organized and detail oriented.
- Experience with leading edge digital content management and publishing analytics and tools.
- Creative thinker and innovator in touch with digital culture and trends.
- Strong planning, prioritization and project management abilities.
- Deep understanding of digital best practices and digital marketing, publisher and media landscape
Supervision
- The Senior Director will manage two direct reports and a total organization of roughly 10-12 people within digital content development and operations.
National Geographic's headquarters is located in the heart of Washington, D.C. In addition to a unique and dynamic work environment, National Geographic offers its employees a comprehensive benefits package, including health and dental benefits, generous vacation and leave time, a 401(k) plan, and flexible work options. National Geographic is an Equal Opportunity Employer
Responsibility percentages may vary depending on business needs.