How You’ll Contribute
The Communications, Marketing and Brand team uses creative and strategic tools to further the mission of the National Geographic Society (NGS), while maintaining our place as one of the world’s most trusted non-profit organizations and global brands. The Division develops and executes mission-driven,-brand strategies and integrated strategic communications, marketing, creative and audience growth for the National Geographic Society and unifying our efforts across owned channels, partners and earned media. The team is composed of seven integrated departments: Creative, Integrated Brand Marketing, Partnerships Marketing, MarCom Operations and Internal Communications, Strategic Communications, Executive Communications, and Crisis Communications and Public Relations.Your Impact
Responsibilities Include:
Brand and Marketing Strategy (35%)
Lead and evolve the brand strategy across the Society and serve as a thought leader and key brand liaison to partners, including The Walt Disney Company, that are licensed to amplify the brand leading brand positioning, brand expression and activation and brand guardianship.
Lead in development of gathering audience insight and market data into actionable brand positioning and compelling reasons to believe that drive differentiation and brand performance.
Lead the development of comprehensive, integrated marketing plans that align with overarching business goals working across divisions translating business priorities into integrated calendars and seasonal initiatives and ensuring alignment with larger brand priorities.
Develop marketing strategies and execute multi-channel marketing plans for the Advancement and Education divisions growing impact with donor, educator and learner audiences.
Defining the short- and long-term objectives and goals for marketing, establishing quantifiable metrics to track progress and ensure all efforts are data-driven and seamlessly integrated with broader fundraising and organizational goals.
Synthesize market trends, competitive intelligence, and audience insights into a compelling brand narrative.
Provide strategic direction for brand, creative, marketing, and other teams across the Communications division and the entire Society to produce innovative, compelling work of the highest standard.
Able to build and execute marketing campaigns and effectively lead the creative development process.
Serve as “brand guardian” and resident expert on brand guidelines, maintain brand integrity across all initiatives, products, partnerships, activations, and all opportunities, ensuring consistent adherence to brand guidelines and standards.
Partner with internal teams to vet new opportunities and partnerships and assess how they align with NGS’ brand standards and mission and assess potential brand or reputational risk versus reward and recommend opportunities to leadership.
Lead team responsible for Society-wide brand training working with key partners to ensure a unified brand voice and determine the appropriate brand education cadence.
Content Strategy and Content Orchestration (20%)
Leads the Society-wide process for developing the comprehensive content roadmaps, annual content and editorial plan and guidelines and multi-channel distribution strategies across partner, owned and other applicable channels.
Lead Brand and Content Committee that consists of decision makers across the Society to review, evaluate, and make decisions on all audience facing brand and content efforts.
Perform content audits to assess effectiveness, map content to user journeys, and maintain editorial calendars and work with designers, marketers, and stakeholders to ensure consistent messaging across channels.
Customer Growth and Engagement and Digital Strategy (20%)
Design and partner across the organization to lead a holistic digital growth roadmap that aligns with high-level business goals for revenue and audience expansion.
Lead development of an integrated customer experience (CX) across all platforms—website, social and email —to drive engagement.
Oversee or create high-quality content, ensuring it is optimized for SEO/SEM and user experience (UX) across society channels.
Utilize customer data and CRM systems to analyze behavioral trends, creating journey maps and identify personalized interactions that drive efficiency and increase retention.
Lead development, deployment and optimization of NGS channels, including email, web and social in support of broader campaign and audience engagement goals.
Partner on development of customer data and martech needs supporting digital programs and integrated marketing strategies.
Team Development/Management (25%)
Develop vision for the team and build innovative solutions and strategies to complex problems, articulate clear goals, KPIs, insights and plans, and move forward key projects to meet business objectives.
Recruit and manage a team to support the development and execution of ther marketing and brand strategies.
Lead and mentor junior to mid-level team members to build a culture of high performance, creative thinking, and risk-taking.
Establish and monitor staff performance and development goals, assign accountabilities, set objectives, establish priorities, conduct annual performance appraisals, and administer salary adjustments.
Serve as a marketing thought leader and trusted advisor to the CAO and Chief Education and Community Engagement Officer and their Senior Leadership team and participate in key divisional leadership meetings.
Ensure activities drive agreed to Advancement and Education goals and KPIs as outlined are delivered.
What You’ll Bring
Educational Background
Bachelor's Degree required. Credentials in branding, marketing, business or related field. MBA or advanced degree preferred.
Minimum Years of Experience
15+ years of experience in brand building and integrated marketing with experience in content strategy, audience engagement and omni-channel management and deployment.
Necessary Knowledge and Skills
Experience building a global brand, developing brand positioning and repositioning, assessing brand risk and maintaining brand standards, including with partners.
Understanding of the creative process and experience in managing agencies and working with in-house creative teams to develop high quality and effective creative.
Proven success acting as a brand guardian while strategically assessing and adding partners and advancing growth opportunities.
Experience building integrated marketing campaigns including digital channels, content strategy and audience growth with experience in executing omni-channel engagement activities.
Ability to analyze data to gauge success, adjust strategies quickly and efficiently, and forecast growth and engagement goals.
Technical proficiency and working knowledge of key Martech systems including Content Management Systems, SEO platforms, digital analytics, marketing automation, social listening platforms and audience analytics.
Excellent oral and written communication skills and meticulous attention to detail.
Ability to handle sensitive information confidentially and exercise good professional judgment.
Proven leader and manager with experience developing talent and leading teams to meet deadlines, produce exceptional work, and have fun while doing it.
Self-starter that is comfortable with ambiguity, able to adapt to change, and can innovate and thrive in a fast-paced environment.
Excellent interpersonal, communication, and relationship management skills.
Leads by example, displaying highly collaborative, influential and creative approaches to solving problems.
Desired Qualifications
Agency experience or management of an agency.
Experience in advocacy, non-profit, and/or fundraising space.
Experience working with a legacy brand a plus.
Supervision
5 Direct Reports; Will supervise a team of 15-20 people.
Salary Information
The National Geographic Society offers a competitive and holistic total rewards package. Our compensation structure and transparent pay philosophy are based on industry-specific market data for similar-sized nonprofit organizations.
The salary range for this position accounts for a wide range of factors including but not limited to organizational need; specific skill sets; experience and training; certifications; and more. At the National Geographic Society, individuals are typically hired at or near the starting point of the salary range for their role, and compensation decisions are dependent on the facts and circumstances of each case.
The salary range for this position is $228,000.00 - $240,000.00.In addition, the National Geographic Society offers a competitive and comprehensive benefits package that includes, but is not limited to, medical, dental, and vision insurance; engaging and comprehensive wellness program; 401(k) retirement savings plan with matching contributions after 6 months of employment; flexible paid time off benefits with up to 22 days of paid annual leave per calendar year (15 days for new hires in their first year, prorated based on the number of pay periods remaining in the year) and 10 days of sick leave; 12 paid holidays and a paid winter break between December 25 and 31 (May not apply to all roles that are required to work during high volume seasons or essential workers. Please check with the hiring manager for confirmation.); paid parental leave, adoption and surrogacy expense reimbursement, fertility benefits; learning and development opportunities; Lifestyle Spending Account; pet adoption assistance and insurance; pre-tax transportation benefits with a generous employer subsidy; employer-paid life insurance and disability benefit; and a variety of National Geographic discounts and perks.
Job Designation
Hybrid - At the Society, we believe in the advantages of coming together to build community, mentor and learn from colleagues, and connect more deeply with our mission. As a result, the majority of our staff are Hybrid. Our Hybrid category requires that staff work at Base Camp two days each week: every Tuesday and Wednesday. Hybrid staff are also always welcome to come in additional days each week if preferred.Candidates must be legally authorized to work in the United States. This position is not eligible for visa sponsorship.
We encourage you to apply even if your experience is not a 100% match with the position. We are looking for someone with relevant skills and experience, not a checklist that exactly matches the job description. We want to help you grow and in return, you help us grow into a stronger, more inclusive organization.