Director of Media Strategy – Performance

This is a fully remote position, open to applicants in United States.

📋 Description

• Take ownership of the enterprise paid media strategy and be accountable for media investment and performance across Spring Education Group’s preschool, K–12, and online education brands.

• Convert enrollment priorities, school capacity, market demand, lead quality, conversion performance, lifetime value, seasonality, competition, and brand priorities into unique media strategies.

• Manage a multi-million-dollar media portfolio, providing recommendations on where to increase, maintain, test, or decrease investment.

• Collaborate with Finance, Analytics, Enrollment, Regional Directors, and marketing leadership on forecasting and achieving enrollment and financial outcomes.

• Assess performance across the entire enrollment funnel, from demand and inquiry through tours, applications, enrollment, retention indicators, and lifetime value.

• Identify the root causes of underperformance, whether they originate from media, market demand, creative execution, website experience, lead quality, admissions conversion, capacity, competition, or other factors.

• Act as the primary liaison with the paid media agency, establishing strategic direction, objectives, performance expectations, testing priorities, investment limits, operational standards, governance, reporting requirements, and escalation protocols.

• Ensure agency partners are held accountable for execution, optimization, innovation, reporting, quality, responsiveness, and results.

• Provide strategic direction to internal paid media teams and develop workflows across paid media, brand, web, creative, analytics, CRM, enrollment, and finance.

• Keep abreast of advancements in AI-driven advertising, automation, measurement, privacy, emerging channels, and AI search behavior.

• Create robust test-and-learn programs and expand successful tests across brands, markets, and campuses.

• Partner with brand, creative, web, conversion, CRM, analytics, and enrollment teams to eliminate non-media obstacles to performance.

• Develop performance frameworks that link media investment to qualified inquiries, tours, applications, enrollments, cost per enrollment, lifetime value, and ROI.

• Evaluate performance across brand, campus, geography, audience, creative, campaign, channel, device, and funnel stage.

• Create scalable reporting and deliver clear, decision-oriented insights to marketing and executive leadership.

⛳️ Requirements

• Over 10 years of progressive experience in paid media, performance marketing, growth marketing, digital acquisition, or a related field.

• Director-level leadership experience is required.

• Extensive experience in developing strategies for and managing multi-million-dollar media investments across various brands, locations, markets, or business units.

• Deep knowledge of paid search and paid social, especially with Google and Meta.

• Experience with video, display and programmatic media, retargeting, local acquisition, and new performance channels.

• Strong understanding of AI-driven advertising, automation, bidding, audience development, attribution, privacy, platform evolution, and AI search visibility.

• Proven capability to connect marketing expenditures to enrollment, acquisition costs, lifetime value, revenue, profitability, and ROI.

• Fluency in full-funnel measurement and analytics, including CRM data, lead management, conversion tracking, GA4, reporting platforms, and dashboards.

• Demonstrated success in managing and challenging paid media agencies, vendors, publishers, and platform partners.

• Experience in leading and developing teams while building effective operational structures.

• Strong, clear communication skills with the ability to distill complex performance data into concise, actionable insights.

• Capability to collaborate with brand, analytics, creative, content, SEO, CRM and lifecycle, web, enrollment or sales, finance, Regional Directors, and executive leadership.

🏝️ Benefits

• Comprehensive medical, dental, and vision insurance.

• FSA/HSA options available.

• 401(k) plan with company match.

• Student tuition remission benefits.

• Continued education savings through partnerships with universities.

• Paid holidays and sick leave.

• Eligibility for a 20% bonus.