"Assistant Director, Digital Strategy"

Reporting to the Associate Director of Digital Strategy, the Assistant Director, Digital Strategy will help manage digital solicitation strategy, digital content planning, email marketing, web strategy, and social media plans for the Alumni Relations and Resource Development (ARRD) team and serve as the Communications team’s project manager. Responsibilities include identifying needs and new opportunities to effectively engage and connect the Harvard Kennedy School (HKS) alumni community and increasing fundraising revenue.

The successful candidate is a tech-savvy professional who has innovative ideas to improve audience engagement through digital communications and is creative and comfortable working with a team. They have excellent communication skills and are a strategic thinker with an in-depth understanding of how technology can help us tell the alumni story and drive fundraising revenue. Our ideal person is methodical, has excellent time management skills, and can use their communication skills to collaborate effectively with various teams.

Digital Solicitation Strategy

• Assist Senior Director of Communications with current digital principal and major gift proposals
• Research and expand platform options for digital principal and major gift proposals
• Partner with HKS Annual Fund team to plan solicitation strategy, including brainstorming new opportunities and concepts
• Liaise with University’s principal and major gifts proposal team to leverage existing formats and content for principal and major gift solicitations

Digital Content Planning

• Assists Senior Associate Director of Digital Strategy to plan, design, and develop overall digital content strategy for ARRD
• Partners with ARRD’s Comms. writing team to effectively synthesize content across platforms
• Publish, maintain, and update the Alumni section of the HKS website, including making recommendations and driving optimization plans for summer 2025
• Analyze web traffic metrics and suggest solutions to boost web presence
• Monitor SEO/SEM, Google Analytics metrics and social media insights to inform future content production
• Collaborate with centers and departments to identify new sources of content for sharing in alumni and donor newsletters

Email, Website, Social Media, and On-Campus Advertising Support

• Keep up-to-date with our audience’s preferences and proactively suggest new ideas
• Manage email builds through Salesforce Marketing Cloud, including HKS Annual Fund, working in partnership with the AA&D Email Strategies team and internal ARRD stakeholders; responsibilities include building templates, managing content approvals and edits, partnering on testing and scheduling
• Collaborate with the HKS’s Office of Communications and Public Affairs (OCPA) digital communications coordinator to generate, edit, publish, and share engaging social content
• Manage and maintain the content and schedule for ARRD’s digital screens on campus
• Lead efforts on ARRD’s digital Annual Report on Giving, including microsite creation and editing, content direction, and project timeline
• Participate in weekly calls with OCPA and support as needed

Digital Analytics

• Develop strategies for effective data analysis and reporting
• Define metrics and relevant data sources
• Help to implement a comprehensive internal reporting structure for all email campaigns, providing actionable insights that drive strategic, data-informed decisions
• Interpret data, analyze results and provide ongoing reports
• Measure and report performance of digital content, and assess against goals
• Identify trends and insights, and optimize spend and performance based on the insights
• Collect data and report on impressions, engagement, pageviews, and sessions to help inform future strategy

Project Management

• Assist with implementation and oversight of new Smartsheet project management system, including building dashboards and reports
• Deliver projects on time ensuring quality standards are met
• Communicate with the team and ensure all members are on board with delegated tasks
• Seek opportunities for improvement and suggest new projects