Director, Audience Engagement

Who We Are:

Southern California Public Radio (SCPR) is a member-supported public media network whose mission is to strengthen the civic and cultural bonds that unite Southern California's diverse communities by providing the highest quality news and information service on air at LAist 89.3, online at LAist.com and through LAist Live Programming & Events. Since our founding in 1999, SCPR has been a fast growing, innovative, multi-platform public service newsroom. Every day, our staff helps audiences catch up on the latest headlines, solve the complexities of life in Southern California, and connect curious communities to one another.

Position Summary:

Public radio is ready for a glow-up.

At LAist, we believe Angelenos deserve great local news that meets them wherever they are—online, on-air, in person, via podcasts, newsletters, and their favorite social media feed.

To really do that, we must understand and prioritize Angelenos’ information needs and digital habits. That’s one reason we’re launching a search for our first-ever audience engagement director, somebody who will bring energy, innovation, and a whole lot of strategy to our audience development work—and help people along in their journey from discovery to financial support.

Help us more deeply engage Angelenos on the issues and stories that matter most to Los Angeles. It’s no easy task. The audience engagement director will work across the newsroom, product, and in-person teams with a focus on newsletters and social media.

You’ll know this position is for you if you love to work with others, analyze data and make data-informed decisions, have familiarity with platforms, and are a supportive people manager. Bring strong journalistic standards and be ready to edit social and newsletter copy. We’re also looking for someone who can keep tabs on emerging opportunities and evaluate whether we should engage with them

In this role, you’ll report to the vice president of community engagement and strategic initiatives.

We believe a strong organization includes employees from a range of backgrounds, with different skills, experiences and passions. If you do not meet every job qualification, but have some of these skills and feel you could be a good fit, we would like to hear from you. Please apply and tell us more about yourself.

Compensation:

The salary for this opportunity will be no less than $110,003 annualized and no more than $137,504 annualized. Exact salary determined by experience and education related to the role, organizational compensation structure, budget and internal equity.

Position Responsibilities:

• Grow and engage audiences via search and social
• Oversee social media channels, including but not necessarily limited to Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok and Reddit
• Lead audience growth strategies to deepen engagement and increase reach (inclusive but not limited to social media, newsletters and other channels)
• Work with newsroom, engagement, marketing, and other key internal stakeholders to identify, understand, reach, and engage target audiences across platforms
• Optimize workflows for featuring reporters’ and producers’ stories on social platforms in a consistent, effective way
• Work with community engagement team and the rest of the newsroom to facilitate audience callouts and closing the loop
• Provide training and other coaching to colleagues on best practices for social media and other digital platforms

Newsletter Strategy and distribution:

• Set newsletter strategy across teams
• Work with product team to streamline and optimize the production and execution of editorial newsletters
• Work with marketing team to streamline and optimize marketing strategies to grow email acquisition efforts, newsletter growth efforts and others through owned, paid, earned and shared media means
• Edit editorial newsletters
• Oversee calendar of newsletters across the organization; manage calendar and provide consistency with style
• Work with product to ensure we’re leveraging technology to best serve and engage audiences

Collaborate with marketing:

• To design efficient growth efforts through paid means for social media, both for brand awareness and for particular products (e.g site), tentpoles or content initiatives

Collaborate with membership:

• Work with vice president, development and membership to develop and execute funnel strategy—and experiments—for growing membership revenue, optimizing the audience and member funnels
• Work with membership and product teams to track and report on key conversion metrics for membership and other revenue opportunities
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams to optimize our audience and member funnels as well as the audience digital journey

Develop SMART, actionable goals and tracking them:

• Determine and own goals for growth and engagement on newsletters, social
• Work with product to develop an engagement measurement and reporting strategy to educate internal stakeholders across editorial, product, and development; this should inform daily and strategic decision-making

Manage social media and newsletter teams:

• Support development of direct reports
• Create an environment that supports learning and collaboration

Required Education and Experience:

• A Bachelor’s Degree, Military Experience or other related experience is necessary.
• 7 years of experience in the desired, or a related, field

Required Skills, Knowledge and Abilities:

• Experience as a journalist
• Strong writing and editing skills
• Experience running newsletters
• Experience and/or relationships with third-party platforms
• Knowledge of product management
• Strong communication skills, including ability to make analytics and social media trends feel accessible and actionable for editors
• Direct experience in building and developing member messaging journeys that utilize multiple channels including remarketing, email, and social
• Proven ability to synthesize and interpret data and customer insights into successful engagement strategies
• Strong project management skills, excel at juggling multiple projects, staying organized and prioritizing deadlines
• Proficient in customer engagement technology and media platforms
• Strong presentation and communication skills, with the proven ability to gain alignment
• Strong data analytics familiarity and strong understanding of web, mobile, and off-site data reporting systems
• Ability to define opportunities and problems, collect and analyze data, establish facts and make valid conclusions

Preferred Skills and Experience:

• Experience building audience-focused engagement products across via SMS, push notifications and emerging messaging platforms
• Experience managing a team

Reporting To This Position:

• Associate Editor
• Social Media Producers

Physical Demands and Working Conditions:

• Must be able to perform the essential duties of the position with or without reasonable accommodation.
• Physical Demands:
  • Required to move about in an office environment and sit for extended periods of time.
  • Required to move about in the community.
• Working Conditions:
  • Moderate noise level

Southern California Public Radio (LAist 89.3/LAist.com/LAist Studios) is diverse in race, ethnicity, language, culture, social class, national origin, religious and political belief, age, ability, gender, gender identity, and sexual orientation in addition to other markers protected by law.