Sr. Partner Marketing Lead

Description:

The Senior Partner Marketing Lead is responsible for driving marketing value, adoption and growth across a highly complex set of programs and universities, across all business lines. They are a key external and internal marketing stakeholder, laser focused on developing and leveraging effective marketing-forward school partnerships that support, nurture and grow partner marketing engagement to drive impact in the overall business. Reporting to a Senior Manager or Director of Partner Marketing, this role is a peer lead across the team, with demonstrated expertise in leveraging account and relationship management to drive marketing strategy and partner engagement both for their individual portfolios, and in support of the broader Portfolio across all lines of business.. They are accountable for complex and multi-stakeholder external relationships and goaled towards effective partner engagement that directly results in business growth and success. The Senior Partner Marketing Lead is ultimately responsible for overall program performance of their portfolio through the active engagement with both internal and external stakeholders to drive focused and effective marketing strategies that deliver business results.

Responsibilities:

Partner Management 

• Establishes and upholds productive marketing relationships between 2U marketing and partner institutions within a large, complex and high impact growth portfolio.
• Determines and executes appropriate cadenced communication plan with school stakeholders  to ensure effective and efficient brand stewardship that supports the program’s strategic marketing plan.  
• Engages as a trusted advisor and brand steward with, and for, the partner, leading proactive and productive partner discussions to align objectives, drive growth strategies and create successful outcomes.
• Manages direct, scoped and regular contact with partners to ensure progress against growth objectives
• Secures partner and/or internal approvals on new projects/initiatives, navigates partner and business requests and feedback, create and manages jira tickets, collaborates on creatives briefs, logs call, meeting and incident reports
• Successfully maintains multi-level stakeholder relationships, including senior level leadership and central marketing alongside school side engagement
• Goaled with increasing partner confidence, improving partner sentiment and increasing go-to-market speed across complex partner portfolio to support achievement of established business goals

Funnel Management 

• Owns and powers the development, iteration and driving of impactful marketing narrative within a large, complex and high impact growth portfolio to support partner engagement and achievement of university and 2U business goals 
• Responsible for monitoring and tracking partner funnel and collaborating with strategic internal stakeholders to optimize funnel performance.
• Proactively engages internal teams and escalates appropriately to address performance and partner concerns as appropriate against 2U business goals
• Ensures strategic and creative deliverables are aligned with partner brand, strategy and business goals
• Responsible for identifying and implementing strategies and tactics that optimize funnel performance within the Portfolio.
• Proactively engage with Marketing Strategy to uncover opportunities, trends and insights by vertical to grow and strengthen strategic marketing approach

Internal Partnership 

• Works closely and autonomously with each program’s General Manager/Program Director within a large, complex and high impact growth portfolio to ensure proper alignment and execution of brand strategies and program objectives.
• Attend and participate in business critical internal meetings (PLTs, etc) and strategy planning
• Secures school approvals on new projects/initiatives, navigates partner and business requests and feedback, create and manages jira tickets, collaborates on creatives briefs, logs call, meeting and incident reports
• Maintains and keeps current partner specific “playbook” to document and support continuity of historical context, institutional knowledge and partner relationship nuance.
• Collaborates with internal teams to provide necessary context and insight to drive performance and relationship growth, as well as strategy
• Proactively identifies and nurtures growth opportunities with partners and internal stakeholders that advance partner relationship and marketing effectiveness to improve program performance
• Mentorship of peers regarding best practices and effective tactics in relationship/partner management, marketing strategy, problem solving, prioritization and conflict resolution.
• Support wider Portfolio success as needed, with strategic partnership, mentorship, preparation and presentation alongside other Partner Marketing team members.

Process Development and Training 

• Develops and proactively drives strategic resources, positioning and team training to highlight and support large-scale marketing efforts 
• Collaborate with Marketing Strategy stakeholders to create quantitative and qualitative performance reports for internal and external stakeholders
• Develops standards and processes to provide partners with regular performance feedback and reporting
• Work closely with Senior Manager/Director of Partner Marketing to ensure balanced and effective Portfolio partner management aligned with business drivers and growth objectives

Qualifications:

• 5-10 years as a Account Manager, Marketing Manager, Communications Specialist, Strategist or similar job function, either in agency, educational, digital marketing or corporate setting
• Bachelor’s degree required, MBA or similar a plus
• Client facing agency experience highly preferred