Audience Engagement Director
The Maine Monitor is seeking a creative and enterprising professional to help us better serve our readership and grow public engagement with our investigative and solutions-focused journalism for Maine.
Our audience engagement director should be a strong writer with a nuanced grasp of social media and the ability to draw actionable insights from data analytics to take our audience growth and engagement to the next level. This position reports to the Editor.
Position Responsibilities:
- Work closely with editors to create a plan to maximize readership, including SEO-friendly headlines and attractive story packages.
- Work with the newsroom on audience engagement strategies pegged to specific stories. We’re looking for someone who can think creatively about distilling long, dense investigations into digestible social posts.
- Define, track, and report on audience growth goals and engagement indicators. Lead regular traffic meetings to report progress and to discuss strategic adjustments.
- Use analytics and surveys to tell us more about who our audience is and how and why they read our work. Mine this data to help us understand and expand our readership and increase the impact of our journalism.
- Devise and execute The Maine Monitor’s social media strategy and manage its social media accounts, including on Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram. Produce copy, graphics, and video for each account, exploring automation and other techniques to ensure that we have a lively and engaging feed. Confer with the editorial team on social media rollouts for stories and brainstorm which platforms would be best for engaging and retaining readers.
- Audit our social media accounts to see where The Monitor needs to prioritize and which new platforms to explore.
- Work with Monitor newsroom reporters to grow their presence on social media and strategize on how best to tell stories via social.
- With the executive director and membership manager, brainstorm and execute strategies related to membership campaigns and audience events.
- Stay abreast of changes and trends within the news industry regarding techniques, products, or models that The Monitor might adopt.
Where you’ll be:
This position is based in Maine. Work can be done from home, but does involve travel for occasional visits to our office in Augusta, programs, and events. We are a statewide news organization.
The Maine Monitor is the nonpartisan, independent publication of the Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting, a registered 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization (EIN: 27-2623867), dedicated to delivering high-quality, nonpartisan investigative and explanatory journalism to inform Mainers about issues impacting our state and empower them to be engaged citizens. Our organization is governed by an independent Maine-based board of directors with fiscal and strategic oversight responsibilities. Visit us online to read our reporting and learn more about us!
Skill/Experience Requirements:
- At least 1-2 years of audience development and/or distribution experience in digital/editorial publishing.
- Experience building an engaged audience through newsletters, social media distribution platforms, and events.
- Ability to analyze key performance metrics and experience with native social analytics. Experience with Parse.ly, Social Flow, Chartbeat and Google Analytics is a plus.
- Ability to set and abide by deadlines, prioritize projects and experience managing both urgent, short-term projects and complex, longer-term projects.
- Understanding of audience behavior, engagement strategies, and best practices.
- Well-versed in SEO and email newsletter strategy
- Excellent communication skills — both written and verbal.
- Experience with digital publishing or content management systems (e.g. WordPress, Hootsuite, etc.) and popular social media platforms.
- Experience collecting, interpreting, and reporting on data, qualitative and quantitative.
- Understanding of nonprofit media is a plus.
- Enjoys working in teams and has excellent interpersonal skills.
- Comfortable adapting to changes in the evolving industry.
- Self-motivated personality with the ability to balance multiple competing projects and priorities.
- Deep interest in keeping up with digital trends and forecasting.
We know there are great candidates who have skills we haven’t thought of, or who may have experiences different from what we’ve described. If that’s you, reach out and tell us about yourself!
Salary and Benefits:
- $48,000 – $52,000 annual salary, depending on experience
- Health Stipend (taxable)
- Cell phone stipend (nontaxable)
- Retirement savings plan with a 3% employer match
- Expense reimbursement, according to published policy
- Short-term disability insurance
- 15 days of paid time off in the first year of work; 20 days starting with the second year of employment.
- 6 personal/sick days.
- Remote work and flex time
We are taking steps to make our newsroom better reflect the diverse communities we cover. We especially encourage members of traditionally underrepresented communities to apply, including women, people of color, LGBTQ people and people with disabilities.
Think you’re right for this role? Apply today by completing the form on our website. We hope to have our newest teammate start early in 2025 and will accept applications on a rolling basis until the position is filled.
If you have any trouble submitting this form or any questions email careers@themainemonitor.org.