Lead – Digital Growth Marketing (SEM/SEO)

Pepper; Mumbai; On-site; INR 4,000,000 - 7,500,000; Full time

Job summary

Pepper is seeking a Lead – Digital Growth Marketing to own SEM and performance marketing for our US business, Pepper's largest market. You will run a multi-million-dollar paid budget across Google, Bing, Meta, LinkedIn, and YouTube, measured by qualified pipeline and efficient CAC.

This role is hands-on, with AI-driven automation, SEO and GEO as levers to reduce blended CAC. Expect to build the bidding strategy, run experiments, and own the funnel from search to pipeline.

Qualifications

• Seasoned in managing multi-million budgets for US-focused campaigns.
• Strong CRO mindset with landing page optimization.
• Proven ability to drive CAC down and pipeline up through automation.

Responsibilities

• Own SEM and paid search end-to-end across channels.
• Lead AI-driven automation to improve CAC and pipeline.
• Set channel mix, bidding, and creative strategy.
• Improve SEO and GEO to boost efficiency.
• Partner with US stakeholders and growth teams.

Skills

SEM & paid search mastery

Budget ownership

GA4 / Looker

AI-driven automation

US market experience

SEO & GEO understanding

Cross-functional collaboration

Tools

SEMrush

Gumloop

n8n

Optmyzr

GPT pipelines

Job description

About the Role

We're hiring a Lead – Digital Growth Marketing to own SEM and performance marketing for our US business — Pepper's largest and fastest-growing market. You'll run a multi-million-dollar paid budget across Google, Bing, Meta, LinkedIn, and YouTube, and you'll be measured on one number: qualified pipeline at efficient CAC.

This is a hands-on, P&L-style role. You'll set the channel mix, build the bidding and creative strategy, run the experimentation engine, and deploy AI-led automation to extract every dollar of efficiency. SEO and GEO sit under your remit as compounding levers that lower your blended CAC — but the core job is paid: own the auction, own the funnel, own the number.

This role is for someone who has run 7-figure paid budgets, can audit a Google Ads account in 30 minutes, and gets restless when CPLs creep up by 5%.

Location & Hours

Working hours: 5:00 PM – 2:30 AM IST, aligned to US business hours, Monday–Friday.

This role partners daily with US stakeholders and the US growth/marketing team. The shift is non-negotiable — please apply only if you're committed to the US schedule.

What You’ll Own

SEM & Paid Search (Primary)

• Own Google Ads and Bing end-to-end — campaign architecture, keyword strategy, match-type discipline, bidding (manual + Smart Bidding), Quality Score, ad copy, sitelinks, audience layering, and negative keyword hygiene.
• Drive CPL and CAC efficiency quarter-over-quarter through structured experimentation: bid strategy tests, ad copy iteration, landing page A/B tests, audience exclusions, and dayparting.
• Build AI-driven SEM workflows — search intent classification, automated negative keyword harvesting, bid optimization, ad copy generation, and anomaly detection — using tools like SEMrush, Gumloop, n8n, Optmyzr, or custom GPT-based pipelines. Replace hours of manual work with automation.
• Own SEM landing page strategy in partnership with Web Engineering and Content. Ship dedicated, conversion-optimized LPs (not generic homepage drops) for every major campaign cluster.
• Run rigorous SEM forecasting and budget allocation: weekly pacing, channel-level ROAS, marginal CAC analysis, and incremental budget cases for leadership.

Paid Social & Performance Channels

• Own Meta, LinkedIn, YouTube, and emerging paid channels for US demand gen. Drive MQLs, demos, and pipeline at target CPA.
• Build full-funnel paid social: prospecting, retargeting, lookalikes, abandoned-funnel sequences, and creative-led campaigns (e.g., Meta DM campaigns with incentives, LinkedIn Document Ads, YouTube demand gen).
• Own creative strategy with the brand/design team — brief, test, iterate. You don't just run media; you drive what gets made.
• Build paid attribution and incrementality testing — geo holdouts, conversion lift studies, MMM inputs — to know what's actually working vs. what looks good in last-click.
• Own the paid → MQL → SQO conversion funnel. Partner with RevOps on lead scoring, routing, and SLA adherence.
• Run the CRO program across all paid landing pages and high-intent web pages — hypothesis-driven A/B testing, heatmap analysis, form optimization, and friction reduction.
• Partner with PMM and Web Engineering to ship high-intent web tools (calculators, generators, comparison tools) that lower paid CPL and drive 3–5x higher conversion rates.
• Own organic MQL acquisition as a CAC-reduction lever — every dollar saved in paid via SEO directly improves blended efficiency.
• Drive programmatic SEO at scale: glossaries, comparison pages, category/location LPs, template-driven content systems. Target top-3 rankings on commercial-intent terms.
• Lead GEO (Generative Engine Optimization) strategy: optimize Pepper's content and structured data to win citations across ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Claude, and Google AI Overviews. Build the measurement playbook for AI-search visibility.
• Partner with the Content team to ensure SEO/GEO output meets quality and intent — but you set the strategy and the targets.
• Own the weekly performance review: spend, MQLs, SQOs, CPL, CAC, pipeline, and channel-level health.
• Build dashboards in Looker/GA4/Sheets that the Founder, CRO, and CMO can read in under 60 seconds.

What We’re Looking For

• 5–9 years in performance marketing at a high-growth B2B SaaS or marketplace company, with at least 2–3 years owning SEM for the US market.
• Demonstrated experience managing $2M+ in annual paid budget with clear ARR/pipeline outcomes attached to your work.
• Deep, hands-on Google Ads expertise — you can talk Quality Score, auction insights, search term reports, and bid simulators in your sleep.
• Proven track record of driving CAC down and pipeline up quarter-over-quarter through experimentation and automation, not just spend increases.
• Strong paid social chops across Meta and LinkedIn — full-funnel, creative-led, with attribution rigour.
• Hands-on with AI/automation tooling (LLMs, Gumloop, n8n, Zapier, Optmyzr, SEMrush AI, custom GPTs) to scale performance workflows.
• Strong working knowledge of SEO and a clear point of view on GEO. You don't need to be a technical SEO expert — but you need to know enough to set targets and lead a team.
• Excellent analytical skills — fluent in GA4, Looker/Tableau, attribution platforms. SQL/BigQuery is a strong plus.
• High ownership, strong bias for action, operational rigour. You run tight weekly cadences and don't let things slip.
• Comfortable working US hours from Mumbai on a sustained basis. Prior US team/stakeholder experience required.

Bonus Points

• Scaled SEM at a B2B SaaS company from $10M → $100M+ ARR.
• Built AI-driven SEM automation that delivered measurable efficiency gains.
• Shipped a high-intent web tool that became a top-3 lead source.
• Experience with international expansion (UK, AU, EU markets).
• In-housed SEM from an agency or built a performance team from scratch.

Why This Role

Own the largest paid budget at Pepper, with direct accountability for US pipeline.

Build the AI-native performance playbook at a content + AI company that's already deep in the AI stack.

Direct line to the Founder's Office and US leadership. Clear path to Director / Head of Growth.

Front-row seat to GEO and the next era of search — at a company actually positioned to win it.