Growth Marketing Director: Acquisition & AI-Driven Strategy

EF Education First Ltd.; Cambridge (MA); On-site; USD 165,000 - 185,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Training & workshops

Paid time off

Business travel

401(k) match

Health/dental/vision

FSAs

Fertility support

Wellness reimbursement

Employee groups

Employee assistance

Sabbatical

Product discounts

Local discounts

Flexible office

Director compensation

Job summary

EF Education First Ltd. is seeking a marketing leader to drive EF Adventures growth, owning end-to-end customer acquisition across paid media, social, creator content, ecommerce, CRM, events, and traditional media to boost bookings.

This is an early-stage, hands-on director role: you’ll build the plan, manage agencies, and lead a small team while partnering across PR, Sales, Operations, Product, and Analytics to maximize high-quality traffic and conversions.

Qualifications

• 10+ years in marketing with deep experience in digital customer acquisition, including several years leading teams.
• Experience managing both a digital media agency and a creative agency.
• Hands-on depth in paid search and paid social.
• A track record of building the business case for marketing investment: forecasting results, stating assumptions, securing budget.
• Strong analytical skills and the ability to turn complex data into a clear recommendation.
• Experience with campaigns beyond digital, such as events, out-of-home, or partnerships, and measuring what they deliver.
• Experience building measurement where little exists.
• Practical experience using AI in marketing work.
• Ability to influence cross-functional partners without relying on title.
• A hands-on, entrepreneurial approach, with comfort in ambiguity and a small team.
• Nice to have: travel, education, or other considered-purchase experience; CRM or loyalty exposure; startup experience.

Responsibilities

• Develop and implement a strategy to acquire new customers, drive qualified traffic and leads, and increase conversion to booking.
• Use data to find the biggest opportunities and decide where to invest, scale, or stop.
• Concept integrated campaigns that span digital and non-digital channels, including events, out-of-home, and traditional media, and support brand and product launches.
• Lead strategy for paid search, paid social, and emerging platforms, with a focus on qualified demand and conversion efficiency.
• Manage our digital media and creative agencies: set goals, challenge plans and reporting, and hold partners accountable for results.
• Direct social and creator programs that reach new customers, working within the brand and creative direction set by our Creative Director, and scale the best organic content through paid.
• Oversee booking conversion from web lead to confirmed traveler, growing our digital booking pipeline across ecommerce platforms, partnering with ecommerce, product, and creative leads to improve the booking experience and conversion.
• Oversee customer lifecycle engagement and retention, building a robust CRM and lifecycle nurturing program that turns new contacts into highly engagement customers and first-time bookers into repeat customers.
• Define how marketing's contribution to bookings is measured and build the foundation to get there; turn channel data into clear performance narratives for leaders; use AI to speed up analysis, creative development, and campaign execution.

Skills

Digital marketing

Agency management

Paid search

Paid social

Analytics

AI in marketing

Cross-functional

CRM / Loyalty

Startup experience

Entrepreneurial

Job description

EF Education First Ltd. is seeking a marketing leader to drive EF Adventures growth, owning end-to-end customer acquisition across paid media, social, creator content, ecommerce, CRM, events, and traditional media to boost bookings.

This is an early-stage, hands-on director role: you’ll build the plan, manage agencies, and lead a small team while partnering across PR, Sales, Operations, Product, and Analytics to maximize high-quality traffic and conversions.