Manager, SEO & AI Discovery

dentsu; Chicago (IL); Hybrid; USD 65,000 - 75,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Medical, vision, and dental insurance

Life insurance

Disability insurance

401k

Flexible paid time off

At least 15 paid holidays per year

Paid sick and safe leave

Paid parental leave

Job summary

Merkle in Chicago seeks a Sr. Strategist, SEO & AI Discovery to lead SEO across a portfolio of client accounts, setting program direction, owning complex audits and recommendations, and translating search performance into business outcomes.

This senior individual contributor will move between technical SEO, content and on-page strategy, AI-driven discovery, performance measurement, and client advisory, mentoring juniors and shaping scalable workflows.

Qualifications

• 3+ years of progressive SEO experience in agency, consultancy, or multi-stakeholder environments.
• Ability to combine data sources and translate findings into business-driven recommendations.
• Hands-on with tools like GSC, GA4, Screaming Frog, Sitebulb, Ahrefs, SEMRush, Data Studio.
• Strong written, verbal, and presentation skills for executives and teams.

Responsibilities

• Lead SEO strategy across assigned accounts and link work to client goals and outcomes.
• Serve as day-to-day search lead, building trusted relationships with client stakeholders.
• Own complex SEO / AI audits and analyses across technical, content, and AI visibility.
• Develop measurement frameworks connecting organic visibility to business results.
• Turn data into decisions using multiple data sources to prioritize actions.
• Lead technical SEO workstreams across crawl, indexation, rendering, and schema.
• Advance content and AI Search visibility with topical authority and on-page optimization.
• Manage end-to-end delivery including scoping, QA, and stakeholder updates.
• Mentor junior consultants and support account growth through pitches and renewals.

Skills

SEO strategy

Audits

AI discovery

Client advisory

Cross-functional leadership

Tools

Google Search Console

GA4

Screaming Frog

Sitebulb

Ahrefs

SEMRush

enterprise crawlers

rank tracking platforms

Data Studio

AI visibility platforms

Job description

Job Description

As a Sr. Strategist, SEO & AI Discovery at Merkle, you will lead SEO strategy across a portfolio of client accounts, setting program direction, owning complex audits and recommendations, and translating search performance into business outcomes. This role is built for a senior individual contributor who can move comfortably between technical SEO, content and on-page strategy, AI-driven discovery, performance measurement, and client advisory. You will serve as a trusted lead for assigned accounts, helping clients understand what is happening, why it matters, and what to do next.

Core Responsibilities

• Lead SEO strategy across assigned accounts: Set search program direction, prioritize workstreams, and ensure recommendations connect to client business goals, marketing priorities, and measurable outcomes.
• Serve as the day-to-day search lead: Build trusted relationships with client stakeholders, understand their goals, KPIs, business context, priorities, and decision-making dynamics, and translate search priorities into clear, business-relevant action.
• Own complex SEO / AI audits and analyses: Independently diagnose performance opportunities across technical SEO, content and on-page optimization, AI Search visibility, competitive landscape, and site architecture.
• Develop measurement frameworks: Define SEO reporting structures that connect organic visibility, technical health, content performance, classic SERP visibility, AI Overview presence, LLM visibility, and business outcomes.
• Turn data into decisions: Analyze data from GSC, GA4, crawl tools, rank tracking, log files, AI visibility platforms, and third-party tools to identify patterns, explain performance shifts, and prioritize action.
• Create actionable recommendations: Translate findings into prioritized recommendations with clear impact, effort, dependencies, confidence level, and implementation guidance for client, content, and engineering teams.
• Lead technical SEO workstreams: Guide recommendations across crawl, indexation, rendering, JavaScript SEO, Core Web Vitals, site architecture, internal linking, schema, structured data, migrations, and re-platforming.
• Advance content and AI Search visibility: Lead search intent mapping, topical authority planning, SERP feature analysis, AI Overview evaluation, LLM visibility analysis, entity and brand authority recommendations, and scalable on-page optimization frameworks.
• Own delivery quality: Manage assigned SEO workstreams end-to-end, including scoping, work planning, QA, stakeholder updates, timeline management, and on-time delivery.
• Mentor and review junior work: Coach consultants and staff consultants on analysis planning, data interpretation, recommendation quality, deliverable structure, and client-ready communication.
• Support account growth: Identify organic growth opportunities, contribute SEO expertise to pitches, RFPs, renewals, and SOW scoping, and help shape work that is clearly scoped, valuable to clients, and feasible for the team to deliver.
• Improve the SEO practice: Contribute to internal templates, playbooks, QA standards, training materials, AI-assisted workflows, and process improvements that help the team deliver better work at scale.

What You’ll Bring

• 3+ years of progressive SEO experience, preferably in an agency, consultancy, or complex multi-stakeholder environment.
• Strong technical SEO capability across crawl, indexation, rendering, site architecture, internal linking, Core Web Vitals, structured data, migrations, and JavaScript SEO.
• Demonstrated capability in SEO analysis and measurement, including the ability to combine multiple data sources and translate findings into business-relevant recommendations.
• Hands-on experience with tools such as Google Search Console, GA4, Screaming Frog, Sitebulb, Ahrefs, SEMRush, enterprise crawlers, rank tracking platforms, Data Studio, and AI visibility tracking platforms.
• Ability to build clear, persuasive client deliverables, including audits, executive summaries, dashboards, roadmaps, and strategic recommendation decks.
• Strong written, verbal, and presentation skills, with the ability to adjust communication for executives, marketers, engineers, content teams, and internal stakeholders.
• Experience leading client conversations, answering questions in real time, and explaining and supporting recommendations with evidence, context, and judgment.
• Working knowledge of AI Search, including AI Overviews, LLM-powered discovery, citation visibility, entity authority, and AI-assisted SEO workflows.
• Strong project and workstream ownership, including the ability to manage timelines, flag risks early, coordinate with PMs and cross‑functional teams, and keep stakeholders informed.
• Comfort mentoring consultants and staff consultants and reviewing their work for analytical accuracy, strategic clarity, and client readiness.

Preferred / Bonus Experience

• BigQuery, SQL, Python, server log analysis, API-based reporting, or other scalable data workflows.
• Experience with international SEO, e-commerce SEO, local SEO, video/image SEO, link building, digital PR, or SEO testing.
• Experience developing reusable SEO templates, processes, playbooks, training materials, or productized service offerings.

Leadership & Ways of Working

• You are proactive, responsive, and self‑directed. You readily provide status/account updates, risks, or next steps.
• You can manage multiple accounts or workstreams at once without losing quality, context, or follow‑through.
• You are comfortable with ambiguity and can turn broad client questions into structured analysis plans and practical recommendations.
• You raise risks early, propose paths forward, and balance client needs with team capacity and scope boundaries.
• You help make the team better by sharing what you know, improving how work gets done, and creating space for consultants and staff consultants to grow.

The annual salary range for this position is 65K- 75K. Placement within the salary range is based on a variety of factors, including relevant experience, knowledge, skills, and other factors permitted by law.

Benefits available with this position include

• Medical, vision, and dental insurance,
• Life insurance,
• Short-term and long-term disability insurance,
• 401k,
• Flexible paid time off,
• At least 15 paid holidays per year,
• Paid sick and safe leave, and
• Paid parental leave.

Dentsu also complies with applicable state and local laws regarding employee leave benefits, including, but not limited to providing time off pursuant to the Colorado Healthy Families and Workplaces Act, in accordance with its plans and policies. For further details regarding Dentsu benefits, please visit www.dentsubenefitsplus.com.

At dentsu, we believe great work happens when we're connected. Our way of working combines flexibility with in-person collaboration to spark ideas and strengthen our teams. Employees who live within a commutable distance of one of our hub offices, currently located in Chicago, metro Detroit, Los Angeles, and New York City, are required and expected to work from the office three days per week (two days per week for employees based in Los Angeles). Dentsu may designate other Hub offices at any time. Those who live outside a commutable range may be designated as remote, depending on the role and business needs. Regardless of your work location, we expect our employees to be flexible to meet the needs of our Company and clients, which may include attendance in an office.

Location

Chicago - N. State

Brand

Merkle

Time Type

Full time

Contract Type

Permanent

Dentsu is committed to providing equal employment opportunities to all applicants and employees. We do this without regard to race, color, national origin, sex , sexual orientation, gender identity, age, pregnancy, childbirth or related medical conditions, ancestry, physical or mental disability, marital status, political affiliation, religious practices and observances, citizenship status, genetic information, veteran status, or any other basis protected under applicable federal, state, or local law.