Senior Manager, Search & Digital Marketing, OCCM

COMPANY DESCRIPTION

Singapore Management University is a place where high-level professionalism blends together with a healthy informality. The 'family-like' atmosphere among the SMU community fosters a culture where employees work, plan, organise and play together - building a strong collegiality and morale within the university.

Our commitment to attract and retain talent is ongoing. We offer attractive benefits and welfare, competitive compensation packages, and generous professional development opportunities - all to meet the work-life needs of our staff. No wonder, then, that SMU continues to be given numerous awards and recognition for its human resource excellence.

RESPONSIBILITIES

• This position is for Office of Corporate Communications and Marketing (OCCM).
• Search Everywhere Strategy and Governance
  • Develop and own SMU's Search Everywhere strategy, covering traditional search engine optimisation (SEO), Answer Engine Optimisation (AEO), Generative Engine Optimisation (GEO), social search, and emerging voice and multimodal discovery surfaces.
  • Establish governance frameworks and standards for search discoverability across owned digital assets, ensuring consistent application across web, campaign, social, and research content.
  • Maintain a current, evidence-based view of algorithmic changes, AI model updates, and platform search behaviour shifts, translating these into institutional implications and recommended actions.
  • Define and track a unified set of search performance indicators, and report on SMU's discoverability health across surfaces to the Head, Digital Marketing.
• SEO, AEO, GEO, and AI Discoverability Optimisation
  • Lead the technical and strategic SEO function, ensuring SMU's web and content architecture is optimised for crawlability, indexability, site health, and page experience (Core Web Vitals).
  • Develop and implement an AEO strategy to ensure SMU content surfaces prominently in featured snippets, People Also Ask boxes, and knowledge panels across major search engines.
  • Build and execute SMU's GEO framework — ensuring the University is accurately and favourably represented in AI-generated responses across platforms including ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, and equivalent generative AI surfaces.
  • Lead entity and knowledge graph optimisation, including structured data implementation, semantic markup, and entity association across SMU's digital estate.
  • Manage keyword strategy and search intent mapping across the prospective student journey, from awareness through to application, across priority markets.
• SEO Agency Management
  • Serve as the primary institutional interface for SMU's SEO agency, setting the strategic agenda, reviewing deliverables against agreed KPIs, and holding the agency accountable to technical feasibility, brand alignment, and measurable outcomes.
  • Evaluate agency recommendations critically for feasibility within SMU's content management system environment, flagging and resolving recommendations that cannot be implemented as proposed.
  • Ensure all agency-produced content and optimisation work meets SMU's editorial standards and brand tone of voice before submission or publication.
  • Conduct regular performance reviews with the agency, redirecting effort where performance falls short of institutional expectations, and providing documented feedback on deliverable quality.
• Content Discoverability Architecture and Advisory
  • Advise content and social teams on structuring content for maximum discoverability — including headline strategy, metadata, internal linking, schema markup, content depth, and topic cluster architecture.
  • Collaborate with the Content and Social Lead to embed search intent into editorial planning, ensuring priority keywords and discovery opportunities are reflected in the content calendar from inception.
  • Work with the Analytics and Data Lead to integrate search performance data into broader marketing analytics frameworks and to surface audience signal patterns from search behaviour.
  • Develop and maintain SMU's search content taxonomy, including pillar pages, programme-level keyword architecture, and market-specific search intent maps across priority student recruitment markets.
• Social Search and Platform Discoverability
  • Define SMU's strategy for discoverability on social search surfaces — including TikTok, Instagram, LinkedIn, and YouTube — ensuring content is optimised for platform-specific discovery algorithms.
  • Provide channel-specific discoverability guidance to the Content and Social team on caption strategy, hashtag frameworks, and content formats that improve social search visibility.
  • Monitor shifts in social search behaviour across priority student markets — India, Indonesia, Vietnam, Thailand, China, and Singapore — and adapt strategy accordingly.
• Performance Analytics and Reporting
  • Own search performance reporting, covering organic traffic, keyword rankings, AI citation frequency, featured snippet capture, Core Web Vitals, and conversion pathways from search to enquiry or application.
  • Develop and maintain search performance dashboards, and present regular insights and recommendations to the Head, Digital Marketing in a format accessible to non-specialist senior stakeholders.
  • Conduct quarterly search audits covering technical SEO health, content gap analysis, competitor benchmarking, and AI visibility assessment across priority programmes and markets.

QUALIFICATIONS

• Bachelor's degree in Marketing, Communications, Information Systems, Computer Science, or a related field.
• Professional certifications in SEO, digital analytics, or content strategy (e.g. Google Analytics 4, Google Search Console, SEMrush SEO Toolkit, HubSpot Content Marketing) are advantageous.
• Traditional Search Engine Optimisation (Minimum 5 years)
  • Deep, practised expertise in traditional SEO — keyword strategy, on-page optimisation, technical site health, link signals, E-E-A-T principles, and Google algorithm update cycles.
  • Proven ability to develop and execute search strategy at an institutional or enterprise level, with measurable outcomes across organic traffic, rankings, and conversion.
• Emerging Search Surfaces and AI Discoverability (Demonstrated current practice)
  • Current, hands-on familiarity with how generative AI platforms — including ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, and equivalent tools — source, weight, and cite institutional content, and how to influence that representation through content structure, entity optimisation, and authoritative sourcing.
  • Active engagement with AEO and GEO as emerging practices, including an ability to distinguish credible guidance from overstatement in a rapidly commercialised space.
• Technical SEO and Content Architecture (Minimum 5 years)
  • Hands-on experience with technical SEO auditing and implementation — crawl analysis, indexability, site structure, page speed, structured data, and schema markup.
  • Proficiency with tools including Google Search Console, Screaming Frog, SEMrush or Ahrefs, and GA4.
  • Ability to assess content management system capabilities and constraints, and to propose technically feasible optimisation recommendations.
• Agency Management and Vendor Accountability (Minimum 3 to 5 years)
  • Demonstrated experience managing external SEO or digital agencies, including briefing, deliverable review, and performance accountability.
  • Ability to evaluate agency recommendations critically — separating best-practice guidance from technically impractical or off-brand suggestions — and to push back with institutional context and evidence.
• Social Search and Platform Discoverability (Minimum 3 to 5 years)
  • Working knowledge of discovery algorithms on TikTok, Instagram, LinkedIn, and YouTube, and how content format, metadata, and engagement signals affect discoverability on these platforms.
  • Ability to advise content teams on social search strategy without requiring deep content production expertise.
• Analytics and Data Interpretation (Minimum 3 to 5 years)
  • Ability to interpret search and web analytics data, identify opportunity gaps, and translate insights into concrete optimisation recommendations.
  • Experience presenting performance data to senior stakeholders in a clear, decision-oriented format, including familiarity with GA4, Looker Studio, or equivalent reporting tools.
• Cross-Functional Collaboration and Influence (Minimum 5 years)
  • Proven ability to work across content, analytics, and technical functions — influencing strategy and embedding discoverability thinking.
  • Strong stakeholder management skills, with the ability to translate search complexity into language accessible to non-specialist colleagues and senior leadership.

OTHER INFORMATION

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Candidates who do not possess the stipulated qualifications but have relevant work experience may still apply. Remuneration and appointment terms shall commensurate with qualifications and experience. SMU reserves the right to modify the appointment terms where necessary.

Please note that your application will be sent to and reviewed by the direct employer - Singapore Management University