Associate Director, Paid Search

Digital Matter is a next-generation growth and transformation partner built for the realities of today’s market. We combine the pace and precision of a startup with the discipline and rigor of a global advisory firm.

We help consumer brands manage media as a strategic asset class, with the same intentionality and governance applied to capital allocation. By connecting data, technology, and creative, we turn media investment into measurable enterprise value: accelerating growth, improving efficiency, and building durable capabilities.

Over the past seven years, we’ve guided organizations through IPOs, digital turnarounds, and successful exits. Our point of view is simple: when media is managed as capital, it becomes a catalyst for transformation at scale.

About the Role

We're looking for an Associate Director of Paid Search to lead search strategy, execution, and growth across our client portfolio. This is a senior, client-facing leadership role for someone who has deep, hands-on paid search expertise built over a decade of experience and who has seen the business from both sides of the table, having worked agency-side and platform/vendor-side (Google or Microsoft).

This person will own paid search performance and strategy for a book of business and be accountable for the revenue tied to that book and play an active role in growing it through client retention, upsell, and new business support.

Key Responsibilities

• Strategy & Leadership
  • Own and evolve paid search strategy across assigned client accounts, ensuring alignment with each client's broader marketing and business objectives.
  • Serve as the senior search point of contact for clients, presenting strategy, performance, and recommendations directly to client stakeholders, including senior marketing leadership.
  • Translate platform-level trends (Google Ads, Microsoft Ads, and emerging AI-driven search products) into actionable strategic recommendations for clients.
  • Partner cross-functionally with integrated, paid social, programmatic and product to ensure integrated, full-funnel media strategies.
• Planning & Activation
  • In partnership with the integrated media team, lead paid search campaign planning, budget allocation, and channel strategy across search accounts, ensuring efficient and effective use of client media investment.
  • Oversee campaign build, QA, and activation, ensuring accuracy and adherence to best practices at scale.
  • Stay ahead of platform betas, product releases, and policy changes across Google Ads and Microsoft Ads, and proactively bring relevant opportunities to clients.
• Optimization & Analytics
  • Direct ongoing campaign optimization, including bidding strategy, audience/keyword strategy, and creative/ad copy testing.
  • Own performance reporting and analysis, delivering clear, insight-driven readouts that go beyond metrics to explain the “so what” and “what's next.”
  • Lead test-and-learn agendas (incrementality testing, brand lift, channel mix testing) to continuously improve performance and prove impact.
  • Ensure measurement infrastructure (conversion tracking, attribution, tagging) is set up correctly and audited regularly for accuracy.
• Team Leadership
  • Build scalable processes, playbooks, and best practices to standardize search execution across the team and client roster.
• Business Growth & Revenue Ownership
  • Own growth of your book of business, proactively identifying opportunities to expand scope, budget, and services within existing client relationships.
  • Be accountable for revenue goals tied to your book of business, tracking performance against targets and taking ownership of the outcome.
  • Support new business efforts, including contributing search strategy and POVs to pitches and RFPs.
  • Build strong, trust-based client relationships that lead to renewals, referrals, and organic growth.
  • Track and report on book-of-business health, including revenue, retention, and growth metrics.

Qualifications

• Tenure in hands-on, consistent paid search management experience.
• Required: experience on both the agency side and the vendor/platform side at either Google (Google Ads) or Microsoft (Microsoft Advertising).
• Proven track record managing multi-million-dollar search budgets across complex, multi-brand or multi-client portfolios.
• Deep expertise across Google Ads and Microsoft Ads platforms; familiarity with Google Analytics, Search Ads 360, or similar bid management/reporting tools.
• Demonstrated experience leading and developing a team.
• Proven accountability for revenue goals within a book of business, not just campaign performance.
• Strong track record of growing client relationships and revenue, not just managing performance.
• Excellent client-facing communication and presentation skills, with experience presenting to senior stakeholders.