Senior Marketing Manager (Schools)

Are you looking for a senior marketing role within a fast-growing business where people are at the heart of everything we do?

Would you like to work within a socially conscious organisation that is making a real impact in the education sector?

The company

The Key Group serves school leaders and trusts across the UK providing authoritative guidance and intuitive tools that support school leadership. We work across the full diversity of schools and locations, from small rural and coastal primaries to the largest trusts and local authorities in the country.

We recognise that each school and trust is on a journey and school leaders need to identify their specific context, their own path and the next step in that journey. This process requires more than just shared values in a school, it requires the knowledge, data, context and confidence to bring others with you in effecting change.

That's why we're here. We put the power back in the hands of those leading our schools and trusts, by equipping them with remarkable products & services. The Key Group is home to 5 brands, each the leading provider in its category including Arbor, ScholarPack, Integris, The Key and GovernorHub. Nearly 600 colleagues deliver our award-winning services and serve 19,000 schools.

The role

The Senior Marketing Manager (schools marketing) is responsible for shaping our direct-to-school marketing strategy in order to drive commercial growth.

This role owns the strategy and performance of school-level marketing activity across multiple stages of the customer lifecycle: converting whitespace schools, upgrading existing members and ensuring retention by driving strong usage and adoption of The Key through marketing-owned channels. Working closely with our customer, product and content teams, you’ll lead and develop a team of marketers responsible for making sure schools receive timely, relevant and compelling campaigns and communications that drive conversion, usage and long-term value. You’ll also be responsible for safeguarding and strengthening The Key’s brand perception across high-frequency school-facing touchpoints, ensuring our positioning as a trusted market leader is reinforced through everyday marketing activity.

This is a senior, strategic role with clear commercial accountability and ownership of our core school marketing channels.

Key responsibilities

Strategy & planning

• Own the end-to-end DTS marketing strategy, translating commercial targets into a clear, prioritised termly roadmap
• Define acquisition, upgrade and adoption strategies, including value propositions and messaging
• Balance BAU conversion activity with space for new GTM initiatives and feature launches
• Set clear success measures and KPIs for campaigns and all schools marketing activity

Channel & campaign leadership

• Own the email channel ensuring all comms and journeys are well-targeted, effective and continuously optimised
• Oversee the planning, delivery and optimisation of DTS campaigns across core channels (email, website, PPC, DM and in-product, where relevant)
• Own the effectiveness of key marketing pages on thekeysupport.com, setting clear expectations for activity, performance and continuous optimisation as part of the end-to-end school journey
• Ensure all campaigns, journeys and messaging reinforce The Key’s positioning as a trusted market leader, safeguarding brand perception across high-frequency school-facing touchpoints

Commercial collaboration

• Work closely with the customer team, including inside sales and support, to align targeting, sequencing and messaging in ways that maximise combined commercial impact
• Collaborate with the product and content teams to ensure messaging reflects product value and customer need
• Work with Brand & Partnerships to ensure top-of-funnel activity opens whitespace and supports conversion

Performance & optimisation

• Oversee regular performance reporting, connecting team activity to overall team KPIs and DTS revenue targets
• Ensure growth activity is balanced with adoption and usage objectives, recognising customer health as a leading indicator of long-term commercial success
• Use data and insights to continuously improve journeys, propositions and channel performance
• Identify risks and opportunities early and adjust plans accordingly

Team leadership & ways of working

• Lead, mentor, and empower a team of senior marketing executives, identifying skills gaps and opportunities for professional growth. Conduct regular one-on-ones, performance reviews, and provide constructive feedback to foster a high-performance culture.
• Establish effective ways of working that enable clarity, pace and accountability across the marketing team and with other business functions

We’re looking for an experienced Senior Marketing Manager who has the following experience:

Essential

• Significant experience in a senior marketing role, ideally within B2B, SaaS or subscription-based organisations
• Proven experience owning and delivering commercial marketing strategies with revenue accountability
• Strong understanding of lifecycle marketing and multi-channel campaign delivery
• Demonstrated ability to use data and insight to drive decisions and optimise performance
• Proven experience overseeing the delivery of effective, high-quality campaigns with compelling messaging and engaging concepts
• Strong stakeholder management and communication skills
• Experience managing or mentoring marketers in a high-performing team

Nice to have

• Experience in the education sector
• Familiarity with tools such as Hubspot, Google Analytics or similar platforms
• Experience writing value propositions and positioning

Why work for us

We place huge importance on caring for and developing our people. If you join us, you can expect a good work-life balance and the training and support you need to succeed in your role and continue to progress.

We’re a socially conscious company, but one that also likes to have fun! We offer flexible working, a generous holiday allowance, flexible hours, buying and selling holiday, enhanced maternity pay, free breakfast, fruit, drinks, regular socials and much more.

This role is based in London, but you can work from anywhere in the UK as long as you can make it into the office 2 times a month for whole-team office days.

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