Portland Community College | Portland, Oregon

Marketing Specialist

• Title: Marketing Specialist
• Category: Academic Professional
• Exempt Status : Exempt
• Level: 4

Job Summary

Under the direction of Communications management, the Marketing Specialist provides project management and strategic communication planning for Advancement initiatives and college clients, ensuring that all communications enhance and build the image of the college. This position is responsible for a wide range of activities that support marketing priorities, including identifying specific communication goals and objectives, providing recommendations to establish creative direction, developing strategic and imaginative communication plans, managing and overseeing the details of projects from start to finish, working within policies that identify PCC’s priority messages and how to communicate them, contributing to the creation of marketing materials in a variety of media, plus research and evaluation. The position interfaces regularly with other creative staff, Advancement leadership, and various departments and clients throughout the college.

Distinguishing Characteristics

Positions in the broad class perform a variety of responsible marketing and communication related activities which may include emphasis in a particular area such as writing, multimedia or digital media.

Typical Duties and Responsibilities

1. Provides oversight of assigned marketing projects, including marketing consultation, establishing goals and objectives, providing leadership and creative communication direction, exercising strategies to implement marketing efforts, and working collaboratively with college personnel to help advance the goals of the college.
2. Coordinates projects with in-house Communications staff, external media buying and creative agencies, and production companies to develop communications to reach goals. This includes managing timelines, presenting work to clients, creating written plans, and working with and providing direction to other creative staff.
3. Conducts interviews, attends meetings and other events to develop assigned content; independently develops a variety of publishable material by researching pertinent topics, reading, conducting file searches and contacting others.
4. Builds relationships with representatives from college units in order to position the Communications Office and College Advancement as a leader of and resource for their marketing/communication needs.
5. Assists units in research and data collection regarding target audiences in order to establish better strategies.
6. Evaluates the effectiveness of marketing and promotional efforts.
7. Assists College Advancement in communicating Advancement goals and messages to college employees and partners. Develops promotional efforts to build a sense of community, awareness, support, advocacy and pride among internal and external audiences.
8. Assigns work to staff and vendors and gives direction on projects; reviews projects, coordinates workflow to keep projects running smoothly.
9. Builds relationships and interacts with other college organizations, departments and committees to provide efficient and effective marketing services and training opportunities. Advocates professional marketing practices and scans for specific activities and general trends that might influence, or be influenced by, the Advancement and Marketing Plan.
10. Works closely with Communications Office management and other college Advancement units to stay abreast of key message development and top priorities.
11. Stay current on industry standards and innovation through a commitment to ongoing professional development in the field of communications, content strategy, social media and issues affecting higher education.
12. Serves, at all times, as a champion and advocate of Portland Community College through excellent communications skills.
13. Performs all or some of the functions above and other related duties as assigned.

Position-Specific Duties and Responsibilities

Positions in the Digital Media area may also be responsible for:

• Leading PCC’s primary social media activities and campaigns, coordinating messages and timing with other campaign media. Selecting tools and designing processes so other staff can monitor the online “conversation” about PCC.
• Producing short videos; planning, writing, setting up lighting, shooting, recording audio, editing, mixing, and performing all related production activities using a variety of software.
• Producing occasional photographs for print publications, social media and websites.
• Maintaining and improving the effectiveness of PCC’s campaign microsite, opportunity.pcc.edu, working with Communications staff and outside developers.
• Managing the college’s monthly email newsletter and occasional targeted email campaigns, assembling content, setting up the mailing, and building landing pages and tracking results.
• Evaluating Internet platforms and adjusting strategy to match the right vehicle to given initiatives, such as social media statistics, Google analytics.
• Managing an editorial calendar of Internet content and collaborating with team members to execute campaigns that support overall communication objectives.
• Position-specific minimum qualifications: Bachelor’s degree in Marketing, Communications, Multimedia, Broadcasting, Graphic Design, Business or related field. Relevant experience may substitute for the degree requirement on a year-for-year basis. Three years of experience developing and executing social media marketing campaigns over a range of Internet platforms including developing creative content for use in Internet and social media campaigns (e.g., editing videos, photographs, posts, websites, email, etc.).

Positions in the Events/Operations area may also be responsible for:

• Coordinating all projects that are primarily event focused.
• Leading procurement of all College promotional items.
• Supporting Advancement operational needs.
• Position-specific minimum qualifications: Bachelor’s degree in Marketing, Communications, Business Administration, Public Administration, Project Management, Hospitality, or related field. Relevant experience may substitute for the college level coursework. Three years of marketing experience coordinating projects for events.

Positions in the Senior Design area may also be responsible for:

• Conceptualization and implementation of design solutions that meet marketing strategies from concept to completion.
• Playing a lead role in creative visual aspects of marketing projects and lead junior designers, production artists, and interns in creating concepts, comps, layouts and final art.
• Providing leadership in establishing and maintaining the College’s overall brand identity (style guide), proactively refining the college’s visual style to cultivate a compelling visual “personality” and ensure consistency.
• Attend photo shoots and press checks as necessary and provide art direction.
• Position specific minimum qualifications: Bachelor’s degree in Graphic Design, Marketing, Communications, Public Relations or related field. Relevant experience may substitute for the degree requirement on a year for year basis. Three years of experience executing creative design solutions for marketing challenges.

Positions in the Content area may also be responsible for:

• Determining marketing goals to be achieved through writing. Developing strategic creative writing concept, style, and producing writing based on those goals.
• Creative writing/copywriting in different styles based on medium, target audience and primary content subject for brochures, magazine articles, advertisements, news stories, fundraising materials, blogs, email campaigns and websites.
• Leading and creating content for projects that are primarily writing focused, including speeches and talking points for special events, Presidential communications, PCC publications, assigned web pages, and social media.
• Conducting research and analyzing marketing challenges in order to shape a contextual writing approach that takes the larger college Brand and Advancement goals into consideration, as well as the needs of the client.
• Proofreading work and the writing work of others in the Communication Department; editing the copy of a wide range of writers who work within Advancement, and fact checking for a wide variety of publications.
• Developing internal contacts and scanning the environment to identify students, faculty, staff and alumni as potential subjects for stories and testimonials; coaching them on presentation, key messages and talking points. Making strategic decisions about creatively presenting, and prioritizing stories.
• Position specific minimum qualifications: Bachelor’s degree in Marketing, English, Journalism, Communications or other liberal arts-related field. Relevant experience may substitute for the degree requirement on a year-for-year basis. Three years of experience performing professional-level writing for marketing and promotional campaigns.

Work Environment and Physical Requirements

Work is typically performed in a standard office environment; however, photography and video work may be performed both indoors and outdoors. Exposure to video display terminals occurs on a regular basis. Work is often unpredictable and necessitates operating under tight deadlines and occasional evening and weekend work may be required.

Learned physical skill is required to perform keyboarding functions. Physical skill is required for photography and video recording on location, loading and unloading video and lighting equipment and driving between campuses. Work may require standing, walking, sitting, bending, reaching, kneeling, pushing and pulling.

Minimum Qualifications

Bachelor’s degree as described in position-specific sections above. Relevant experience may substitute for the degree requirement on a year-for-year basis. Three years of experience successfully coordinating marketing and promotional campaigns and creative deliverables or three years of experience as described in the position-specific sections above.

Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities

Knowledge of:

• Demonstrated competency in a wide range of communication material such as brochures, advertisements, editorial feature writing, web pages, emails, speeches, etc.;
• Internet advertising;
• Project management principles and practices;
• Impact ethnicity, race, national origin, and gender have on communication and interaction.

Skills in:

• Effectively using appropriate software to develop creative content, which may include Final Cut Pro, Lightroom and other Adobe Creative Suite programs, QuickTime Pro, Soundtrack Pro, LiveType2, Compressor and Mac OSX;
• Giving presentations;
• Establishing and maintaining effective working relationships with staff, internal clients and external parties.

Ability to:

• Effectively communicate both verbally and in writing;
• Coordinate design projects with multiple people and deliverables;
• Contribute to creative direction at the concept stage of new promotional projects;
• Work under pressure, manage more than one project at a time, and meet deadlines.

Reviewed: 12/2018

• Revised: 10/2018; 7/2018; 12/2105; 1/2014; 10/2022
• Replaces: Marketing Specialist 1/2007