Associate Director of SEO

USA (On-site)

Salary Not AvailableSenior Level4+ years expFull time

Posted 4 months ago

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Job Summary

Lead the SEO practice as Associate Director, shaping strategy, coaching a team, and delivering client impact.

  • Lead day-to-day strategy for a 2-3 client portfolio and mentor 1–2 SEO Account Managers.
  • Must-have: agency experience with a performance-marketing focus and 4+ years marketing.
  • Standout: drive SEO product innovation and AIO/GEO enablement across client work.

Job Description

Responsibilities

  • Leadership: Partner with the Senior Director of SEO as the second-in-command leader of Silverback’s SEO department, helping set direction, priorities, and standards for the team
  • Coaching & People Management: Manage and support an industry-best organic search team, including direct oversight of 1-3 SEO Account Managers. Proactively identify coaching & upskilling opportunities, and deliver timely, candid, constructive feedback to your team
  • Client Ownership: Stay hands-on in client delivery by owning a small (2-3 accounts) portfolio of some of the agency’s key organic search clients, leading day-to-day strategy and relationship management
  • Content-Focused: Use your robust content background to streamline and modernize Silverback’s Content product and processes, bringing stronger structure, consistency, and scalability to content strategy work
  • SEO Product Innovation: Roll up your sleeves and lead the charge in collaboration with the Senior Director of SEO on SEO product innovation. Help us create & deliver SEO products and services that are measurable, reliable, and impactful in the “modern era” of search engines & user behavior
  • SEO Process Automation: Implement efficiency improvements across the SEO team by identifying & building automation opportunities/workflows — without sacrificing product quality
  • Well-Rounded Marketing Expertise: While you have a background in SEO & Content, you flex broader marketing chops to more effectively understand all the pieces of a puzzle in clients’ marketing strategies
  • Focus on Impact: Directly tie your work (and your team’s work!) back to revenue & business impact for your clients. Deprioritize “vanity metrics” and focus on real results
  • AIO / GEO Enablement: Drive the evolution of the agency’s approach to AIO / GEO, translating changes in search engines & user behavior into practical strategy, process, and client value
  • Initiative & Ownership: Operate as a self-motivated, trailblazing leader who identifies opportunities, pushes work forward, and elevates the team without needing heavy direction
  • Cross-Functional Collaboration: Work with internal teammates across measurement, paid media, and creative to bring strategies for multi-service clients to life

Requirements

  • Agency Background: You must have previous experience/tenure at an agency with a performance marketing focus. (While in-house experience is always welcome, qualified candidates for this role need to have prior agency experience and be eager to participate & lead in a fast-paced agency environment!)
  • Years of Experience: Although skills alignment is more important than years of experience for this role, we’re requiring all candidates to have at least 4 years of marketing experience in order to be considered
  • People Management Experience: Qualified candidates for this role will have at least 1 year of people management experience under their belt, and a proven track record of managing, coaching, and developing great talent
  • Deep Content Expertise: Proven experience leading content strategy for SEO, including topic planning, keyword-to-intent mapping, content briefs, and performance-driven optimisation. Ideally, you’ve built or optimized content processes for others to follow before
  • AI Search Testing & Optimization: You have hands-on experience optimizing for AI search (not theoretical; actual tests). You don’t have all the answers — nobody does! — but you’re excited to test, experiment, and figure it out
  • Client-Facing Comfortability: This role is not a good fit for someone who doesn’t want to talk directly to clients. You must be comfortable building rapport, establishing expertise / credibility, and serving as the face of the SEO engagement with your assigned clients, as well as serving as a point of escalation for your direct reports’ clients
  • “Get Sh*t Done” Mentality: You’d rather take a big swing and miss than sit around twiddling your thumbs. You’re energized by & thrive in an environment where no two days are the same, and results are king
  • Independence & Reliability: Because you’ll be a leader within the department (and within the company as a whole!), we’re looking for people who pride themselves on a driving, results-oriented, independent work style — and who we know we can count on to produce results
  • Business Acumen: Being able to build & execute SEO strategies across multiple industries is crucial, but your ability to tie SEO wins to a measurable impact on the clients’ business, bottom line, etc is what will make you a superstar

Benefits

  • Unlimited PTO
  • Comprehensive health, dental, and vision plans
  • Monthly Team Events and a fun, casual, inclusive company culture
  • Company-paid ClassPass membership
  • 12 weeks of Paid Parental Leave
  • Summer Fridays
  • 401(k) with Employer Match
Silverback Strategies logo

Silverback Strategies

Silverback Strategies is a Google Premier Partner specializing in performance marketing built to help marketers grow and capitalize on change. For more than a decade, we’ve delivered data-driven solutions in paid search, SEO, content marketing, social media, and analytics—customized to meet diverse business goals.We’ve managed $500M+ in Google & Meta media spend, earned an NPS score of 73 (38% above industry average), and run 500+ marketing tests annually to keep clients ahead of the curve.Our workplace culture is nationally recognized by Ad Age, Inc., and The Washington Post, and our founder, Neil Welsh, was named to DIGIDAY’s Top Bosses.Choose Silverback Strategies for results-oriented digital marketing backed by expertise, innovation, and proven success.

Founded in 2007
Reston, Virginia, USA
42 employees (22 in marketing)

Traffic Signals

Monthly Visitors
4.1K
Monthly Google Ads Budget
$22K
Traffic Source Mix
Search
31.9%
Direct
45.5%
Referral
14.2%
Social
6.9%
Paid
1.3%

Headcount Trend

Current headcount: ~42

Marketing Team

Marketing Team Size
21 (50% of company)
Median Career Experience
7 years
Median Tenure
5.8 years