[Hiring] Brand Strategist @Risepoint

Role Description

As Partner Brand Strategist, you’ll own how a portfolio of university partners stands out in a crowded market. You’ll develop the positioning, voice, and messaging that make each partner distinct, and package that thinking into partner “brand kits.” You’ll keep those kits current as answer engine optimization (AEO) changes how prospective students find and compare schools in AI tools like ChatGPT and Google AI Overviews. From there, you’ll turn strategy into clear creative briefs, with approved copy and messaging, that vendors and internal teams execute across paid social, email, and SMS. You’ll work hand in hand with SEO, Paid Media, and Integrated Marketing to keep brand, search, and campaign strategy aligned. And you’ll close the loop: present at campaign kickoffs, review results, and use AI tools to make every next brief sharper. This is a lead-level individual contributor role. You’ll take on the most complex partners in your portfolio, be the person teammates come to with hard positioning questions, and run your work with minimal day-to-day direction. This role reports to the Sr. Brand Strategist.

What You Will Do

• Translate marketing briefs into creative briefs for channel campaigns (paid social, email, SMS, flyers), each with the approved copy and messaging the agency works from.
• Build and maintain “brand kits” for your assigned partners: positioning, voice, proof points, and AEO guidelines.
• Differentiating at portfolio scale: develop clear, ownable positioning and messaging for your assigned partners (50+ schools).
• Hand briefs to our external creative agency and internal channel marketing teams, and present at campaign kickoffs.
• Review campaign results with the channel marketing teams and fold what worked into the next brief and the partner voice guidelines.
• Partner with our Research & Insights and Community Engagement teams to keep student personas and partner insights current.
• Work cross-functionally with SEO, Paid Media, Lifecycle, and Integrated Marketing.
• Act as a go-to resource on the team: help peers work through tough positioning and messaging problems.
• Use AI tools daily to research, draft, and scale brief and brand kit work.

What Success Looks Like

• Your partners’ campaigns start from sharp, differentiated briefs.
• Your partners’ brand kits are current, used by every team that touches the partner.
• Campaign learnings show up in your next briefs, so quality compounds quarter over quarter.
• Brief quality and turnaround: campaigns kick off on time, from briefs the agency and marketing teams rarely send back.
• Brand kits delivered and maintained for every assigned partner, with AEO guidelines in active use.
• Results reviews completed each campaign cycle, with documented improvements to briefs and voice guidelines.

Qualifications

• 5-7 years in brand strategy, brand planning, or integrated marketing, with a track record of owning accounts independently; agency or multi-account experience a plus.
• Hands-on experience writing creative briefs that designers, writers, or an external agency executed from.
• Strong writing and synthesis skills: able to turn research, data, and stakeholder input into a clear, usable brief.
• Familiarity with answer engine optimization (AEO), or a strong grasp of SEO and how brand content surfaces in search results and AI answers.

Experience That’s Great to Have

• Master’s degree in Marketing, Communications, or a related field.
• Experience working across a multi-brand or multi-client portfolio (agency, franchise, or higher ed).
• Working knowledge of paid social, email/SMS, and campaign production processes.
• Experience building or maintaining brand toolkits, voice guidelines, or messaging frameworks.

Benefits