Media Relations & Digital PR Strategy

National Basketball Association (NBA)•New York, NY

6d•$110,000 - $120,000•Hybrid

About The Position

The Senior Manager, Media Relations & Digital PR Strategy is responsible for supporting communications strategies for cross-department media relations, experiential communications, and new media and emerging storytelling platforms. This role involves approximately 10% travel per year, depending on priorities. The position requires serving as a media relations expert, managing proactive and reactive media outreach, cultivating relationships with key media figures, and identifying emerging trends for PR opportunities. A key aspect of the role is supporting the transformation of the PR group’s digital newsroom to a more agile, digital-first approach. Collaboration with internal content and production teams to develop multimedia elements, managing business communications announcements across social platforms, and building PR strategies for non-traditional outlets and emerging platforms are also core functions. The role involves developing and maintaining media relations materials, managing PR plans for tentpole events, leveraging AI-enabled tools for campaign enhancement, and tracking/analyzing PR campaign performance. Additionally, the position serves as the communications lead for experiential PR opportunities, developing media engagement plans, coordinating cross-functional planning, and measuring the impact of experiential initiatives.

Requirements

7+ years of agency, in-house communications or journalism experience
BA/BS required
Proven track record of proactive media relations success, including pitching, media relationship management and securing impactful coverage.
Strong written communication skills with the ability to produce executive level messaging and high-quality content under tight deadlines.
Experience developing multimedia assets for PR use, with familiarity in video and graphic production processes.
Highly collaborative mindset with the ability to work within a matrixed organization and influence partners across departments.
Experience navigating and evaluating generative AI tools, AI search features, and summarization technologies, with the ability to translate these capabilities into traditional communications workflows.
Understanding of how AI systems interpret, rank, and surface information while exercising strong human editorial judgment.
Excellent project management skills with the ability to balance multiple priorities and work independently.
Deep understanding of evolving media landscapes across traditional, digital and social platforms.
High attention to detail, strong organizational capabilities and a solutions-oriented approach to problem solving.
Collaborates with supervisor to establish priorities and agree on execution plans across multiple departments; stretches own capabilities.
Identifies issues that impact ability to deliver on a goal and proposes sound solutions.
Drafts standalone deliverables that meet supervisor’s expressed standards.

Nice To Haves

Proficiency in Adobe Creative Cloud (InDesign, Photoshop and Acrobat) preferred

Responsibilities

Serves as a media relations expert across all business communications functions, providing strategic counsel and identifying opportunities to elevate the league’s storytelling across business areas throughout the year.
Manages proactive and reactive media outreach that supports key announcements, events and broader business initiatives across every business communications area, including media, partnership, international, team business, crisis and event communications.
Cultivates and strengthens relationships with key reporters, editors and producers across business, media, tech, health, lifestyle and culture outlets to broaden the league’s storytelling reach.
Identifies emerging cultural and news trends and recommends proactive PR opportunities that position the league and its executives as thought leaders.
Supports the transformation of the PR group’s digital newsroom, driving a more agile, digital first approach to news creation, distribution, and amplification.
Collaborates with internal content and production teams to develop multimedia elements that strengthen PR outputs, including short form videos, motion graphics, social first assets and other creative content that enhances distribution and visibility of business communications announcements.
Manages business communications-related announcements and promotions across @NBAPR on X and leads business communications-related narrative amplification strategy across digital and creator ecosystems in collaboration with NBA’s social and digital teams.
Builds and executes PR strategies that engage non‑traditional outlets and emerging platforms, including podcasts, social platforms and creators, to elevate league announcements, initiatives and on-court storylines.
Develops, maintains, and catalogues media relations materials across business areas.
Manages PR plans, deliverables, and cross-functional coordination for tentpole events and large-scale communications initiatives.
Leverages AI-enabled tools and workflows to enhance media targeting, campaign planning, content development and performance analysis.
Tracks and analyzes PR campaign performance, including the creation of media coverage reports across business announcements, using data, insights and AI-assisted analytics to identify opportunities for optimization and continuous improvement.
Serves as the communications lead for all experiential PR opportunities to drive buzz and visibility for the league’s tentpole events.
Identifies, develops and champions new experiential storytelling opportunities and fan-facing activations that generate buzz, create earned media opportunities and elevate the visibility of the NBA and its tentpole events.
Develops media engagement plans tied to experiential storytelling moments, securing national, local and lifestyle press to maximize visibility of activations.
Coordinates cross functional planning with groups including Events, Marketing, Social and Digital Content and to ensure cohesive execution and maximized visibility.
Measures impact of experiential initiatives through earned and social media coverage, reach and sentiment analysis.