Social Media Audience Engagement Specialist

Northeastern University•Boston, MA

9d•Onsite

About The Position

Northeastern University is seeking a Social Media Audience Engagement Specialist to lead the audience engagement strategy for Northeastern Global News (NGN). This role involves increasing the reach of NGN's journalism to new audiences and driving audience growth through platform-native content, distribution, and experimentation across platforms like Reddit, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Facebook. The specialist will collaborate with editorial and multimedia teams to share news content that highlights Northeastern's research and teaching. The ideal candidate is passionate about news and social media, particularly Reddit, with a strong understanding of data analytics, audience growth strategies, and news distribution. While higher education experience is not required, a deep knowledge of social media, evolving platforms, strong news instincts, editorial judgment, and the ability to translate complex research into engaging content are essential. This role also supports Northeastern's enterprise accounts during significant university events and initiatives. The position reports to the Director of Social Media within Northeastern's External Affairs team and is based on the Boston campus, requiring occasional after-hours and weekend work.

Requirements

3-4 years of social media experience, ideally in news, media, or a fast-moving brand.
Strong news judgment and an instinct for stories that will travel.
Demonstrated ability to grow a social media audience, with measurable follower and engagement gains.
Expertise in Reddit, including familiarity with Reddit’s community culture and interest in reaching audiences there.
Fluency in Instagram, with working knowledge of Reddit, LinkedIn, X, Bluesky, TikTok, YouTube, and Threads.
Ability to execute a data-informed strategy against clear, measurable goals.
Experience with social analytics and listening tools such as Sprinklr, Sprout Social, Meta Business Suite, or native platform insights.
Exceptional writing, copyediting, and proofreading skills, with the ability to adapt voice across platforms.
Strong visual judgment and the ability to refresh existing templates and graphics.
Ability to independently manage NGN’s channels while collaborating across teams and supporting enterprise work as needed.
Consistent attention to detail.

Responsibilities

Grow NGN’s audience and reach across social media, with Instagram and Reddit as the priority channels.
Continue building NGN’s Reddit distribution strategy by expanding presence in relevant subreddits, sharing reporting in ways that respect each community’s culture and rules, facilitating faculty Ask Me Anything (AMA) sessions, and managing a two-prong account approach.
Shape NGN’s journalism into platform-native formats by partnering with reporters and video producers to identify stories with high social potential and turn faculty research into content that travels.
Build recurring social media franchises that encourage audience return visits, test new platforms and features, and scale successful approaches.
Set measurable goals, track performance, and use analytics to strengthen content strategy.
Surface audience insights that inform editorial decisions.
Conduct social listening and monitoring by identifying conversations, sentiment, emerging stories, and reputational signals, and routing relevant information to appropriate stakeholders.
Support Northeastern’s enterprise accounts and campaigns during high-visibility moments and major university initiatives.
Collaborate closely with NGN journalists, multimedia producers, media relations colleagues, and faculty colleagues to maintain cohesive messaging across platforms.