Social Media Manager — Duke's Mayo

Sauer Brands, Inc.•Richmond, VA

7d•$86,500 - $129,800•Hybrid

About The Position

Duke's Mayo is seeking a creative, strategic, and culture-tuned Social Media Manager to lead its social media presence and engage with fan communities. This role involves shaping the brand's daily online persona, from creating timely trend content and responding to community interactions to managing major activations, influencer partnerships, and campaign storytelling. The position is not merely about scheduling posts but about transforming brand love into brand fame, engaging passionate fans, attracting new ones, amplifying partnerships, and turning events like the Duke's Mayo Bowl into shareable content. The manager will oversee platforms including Meta, TikTok, Pinterest, Reddit, YouTube Shorts, and X, ensuring content is platform-appropriate, attention-grabbing, and distinctly Duke's. Occasional evening and weekend work is expected to support live events, cultural moments, and real-time engagement. This position reports to the Marketing Director.

Requirements

5–7 years of experience managing social media for consumer brands.
Proven experience in leading social strategy, content development, community management, and platform-specific execution.
3+ years of direct experience working with influencers or creators, including outreach, briefing, contracting, content management, and performance reporting.
Experience supporting live events, brand activations, sponsorships, or cultural tentpoles.
Strong instincts for brand voice, tone, visual identity, and cultural relevance.
Deep understanding of Meta, TikTok, Pinterest, Reddit, YouTube, X, and emerging social platforms.
Ability to create, edit, and publish content with confidence.
Strong copywriting skills, particularly for captions, comments, scripts, hooks, and social-first storytelling.
Experience with social media management tools such as Sprout Social, Later, Canva, CapCut, Adobe Suite, YouTube Studio, Meta Business Suite, and social listening/reporting platforms.
Ability to manage social budgets and collaborate with media partners on social (paid/boosted) amplification.
Strong understanding of creator content, UGC, influencer partnerships, platform trends, and online communities.
Comfortable analyzing performance data and translating it into creative and strategic recommendations.
Understanding the difference between posting content and building a brand people want to be part of.
Sharp cultural instincts and the ability to identify social opportunities before they become stale.
Passion for food, flavor, fandom, internet culture, and unique brand moments.
Ability to balance strategic thinking with hands-on execution.
Energized by passionate fans, engaging comment sections, creator collaborations, live events, and timely responses.
Understanding that Duke's has a distinct voice, point of view, and fanbase that expects personality.
Willingness to occasionally work evenings and weekends for live events, cultural moments, and timely content.
Ability to travel 20–25% of the time.
Hybrid role, with preference for candidates based in Richmond, VA.

Nice To Haves

Experience in food, CPG, sports, entertainment, lifestyle, or fan-driven brands.

Responsibilities

Build and execute monthly content calendars aligned with brand strategy, campaign priorities, and business moments.
Develop platform-specific content ideas that are native, timely, and shareable, reflecting Duke's positioning and voice.
Create content that fosters brand love, drives engagement, and highlights Duke's unique attributes: bold flavor, Southern roots, chef credibility, and loyal fanbase.
Identify relevant cultural moments, food trends, fan behaviors, memes, and conversations for Duke's participation.
Define the strategic role of each social platform within the Duke's ecosystem.
Actively manage and engage with the Duke's online community across all social platforms.
Build relationships with fans, creators, chefs, food lovers, sports fans, and brand loyalists.
Surface and amplify user-generated content (UGC), fan stories, social mentions, and instances of brand appreciation.
Convert casual followers into brand advocates who actively comment, share, defend, and integrate Duke's into their lives.
Monitor conversations related to Duke's, food culture, sports partnerships, competitors, and cultural events.
Determine appropriate engagement strategies, including when to participate, escalate, or let organic conversations unfold.
Concept, create, write, edit, schedule, and publish content across all Duke's social platforms.
Collaborate with internal teams, agencies, photographers, videographers, creators, and influencers to produce content.
Create and edit short-form video, social-first storytelling, memes, recipes, partner content, behind-the-scenes footage, and live event coverage.
Write copy that embodies the Duke's brand voice: confident, flavorful, and distinctive.
Maintain a consistent brand voice while adapting tone for different platforms, audiences, and moments.
Activate major brand moments like the Duke's Mayo Bowl, Duke's Mayo Classic, chef partnerships, retail programs, and collaborations through social media.
Develop social plans to extend partnerships before, during, and after events, transforming sponsorships into ongoing content narratives.
Attend live events as needed to capture content, engage fans, support creators, and provide real-time social coverage.
Collaborate with internal and external partners to ensure social media plays a significant role in brand activations.
Identify opportunities to make Duke's moments more participatory, shareable, and fan-driven.
Assist in identifying, building, and managing relationships with creators, influencers, chefs, athletes, entertainers, and brand fans.
Support influencer outreach, briefing, contracting, content development, approvals, publishing, and performance tracking.
Partner with creators to develop content that aligns with their voice and the Duke's brand.
Track creator performance and inform future recommendations based on awareness, engagement, credibility, and fan love.
Monitor platform performance and translate results into actionable insights.
Report monthly on platform KPIs, community growth, engagement, content performance, influencer results, and social conversation trends.
Test various content formats, hooks, captions, posting times, creator approaches, and content types to optimize performance.
Monitor social conversations and cultural signals to identify opportunities, risks, and emerging fan behaviors.
Utilize data and intuition to understand performance, its significance, and future strategic directions.
Collaborate closely with brand, creative, media, PR, legal, customer service, sales, shopper, and partnership teams.
Ensure the social media presence supports broader marketing priorities while maintaining agility for real-time reactions.
Align with agencies and external collaborators on content, approvals, voice, community engagement, and performance.
Protect the Duke's brand voice and ensure all content is compliant, accurate, and brand-appropriate.