Digital Engagement Lead NEW

Ronald McDonald House Charities UK

Job role:

The Digital Engagement Lead will play a pivotal role in shaping how people discover, experience and connect with Ronald McDonald House UK.

Working closely with the Head of Brand, Communications and Digital Engagement, you’ll lead the development and delivery of an audience-led digital engagement strategy that helps us reach more people, build stronger relationships and create meaningful opportunities for support. You’ll bring together social media, email, website content and user experience, paid social media and analytics into a clear, joined-up approach that delivers measurable results.

This is a role for someone who can see the bigger picture whilst remaining close enough to the detail to make things happen. You’ll lead and develop a talented digital team, set clear direction and priorities, and create an environment where people feel supported to do their best work. At the same time, you’ll work across the organisation to build understanding, confidence and enthusiasm around digital engagement, helping colleagues see how it can support their goals and strengthen our impact.

You’ll also play an important role in strengthening the foundations that underpin our digital performance, from supporter journeys and content strategy to analytics, testing and optimisation. Through thoughtful leadership, strong collaboration and a focus on continuous improvement, you’ll help ensure our digital channels work harder for the charity and ultimately help us support more families when they need us most.

Key Responsibilities:

Operational leadership and team development

• Provide clear leadership across the Digital Engagement function.
• Line manage the Digital Marketing Manager, Social Media Officer and Website Content & UX Officer.
• Set clear objectives, coach through regular one-to-ones and support professional development.
• Build a collaborative, high trust culture that values inclusion, curiosity and accountability.
• Ensure the team has clear backlogs, roadmaps and ways of working that keep delivery smooth and focused.

Digital strategic approach and planning

• Shape and deliver an integrated, audience-led digital engagement strategy.
• Define the strategic role of each channel for priority audiences, with objectives, KPIs and success metrics.
• Set channel-specific plans across paid social, organic social, content creators engagement, email, paid search and website content/UX.
• Lead annual and quarterly planning, translating organisational goals into clear digital roadmaps with budgets, testing agendas and resourcing.
• Monitor sector, platform and audience trends, advising on where to pivot, invest or pause.
• Guide the Digital Engagement team to deliver effective programmes with clear targeting, creative variants and measurable outcomes.

Digital Marketing ownership

• Oversee a balanced mix of paid, organic and earned activity, ensuring they work together to drive reach, community and conversion.
• Set standards for community management, social listening, risk protocols and out of hours response where required.
• Define our approach to engaging content creators.
• Strengthen the organisation’s approach to paid social, building capability, confidence and performance.
• Set the strategic approach for paid social campaigns, with a clear pathway towards delivering a high quality, scalable campaign in Q4.
• Oversee paid search and Google Ad Grant activity, ensuring compliance, relevance and strong conversion tracking.

Email and supporter journeys

• Oversee performance and growth across paid and owned channels.
• Lead the development of a clear email strategy, starting with strong foundations for best practice journeys
• Oversee the design and implementation of core email journeys
• Ensure email activity is insight led, tested and aligned with wider supporter journeys across channels
• Maintain a practical test plan covering audiences, messaging, creative and landing experiences.

Website content and user experience

• Lead the long term development of the charity’s website.
• Set the content and UX strategy with audience needs at the centre, ensuring information is findable, inclusive and persuasive.
• Oversee page governance, templates and information architecture to support both storytelling and conversion.
• Prioritise UX improvements using evidence from analytics, user feedback and best practice.
• Ensure the site reflects our brand voice and values, with accessible content and clear journeys.

Innovation, creative approach, testing and optimisation

• Embed a culture of smart experimentation and continuous improvement.
• Champion creative exploration across formats, storytelling and interaction design, while setting clear hypotheses and guardrails.
• Maintain a cross-channel testing backlog, with transparent prioritisation, timelines and owners.
• Ensure rigorous measurement: define success criteria, document results, share learning and scale winning variants.
• Encourage responsible adoption of new features and tools where they solve real audience problems.

Data, tracking and reporting

• Ensure decisions are grounded in accurate data and meaningful insight.
• Set the strategic direction for digital analytics and performance measurement.
• Oversee GA4 tracking, analytics and reporting frameworks across channels and key journeys, working with external agencies or specialists to establish robust reporting foundations
• Commission accessible dashboards and provide narrative context so stakeholders understand performance and next actions.
• Promote outcome-focused reporting that complements top of funnel/brand metrics.

Stakeholder and partner collaboration (internal and external, including suppliers)

• Lead strong, respectful collaboration that gets the best from people and partners.
• Partner with fundraising, family services, brand, and data & insight teams to shape clear briefs and deliver impactful digital work.
• Manage agencies, creators, platform reps and technical suppliers: set scopes, deliverables, timelines and KPIs, and review performance against objectives.
• Ensure all external output meets brand, accessibility, safeguarding and data protection standards.
• Build constructive relationships with senior stakeholders, presenting insights and recommendations with clarity.

Budget and resource accountability

• Hold responsibility for digital engagement budgets and resourcing.
• Oversee budget planning, forecasting and in flight reallocation to maximise value.
• Track spend, approve invoices and maintain strong financial governance.
• Assess capacity and recommend when to use external support, with clear cost-benefit rationale.

Person Specification:

Knowledge and Experience:

• Significant experience leading audience-led digital channels across paid, organic social, email and web within a charity.
• Demonstrable experience of leading digital engagement change projects
• Proven track record developing channel-specific strategies and roadmaps that drive growth, engagement and conversion.
• Experience setting digital strategy and direction while remaining close to delivery
• Experience leading and line managing digital teams through change and nurturing inclusive, high-performing cultures.
• Strong understanding of analytics, tracking and outcome-focused reporting (e.g. GA4, tagging, data governance).
• Experience commissioning and managing agencies, creators and technical suppliers.
• Comprehensive understanding of accessibility, safeguarding and ethical digital practice.
• Desirable: experience with influencer governance, CRM-integrated journeys, or major website and IA projects.

Skills and Abilities:

• Credible, collaborative leader who can inspire confidence and momentum during change.
• Strategic thinker who can translate long term ambition and distil insight into clear plans and practical delivery.
• Skilled communicator who simplifies complexity and brings colleagues and partners with them.
• Confident decision maker, comfortable balancing creativity with risk and feasibility.
• Strong analytical skills with a disciplined test-and-learn mindset.
• Inclusive leader who sets high standards while keeping momentum and morale strong.
• Comfortable presenting to senior stakeholders and translating data into action.
• Creative problem solver who spots opportunities and moves at pace with care.
• Calm and resilient under pressure