How you’ll make an impact
The Senior Communications Manager, UK & EMEA, is responsible for helping Xero meet its communications objectives with external and internal audiences, including planning and delivery of PR in the UK and South Africa, working closely with our PR agencies.
The position will execute based on a brief from the Director of Communications, UK & EMEA and requires a blend of stakeholder management and strong interpersonal communication skills to help deliver against our organisational priorities.
You’ll be responsible for delivering against Xero’s communications strategy for UK and EMEA, spanning media relations, thought leadership and internal comms. You’ll have established relationships with top-tier business and tech media in the UK, using them to create a regular cycle of quality stories.
You’ll build on your experience in thought leadership and storytelling to craft and deliver consistent messages to the market that capture Xero’s challenger brand. And you’ll draw on our extensive network of influencers and executives for fresh, impactful content and campaigns.
Understanding and applying the Xero brand and tone of voice, this role requires understanding of all communications channels and experience of developing programmes that make best use of them to reach the desired objectives for that particular audience.
What you’ll do
- Campaigns
- Develop and lead execution of integrated communication campaigns and programmes for UK and EMEA to support awareness and customer engagement, in collaboration with marketing and brand, product and partnerships and other cross-functional teams.
- Assist in the building, execution, and optimisation of the UK & EMEA Communications strategy, including global and regional campaigns.
- Help with the management of our PR agencies in the UK and South Africa and lead on specific campaigns when appropriate.
- Build and lead execution of a sophisticated thought leadership strategy, including top-tier Xero and industry events
- External Communications
- Support global customer initiatives, such as the Xero Beautiful Business Fund, with well considered external communications, adapted to our regional audience.
- Manage influencer relationships for the always-on influencer programme or as part of specific campaigns.
- Help to build and execute the thought leadership programme and content at Xero and industry events. Contribute and/or lead on keynote content creation and other speaking opportunities.
- Maintain a keen awareness of discourse in the small business and accounting community and customer sentiment to leverage appropriate messaging and activations
- Assist other teams, e.g. MD, sales and government relations with activations or events
- Craft the right messages and campaigns across brand, product, and partnership news for key
- business, tech and financial media outlets
- Build and defend the Xero positioning with our priority audiences in the UK and EMEA
- Create top-tier opportunities for executive communications and key influencers. Build trusted
- relationships with the region’s senior team that supports effective and dynamic communications across all areas of the business
- Internal Communications
- Work with the rest of the UK and global communications teams to coordinate our regional All Hands meetings and support other internal messaging campaigns
What you’ll bring with you
- Proven experience in communications roles, in-house (multinational) or agency, predominantly in the UK, working on both B2B and B2C brands
- Proven experience in creating and delivering and executing PR plans
- An understanding of the small business market and/or accounting would help
- Track record of identifying, building and delivering communications programmes that make business impact
- Experience developing communications strategy for brand, product and partnership news; plus issue management
- Experience in agency management
- Technical background, preferably in the cloud or SaaS space. Aptitude to quickly come up to speed on new technology concepts
- Excellent media relationships with top-tier UK & EMEA journalists in technology/enterprise/business media outlets with proven experience in landing high-profile stories
- Ability to establish credibility and strong working relationships
- Passion for comms; experience in thought leadership and creative campaigns
- Verbal and written communication skills including copywriting
- Expert in content creation and storytelling
