Paid Search Marketing Manager

Paid Search Marketing Manager
Location - San Diego, CA
Employment Type - Contract

About Our Client

Our client is a well-established, large-scale consumer software company known for its widely used tax preparation product, serving millions of individual and small business customers each year. Operating within the broader financial technology and personal finance space, the company is recognized for its investment in digital marketing and its commitment to helping customers navigate their finances with confidence. The organization values innovation, data-driven decision-making, and cross-functional collaboration, and it partners closely with external agencies to execute high-performing marketing programs at scale.

Job Description

We are seeking a Paid Search (PPC) Manager to serve as the primary point of contact between internal marketing stakeholders and an external agency partner supporting a major paid search program. This role is responsible for ensuring the PPC program stays aligned with business goals, translating business objectives into clear, actionable paid search strategy, and holding the agency accountable to performance targets, timelines, and quality standards.
Day-to-day, the person in this role will review and provide feedback on campaign strategy, structure, ad copy, and landing page recommendations, while contributing to the paid search roadmap and testing agenda. They will analyze campaign performance and translate complex PPC data into clear business insights for internal stakeholders, and will collaborate cross-functionally with SEO, analytics, creative, and web teams to keep search marketing efforts coordinated and effective.
This is a highly collaborative, agency-facing role suited to someone who is comfortable operating in an ambiguous, fast-paced environment, enjoys hands-on PPC strategy work, and is energized by driving measurable performance improvements across a large-scale search program.

Duties and Responsibilities

• Serve as the primary point of contact between internal stakeholders and the agency partner, ensuring the PPC program stays aligned to business goals and priorities.
• Interpret business objectives, growth targets, and marketing strategies, translating them into clear, actionable direction for the agency.
• Contribute to the paid search roadmap, setting priorities, defining testing agendas, and ensuring the agency executes against the right strategies at the right time.
• Partner with the agency to achieve performance targets, timelines, and quality standards, reviewing and providing feedback on campaign strategy, structure, ad copy, and landing page recommendations.
• Leverage hands-on PPC knowledge to ask the right questions, identify gaps, and push for continuous improvement across bid management, keyword strategy, and campaign optimization.
• Evaluate AI-powered tools and platform-native features (such as Smart Bidding and Performance Max) and collaborate with partners on when and how to adopt them.
• Analyze campaign performance data and synthesize insights for internal stakeholders, translating PPC metrics into clear business implications and recommendations.
• Work with the SEO team to ensure paid and organic search strategies are complementary and coordinated.
• Collaborate with analytics, creative, and web teams on landing page testing, conversion tracking, and audience segmentation.
• Lead project management for key PPC initiatives, defining timelines, aligning stakeholders, tracking milestones, and ensuring on-time delivery.
• Oversee QA processes to ensure campaigns, ad copy, keywords, and tracking are accurate and on-brand.
• Conduct competitive research and bring forward-looking insights and recommendations to internal stakeholders and leadership.
• Stay current on search marketing trends and serve as an informed advocate for innovation within the program.

Required Experience/Skills

• 3-4 years of hands-on PPC experience, with a focus on Google Ads, Microsoft Ads, and other search platforms.
• Strong analytical skills with experience interpreting campaign data to inform strategy (Google Ads, SA360, Adobe Analytics, or similar).
• Solid working knowledge of bid management, keyword strategy, ad copy best practices, quality score optimization, and A/B testing.
• Familiarity with AI-powered advertising tools and a willingness to adopt emerging technologies to drive efficiency and performance.
• Strong project management skills with the ability to juggle multiple workstreams, align stakeholders, and keep initiatives on track.
• Excellent communication skills, able to distill complex PPC concepts for non-technical stakeholders and provide clear direction to agency partners.
• Comfortable operating in an ambiguous, fast-paced environment where priorities can shift and strong judgment is required.
• Collaborative and proactive team player who takes ownership and drives results.

Nice-to-Haves

• Experience managing enterprise-scale paid search programs.
• Prior experience working directly with external marketing agencies.
• Experience translating business goals into measurable PPC performance.

Education

Bachelor Degree in Marketing

Pay & Benefits Summary

Up to $55/hr W2

Call-to-Action

Ready to lead a high-impact paid search program? Apply now!

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