Senior Manager of Demand Generation

About CDI

The Constructive Dialogue Institute (CDI) is a non-profit dedicated to equipping the next generation of Americans with the skills to communicate and collaborate across lines of difference. We work with U.S. colleges and universities by providing co-curricular programming for students, professional development for faculty and staff, and strategic guidance to leadership. Our goal is to foster constructive dialogue at every level of the institution and to create the conditions for lasting organizational change. CDI was co-founded by psychologist Jonathan Haidt, the bestselling author of The Righteous Mind and The Anxious Generation.

About the Role

CDI is seeking a Senior Manager of Demand Generation to design and run the programs that fuel our growth. Reporting to the Chief Growth Officer, you will own our marketing funnel by leading paid campaigns, building email nurture programs, and optimizing CRM to drive measurable pipeline.

This is a hands-on builder role where you will transform CDI’s existing activities, such as newsletters, webinars, conferences, and early paid/organic efforts, into a coordinated, data-driven system that generates leads and equips our Partnerships team with high-quality opportunities.

You will oversee agency support across content, web, and paid social, while directly leading CDI’s lifecycle and email marketing campaigns. Over time, you will help expand CDI’s digital strategy with the opportunity to grow into managing future specialists, contractors, or staff.

The ideal candidate is an experienced demand generation marketer who thrives in a startup-style environment, is comfortable working across multiple channels, and is excited to apply the latest AI and automation tools to accelerate impact.

Responsibilities / Outcomes (First 12–18 Months)

Success in this role will be measured by growth in qualified opportunities generated from marketing. In the first 3–6 months, you will establish clear measurement capabilities and dashboards for key funnel metrics, ensuring CDI can track impact and refine strategy.

Build and optimize CDI’s demand generation engine

• Lead paid campaigns (LinkedIn, search, retargeting) to generate high-quality leads from CDI’s target accounts.
• Design and launch email nurture programs that move prospects through the funnel and increase conversion.
• Amplify CDI’s newsletters, webinars, white papers, and conferences by connecting them into coordinated multi-channel campaigns.

Strengthen lifecycle marketing and CRM

• Improve list enrichment, segmentation, and targeting to boost campaign performance.
• Streamline and professionalize nurture and follow-up campaigns, particularly for webinar, white paper downloads, and conference leads.
• Partner with Operations to optimize HubSpot workflows and reporting.

Professionalize marketing analytics and reporting

• Build dashboards and reporting for funnel metrics ($ qualified opportunities, MQLs, SQLs, conversion rates, ROI by channel).
• Integrate AI/automation into campaigns and workflows to reduce manual lift and accelerate experimentation.
• Conduct competitive landscape scans to inform messaging, campaign design, and positioning.

Partner across the organization

• Collaborate with Comms to maximize lead generation from webinars, events, and other thought leadership activities.
• Work closely with Partnerships to translate messaging into tailored campaigns that support outbound sales.
• Oversee agency partners for content and web, ensuring output is aligned with CDI’s goals.

Lay the foundation for future scale

• Manage a six-figure marketing budget, allocating resources to maximize ROI.
• Establish playbooks and processes that enable CDI to scale marketing capacity.
• Grow into leadership of future specialists, contractors, or staff.

About You / Competencies

• Demand Generation Expertise: Proven track record running full-funnel B2B marketing campaigns, ideally in education, nonprofit, or SaaS contexts. Skilled at mapping content to buyer stages.
• Hands-On Execution: Startup scrappiness; comfortable building strategy while also executing campaigns directly.
• Email Marketing & Nurture: Strong experience with lifecycle campaign design, nurturing leads through the funnel, and optimizing for conversion.
• Digital & Technical Fluency: Skilled with HubSpot, paid search and social, and campaign analytics. Familiar with AI tools and list enrichment platforms; comfortable partnering with ops support on marketing automation.
• Communication & Storytelling: Able to translate CDI’s positioning into compelling campaigns and collateral that engage prospects and support sales.
• Analytical Mindset: Adept at using data to prioritize, measure ROI, and refine strategy. Builds dashboards and tracks performance rigorously.
• Collaboration & Influence: Thrives in cross-functional settings; able to partner fluidly with Comms on positioning and Partnerships on pipeline.
• Mission Alignment: Excited about CDI’s role at the intersection of higher education, dialogue, and democracy. Brings humility and curiosity to sensitive issues.

Qualifications

• 6–8 years of experience in B2B marketing with a focus on demand generation and lifecycle/email nurture.
• Demonstrated success owning marketing channels that drive pipeline (email, paid, events, organic) in close partnership with sales/partnerships teams.
• Strong experience with HubSpot (or equivalent CRM/marketing automation platform) and ability to partner with ops to optimize workflows.
• Proficiency with analytics tools (Google Analytics or similar) and experience establishing dashboards and KPIs.
• Comfort with AI tools, automation, and enrichment platforms to optimize marketing workflows.
• Experience in a startup or scrappy environment strongly preferred, with the ability to drive execution independently while also shaping strategy.
• Exposure to or experience collaborating with comms, content marketing, or product marketing teams a plus.