Associate Director, Discoverability & Web Strategist (Hybrid - Upper Gwynedd, PA)

Job Description

The Associate Director, Discoverability and Web Strategist is a critical, cross‑functional digital leader responsible for shaping, evolving, and operationalizing our company's discoverability strategy for U.S. Market segments across Healthcare Consumer (HCC), Healthcare Professional (HCP), across our company business units. This role unites AI-enabled Content Discoverability, Paid Search and Web Ownership and Leadership, to drive best‑in‑class experiences, compliant execution, and measurable customer impact across channels including organic and paid search.

The leader will collaborate closely with Business Unit stakeholders including Marketing, Media, Promotion, Customer Agile Teams (CAT’s), Digital Data and Analytics, the Content Accelerator team, Content Hub team, and design system product owners to ensure our digital ecosystem is intuitive, discoverable, scalable, future‑ready and meets the needs of our patients and customers as they navigate the web for health information.

Key Responsibilities

Content Discoverability Leadership

• Act as the primary liaison between internal teams and the SEO partner organization.

• Serve as the SME for AI Search for assigned BU, with responsibility for capability roadmaps, enhancements, and long-term experience evolution.

• Define, own, and continuously optimize the overarching web strategy (content disoverability) across HCC and HCP properties.

• Co-Lead and evolve the enterprise-wide digital discoverability strategy, including SEO, AEO (Answer Engine Optimization), GEO (Generative Engine Optimization), and AI-friendly content structure.

• Oversee SEO audits, keyword strategy, ranking trends, and performance dashboards with a continual improvement mindset.

• Partner with Customer Engagement Planning & Measurement team to evolve the landscape of measurement to include new metrics (e.g., agent traffic)

• Develop and maintain AI Search guidance, governance documentation, and training resources to scale discoverability best practices across the enterprise.

• Embed AI Seach and discoverability considerations into early creative concepting, UX planning, and content development processes.

• Ensure optimal site architecture, navigation, and accessibility for search engines and AI search models.

• Serve as SME on structured content creation and the preparation of data/metadata for AI platforms

• Provide SME consultation on content, templates, or web experiences to drive content discoverability

• Research and introduce innovations that enhance discoversbility, customer experience, team efficiency, and time‑to‑market speed.

• Contribute to UX research, usability testing, prototyping, and experimentation to identify friction points and create actionable optimization plans.

• Drive standardization across design systems (e.g., VIVID360) to ensure consistency, compliance, reuse across brands and content discoverability.

• Evaluate and prioritize new capability requests based on customer needs, technical feasibility, and business impact as they relate to content discoverability.

• Partner with BU stakeholders, CAT teams, DHH, Content Accelerator and Content Hub teams to translate business needs into technical execution, ensuring smooth deployment of new website features and enhancements as they relate to content discoverability.

• Lead legal, regulatory, and marketing partners through educational forums, web summits, and training around best practices and design system usage as they relate to content discoverability.

• Facilitate innovation forums for BU stakeholders, CAT teams, and marketers to bring forward new ideas and share learnings as they relate to content discoverability.

• Partner with CAT design teams and Content Hub design teams to ensure alignment on process, standards, and consistent quality as they relate to content discoverability.

• Collaborate across DHH, BU stakeholders, CAT teams, marketing, Content Accelerator and Content Hub teams to drive operational excellence and cross-organizational adoption of improvements.

Required Qualifications

• Bachelor's Degree required.

• Minimum of 7 years of professional experience

• Minimum of 5 years in digital marketing, web strategy, IT, channel innovation, or related areas.

• Proven ability to manage complex digital programs with multiple stakeholders.

• Strong proficiency in content discoverabilty, digital marketing strategy, and content optimization.

• Experience with web analytics platforms, KPI creation, and data-driven decision-making.

• Demonstrated success in managing vendors, agencies, and third-party partners.

• Strong leadership, communication, stakeholder management, and cross-functional influence skills.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience launching and leading new web capabilities and scaling operational improvements.

• Agile experience strongly preferred.

• Strong problem solving, analytical thinking, and comfort solving ambiguous challenges.

• Experience with design systems and creative workflow tools (e.g., Figma).

• Experience with AI-driven content workflows, structured data, and emerging search channels.

• Background in consumer healthcare, HCP engagement, pharma marketing, or regulated industries.

Leadership Behaviors

• Strategic thinker with the ability to balance long-term vision with near-term priorities.

• Change agent who can advocate for, enable, and accelerate new ways of working.

• Collaborative partner who builds trust and alignment across diverse teams.

• Innovator who embraces emerging technologies and leads experimentation.

• Storyteller who can translate complex digital concepts into clear, action-oriented narratives.

• Champion of customer experience who advocates for intuitive, compliant, impactful digital interactions.

Required Skills:

Preferred Skills:

Current Employees apply HERE

Current Contingent Workers apply HERE

US and Puerto Rico Residents Only:

Our company is committed to inclusion, ensuring that candidates can engage in a hiring process that exhibits their true capabilities. Please click here if you need an accommodation during the application or hiring process.

As an Equal Employment Opportunity Employer, we provide equal opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment and prohibit discrimination on the basis of race, color, age, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, protected veteran status, disability status, or other applicable legally protected characteristics.  As a federal contractor, we comply with all affirmative action requirements for protected veterans and individuals with disabilities.  For more information about personal rights under the U.S. Equal Opportunity Employment laws, visit:

EEOC Know Your Rights

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We are proud to be a company that embraces the value of bringing together, talented, and committed people with diverse experiences, perspectives, skills and backgrounds. The fastest way to breakthrough innovation is when people with diverse ideas, broad experiences, backgrounds, and skills come together in an inclusive environment. We encourage our colleagues to respectfully challenge one another’s thinking and approach problems collectively.

Learn more about your rights, including under California, Colorado and other US State Acts

The salary range for this role is

$142,400.00 - $224,100.00

This is the lowest to highest salary we in good faith believe we would pay for this role at the time of this posting. An employee’s position within the salary range will be based on several factors including, but not limited to relevant education, qualifications, certifications, experience, skills, geographic location, government requirements, and business or organizational needs.

The successful candidate will be eligible for annual bonus and long-term incentive, if applicable.

We offer a comprehensive package of benefits.  Available benefits include medical, dental, vision healthcare and other insurance benefits (for employee and family), retirement benefits, including 401(k), paid holidays, vacation, and compassionate and sick days. More information about benefits is available at https://jobs.merck.com/us/en/compensation-and-benefits.

You can apply for this role through https://jobs.merck.com/us/en (or via the Workday Jobs Hub if you are a current employee). The application deadline for this position is stated on this posting.

San Francisco Residents Only: We will consider qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records for employment in compliance with the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance

Los Angeles Residents Only: We will consider for employment all qualified applicants, including those with criminal histories, in a manner consistent with the requirements of applicable state and local laws, including the City of Los Angeles’ Fair Chance Initiative for Hiring Ordinance

Search Firm Representatives Please Read Carefully 
Merck & Co., Inc., Rahway, NJ, USA, also known as Merck Sharp & Dohme LLC, Rahway, NJ, USA, does not accept unsolicited assistance from search firms for employment opportunities. All CVs / resumes submitted by search firms to any employee at our company without a valid written search agreement in place for this position will be deemed the sole property of our company.  No fee will be paid in the event a candidate is hired by our company as a result of an agency referral where no pre-existing agreement is in place. Where agency agreements are in place, introductions are position specific. Please, no phone calls or emails. 

Employee Status:

Regular

Relocation:

No relocation

VISA Sponsorship:

No

Travel Requirements:

10%

Flexible Work Arrangements:

Hybrid

Shift:

Not Indicated

Valid Driving License:

No

Hazardous Material(s):

N/A

Job Posting End Date:

05/23/2026

*A job posting is effective until 11:59:59PM on the day BEFORE the listed job posting end date. Please ensure you apply to a job posting no later than the day BEFORE the job posting end date.