Director of Marketing & Student Recruitment – UNSW Bengaluru Full Time NEW

Emeritus is committed to teaching the skills of the future by making high-quality education accessible and affordable to individuals, companies, and governments around the world. It does this by collaborating with more than 50 top-tier universities across the United States, Europe, Latin America, Southeast Asia, India and China. Emeritus’ short courses, degree programs, professional certificates, and senior executive programs help individuals learn new skills and transform their lives, companies and organizations. Its unique model of state-of-the-art technology, curriculum innovation, and hands-on instruction from senior faculty, mentors and coaches has educated more than 250,000 individuals across 80+ countries. Founded in 2015, Emeritus, part of Eruditus Group, has more than 2,000 employees globally and offices in Mumbai, New Delhi, Shanghai, Singapore, Palo Alto, Mexico City, New York, Boston, London, and Dubai. Following its $650 million Series E funding round in August 2021, the Company is valued at $3.2 billion, and is backed by Accel, SoftBank Vision Fund 2, the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, Leeds Illuminate, Prosus Ventures, Sequoia Capital India, and Bertelsmann.

Position Description

Position Title: Director of Marketing & Student Recruitment

Reports To: Chief Operating Officer

Employment Type: Full-time

Location: UNSW Bengaluru Campus

Position Summary

The Director of Marketing & Student Recruitment leads the UNSW Bengaluru marketing and student recruitment strategy and operations, operating within UNSW’s global brand and governance framework. The role is accountable for enforcing brand quality standards, delivering local market growth, managing end-to-end student recruitment performance, and ensuring all activity in-market is coordinated with UNSW Sydney to present a unified brand and student experience.

This role blends strategic marketing leadership with hands-on student recruitment channel management, brand stewardship, and stakeholder engagement to attract high-quality students and meet undergraduate and postgraduate enrolment targets. The leader owns the full recruitment lifecycle — from integrated campaign development and partner management to outreach programs and pipeline conversion — while ensuring alignment with UNSW’s institutional brand, strategic priorities, and compliance frameworks.

Accountable for leading strategies that deliver enrolment growth and financial outcomes, while navigating brand governance, risk management, and regulatory compliance within India’s higher education context, the role leads the campus-wide marketing and student recruitment function to support enrolment objectives, brand reputation, and stakeholder trust. The position partners closely with UNSW Sydney and collaborates with local academic and professional leaders to deliver market impact across priority regions and segments.

Accountabilities

Strategy, Planning & Governance

• Own the multi-year UNSW Bengaluru marketing and student recruitment strategy and annual operating plan, delivering UNSW Bengaluru outcomes and aligned to UNSW’s Marketing & Digital Experience (M&DX) strategy, global priorities, with appropriate localization to account for the local market context.
• Lead integrated campaign planning across paid, owned, shared and earned channels with undergraduate and postgraduate marketing and recruitment funnels mapped to awareness, consideration, application, offer, and enrolment stages.
• Analyse market trends, competitor activity, and student data to inform evidence-based strategies, forecasting, and pipeline targets.
• Maintain collaborative planning rhythms with UNSW Sydney M&DX and Student Recruitment teams to ensure cross-campus alignment.
• Establish and operationalize local governance aligned to UNSW Sydney guiding principles and playbooks, including marketing policies, brand standards, approval workflows, and compliance controls, covering integrity of marketing claims, consent management, and data privacy, and partner compliance and management
• Ensure all use of the UNSW brand in India complies with the Brand Licensing Agreement, including monitoring, reporting, and escalation of any misuse or risk.
• Ensure compliance with Indian advertising standards, sector guidelines, and data protection requirements, maintaining audit-ready documentation.

Marketing & Brand

• Lead integrated undergraduate and postgraduate campaign planning across paid, owned, shared, and earned channels, mapped across the full recruitment funnel.
• Direct media planning and buying (search, social, video, display, OOH, portals) with clear objectives, benchmarks, brand safety controls, and compliance with UNSW procurement requirements.
• Oversee digital marketing initiatives including SEM, social media, content marketing, email campaigns, SEO, and analytics.
• Steward brand architecture and identity usage in India, including program naming conventions, co-branding, and protection against misuse, consistent with UNSW Sydney brand governance requirements .
• Oversee content operations including editorial calendars, creative production, localisation, asset management, accessibility, and speed-to-market, ensuring brand safety and authenticity standards .
• Coordinate local public relations activities in collaboration with UNSW Sydney Corporate Communications, M&DX teams, and retained agencies, including spokesperson preparation, media engagement, and crisis communications protocols.

Recruitment, Outreach & Partnerships

• Lead future student outreach strategy and planning, including market mapping across schools, counsellors, pathway providers, industry bodies, and regional partners.
• Manage partner governance, training, performance, and compliance with UNSW brand and regulatory requirements.
• Represent UNSW Bengaluru at fairs, expos, school visits, open days, campus tours, webinars, and industry events, domestically and internationally.
• Supervise enquiry management, lead nurturing, and conversion activities across the student journey.
• Engage with regulators, industry partners, and community groups to strengthen institutional presence and reputation.

Data, Performance & Reporting

• Track and manage recruitment pipelines using CRM and reporting tools across leads, applications, offers, acceptances, and commencements.
• Partner with digital, CRM, and analytics teams to optimise conversion funnels and improve the student experience.
• Provide regular dashboards, forecasts, ROI analysis, and strategic insights to senior leadership.
• Evaluate campaign, channel, and partner performance and reallocate investment based on outcomes and risk.

Leadership, Operations & Financial Management

• Lead the marketing and recruitment organisation structure spanning brand, content, digital, PR, outreach, events, analytics, and partnerships.
• Recruit, onboard, mentor, and develop high-performing teams aligned to defined capability frameworks.
• Foster a customer-focused, results-driven culture.
• Own budget management, investment cases, and reallocation based on ROI and risk, aligning with budget stewardship and reporting standards applicable to UNSW Sydney.
• V endor management: RFPs, SOWs, SLAs, and performance reviews invoice reconciliation, and risk registers; in alignment with the UNSW Sydney M&DX Playbooks and with UNSW financial and delegation frameworks.
• Collaborate cross-functionally with Academic Units, Admissions, Student Services, Facilities, Finance, Legal, and Compliance teams.

Qualifications

Skills & Experience

• Bachelor’s degree in Marketing, Business, Communications, or a related field (required).
• Master’s or postgraduate qualification in Marketing, Business, or Higher Education (preferred).

Experience

• 12+ years’ experience in senior marketing and/or student recruitment roles.
• Demonstrated success delivering enrolment growth or sales targets in education or related sectors.
• Experience leading multi-channel marketing, performance marketing, and student recruitment operations.
• Proven capability working within global brand governance frameworks and matrixed organisations.

Skills & Capabilities

• Strategic marketing and recruitment leadership with strong commercial and financial acumen.
• Deep understanding of India’s higher education and youth market, recruitment channels, and partner ecosystems.
• Data-driven decision-making with confidence managing and presenting complex insights to executive audiences.
• Advanced leadership maturity and proven team performance management experience
• Strong stakeholder engagement, influencing, and negotiation skills.
• High cultural intelligence and ability to localise global strategy.
• Exceptional written, verbal, and public communication skills.
• Willingness and ability to travel across India and internationally as required.

Key Relationships

• Chief Operating Officer, Rector, Academic Deans and Program Heads
• Admissions, Student Services, and Professional Staff
• UNSW Sydney Marketing & Digital Experience and Corporate Communications
• Finance, Legal, and Compliance teams
• Agency partners (media, PR, creative) and external vendors
• Schools, counsellors, pathway partners, industry bodies, and regulators

Emeritus provides equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment and prohibits discrimination and harassment of any type without regard to race, color, religion, age, sex, national origin, disability status, genetics, protected veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state or local laws.

In Press

• https://inc42.com/buzz/edtech-startup-eruditus-fy23-revenue-crosses-inr-3000-cr-mark/
• emeritus harvard business school: Edtech unicorn Emeritus story now a Harvard Business School case study – The Economic Times (indiatimes.com)