Airwallex · 2 days ago
Associate Director, Performance Marketing, SEM
San Francisco, CA
Full-time
Onsite
Senior Level, Lead/Staff
$138K/yr - $210K/yr
8+ years expAirwallex is a unified payments and financial platform for global businesses, empowering over 200,000 businesses worldwide. The Associate Director, Performance Marketing (SEM) will lead the strategy and execution of the global paid search program, managing a multi-million-dollar budget and driving measurable business outcomes through effective SEM campaigns.
FinanceFinancial ServicesFinTechPayments
Responsibilities
Own the global SEM strategy, setting the vision for how paid search drives customer acquisition, lead generation, and pipeline growth across segments (SMB, mid-market, enterprise)
Develop and execute short- and long-term SEM growth plans, balancing efficiency (LTV:CAC) with scale
Partner with Global Performance Marketing Strategy, Product Marketing, and Regional Leads to localize SEM campaigns for each market’s commercial priorities
Manage annual and quarterly budget planning, pacing, and forecasting for paid search investments
Serve as the SEM thought leader, identifying innovation opportunities in automation, AI bidding, audience layering, and creative testing
Oversee campaign structure, keyword strategy, bidding models, and creative optimization across Google and Microsoft Ads
Implement testing frameworks (ad copy, landing pages, audiences, match types) to continuously improve CTR, CVR, and pipeline conversion
Partner with Analytics and Data teams to ensure end-to-end visibility into ROI, pipeline contribution, and attribution across campaigns
Drive adoption of value-based bidding (VBB) and audience-first approaches (RLSA, Customer Match, CRM-based targeting)
Ensure strong campaign hygiene, naming conventions, and tracking governance (UTMs, conversion imports, offline events)
Collaborate with Product Marketing and Content to align messaging, creative, and offers with product value propositions
Partner with Lifecycle and Growth Product teams to build cohesive acquisition-to-activation journeys
Work with Finance and RevOps on pacing, forecasting, and ROI analysis to guide data-driven budget allocation
Align with Sales and Regional Marketing to ensure SEM efforts support pipeline coverage and demand generation goals
Manage and mentor SEM managers or specialists, fostering a culture of experimentation, precision, and data-driven decision-making
Develop playbooks and best practices for global and regional SEM teams
Partner with agency and platform reps to stay ahead of algorithm updates, betas, and emerging trends
Drive operational excellence through consistent QA, documentation, and performance review cadences
Qualification
Required
8+ years of experience in SEM or performance marketing, with proven success driving measurable growth and ROI
Strong expertise managing large-scale multi-region paid search programs (Google + Microsoft)
Experience optimizing for B2B SaaS or fintech pipelines with full-funnel visibility (from lead to closed-won)
Hands-on familiarity with Marketo, Looker, SQL, Salesforce, and offline conversion tracking workflows
Demonstrated analytical strength — comfortable with bid modeling, forecasting, and performance attribution
Exceptional leadership, communication, and stakeholder management skills
Bachelor's degree in Marketing, Economics, Data Analytics, or related field (MBA a plus)
Preferred
Experience building global SEM frameworks that scale across markets
Knowledge of multi-touch attribution (MTA), MMM, or incrementality testing
Exposure to AI-driven ad copy generation or creative automation systems
Familiarity with SEO/SEM alignment strategies to maximize paid–organic synergy
Strong relationship with platform partners (Google, Microsoft) for co-marketing and innovation programs
Multi-lingual and particularly Mandarin or Cantonese
Company
Airwallex
Airwallex is a global payments and financial platform that provides business accounts, payment solutions, and spend management tools.
1001-5000 employees
H1B Sponsorship
Airwallex has a track record of offering H1B sponsorships. Please note that this does not
guarantee sponsorship for this specific role. Below presents additional info for your
reference. (Data Powered by US Department of Labor)
Distribution of Different Job Fields Receiving Sponsorship
Represents job field similar to this job
Trends of Total Sponsorships
2025 (16)
2024 (6)
2022 (2)
Funding
Current Stage
Late StageTotal Funding
$1.53BKey Investors
AdditionSquare Peg CapitalLone Pine Capital
2025-12-08Series G· $330M
2025-05-21Series F· $150M
2025-05-21Secondary Market· $150M
Leadership Team
Jack Zhang
Co-Founder & CEO
Jacob Dai
Co-Founder & CTO
Recent News
Mobile World Live
2026-01-06
2026-01-06
Electronic Payments International
2026-01-06
Company data provided by crunchbase