Audience Engagement Editor

Job Description

Bolts is a digital publication that covers the nuts and bolts of power and political change. We are focused on two areas where local governments play an outsized role: criminal justice and voting rights. Since our launch in 2022, we have covered stories about obscure institutions and local elections, and the movements around them, that highlight their real world stakes and conflicts. We also publish resources that make it easier to follow local politics nationwide. 

Bolts is now hiring for an audience engagement editor who will grow the reach and impact of our stories, develop a keen understanding of our audiences, and work to build and grow them.

This role directs audience engagement work in our newsroom. They play a critical role in shaping how we interact and work with our readers, partners, peers, and the communities we serve and cover so that we can reach our audiences, grow our platforms, and discover underreported stories. They participate in regular editorial meetings alongside other Bolts editors. They manage our social media channels, promote our stories and mine our analytics. They also help build partnerships with other publications, and develop new ways to invite our readers to contribute to, and interact with, our journalism. 

This editor should be a strong writer with a nuanced grasp of social media and data analytics, and enthusiasm for engaging varied audiences about local politics, policy, and organizing and about voting rights and the criminal legal system. They must be able to meet deadlines and be responsive, and juggle competing demands on their time.

Responsibilities 

Distribution and promotion

• Tailor and execute a distribution and promotion plan for Bolts stories and projects to grow their reach, including working with writers and editors from a project’s inception.

• Manage our social media, including preparing content for different channels and creating a strong presence on various social platforms and distribution platforms, with an emphasis on increasing followers and engagement with our journalism. 

• Reach out to other organizations and media to build visibility for Bolts stories and journalists and grow our reach.

• Oversee the production of Bolts’ weekly newsletter, and manage strategy around building email lists.

• Work with other editors to optimize SEO.

Audience engagement and development

• Oversee existing engagement-centered projects, such as our “Ask Bolts” series, and help develop other similar projects.
• Mine audience analytics and surveys, to track key metrics and develop new strategies to grow and engage our readership.

• Conduct outreach and surveys that provide feedback from Bolts readers and key audiences, to help drive journalism that is responsive to readers’ needs and questions.

• Engage communities impacted by the issues we cover, such as people affected by the criminal legal system, and identify underreported trends and stories. Develop methods for better reaching and serving audiences Bolts is not sufficiently serving.

• Collaborate with engagement editors at partner newsrooms to pave the way for possible editorial partnerships. We are especially eager to continue working with local news partners.

Growth

• Pursue strategies to transform readers into engaged subscribers and help build a base of small donors.
• Pursue direct engagement with small donors and monthly donors, and help the editor-in-chief craft communication and appeals around reader fundraising drives. 

• Help track evidence of engagement and impact.

Job Requirements

Qualifications

• Experience leading audience engagement work with a publication, preferably with experience developing engagement-centered projects.

• Experience overseeing social media platforms. Enthusiasm for social media and using it creatively to build engagement.

• Familiarity with audience and survey analytics tools and with SEO strategies, and the ability to draw actionable insights from data analytics.

• The ideal candidate should be organized, responsive, and comfortable in a collaborative work environment.

• Strong writing and editing skills, and attention to copy.

• Enthusiasm for political journalism, and for coverage that connects nationwide politics to local stakes and granular decision makers. 

• Broad interest in and familiarity with core issues that Bolts covers, namely criminal justice, voting rights, social justice, policing, democracy, immigration, and social movements.

We also acknowledge that some strong candidates won’t have all the qualifications listed here and want to encourage people with a diversity of experience to apply, even if they might not fit the description as written.

Bolts is an equal opportunity employer that is committed to building a diverse and inclusive workplace. We encourage journalists from underrepresented communities to apply and welcome qualified applicants of all races, ethnicities, physical abilities, genders and sexual orientations, including people who have been incarcerated or otherwise involved with the criminal justice system. 

Position details

This position is full-time and remote. 

The salary range is $83,000 to $88,000, pending experience. Benefits include medical, dental and vision insurance, long-term disability insurance, life insurance, an automatic 4% employer contribution to a 401K plan, and 14 weeks of paid family leave. 

Please contact jobs@boltsmag.org with any questions about the position or publication.

How to apply

To apply, please send to jobs@boltsmag.org: 

• your resume,
• a cover letter, 
• two to four samples of your work that show how you approach audience development and engagement,
• contact information for three references.

We created the job posting in March 2025. We will begin reviewing positions on April 7, 2025. The job posting remains open as long as the posting is up. 

We will reach out to candidates who have been selected for an interview, but we cannot respond to each individual application due to the volume of submissions. 

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