Commercial Lead, Upside
Referrals
$170-212k
+ Equity
More information about location
3+ days a week in office
Mobile reward application for retail spending
Be an early applicant
Mobile reward application for retail spending
201-500 employees
Be an early applicant
$170-212k
+ Equity
More information about location
3+ days a week in office
201-500 employees
Company mission
To advance the economic power of people living and working in the real world.
Role
Who you are
- 7+ years in growth, commercial, or lifecycle marketing roles — with a track record of owning acquisition or retention KPIs end-to-end
- Deep experience running behavior-triggered lifecycle programs (email, push, IAM) in a consumer product environment (Braze, Iterable, or equivalent)
- Strong analytical ability: comfortable in Looker or similar BI tools, fluent in conversion funnel analysis, and experienced designing and interpreting A/B experiments
- Experience collaborating tightly with product managers — you know how to write commercial requirements, participate in sprint reviews, and influence roadmap decisions without owning eng resources directly
- Demonstrated ability to work across functions (product, engineering, creative, finance, legal) to ship programs on time
- Clear, direct communicator — you can write a crisp exec summary and present tradeoffs to senior leadership without a handler
- Direct ownership of a referral or word-of-mouth growth program in a consumer app, with a strong understanding of referral mechanics, fraud considerations, and the incentive design tradeoffs that drive sustainable performance preferred
- Familiarity with PLG principles or viral loop design is a plus, especially if applied in consumer products to increase user-driven acquisition
- Experience in consumer fintech, cashback, loyalty, or similarly economics-driven consumer businesses is strongly preferred
What the job involves
- Upside's referral program is one of its highest-performing growth engines — referred users convert to first transaction at double the rate of paid and organic channels, carry meaningfully higher LTV, and account for a significant share of overall revenue
- We are searching for a dedicated commercial owner leading the program to its full potential
- As a Commercial Lead, Referrals, you will own the end-to-end performance of the referrals channel — from strategy and incentive design through lifecycle activation, conversion optimization, and measurement
- You will work closely with the Referrals Product Lead (PM) to shape the product roadmap and serve as the commercial and go-to-market counterpart: setting targets, prioritizing the highest-impact moments, and building the always-on system that keeps the referral flywheel turning
- Grow referrals as a share of total acquired new users — set the annual target, track weekly, and intervene when off-pace
- Drive referred-user conversion: referral signup → first transaction → M1–M3 retention. Own the full funnel, not just top-of-funnel volume
- Build and operate a cohesive, behavior-triggered referral engine — replacing one-off campaigns with an always-on lifecycle system that activates users at high-intent moments (first cash out, 3rd reconcile, heavy-active milestone, etc.)
- Define and execute incentive strategy: test and optimize referral bonus constructs by segment, balancing conversion rates against cost-per-acquired-user
- Partner with the Referrals PM to shape the product roadmap — you set commercial requirements; they build the mechanics. Align on experiment prioritization, feature launches, and measurement
- Unlock the never-referrer segment (the majority of the active base): develop and iterate on strategies to get users from 0 → 1 referral, with a clear path to repeat advocacy
- Define success metrics, own the dashboard, and report progress to consumer growth leadership and company executives
Our take
Loyalty systems, vouchers, and other special offers have a proven track record at winning over new customers for businesses. However, customers can be reluctant to sign up due to the sheer number of these schemes. Upside exists to unify these loyalty schemes with a single flexible reward app.
While retail reward platforms are nothing new, Upside functions more like a marketplace, linking participating businesses to potential customers. It also rewards customers with cash back on eligible purchases, a more flexible reward than is traditional in loyalty schemes.
With over 50,000 businesses enrolled and 30 million app users, Upside has grown into a major player in this sector. The company is well-funded and ever-expanding its offering, with a product that is increasingly appreciated by consumers in an expensive world, as well as the businesses who depend on their custom.
Freddie
Company Specialist at Welcome to the Jungle
Insights
24% employee growth in 12 months
Company
Funding (1 round)
Apr 2022
$65m
SERIES D
Total funding: $65m
Company benefits
- Health and Wellness - We’re happy to provide our team members with generous health, vision, and dental insurance options
- Lunch - We cover the cost of lunch everyday for team members onsite to enhance our team building and encourage collaboration. Plus local restaurants appreciate it!
- Stock Options - Our team’s success is our company’s success, and we should all have a stake in that. We’re glad to offer our team members valuable stock options
- Unlimited PTO - Yes, you read that right. When you need time off, we’ve got you covered
Company HQ
Dupont Circle, Washington, DC
Leadership
Alex Kinnier
(CEO & Co-Founder)Experience as Group Product Manager for Google from 2005 to 2008. Senior Vice President of Products and Engineering for Opower from 2012 to 2015.
Wayne Lin
(CPO & Co-Founder)Experience as Product Manager for Google from 2005 to 2010. Vice President of Product Management & Analytics for Opower from 2010 to 2015.
Rick McPhee
(Co-Founder)Experience as Vice President of Engineering for HP's Fortify Software from 2008 to 2012. Senior Vice President of Engineering for Opower from 2012 to 2015.
Joanna Kochaniak
(Engineer & Co-Founder)Experience as Programmer Analyst for the Institute for Physical Sciences from 2007 to 2010. Lead Software Engineer for Opower from 2010 to 2015.
Jan Rubio
(Designer & Co-Founder)Experience as Research Assistant for George Washington University from 2009 to 2011. Senior Software Engineer for Opower from 2011 to 2016.
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