Retention Strategy Lead - New Initiatives

AVP Level | Full-Time | Consumer Product & Growth

ROLE OVERVIEW

We're looking for an insight-led, execution-focused Retention Strategy Lead who will own the discovery and end-to-end delivery of new retention initiatives. This is not a BAU role - it's built for someone who thrives at the whitespace between data, consumer psychology, and product thinking.

You will be the engine behind identifying why users churn or disengage, generating hypotheses grounded in quantitative and qualitative research, designing interventions, and scaling what works - all the way from insight to impact. You'll lead a team and partner deeply with Product, Data, and Marketing to move fast and build things that last.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES

1. Consumer Insights & Research:

- Design and run consumer surveys, interviews, and qualitative research studies to uncover retention pain points and unmet needs.

- Deep-dive into behavioral data - cohort trends, drop-off patterns, engagement signals - to identify structural churn drivers.

- Synthesise quantitative and qualitative signals into a clear, prioritized "why" behind user disengagement.

- Build and maintain a consumer intelligence repository that continuously feeds the initiatives pipeline.

2. New Initiatives - Ideation to Execution:

- Execute the full lifecycle from insight, hypothesis, solution design, pilot, to scale.

- Generate a structured pipeline of retention initiatives spanning product features, engagement mechanics, communication flows, and loyalty constructs.

- Define initiative goals, success metrics, and learning objectives before every test.

- Work with Product teams to embed retention mechanics natively into the product experience (product-led growth).

- Drive rapid prototyping and structured experimentation - A/B tests, holdout groups, multivariate experiments.

3. Scale-Up of Proven Initiatives:

- Develop robust scale-up playbooks for initiatives that prove efficacy at pilot stage.

- Partner with Engineering, Product, and Ops to translate pilots into full-scale product or process changes.

- Define the operational model - tooling, resourcing, measurement - required to sustain and grow each scaled initiative.

- Track scaled initiative performance over time; iterate and course-correct based on real-world signals.

4. Product-Led Growth & Funnel Thinking:

- Champion product-led retention: drive features, flows, and nudges that create habitual, compounding engagement.

- Work with PMs to build onboarding and activation experiences that set users up for long-term retention.

- Identify leverage points in the product funnel where behavior change has the highest retention impact.

- Influence the product roadmap with data-backed retention use cases.

5. Data, Measurement & Reporting:

- Build and own dashboards tracking retention KPIs: D7/D30/D90 retention, engagement depth, reactivation rate, LTV curves.

- Establish a rigorous experimentation framework - define significance thresholds, guardrail metrics, and learning documentation.

- Translate complex data outputs into clear executive narratives and actionable team briefs.

- Ensure measurement infrastructure (event tracking, attribution) supports initiative-level learning.

6. Stakeholder Management & Cross-Functional Leadership:

- Align Product, Marketing, Data, and Tech teams around a shared retention roadmap and KPI framework.

- Present initiative strategies, pilots, and results to senior leadership with clarity and conviction.

- Create buy-in for new, ambiguous ideas that may not have obvious precedent.

- Operate as the centralised voice of the retention agenda across the organisation.

7. People Management:

- Lead, mentor, and grow a team of analysts and growth managers focused on retention and new initiatives.

- Set clear goals, ownership areas, and development plans for each team member.

- Foster a culture of curiosity, structured thinking, and bias for action within the team.

- Build team capability in consumer research, experimentation design, and product thinking.

KEY METRICS OWNED:

- D7 / D30 / D90 Retention Rates.

- Initiative Pipeline Velocity.

- Pilot-to-Scale Conversion Rate.

- Engagement Depth Score.

- Reactivation / Win-back Rate.

- LTV Improvement (by Cohort).

IDEAL CANDIDATE PROFILE

Experience:

- 6-10 years in growth, retention, product strategy, or consumer insights roles in consumer internet / app businesses.

- Demonstrable track record of taking initiatives from idea through to scaled business impact.

- Experience managing and developing team members in a high-growth environment.

- Prior exposure to product-led growth frameworks and working directly with Product teams.

Skills & Expertise:

- Survey design, qualitative interview techniques, user behaviour analysis.

- Proficiency in SQL, cohort analysis, funnel diagnostics, experimentation frameworks.

- Ability to translate insights into product requirements and influence roadmaps.

- A/B testing, statistical significance, holdout analysis, causal inference basics.

- Turn complex data into compelling narratives for diverse audiences.

Soft Skills:

- High ownership - takes full accountability from insight to outcome, not just the analysis layer.

- Structured problem solver who can operate effectively in ambiguity.

- Strong cross-functional influencer - can align diverse stakeholders without direct authority.

- Intellectually curious with genuine interest in consumer psychology and behaviour change.

- Comfortable in fast-paced environments where the roadmap evolves quickly.

BONUS POINTS:

- Experience in hyperlocal services, beauty, wellness, or subscription-based consumer platforms.

- Background in behavioural economics or consumer psychology applied to product design.

- Familiarity with lifecycle marketing - CRM, push, in-app messaging - and how it connects to retention.

- Experience building or managing referral loops or loyalty / rewards programmes.

- Exposure to experimentation platforms (Optimizely, Statsig, Eppo, LaunchDarkly, etc.).

WHY THIS ROLE IS EXCITING:

- Greenfield mandate - you define what the retention initiatives agenda looks like, not inherit a fixed playbook.

- Direct influence on LTV, business sustainability, and long-term product strategy.

- Rare combination of deep analytical work, consumer empathy, and product co-creation.

- Ownership of a team and the opportunity to build a world-class retention practice from the ground up.

- Work at the intersection of data science, product design, and consumer behavior - one of the most exciting spaces in growth.