Sr. Customer Success Manager - Merchants

Early Warning; Chicago (IL); Hybrid; USD 135,000 - 185,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Healthcare Coverage

401(k) Retirement Plan

Paid Time Off

Paid Parental Leave

Bonus potential

Job summary

Early Warning is seeking a Sr. Customer Success Manager - Merchants to lead strategic merchant relationships and drive adoption, activation, and revenue growth. You will oversee cross‑functional collaboration across Product, Risk, and Operations to ensure customer success at senior levels.

You will own growth plans, articulate value, negotiate agreements, and guide initiatives that increase merchant investment. This role is hybrid and located in major markets including Chicago.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree or equivalent experience.
• 8+ years in payments, financial services, fintech, or customer success.
• Proven success growing strategic merchant/partner relationships.
• Strong consultative selling, negotiation, and commercial acumen.
• Experience developing and executing strategic account plans.
• Deep understanding of the payments ecosystem.
• Excellent communication and executive stakeholder management.
• Ability to influence senior decision-makers and drive initiatives.
• Willingness to travel as needed.

Responsibilities

• Proactively builds executive relationships across strategic merchants and partners.
• Owns merchant success and growth outcomes including activation and transactions.
• Develops strategic account growth plans to deepen engagement.
• Acts as trusted advisor, articulating value and securing commitments.
• Identifies expansion opportunities and builds business cases.
• Collaborates with Product, Marketing, Risk, and Operations teams.
• Leads post‑integration account management and reviews performance.
• Represents merchant voice to influence product and policy decisions.
• Maintains Salesforce-based portfolio tracking and governance.
• Upholds risk management and data security in growth initiatives.

Skills

Strategic account management

Relationship management

Executive stakeholder management

Consultative selling

Negotiation

Cross-functional collaboration

Analytical thinking

Financial acumen

Travel flexibility

Industry knowledge: payments/fintech

Communication skills

Education

Bachelor’s degree in Business, Finance, Marketing or related field

Tools

Salesforce

Job description

At Early Warning, we’ve powered and protected the U.S. financial system for over thirty years with cutting‑edge solutions like Zelle®, Paze℠, and so much more. As a trusted name in payments, we partner with thousands of institutions to increase access to financial services and protect transactions for hundreds of millions of consumers and small businesses.

Positions located in Scottsdale, San Francisco, Chicago, or New York follow a hybrid work model to allow for a more collaborative working environment.

Candidates responding to this posting must independently possess the eligibility to work in the United States, for any employer, at the date of hire. This position is ineligible for employment Visa sponsorship.

Overall Purpose

The Sr. Customer Success Manager - Merchants is a senior strategic leader responsible for building strong relationships with a portfolio of key strategic Paze merchant partners. The leader holistically owns and manages the merchant relationships to drive acceptance, awareness, optimization, and support the overall strategic engagement with Paze merchants. The role oversees merchant relationship health, building strong cross‑functional relationships with customers, and collaborates across Paze and Paze partners, to enable Paze strategies and success at the senior executive level, ensuring these partnerships grow and thrive over time. The Sr. Customer Success Manager - Merchants plays a key role in delivering strong team and individual results in a high‑growth environment.

Essential Functions

• Proactively builds and expands executive relationships across strategic merchants, channel and issuer partners, and internal stakeholders to drive adoption, growth, and long‑term partnership value.
• Owns merchant success and commercial growth outcomes, including activation, transaction volume, checkout performance, consumer adoption, campaign effectiveness, and overall relationship health.
• Develops and executes strategic account growth plans, identifying opportunities to deepen engagement, increase utilization, and accelerate business results.
• Serves as a trusted advisor and growth partner, articulating Paze’s value proposition, influencing strategic decisions, negotiating agreements, and securing stakeholder commitment.
• Demonstrates strong sales acumen by identifying expansion opportunities, building business cases, overcoming objections, and driving initiatives that increase merchant investment and adoption.
• Collaborates across Product, Marketing, Risk, Technology, Operations, Finance, Legal, as well as Channel and Issuer‑facing teams to remove barriers, unlock growth opportunities, and deliver merchant outcomes.
• Leads post‑integration account management, proactively monitoring performance, identifying risks and opportunities, conducting business reviews, and driving action plans to maximize results.
• Represents the voice of the merchant by translating feedback, performance insights, and market trends into recommendations that strengthen the customer experience and support business growth.
• Leverages deep expertise in customer success, relationship management, and the payments ecosystem to differentiate Paze, strengthen competitive positioning, and deliver measurable business impact.
• Maintains disciplined portfolio management through accurate Salesforce tracking and effective coordination of contractual, incentive, and operational commitments.
• Upholds risk management, data security, and ethical business practices while enabling sustainable growth and protecting the integrity of Paze and its partners.

Minimum Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Business, Finance, Marketing or a related field, or equivalent experience.
• Typically 8+ years of experience in payments, financial services, fintech, customer success, strategic account management, business development, or related client‑facing roles.
• Proven success managing and growing strategic merchant or partner relationships, driving adoption, engagement, retention, and revenue growth.
• Strong consultative selling, negotiation, and commercial acumen, with the ability to identify opportunities, build business cases, influence senior decision‑makers, and advance complex initiatives.
• Experience developing and executing strategic account plans and growth strategies that deliver measurable business outcomes.
• Deep understanding of the payments ecosystem, including merchants, issuers, processors, networks, digital wallets, and eCommerce payment solutions.
• Strong analytical and financial acumen, with the ability to evaluate opportunities using quantitative and qualitative insights, develop business cases, conduct market and competitive analysis, and track performance against key business objectives.
• Exceptional communication, presentation, and executive stakeholder management skills, including experience influencing C‑suite leaders and navigating complex, matrixed organizations.
• Demonstrated ability to lead through influence, collaborate cross‑functionally, and drive execution in fast‑paced, high‑growth environments.
• Self‑motivated, proactive, and results‑oriented, with a track record of managing ambiguity and delivering results with minimal oversight.
• Ability to travel as needed to support merchant meetings, business reviews, conferences, and industry events.
• Must successfully complete applicable background check and drug screening requirements.

Physical Requirements

Working conditions consist of a normal office environment. Work is primarily sedentary and requires extensive use of a computer and involves sitting for periods of approximately four hours. Work may require occasional standing, walking, kneeling and reaching. Must be able to lift 10 pounds occasionally and/or negligible amount of force frequently. Requires visual acuity and dexterity to view, prepare, and manipulate documents and office equipment including personal computers. Requires the ability to communicate with internal and/or external customers and travel. Employee must be able to perform essential functions and physical requirements of position with or without reasonable accommodation.

The Pay Scale For This Position In

Phoenix, AZ/ Chicago, IL in USD per year is: $135,000-$155,000.

New York, NY/ San Francisco, CA in USD per year is: $150,000 - $185,000.

Additionally, candidates are eligible for a discretionary bonus and a competitive benefit plan.

This pay scale is subject to change and is not necessarily reflective of actual compensation that may be earned, nor a promise of any specific pay for any specific candidate, which is always dependent on legitimate factors considered at the time of job offer. Early Warning Services takes into consideration a variety of factors when determining a competitive salary offer, including, but not limited to, the job scope, market rates and geographic location of a position, candidate’s education, experience, training, and specialized skills or certification(s) in relation to the job requirements and compared with internal equity (peers). The business actively supports and reviews wage equity to ensure that pay decisions are not based on gender, race, national origin, or any other protected classes.

Some of the Ways We Prioritize Your Health and Happiness

• Healthcare Coverage – Competitive medical (PPO/HDHP), dental, and vision plans as well as company contributions to your Health Savings Account (HSA) or pre‑tax savings through flexible spending accounts (FSA) for commuting, health & dependent care expenses.
• 401(k) Retirement Plan – Featuring a 100% Company Safe Harbor Match on your first 6% deferral immediately upon eligibility.
• Paid Time Off – Flexible Time Off for Exempt (salaried) employees, as well as generous PTO for Non‑Exempt (hourly) employees, plus 11 paid company holidays and a paid volunteer day.
• 12 weeks of Paid Parental Leave
• Maven Family Planning – provides support through your Parenting journey including egg freezing, fertility, adoption, surrogacy, pregnancy, postpartum, early pediatrics, and returning to work.

And SO much more! We continue to enhance our program, so be sure to check our Benefits page here for the latest. Our team can share more during the interview process!

Pursuant to the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance, we will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records.

Early Warning Services, LLC (“Early Warning”) considers for employment, hires, retains and promotes qualified candidates on the basis of ability, potential, and valid qualifications without regard to race, religious creed, religion, color, sex, sexual orientation, genetic information, gender, gender identity, gender expression, age, national origin, ancestry, citizenship, protected veteran or disability status or any factor prohibited by law, and as such affirms in policy and practice to support and promote equal employment opportunity and affirmative action, in accordance with all applicable federal, state, and municipal laws. The company also prohibits discrimination on other bases such as medical condition, marital status or any other factor that is irrelevant to the performance of our employees.