Lifecycle Growth Lead

M-KOPA; Remote; ZAR 1 282 000 - 1 603 000; Full time

Job summary

A leading fintech company is seeking a Lifecycle Growth Lead to span customer activation and retention for over 7M customers across Africa. This role leverages data and requires expertise in CRM execution and structured experiments. Embracing a remote-first approach, you will collaboratively build automated journeys that impact financial inclusion meaningfully. Ideal candidates will possess hands-on lifecycle marketing experience, metrics ownership, and deep multi-channel expertise in communication strategies.

Benefits

Professional development programs

Family-friendly policies

Flexible working arrangements

Qualifications

• 5+ years experience in hands-on lifecycle/CRM execution, preferably in fintech.
• Proven track record of driving activation, retention, and LTV metrics.
• Expertise in multi-channel communication including SMS and WhatsApp.

Responsibilities

• Own and drive activation and retention metrics for 7M+ customers.
• Run structured A/B tests and optimize customer journeys.
• Partner cross-functionally with Product, Data, and Operations teams.

Skills

Lifecycle/CRM execution

Growth initiative ownership

Multi-channel expertise

Structured experimentation

Tools

CleverTap

Braze

MoEngage

Customer.io

HubSpot

Job description

Overview

We're actively recruiting a Lifecycle Growth Lead as we continue to scale our growing FinTech division at M-KOPA. You'll turn data, experiments, and hands-on CRM execution into scalable growth systems that unlock financial inclusion for millions across Africa.

The Impact

• Build automated customer journeys that activate, retain, and re-engage millions of customers across Africa. Your campaigns will directly enable financial inclusion by helping customers successfully complete their payment journeys and access life-changing products they've been traditionally excluded from. You will see measurable impact weekly through activation rates, retention curves, and customer lifetime value growth.

The Opportunity

• Own lifecycle outcomes at scale: Drive activation and retention metrics for 7M+ customers by designing segmentation frameworks and experimentation strategies, then executing them hands-on
• Rich experimentation playground: Run structured A/B tests annually with Africa's most sophisticated fintech dataset
• Unique channel mix: Optimise across SMS, WhatsApp, push, and in-app for mobile-first African markets while coordinating with 30,000 field agents + 300 telesales agents
• Strategic execution: Design the segmentation frameworks and growth playbooks that guide lifecycle strategy, then personally build the campaigns that validate what works
• Revenue impact: Drive measurable revenue growth and improve unit economics through lifecycle optimisation - your experiments directly influence profitability and customer lifetime value
• Purpose-driven impact: Your retention campaigns contribute to products that have displaced 2.1M+ tonnes of CO₂ and connected 2.5M people to their first internet access

What You’ll Do

• Own lifecycle growth outcomes: You're accountable for activation, retention, and LTV metrics - driving revenue growth and improving unit economics. Lead growth initiatives end-to-end (strategy → experiment → scale): identify opportunities, form hypotheses, run structured experiments, build repeatable playbooks that scale across markets. Design segmentation frameworks that Product and Data teams use. Influence product priorities with customer insights. You combine product-led growth thinking with hands-on CRM execution to maximise customer profitability and lifetime value.
• Hands-on execution: Personally build automated customer journeys - onboarding sequences, activation campaigns, retention flows, churn prevention, win-back. Configure triggers, build segments, write copy, deploy campaigns across WhatsApp, SMS, push, and in-app channels. Run A/B tests with clear methodology. Analyse performance, iterate rapidly, scale winners.
• Partner cross-functionally: Work with Product, Data, Telesales, Operations, and Commercial teams.

Essential Requirements

• 5+ years hands-on lifecycle/CRM execution - ideally at a fintech, mobile money, subscription, or PAYG business (bonus: emerging markets)
• End-to-end growth initiative ownership - proven experience leading initiatives from strategy (identifying opportunities, forming hypotheses) through experimentation (structured testing) to scale (repeatable playbooks), with demonstrated revenue impact and unit economics improvements
• Proven track record owning growth outcomes (activation rate, retention, LTV, revenue growth, unit economics) through lifecycle marketing - being accountable for the metrics and influencing Product/Operations to improve them
• Expert CleverTap, Braze, MoEngage, Customer.io, or HubSpot proficiency - you personally build complex automated journeys (workflow building, triggers, segmentation)
• Deep multi-channel expertise - SMS, WhatsApp, push, in-app messaging. Bonus: coordinated with telesales or field sales teams
• Structured experimentation track record - A/B tests with clear methodology, statistical rigour, and documented learnings

Bonus points

• PAYG, alternative credit, or financial inclusion business model experience
• Kenya or East Africa market experience with mobile-first, WhatsApp/SMS-heavy strategies
• Analytics fluency (GA4, Mixpanel, Amplitude, Looker) for funnel analysis and cohort tracking

The Why

You'll optimise customer journeys, coordinate campaigns across field agents + telesales + digital channels, run experiments that influence millions of lives, and master sophisticated tools at a scale and complexity you won't find elsewhere.

If you're a lifecycle growth operator who combines strategic ownership (designing frameworks, influencing product, owning metrics) with hands-on execution (building campaigns, running tests, optimising journeys), and wants to apply that expertise where it unlocks financial inclusion at scale, this is it.

Team Overview

Join the Product - Growth team reporting to the Head of Product - Growth. Work alongside analytics engineers, data scientists, product managers, and growth campaign coordinators. Collaborate closely with market GMs, Operations, Telesales, and Field Sales leaders to align campaigns with customer behaviour and business priorities.

Location & Benefits

• Fully remote role within UTC -1 to UTC +3 time zones
• Work with diverse teams across UK, Europe, and Africa
• Professional development programs and coaching partnerships
• Family-friendly policies and flexible working arrangements
• Well-being support and career growth opportunities

Our Mission

We create financial inclusion for the traditionally excluded through a fair, flexible, customer-centric financing model. We strive to drive greater inclusion of women, youth, and low-income communities.

Our Impact

• Connected : 2.5 million first-time mobile internet users connected
• Prosperous : 62% of customers use M-KOPA smartphones for income generation, with 35,000+ livelihoods created for agents
• Green : 2.1 million tonnes of CO₂ avoided through clean energy products, with over 127,700 circular economy products provided

Ready to build growth systems that create real-world financial inclusion while advancing your career in fintech?

Apply Now!

Why M-KOPA?

At M-KOPA, we empower our people to own their careers through diverse development programs, coaching partnerships, and on-the-job training. We support individual journeys with family-friendly policies, prioritize well-being, and embrace flexibility. Join us in shaping the future of M-KOPA as we grow together. Explore more at m-kopa.com.

Recognized four times by the Financial Times as one of Africa's fastest growing companies (2022, 2023, 2024 and 2025) and by TIME100 Most influential companies in the world 2023 and 2024, we've served over 6 million customers, unlocking $1.5 billion in cumulative credit for the unbanked across Africa.

Important Notice: M-KOPA is an equal opportunity and affirmative action employer committed to assembling a diverse, broadly trained staff. Women, minorities, and people with disabilities are strongly encouraged to apply.

M-KOPA explicitly prohibits the use of Forced or Child Labour and respects the rights of its employees to agree to terms and conditions of employment voluntarily, without coercion, and freely terminate their employment on appropriate notice. M-KOPA shall ensure that its Employees are of legal working age and shall comply with local laws for youth employment or student work, such as internships or apprenticeships.

M-KOPA does not collect/charge any money as a pre-employment or post-employment requirement. This means that we never ask for ‘recruitment fees’, ‘processing fees’, ‘interview fees’, or any other kind of money in exchange for offer letters or interviews at any time during the hiring process.

Applications for this position will be reviewed on a rolling basis. Shortlisting and interviews will take place at any stage during the recruitment process. We reserve the right to close the vacancy early if a suitable candidate is selected before the advertised closing date.

If your application is successful M-KOPA undertakes pre-employment background checks as part of its recruitment process, these include; criminal records, identification verification, academic qualifications, employment dates and employer references.