About this role
Job Title: Founding Growth Marketing Director Experience: Proven LeadGen ownership Skills: Outcome Oriented, Proven Results, AI savvy, Scientist mindset Location: Austin, TX Company: Forward
About Us: Forward is one of the fastest growing payments and embedded finance companies in North America. Our infrastructure powers leading private equity and venture capital backed software platforms’ money movement capabilities. We typically double a partner’s revenue in 36 months.
Our ICP is a software company with $5m-$100m in software revenue with a sub-optimal existing payments relationship. We’ve run a playbook 1,500+ times that delivers proven results - shortening sponsor hold times, doubling average revenue per user (ARPU) and simplifying the technical lift.
North America (our current operating geography) represents 55,000 software companies, 7,000 sponsors and $7 trillion in payment volume. Forward currently partners with sponsors bringing $145B in investable capital to accelerate the growth of vertical software platforms.
Our buyer personas are: Software CEO, Software CRO, Software Payments GM, Private Equity Investor, Private Equity Value Creation team member and Industry Consultants.
Forward is a mission driven company that is working to Pay it Forward, in an industry that extracts rents from asymmetric information. Our values (ethos, pathos, logos) are inspired by the ancient Greeks who believed the combination to be the foundation of trust. We built, scaled, and successfully exited multiple software+payments companies for 20+ years, and built Forward to be what we were always looking for in a partner.
Job Description: As a founding member of the Forward marketing team, you will report directly to the Co-Founder and Head of Partnerships & Revenue. We’re looking for a creative, AI-savvy marketer who brings a strong sense of ownership and accountability. The ideal candidate is comfortable experimenting—someone who isn’t afraid to test, measure, iterate, and try again. You’re driven to win and share our passion for helping software companies reach their full potential.
At Forward, we measure everything and optimize relentlessly. When an initial hypothesis doesn’t work, we adapt quickly and move forward. Success in this role will be defined by the number of software companies engaging with our content and seeking to learn how Forward can support their growth. Each quarter, more than 400 software companies evaluate new payments partners, and we are currently engaged in a fraction of those buying processes. Your role will be to own, validate, and refine our core growth hypothesis: that by (1) optimizing for LLM-driven discovery, (2) executing highly personalized, account-based marketing targeting companies that resemble our best customers, and (3) building a complementary event strategy alongside established industry events, we can increase lead flow by 2–3x.
Key Responsibilities:
Increase deal participation
Drive Forward’s presence in more high-quality buying cycles Identify in-market accounts and convert early interest into active opportunities
Build and execute an account-based GTM strategy
Define, segment, and prioritize target accounts (PE firms, software companies, partners) Develop tailored outreach and engagement strategies for each audience
Create and scale high-impact content
Translate Forward’s value proposition into clear, credible narratives Produce and repurpose content across channels (outreach, events, LLM/GEO, follow-ups)
Activate and optimize CRM data (Hubspot)
Leverage ~30,000 existing accounts to drive pipeline Implement segmentation, prioritization, and lightweight lead scoring
Design and run pipeline generation systems
Build repeatable outbound and inbound workflows Partner with sales to align on targeting, messaging, and follow-up
Own messaging and sales enablement
Standardize founder-led messaging into scalable materials Ensure consistency across sales conversations, content, and events
Leverage AI to increase efficiency and personalization
Use AI tools to scale outreach, content creation, and targeting Continuously improve speed and effectiveness of execution
Test, measure, and iterate quickly
Run experiments across channels and campaigns Optimize based on performance and learnings Report campaign metrics on a defined cadence
Experience and Background:
3-8 years in B2B growth, marketing, or revenue roles Proven ability to generate pipeline and influence revenue Experience building or scaling programs in a startup or high-growth environment Hands-on with targeted GTM (ABM, outbound, or similar) Strong communicator—can turn complex ideas into clear messaging Comfortable working cross-functionally with sales on high-value deals Data-driven and familiar with tools like HubSpot Thrives in ambiguity and moves quickly without a playbook
Experience with B2B software or private equity audiences Familiarity with AI tools for marketing or outreach