Find the nextgrowth bet.
Three weeks. Fixed scope. Clear priorities.
Cristina SebeFractional growth lead.I combine product, marketing, data, and AI to find where growth is stuck, design better experiments faster, and build the system that scales what works.
Built growth for teams at
- BirdConsumer app · acquisition & retention
- SendcloudB2B SaaS · growth function from scratch
- Mattel10k-piece digital launch · community
What I do
Three capabilities, end to end.
- 01
Diagnose the journey
Find where visitors and new users drop, why it happens, and which problems are worth fixing first.
- 02
Design the experiments
Turn findings into clear hypotheses across messaging, onboarding, lifecycle, pricing, and acquisition.
- 03
Build the growth system
Put the measurement, experimentation process, and team ownership in place so growth continues after I leave.
What clients say
How I work
The Compounding Loop
Activation is the on-ramp. Retention is where growth compounds.
Most growth work chases spikes. I build a loop instead. Every stage feeds the next, and the loop gets stronger each cycle. That is what makes growth compound. The order matters, too: activation before monetization, retention before acquisition scale.
01Acquire
New users come in through paid, organic and referrals. The fuel of the loop.
02Activate
The on-ramp: setup, aha, habit. Users hit first value fast and start coming back.
03Retain
The habit holds. This is where growth compounds.
04Monetize
Retained users convert and expand. Revenue follows the habit, and feeds the next cycle.
How I use AI
I build custom AI workflows for research, funnel analysis, growth modelling, competitor analysis, and experiment design. This compresses the analysis, so more time goes into judgment, testing, and execution.
About
I’ve spent more than ten years working across growth, product, and marketing for companies including Bird, Sendcloud, and Mattel.
At Sendcloud, I built the growth team from scratch. At Bird, I worked across acquisition and retention during hypergrowth. The recurring problem was the same: teams had plenty of possible growth ideas, but no clear way to identify what mattered most or test it systematically.
That is the problem I now help SaaS companies solve.
I work close enough to the product to change the experience and close enough to marketing to improve how it is sold.
Selected growth work
- 012026
Sendcloud
Built the cross-functional growth team, defined activation, and established the experimentation system.
- 022018 to 2019
Bird
Helped Bird grow across European markets by working across rider acquisition, retention, local campaigns, and product experiments during hypergrowth.
- 032023
Mattel
Led the launch and community growth for a 10,000-piece Barbie digital collection.
A fixed-scope, three-week diagnostic of your website, acquisition journey, and first-time product experience. You receive 5–8 prioritized growth opportunities with clear test hypotheses. The highest-priority experiment is taken one step further, with the messaging, journey, measurement plan, and implementation brief ready for your team to ship. Fixed fee: €4,000.
Best for seed to Series B SaaS companies with a live product, enough usage data to examine customer behaviour, and someone who can implement the resulting experiment. You do not need a dedicated growth team.
FAQ
Questions I get.
- What is a fractional growth lead?
- A fractional growth lead owns a company’s growth part-time, strategy through execution, instead of as a full-time hire. Unlike an advisor who only recommends, a fractional lead builds the growth system and runs it: acquisition, activation, retention, and the team to own it.
- When should a SaaS company hire a fractional growth lead?
- When you have a product in market and enough customer activity to learn from, but nobody owns growth end to end. I can step in before you build a full growth team, identify what matters, run the experiments, and put the growth system in place.
- How is this different from an advisor or agency?
- An advisor recommends what to do. An agency executes a defined scope. I embed in the company, own the growth priorities, and work hands-on across product and marketing to ship them.
- What does AI-native mean here?
- I use AI to compress research, analysis, prototyping, and execution. That allows me to test more ideas without building a large growth team. But speed is not the main advantage. The advantage is learning faster and spending more time on the decisions that require judgment. I also look for places where AI can improve the product experience, growth model, or operating system. I do not add it where it does not create value.
- How does an engagement work?
- Most clients start with a Growth Sprint: a fixed-scope, three-week diagnostic of the website, acquisition journey, and first-time product experience. You receive 5–8 prioritized growth opportunities, each with a clear test hypothesis. The highest-priority experiment is taken one step further, with messaging, journey, measurement plan, and implementation brief ready for your team to ship. Fixed fee: €4,000. Some teams run with the Sprint findings internally. Others bring me in as a fractional growth lead to run the experiments and make sure the team can continue without me.
- What happens on the first call?
- We spend 30 minutes mapping where growth appears to be stuck, what has already been tried, and what data is available. By the end, we will know whether a Growth Sprint is the right next step.
Let’s talk
Not sure what to fix first?
In 30 minutes, we’ll map the current growth journey, identify the likely constraint, and decide whether a Growth Sprint is worth pursuing.