About Stanford GSB Professor on Startups & Investors
Stanford GSB Professor on Startups & Investors is the Substack from Ilya Strebulaev, the Stanford Graduate School of Business professor who teaches venture capital and lead the Stanford GSB Venture Capital Initiative. (Note: this Substack is not affiliated with or sponsored by Stanford University, and this is not a Stanford position.)
The publication gives readers access to the VC class Ilya teaches at Stanford, plus the Strebulaev-Jackson Venture Rankings (proprietary, data-driven rankings of VC firms and investors that founders, LPs and investors use for fundraising, benchmarking and allocating capital).
Growth Lead Role
This person will turn Ilya’s audience into paying subscribers, expand the overall audience across all platforms, and help us discover what works and what doesn’t.
Every week, the publication ships VC 101 lessons, research and charts, and new editions of the rankings. Your job is to grow the audience for it and convert it to paid: through campaigns, paid acquisition, collaborations with other creators, and constant testing of the offer itself, across our platforms (Substack, LinkedIn, and X).
This is a hands-on operator role. Ilya is a full-time professor with a large research team. The team also includes a designer and the head of impact with whom you will be working closely. You’ll get direction and access and then be trusted to run with it. We need someone proactive, fluent with AI tools, fast, organized, and not shy about saying when a campaign, price, or offer isn’t working. You will work with the rest of the team closely..
Full-time and fully remote. We’re open to candidates outside the US. Regular overlap with US Pacific hours for planning calls and launch days is an advantage. No relocation or visa sponsorship. You’ll report directly to Ilya.
Responsibilities
Campaigns & Launches:
– Own the growth campaign calendar: plan every push in advance and tell the team exactly what each one needs
– Run every ranking release as a conversion event: teaser, founding-member early access, public launch, and 2-3 follow-up upgrade emails
– Build news-driven campaigns: when a big round, fund close, or IPO filing breaks, turn it into a subscribe or upgrade push within 24-48 hours
– Plan milestone and moment campaigns (subscriber milestones, events Ilya speaks at, price changes, student/.edu offers)
– Run upgrade, discount, and win-back pushes
– Write the conversion copy: marketing emails, upgrade and landing pages, paywall and subscribe CTAs, welcome and drip sequences
Social Management:
Ilya has 140,000 LinkedIn followers (currently the main top of funnel), also Substack Notes, and X.
– Turn each data release into a week of posts: carousels, charts, takeaway posts, and teasers that keep the full ranking behind the paywall
– Test post formats, hooks, and visuals against each other (we can produce dozens of data posts from a single release - your job is to find the presentation that converts)
– Put the “so what” behind the paywall: share the data, make Ilya’s interpretation the reason to subscribe
– Reintroduce the Substack and its offer on LinkedIn at least every two weeks
– Build out Substack Notes and X as top of funnel
– Optimize Ilya’s LinkedIn profile (header, About, Featured) to drive to Substack
– Manage the content calendar across all the channels
– Write in Ilya’s voice: authoritative, data-first, academic credibility without the jargon. You’ll be given the style guide and past posts.
Product & Offer:
– Find out what readers pay for and what makes them leave: surveys, subscriber interviews, churn reasons, reply and comment patterns
– Test the offer: pricing, tiers, trials, discounts, what sits behind the paywall
– Bring Ilya clear hypotheses on what to change in the offer, with the data behind them
– Build and test lead magnets (e.g. stripped-down ranking cheat sheets) that grow the free list
Growth & Outreach:
Grow the top of the funnel and turn it into paid subscribers.
– Grow free subscribers with lead magnets (e.g. stripped-down ranking cheat sheets) promoted on LinkedIn
– Turn on Substack recommendations and run cross-promotions, guest posts, and collaborations with other publications
– Design the direct outreach playbook (LinkedIn DMs and personalized emails to firms in the rankings)
– Help package and promote a group/institutional offer for universities and firms
Acquisition:
– Plan and run campaigns on LinkedIn, X, Substack and other channels
– Own the payback from each campaign
– Test audiences, creatives, and landing pages, and scale what pays back
Collaborations & Partnerships:
– Run Substack recommendations, cross-promotions, guest posts, and swaps with other creators and publications
– Build relationships with newsletter writers, podcasters, and creators in VC, startups, and finance
– Design the direct outreach playbook (LinkedIn DMs and personalized emails to firms in the rankings)
Measurement & Reporting:
– Set up UTMs and source tracking so we know which channels, campaigns, and partners drive subscribers and upgrades
– Report weekly on free growth, paid conversions, churn, acquisition cost, and campaign revenue
– Kill what isn’t working and double down on what is, with data to back it up
– Recommend what to test next
Team & SOPs:
– Write and maintain SOPs for every repeatable campaign
What we’re looking for
Necessary skills:
– Proven growth marketing: you’ve planned and shipped campaigns tied to subscriber and revenue numbers
– Hands-on acquisition experience
– Comfortable with data: you can read a ranking table and a funnel report, and know what to test next
– Product sense: you can turn audience behavior into a specific hypothesis about the offer
– Strong conversion copywriter for a sophisticated B2B audience (investors, founders, LPs) who doesn’t sound salesy
– Work independently and bring ideas
– Not afraid to speak up and push back, with numbers
Nice to have:
– Substack experience (recommendations, paid conversion, pricing)
– B2B, VC, fintech, or financial media marketing background
– Existing relationships with newsletter writers or creators
– Email lifecycle experience (welcome, drip, upgrade flows)
– Experience writing SOPs
What success looks like
We’ll review against these in your first 90 days:
– Paid subscribers and free-to-paid conversion rate
– Free subscriber growth
– Churn
– Acquisition cost and payback on paid spend
– Revenue per campaign and per ranking launch
– Subscribers driven by creator collaborations
– A campaign calendar and playbook
Logistics
Reports to: Ilya Strebulaev
Location: Remote, with regular overlap with US Pacific hours
Start date: ASAP
Compensation: Competitive base + performance bonus
Application deadline: Reviewed on a rolling basis
How to apply
Send your resume to ilya@strebulaev.com with subject “Growth Lead” with your resume and include the following information:
– One relevant growth case: publication/business, dates, starting and ending free and paid subscribers, pricing, acquisition spending, and your personal contribution.
– Two actual work samples: an acquisition campaign and an upgrade or retention campaign.
– A short diagnosis: “What are the two biggest opportunities you see for this publication?” Limit this to 200 words.
– Compensation expectations, location, and Pacific-hours availability.
