Head of Growth

Job role: Head of Growth/Digital marketing lead

Department: Brand & growth

Job Experience: Min. 9 years

Location: Mumbai HQ

About The Hosteller

The Hosteller started in 2015, when backpacker hostels weren't a category in India yet. Seventy-plus properties later, we're the country's largest self-operated hostel chain — and we've never really sold beds. We sell the common room at 11pm, the trek someone talks you into, the table that had four people and now has seven. Belonging is the product. The whole brand runs on one line: go meet your people.

Role overview

You own the whole demand-distribution engine: paid, organic, search and PR, plus the blended number that turns made content and spend into direct bookings. Four function owners report to you and each carries a channel number. You own the budget split, channel-level CAC, ROAS and attribution, the martech stack behind them, and the weekly call to reallocate spend on evidence. When we open a new city, you own the playbook it launches on.

Responsibilities

1. Lead all three distribution sub-functions: paid, organic (social/community) & search
2. Own performance and affiliate partnerships, including distribution deals and referral networks, and brief the external PR agency alongside the marketing strategy lead
3. Own the blended distribution number and the budget split across channels
4. Own channel-level CAC, ROAS, attribution & feed the strategy lead's portfolio view
5. Set the full-funnel strategy from awareness to direct booking in a 100% D2C model
6. Manage the channel owners and hold each accountable for their channel's metrics
7. Drive down blended CAC while protecting volume and repeat rate
8. Own the martech and attribution stack across channels
9. Run weekly channel reviews and reallocate spend on data
10. Lead new-market distribution play-books, for example city launches, events, product launches, etc.
11. Be the single owner of how demand gets captured

Qualifications

1. Min. 9 years in performance or growth marketing, with time at a D2C, e-commerce, marketplace/aggregator model or travel/hospitality/service business
2. Has owned a blended CAC and ROAS number across paid, organic and search together
3. Has managed function owners rather than only executives, and held them to channel numbers
4. Deep on attribution and the martech stack, and honest about what the data can and cannot prove
5. Has run city or market launches with a repeatable distribution playbook
6. Comfortable reallocating spend weekly on evidence, including away from their own favourite channel