Put the next euro of marketing budget where it pays back.
Growth and marketing strategy for consumer and subscription products. I help companies decide where their marketing budget should go and check that decision against real numbers. 10+ years in growth marketing, most recently leading acquisition for a consumer-education group with 902K paying customers.
- 10+ years
- in growth marketing, from startup to a large consumer group
- $15–20M
- yearly budget I allocated across channels
- 55 people
- in the team I led
- +20%
- marketing efficiency in a shrinking market
What I help with
Growth strategy
Where growth will come from over the next 6–12 months. Which channels, in what order, at what cost per customer.
Budget allocation across channels
How to split the budget across channels and product lines by margin and payback. A monthly plan-versus-actual review and the corrections that follow from it.
Marketing analytics
Unit economics, cohorts and LTV, attribution beyond last-click. Which spend actually pays back and which only looks like it does.
AI in marketing teams
Where AI saves time or lifts results in a marketing team. A pilot against a control group first, then a rollout with quality review.
Funnel audit
A review of your funnel from first touch to repeat purchase. You get a prioritised list of fixes with the expected effect of each.
How we work together
Remote from Belgrade, Serbia. In English or Russian. Billed in EUR.
Monthly advisory
Regular calls with your team, review of plans and reports between calls, a direct line for decisions that can't wait. Billed monthly.
Fixed-scope project
A funnel audit or a budget plan in 2–4 weeks. Scope and price agreed before we start.
How it starts
- You leave a request or write to me.
- We have a free 30-minute call about your product and numbers.
- Within two working days I send a short proposal with scope, timeline and price.
I set the strategy and the numbers. Your team or agency runs the campaigns. I don't buy or place ads.
What I've done before
Situations from my in-house leadership roles.
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+20%marketing efficiency (MER)
One budget, six business lines, a shrinking market
A consumer group had six business lines competing for one marketing budget while the market contracted. I set a quarterly budget strategy with finance and product marketing and corrected it every month on margin and payback.
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2×the revenue last-click showed, within a year
A funnel that last-click wanted to kill
The team was about to cut a free-event funnel because it looked weak on last-click. Cohort data showed it turned profitable by month 5 and earned twice its last-click revenue within a year. We kept it.
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+30–40%influencer spend at target ROAS
Influencer spend that last-click couldn't see
Last-click caught only about 10% of influencer conversions. I built survey-based attribution with the data science team and lifted survey completion from 30% to 56%, so the real effect became visible.
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+44%revenue per CRM send
AI in a CRM team, tested against a control group
We piloted a chain of AI agents that analyses past sends, drafts the brief and produces copy, images and layout. Every result was measured against a control group before rollout. The pilot team also tested 23% more hypotheses a month.
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+266%paid traffic, ROMI above 570%
Fast growth at an early-stage startup
A young startup had to grow fast without losing payback. Paid traffic grew 266%, and ROMI stayed above 570%.
About
I've worked in marketing since 2016. I started as the first marketing hire at an education startup, then led growth at Geometrium, an early-stage startup (2021–2022). At GeekBrains I went from performance team lead to Head of Marketing (2022–2025). At Skillbox Holding I was Head of Acquisition (2025–2026) and led a team of 55.
I think in unit economics and cohorts, and I like building a system once and handing it over to the team. I studied innovation management and engineering at Bauman Moscow State Technical University. I live in Belgrade.
Let's talk
Tell me about your product and where growth is stuck. I usually reply within a day.
Email[email protected]
LinkedInlinkedin.com/in/rinat-minnebaev