Product Marketing Manager, Brand Partnerships

Job description

ABOUT CARDLESS Cardless is a Series C consumer fintech that makes it easy for the world's largest brands to build credit cards into their ecosystems. Think Shopify, but for credit cards. Brands use Cardless to configure, launch, and grow credit card programs that delight their customers and strengthen their core business. Customers include Coinbase, Bilt Rewards, Alibaba, Qatar Airways, and LATAM Airlines. Cardless powers cards on all three major networks (Visa, Mastercard, and American Express) and uses AI-powered servicing to operate at a fraction of the headcount traditional card issuers require. The company has scaled from $10 million to $150 million in run rate revenue in the past 12 months. Cardless raised a $60 million Series C led by Spark Capital in September 2025, bringing total funding past $170 million. The team is past 50 people and scaling toward profitability by year-end 2026. ABOUT THE ROLE Credit cards are a visual product — and for Cardless, product marketing is how the partnership pitch becomes real. Every brand that evaluates Cardless needs to see what their card program could look like before they commit. Every investor needs to understand the product without reading a technical spec. This role exists to build those assets. As Product Marketing Manager, Brand Partnerships, you will own the visual layer of how Cardless presents itself to the outside world: partner pitch decks, product mockups, investor materials, and the design system that makes the card product feel polished and differentiated. You will work at the intersection of brand, product, and commercial — translating strategy into visuals that move deals forward. You will work closely with the partnerships and business development teams. This role is production-heavy: you will ship a high volume of high-quality work on tight timelines. WHAT YOU WILL DO BUILD PARTNER AND INVESTOR PRESENTATION MATERIALS - Design and maintain a library of pitch decks used across partner conversations, RFP responses, and investor updates — balancing consistency with the flexibility to customize for specific audiences. - Translate complex product and business concepts into visual narratives that are clear, compelling, and on-brand for both Cardless and its partners. - Own end-to-end production of presentation materials: from initial brief to final polished deck, with the speed and independence to turn around work in hours, not days. - Collaborate with the partnerships team to understand what each partner cares about and reflect that in how materials are framed and designed. DESIGN PRODUCT MOCKUPS AND PROTOTYPES - Build decks and materials to present to clients (using PPT, Figma or other relevant tools). - Build high-fidelity Figma mockups of card products, cardholder-facing interfaces, and partner-facing dashboards that help prospects visualize what they are buying. - Work closely with the product team to ensure mockups are grounded in what Cardless actually builds — not aspirational fiction that sets unrealistic expectations in the field. - Maintain a library of reusable decks, documents, design elements and materials that speed up production of new partner mockups without sacrificing quality. - Rapidly iterate on designs based on feedback from sales conversations, partner calls, and internal review. THINK THROUGH PRODUCT CONSTRUCTION - Participate in product discussions with enough depth to translate product decisions into accurate, visually compelling representations. - Flag implications of product decisions early — before they become inconsistencies between what the sales team is showing and what engineering is building. - Contribute to the product roadmap by surfacing product constraints and opportunities the product team may not have considered. OWN THE CARDLESS VISUAL BRAND - Maintain and evolve the Cardless visual identity across all external-facing materials — pitch decks, one-pagers, event collateral, and social assets. - Ensure every asset that leaves the building reflects the level of craft that Cardless's brand positioning requires. - Use AI design tools to accelerate production without compromising quality — you should be fluent in what current tools can and cannot do. - Build repeatable processes and templates that make the team faster without requiring you to be the bottleneck on every piece of output. WHAT WE ARE LOOKING FOR EXPERIENCE - 3-6 years of product marketing / design experience, with a portfolio demonstrating high-quality work across presentations, product design, and brand materials. - Meaningful experience working in or alongside commercial teams — design agency serving financial or tech clients, in-house at a startup, or a role with direct exposure to sales or business development. - Experience marketing and designing for financial services or fintech is a strong plus — you should be able to design a card product without needing to be taught what a credit card is. - Demonstrated ability to operate independently at high output, without a creative director managing every deliverable. SKILLS AND COMPETENCIES - Figma: Expert-level fluency — you build components, maintain libraries, and prototype interactions, not just static screens. You are faster in Figma than most designers are in PowerPoint. - Presentation Design: You make decks that people actually want to look at. You know when to use a visual and when to use words, and you can make a complex argument feel simple without dumbing it down. - Photoshop and Image Editing: Comfortable handling photo editing, compositing, and asset production at a professional level. You do not need to be a photographer, but you know what to do with raw images. - AI Design Tools: Fluent in current AI tools for design acceleration — image generation, layout suggestions, copy assistance. You use them to go faster, not as a crutch. - Communication and Collaboration: You ask the right questions before starting, give and receive feedback clearly, and can explain design decisions in terms that non-designers find useful. - Speed and Judgment: You calibrate quality to urgency. You know when to ship a good-enough version and when to hold out for excellent — and you make that call without needing to be told. THIS ROLE IS NOT A FIT IF - Your portfolio is primarily brand identity or motion graphics with limited evidence of product or presentation design work. - You need heavy creative direction or a well-defined brief before you can produce — this role requires you to generate the brief yourself from a vague commercial objective. - You are not comfortable with the pace of a commercial-facing design role, where timelines are set by partner meetings and investor calls, not design sprints. - You require remote or hybrid work arrangements. WHY THIS ROLE Cardless is at the stage where the visual quality of how it presents itself is a meaningful competitive variable. The company has the product, the customers, and the capital — what it needs now is someone who can make all of that look as good as it actually is. The right person for this role will have their work in front of some of the largest brands in the world within their first few weeks. If you want to design for financial products at scale and have your work matter to commercial outcomes, this is the role. COMPENSATION This role has an annual starting salary range of $170,000–$215,000 + equity + benefits. Actual compensation is influenced by a wide array of factors including but not limited to skills, experience, and specific work location. BENEFITS We're proud to offer our team excellent benefits: 💸 Meaningful Start-up equity 🏥 100% health, vision & dental primary coverage ➕ 75% health, vision & dental dependent coverage 🍱 Catered lunches 🚎 $250/month Commuter benefit 👶 Parental leave ✈️ Team building events & happy hours 🌴 Flexible PTO with a minimum of 15 days off per year 🖥️ Apple equipment 💸 401k plan LOCATION We're headquartered in San Francisco, CA, with a beautiful office in Jackson Square. This role is in-office 5 days a week.