Matt Lerner

Startup growth strategist, Ex PayPal, 500 Startups VC, Founder @ SYSTM

I founded SYSTM to help startups find their big growth levers - the small actions that can have the biggest impact on their growth. We’ve worked with over 200 companies and earned a 96% founder “likely to recommend” score.

Before founding SYSTM, I was the London-based Partner of 500 Startups, an early-stage VC fund, where I built and ran an accelerator seed-stage growth program for our portfolio companies.

Prior to joining 500 Startups, I worked for many years building and managing growth teams for three  startups (two disasters, one exit), and later at PayPal. 

I approach my work first as a general manager and then as a marketer, product manager or both, as needed. My lens is quantitative, but rooted in deep customer insights and testing, and based on fast iteration. I’m always learning, and I really enjoy teaching and helping those around me to learn and improve. Skip to the references below, you'll see that I'm regarded as a thought leader in many areas of business, and an inspiring people manager who reliably delivers ahead of expectations.

Founder & CEO

At SYSTM (formerly Startup Core Strengths), our mission is to help early-stage startups find their big growth levers (and pull them). We've noticed that great startups don't waste time on small stuff, so we  focus everyone on the most impactful work.

Magnus Carlsen has a coach.

So does Serena Williams.

And Lewis Hamilton.

Taylor Swift, Michael Jordan and Tiger Woods – all had coaches.

Asking for coaching doesn’t signal weakness.

It signals a hunger.

Founder @ SYSTM, Ex PayPal, 500 Startups VC

What your founder secretly wants from you.
I climbed from doing marketing scut work to running an $800 million business when I figured out one thing…

Founders desperately want to promote you.

They'd love nothing more than for you to run part of their business, if they believed you could do it well.

𝗛𝗼𝘄 𝘁𝗼 𝗯𝗲 𝘀𝗲𝗲𝗻 𝗮𝘀 𝘀𝘁𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗴𝗶𝗰

Early in my career, I started working for a guy we’ll call Alex. He was 28 years old, and running the largest division of a publicly traded tech company. (I was 27) 

I kept asking myself, "Why is he the VP, and I'm just a marketer?" I studied his every move.

In C-level meetings, he spoke like he owned the business. He talked about the work I was doing, but took it 10% further – connecting it to shareholder outcomes – revenue and growth.

Nothing esoteric. He just drew a line from my work to revenue, growth and profit.

So I did some digging to find out where this wunderkind got his MBA.

Turns out he didn't have one. Just a Bachelor of Arts. In theater. 

That's when it clicked: Alex wasn't running a business because of some credential, he was running a business because he played the part – he thought and spoke like a business owner.

𝗦𝗮𝗺𝗲 𝘄𝗼𝗿𝗸, 𝗻𝗲𝘄 𝗽𝗲𝗿𝘀𝗽𝗲𝗰𝘁𝗶𝘃𝗲
All I did was shift to an owner’s perspective. For example:

• Instead of "We increased engagement by 20%," I'd say: "We're retaining 20% more customers in month 2 – if it holds, that's $2M ARR over 24 months."

• Instead of test results, I'd share insights: "We learned that customers aren't price sensitive if they understand our value."

• Instead of optimizing channels, I'd think in systems: "Meta users have better retention than affiliates, so we’ll shift affiliate spend to Meta."

That’s all.

𝗪𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝗵𝗮𝗽𝗽𝗲𝗻𝗲𝗱 𝗻𝗲𝘅𝘁
It worked. Within six months, I was getting invited to strategy meetings. Finance people started asking for my input, and defending my work when I wasn't in the room. 

Promotions came. Eventually I worked my way up to that GM role – running a nine-figure business at PayPal.

𝗡𝗼𝘄, 𝗶𝗺𝗮𝗴𝗶𝗻𝗲 𝘆𝗼𝘂'𝗿𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗖𝗘𝗢
Imagine your CEO's point of view – Busy and overwhelmed. They don't want to micromanage you! They’d love to hand you more responsibility. They pay recruiters massive fees to find people who think like owners.

You could be that person.

Just do that last 10%: Think like an owner. Talk like an owner. Become an owner.

Helpful? Re-post to pay it forward to your network.

This is weird... 

Products make up only 16% of GDP, but 47% of stock market earnings.

And services are 72% of GDP but only 53% of stock market earnings.

Why is that?

I have a theory... 

Product companies only work at scale – logistics, sourcing, volume discounts, mass production, distribution deals, expensive to develop new products.

They're just not viable below a certain size. That's why most D2C startups end up getting acquired by big companies. When they do IPO, it usually fails (e.g. GoPro, FitBit, Peloton, Sonos)

But services businesses can be viable, even profitable, at micro-scale: Law firms, ad agencies, nail salons, medical practices, consultants and accountants – don't need money from public markets.

But services don't IPO, because they can't scale revenue independent of headcount. A law firm rents out lawyers, a radiology practice rents out radiologists.

Until now.

AI breaks the fixed relationship between revenue and headcount in services businesses – profits can scale far ahead of salaries and other fixed costs.

That's why VC and Private equity are snapping up small local medical practices. And boutique law firms, agencies, tax preparers... will all get rolled up, or rolled over, soon.

There's a lot at stake – 72% of GDP!

Are you working in a services firm? Because AI adoption is a matter of life and death.

They didn't forget; they objected.

Instead of "activation" or "abandonment" emails, try this...

People don't abandon checkouts and free trials because they 𝘧𝘰𝘳𝘨𝘦𝘵, they abandon because they 𝘰𝘣𝘫𝘦𝘤𝘵. 

Instead of sending “reminders,” figure out 𝘸𝘩𝘺 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘺 𝘣𝘢𝘪𝘭𝘦𝘥 and address the 𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘭 𝘰𝘣𝘫𝘦𝘤𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯 – Not just in your emails, but at the root cause, before they abandon.

𝗛𝗼𝘄 𝘁𝗼 𝗳𝗶𝗻𝗱 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗹 𝗼𝗯𝗷𝗲𝗰𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀
If you ask ChatGPT, it'll tell you to offer free shipping and enable guest checkout – but you know it’s not that simple. Fixing “process friction” will only get you so far – most abandonment is caused by 𝘱𝘴𝘺𝘤𝘩𝘰𝘭𝘰𝘨𝘪𝘤𝘢𝘭 𝘧𝘳𝘪𝘤𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯, like an unanswered question or a nagging doubt.

𝟲 𝗠𝗮𝗶𝗻 𝗦𝗼𝘂𝗿𝗰𝗲𝘀 𝗼𝗳 𝗣𝘀𝘆𝗰𝗵𝗼𝗹𝗼𝗴𝗶𝗰𝗮𝗹 𝗙𝗿𝗶𝗰𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 (𝗔𝗻𝗱 𝗵𝗼𝘄 𝘁𝗼 𝗳𝗶𝘅 𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗺)

1. 𝗠𝗶𝘀𝘀𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗶𝗻𝗳𝗼𝗿𝗺𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 – Is it compatible with…? Does it do X thing? 
   𝗙𝗶𝘅: Live chat & detailed Q&A
   
2. 𝗪𝗶𝗹𝗹 𝗶𝘁 𝗮𝗰𝘁𝘂𝗮𝗹𝗹𝘆 𝗵𝗲𝗹𝗽 𝗺𝗲 𝘁𝗼 [𝗰𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗺𝗲𝗿’𝘀 𝗴𝗼𝗮𝗹]?  
   𝗙𝗶𝘅: Show the main use cases, testimonials with specific results
   
3. 𝗪𝗶𝗹𝗹 𝗜 𝗮𝗰𝘁𝘂𝗮𝗹𝗹𝘆 𝘂𝘀𝗲 𝗶𝘁? Or forget it but keep getting billed? 
   𝗙𝗶𝘅: Generous cancellation / return policies
   
4. 𝗦𝗼𝗰𝗶𝗮𝗹 𝗙𝗿𝗶𝗰𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 – What will my boss / team / spouse think?  
   𝗙𝗶𝘅: Give them a story to justify the purchase to themselves (e.g. “it's cheaper in the long-run” or “you only live once.”)
   
5. 𝗜𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝗽𝗲𝗼𝗽𝗹𝗲 𝗹𝗶𝗸𝗲 𝗺𝗲? (e.g. Coders, non-native speakers, gen Z women?)
   𝗙𝗶𝘅: Say & show who it’s for
   
6. 𝗢𝗻𝗰𝗲 𝗯𝗶𝘁𝘁𝗲𝗻 – They are switching from their last product for a reason, so they need to believe your product won't have that flaw.
   𝗙𝗶𝘅: Position against your competitor’s flaw (e.g. “99.999% availability,” or “24/7 live support.”)

𝗛𝗼𝘄 𝘁𝗼 𝘂𝗻𝗰𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗿 𝙮𝙤𝙪𝙧 𝗽𝘀𝘆𝗰𝗵𝗼𝗹𝗼𝗴𝗶𝗰𝗮𝗹 𝗳𝗿𝗶𝗰𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻:

Don't speculate. Ask your 𝘴𝘢𝘭𝘦𝘴𝘱𝘦𝘰𝘱𝘭𝘦 𝘰𝘳 𝘺𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘤𝘶𝘴𝘵𝘰𝘮𝘦𝘳𝘴: 
1. 𝗦𝗮𝗹𝗲𝘀𝗽𝗲𝗼𝗽𝗹𝗲 – “What are the main objections you hear from prospects?”
2. 𝗡𝗲𝘄 𝗰𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗺𝗲𝗿𝘀 – “What made you almost not buy?”

Prospects who abandoned probably had 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘴𝘢𝘮𝘦 𝘤𝘰𝘯𝘤𝘦𝘳𝘯𝘴 as the ones who bought.

𝗢𝗻𝗲 𝗳𝗮𝗸𝗲 𝗿𝗲𝗮𝘀𝗼𝗻 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗰𝗮𝗻 𝗶𝗴𝗻𝗼𝗿𝗲
Many people will say they’ve “been too busy.” That’s bullsh*t. Reality: either they don’t understand how it helps, your product or site confused them, or they don’t actually need it.

Helpful? Re-post to help others in your network.

Stealth Startup

Are you a founder of a startup with limited budget that want to build product correctly but hiring full time product leader is too costly? Hiring a Fractional Head of Product might just be the thing you are looking for.

I am currently helping startups improve their Product and Product Teams by mentoring them on how to build their product better. I do this drawing from my total 17 years of experience as ex Founder and Product leader working across product stages.

If you think you need help on how to improve your product or product team, give me a call to see if I can do anything to help you and your company improve.

Current Engagements:

1. Dubai based Martech Startup - Building Campaign and CRM tools based on whatsapp channel. Including chatbot, as well as metapixel integration and funnel tracking capabilities.

2. Indonesia based Edtech Startup - Helping course organizers market their digital products via alternative channel

Fractional Head of Product

Fasset

Joined Fasset to help people gets real world benefits from Blockchain.

Fasset is a global digital asset gateway that brings unparalleled accessibility to the digital asset space.

Through our simple, safe and innovative digital assets, we provide people in emerging markets the opportunity to build a better future. We are pioneering web3 technologies and driving adoption of digital assets for the next billion.

Director of Products

Hijra

Head of Product at Hijra Bank, a challenger Bank in Indonesia targeting muslims. Leading PMs handling 4 different streams.

Areas of responsibilities:
- New user acquisition
- Transaction and integration
- KYC, Platform, OTP, Identity, Risk, Compliance
- Engagement and Retention

Highlights
- Improved Install to Register from 35% to 59% in 3 months
- Improved Register to Verified from 30% to 77% in 3 months
- Maintained Transaction Reliability at 99%
- Improved median verification time from 10 minutes to 6 minutes
- Increased Monthly Active User Retention rate from 6.2% to 30%
- Helped orchestrate marketing, business, and product teams to achieve semesterly objectives for Hijra Bank
- Assist Chiefs in setting up OKRs implementing it in the organization
- Raising the bar for Product Management organization by setting standards and systemizing core PM skill sets

VP of Products

Tokopedia

Moved to Account & User Platform tribe.

Leading Product Managers responsible for register and login experience, new user acquisition, including security, A/B test tool, and User Data Platform development.

Areas of responsibilities:
- New user experience, Login & Register
- OTP, Security, Identity, User Profile Management
- A/B Testing Platform, User Data Platform, KYC Management
- Authorization and Authentication across all Tokopedia family

Highlights:
- Achieved 12 months target in just 3 months for improving Tokopedia security by designing a creative solution and getting buy-in from journey/feature owners.
- Reduces yearly cost for OTP by ~USD 2 million and enhances the success rate of authentication at the same time.
- Integrated Tokopedia account with Gojek account. Leading project involving 250+ people that achieves 3 months target in 1.
- Consistently improved performance of direct reports, leading them to be promoted from IC role to leaders in Tokopedia

Lead Product Manager

Tokopedia is one of the 4 unicorns in Indonesia. I am hired to work for revenue generation tribe, TopAds, working on Seller Growth and Insights. This role expects me to solve seller's problem and help them grow their business through the use of our advertising platform.

I identified quality products to be advertised through data analysis, optimal ad settings for each, and help seller adjust their ad settings to maximize revenue.

I also helped suggest seller on taking actionable insights to improve already existing ads so that they get more return on ad spending, and resulted in higher ad spending and longer retention for us.

Glints

First Product Manager of Glints, in charge of Job Marketplace for SEA market. Was hired when there are only 9 developers in the company, including CTO and Tech Lead. I put the fundamental process for product development in place, including deciding what metrics to use, user research, sprint setup, and product feedback loop.

I helped optimise a lot of agile processes. I mentor and coach two Product Managers in other product line. Worked and managed a distributed team of developers and designers with 5 different nationalities, on site and remote.

Achievements:
- In 3 months managed to increase the average shortlisted application per job post by 522%
- In 3 months drives the number of application per job post to increase by 234%
- Helped increase the number of applications made in the platform by 571% in 3 months.
- Initiated #open-floor, an internal sharing and learning session held biweekly

Product Manager

Kitabisa.com

Kitabisa is the leading fundraising startup in Indonesia. Since founded, It has raised close to USD 30 million for campaigns within the platform.

I was one of first three Product Manager joining the Kitabisa and was in charge of Zakat Product.

Achievements:
- Within two months increases GDV of zakat product to 549% of normal month.
- Achieved 288% increase year on year of zakat product's GDV
- Doubled Ramadan GDV increase compared to last year in only 1 month time to prepare
- Created first proper cohort analysis of zakat payers

Firzil Tech

I lead Project Managers, Business Development, Designers, and Product Development teams. Hands on market research, client meetings, design directions, and oversees all project and software development operation of Firzil Tech. In total manages 30+ people.

Achievements:
-Successfully retained 4 key team members about to leave without raising salary
-Reach an agreement and understanding from 3 clients whose project went awry and turns the relationships better. Winning new projects from 2 of them
-Streamlined internal workflow, reduces general/management headcount from by more than 50%, achieving leaner organization with minimum performance drawback
-In just a month able to cut confusion inside project teams reducing in total 2 months of wasted development efforts.
-Successfully promotes the business through SEO ranking of relevant keywords, bringing not less than 20 qualified prospects monthly.


Other responsibilities consist of:
-Meeting with prospects, managed to almost always gives them solution for efficiency not yet imagined by them before.
-Developing feature lists, user stories, and roadmaps for our clients.
-Gathering and managing users requirement and then design and develop solutions that meets their budget and timeline constraints.
-Effectively Communicate and interface said solutions to our engineering team and assign responsibilities, cutting stress level of developers and managers.
-The go to guy when bad things happens, I make sure problems are solved and the solutions are delivered on time.
-Keeping good communication to engineering team about roadmap, and iterations, making sure we don't miss deadlines.
-Making sure the developers are working happily and extend familiarity to them so they will go extra mile for the company

Moved back to handle Tech Team and overall product development and innovation. Hands on Product management and development team workflow streamlining. Manages 20+ people

Achievements:
-Delivered 9 small to medium scale project to client with satisfaction
-Managed to increase tech team head count by 30% in less than a year
-Designed and promotes knowledge sharing, boosting productivity in projects and developers able to perform more well rounded role.
-Implements Test Driven Development approach to project development ensuring happy stakeholders in higher quality in projects delivered. Cuts bug fixing time by 50% and increases revenue in average by 10%
-Leads proposal development and together with marketing closes 11 medium sized projects totaling more than 2 billion rupiahs. 

Other responsibilities includes:
-Reporting to top management for tech team happiness and recruitments
-Analyze market feasibility for already delivered projects. And if feasible,
-Develop already delivered solutions to product based MVP to be marketed
-Helps marketing lead new business development and partnership with communities for our internal products
-Develop presentation and pitch it to partners and clients.
-Manages operations of Masjidia, our company’s products.
-Manages sales and marketing effort of Masjidia, our company’s products

Head of Product

PT. Shoop Internasional

As founder, We started with identifying pain points of our users. Doing initial market research to validate idea, develop mockups and pitch decks to be used to look for potential investors and get into incubation program.

Shoop is the only e-commerce marketplace platform deeply integrated with android and iOS app. Enabling businesses, governments, and communities of creating marketplaces without investing much development cost using our platform.

 Achievements:
-Successfully lead the company to be accepted to Ideabox, an accelerator backed by Indosat Ooredoo and Mountain Ventures.
-Successfully strikes the first deal with Cipika, under Indosat Ooredoo, to create, and help manage their E-Commerce Marketplace
-Grows the company from 4 initial members to 10 members focusing on tech team.
-Getting the company to become profitable immediately after graduating from the accelerator.
-Successfully gets the platform to handle multiple times of HARBOLNAS achieving more than 5000 concurrent users.

CEO and Founder

RBT Advertising network

This is the product of our company. It deals with advertisement in a relatively new medium, ring back tone.  Basically it works like google adwords but for RBT medium. 

Achievements:
-Successfully strikes a partnership with Telkomsel in just months after launching.
-Successfully gets more than 1,5 million user partners that are ready as inventory to be sold to advertisers.

Co-Founder and CEO

PT. DheZign Online Solution

Started this business with my wife back at 2006 and it is registered since the end of 2009.

Acting as CEO and my main expertise consist of digital project management, digital marketing, and being a connector.

Main job focuses on meeting with our clients, attending events, networking, managing and delegating projects.

With over 17 years of experience as a founder and a product leader, I am passionate about helping startups build better products and teams that deliver more impact.

I have a strong track record of leading product teams across different domains, especially in e-commerce and fintech.

I have successfully improved growth metrics, platform reliability, user verification, and retention rates for various products, such as Tokopedia, the biggest e-commerce marketplace in Indonesia, and Hijra, a challenger digital bank in Indonesia.

I have also founded and grown a non-profit app with 1000 organic DAU, and a community around product management and growth mindset.

I enjoy creating content and hosting live sessions on product management, career, and leadership topics.

If you need help on
- Finding Product Market Fit
- Ensuring your product team deliver values
- Your business are solving the right problem the right way
- Validating your hypothesis on growth levers

I currently offer fractional head of product services to early and mid-stage startups that need guidance and support on product strategy, execution, and culture.



Book a time with me to find how I can help!

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The Battle

Matt Lerner

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The Battle

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