About us

Our mission is to reinvent the way people learn, starting with language.

Learning a language can change a life by opening doors to new cultures, careers, and communities. Two billion people around the world are actively trying to learn a language, but the best way to learn (one-on-one tutoring) is hard to access at scale and hasn't been meaningfully improved in decades. Speak is building a human-level, AI-powered tutor in your pocket: a conversation-first experience that lets learners actually speak, get instant feedback, and progress through carefully designed lessons. The result is a complete path from beginner to confident speaker across multiple languages.

Speak first launched in South Korea in 2019, where Speak has now become the number one language learning app, and we now serve learners across many markets and 15+ languages. Speak is one of the world's leading AI companies, with over $150m raised in venture investment from OpenAI, Accel, Founders Fund, Khosla Ventures, and more, with a distributed team across San Francisco, Seoul, Tokyo, Taipei, and Ljubljana.

About This Role

We're hiring a Growth Marketing Manager to lead WEB-based paid acquisition for the Japan market and play a pivotal role in accelerating Speak's next stage of growth. This is a senior individual contributor role for someone deeply hands-on with paid marketing - owning everything from strategy and execution to experimentation and analytics.

You'll join our Tokyo team at a critical inflection point as we scale our user acquisition efforts in Japan across APP, WEB, and Affiliates. Working alongside existing members, you'll take full ownership of WEB performance marketing - driving strategic channel expansion, deep experimentation, and efficient growth.

This role has a direct impact on one of Speak's most important markets and will help shape our conversion playbook in Japan.

What you'll be doing

• Paid Campaigns: lead WEB-focused paid media campaigns from strategic planning to hands-on execution to maximize LTV growth and LTV:CAC efficiency

• Testing and iterations: systematically test and refine paid media creatives, driving continuous improvement in campaign performance and LTV:CAC (audience segmentation, ad placements, retargeting, etc.)

• Marketing analytics: analyze performance data daily to make real-time adjustments to campaigns, ensuring targets are consistently met

• Strategic growth initiatives: testing, discovering, and managing new growth channels/approaches to drive user acquisition

• Work cross-functionally: with product, data, and design to influence conversion strategy, creative pipeline, and user journey optimization

What we're looking for

• 7+ years of experience managing and optimizing paid user acquisition (UA) campaigns, with a strong track record in hands-on media buying and performance-driven strategy

• Proficiency in both in-app and web-based campaigns and productions

• Strong track record of working with marketing analytics & data to conduct necessary A/B tests and insight-based improvements, especially in real-time for active campaigns to maximize ROI

• Ability to partner with creative/designers to produce on-brand assets for paid channels (creatives and landing pages), optimizing for maximum conversion rates and LTV efficiency

• Proactive problem-solver who can thrive in a fast-paced, cross-functional team

• Fluency in Japanese and English, with the ability to communicate clearly and effectively

Why work at Speak

1. Join a fantastic, tight-knit team at the right time: we're growing very quickly, we've most recently raised our Series C from some of the top investors in the valley, and we've achieved product-market fit in our initial markets. You'd join at a magical time when a single person could significantly change the course of the company.

2. Do your life's work with people you'll love working with: we care strongly about our craft and want every person at Speak to feel like they're growing every day. We believe in the idea that working with people you both enjoy and have respect for makes everything better. We hire thoughtfully and only work with people we admire deeply.

3. Global in nature: We're live in over 40 countries and launching in a number of new markets soon. We have dedicated offices in San Francisco, Ljubljana, Seoul, and Tokyo, and you'll have the opportunity to talk to users in each of these regions on a regular basis as well as travel.

4. Impact people's lives in a major way: Learning a language is one of the single most life-changing skills one can learn, and right now 99% of people never achieve their goal because the process is broken. We're helping millions of people achieve their goals and improve their lives.

Speak does not discriminate based upon race, religion, color, national origin, gender (including pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions), sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, age, status as a protected veteran, status as an individual with a disability, or other applicable legally protected characteristics.