Channel Partnerships & Affiliates Lead

What are we looking for? We’re hiring a Channel Partnerships and Affiliates Lead to build Hercules’ partner distribution engine. You will own partner acquisition, program design, enablement, and performance. You should be: - Commercial: strong at pitching, negotiating, and closing. - Systems-minded: you build programs that scale with clean tracking and tight guardrails. - Partner-obsessed: you make partners successful with clear enablement and co-marketing. - Metrics-driven: you manage partners to sourced signups, revenue, CAC/payback, and quality. What will you lead? - Channel distribution deals: identify targets, build the pitch, negotiate terms, close partnerships - Affiliate program: define structure (tiers, incentives, attribution window), recruit affiliates, and scale - Tracking + payouts: attribution, fraud prevention, payout rules, and reporting - Partner enablement: onboarding, messaging, assets, demo flows, and ongoing support - Co-marketing: launches, webinars, newsletters, marketplace listings, and joint announcements - Partner pipeline + relationship management: CRM pipeline, cadence, QBRs (quarterly business reviews), renewals/expansions What skills do we expect you to have? - Experience closing and scaling channel partnerships and/or affiliate programs - Strong deal execution: outreach, negotiation, contracting, and stakeholder management - Strong program design: incentives, guardrails, attribution windows, payout policies - Familiarity with affiliate tracking and payout ops (links, UTMs, coupons, postbacks, anti-fraud) - Ability to drive partner enablement and co-marketing without heavy internal overhead - Strong analytical skills: partner-level performance, cohort quality, and unit economics tracking What are Hercules’ operating principles? Hercules’ operating principles guide how we make decisions every day. We take them very seriously. Most of them are specifically choices that we as a company unique prioritize and so can be learned on the job. However, we do specifically filter for these principles our hiring process: 1. We move with urgency. We ship fast, iterate, and correct mistakes quickly. Our bias for action speeds our learning and delights our customers. 2. We strive for excellence. Doing things well is in our DNA. We have good taste. We get the details right. Our outputs are exceptionally simple and self-serve. We’re proud of our work. 3. We are hungry. We are willing to work hard and break through walls to achieve the outcomes we want. We are willing to operate at any level to get things done. We are politely relentless. Is Hercules in-office or remote? Hercules founding team works in-office in San Francisco (Kearny and Bush). We have a very strong preference for in office. We are open to remote for exceptional candidates in US time zones who would be willing/able to travel to the office regularly. What are Hercules’ benefits? - Healthcare, vision, and dental - User whatever AI tools you’d like (you have an unlimited AI budget) - Take what you need vacation policy - Daily lunches, dinners and snacks in the office - We guarantee you will do the best work of your career here What’s the compensation? $100k-$250k + equity (depends on seniority, equity, and location)