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About

My job is to create the magic between a business and its customers.

That line has been on my LinkedIn since long before I owned anything technical. It still describes the work. The tools just got bigger.

I lead growth, CRM and technology at Mokobara, the design-led travel brand from Bengaluru. I joined in 2022 to build its customer relationship system. The remit grew every year: the website, then payments and the 36 stores, then the technology and catalogue behind all of it, then a physical product, the Moko Tracker.

Before Mokobara I spent five years on GAP in India, first in retail marketing and then launching and running its loyalty programme, and led the loyalty programme for Sephora India. Before that, Max Fashion. Before that, a commerce degree in Odisha and business school in Bengaluru.

I am not an engineer, and I do not pretend to be one. What I do is understand customers and the business well enough to know exactly what a system should do, make the decisions, and get it built, with the people who build for a living, or by prototyping it myself when that is faster.

LinkedIn See the work
Nikhilendra Pratap Singh Deo
Based in
Bengaluru, India
Languages
English, Hindi, Odia
Education
PGPM, International Business · MBA, Marketing · B.Com, Accounting
The journey

Marketing, then loyalty, then the whole customer journey.

Twelve years, three companies, one direction: closer to the moment a customer decides to come back.

  1. Mokobara

    Now
    Design-led travel brand · Bengaluru · 36 stores in India and Dubai
    2022 – present

    From the CRM to the whole customer journey.

    Nikhil first saw a Mokobara bag at Bengaluru airport around New Year 2022, as a customer. A few months later he joined to build its CRM. Each year the remit widened: the storefront, then payments and omnichannel commerce, then the technology and catalogue behind all of it, then a physical product.

    • Senior Manager II – Growth · leading tech, CRM and catalogue
      Apr 2026 – present
    • Senior Manager – Growth
      Apr 2025 – Mar 2026
    • Manager II – CRM
      Apr 2023 – Mar 2025
    • CRM Lead
      Jul 2022 – Mar 2023
    • Built the retention system and paid membership: members buy 3× more, retention up 30% year on year
    • Made the case for Shopify Plus; revenue doubled year on year, conversion up 30%
    • Led personalisation with Epsilon: 4.1:1 incremental return on ad spend
    • Took Mokobara into Google's Find Hub launch, then launched the Moko Tracker
    • Unified 36 stores and the website into one channel with a custom point of sale
    • Built the team's everyday tools himself with AI

  2. Arvind Fashions

    GAP · Sephora · Aéropostale in India
    2016 – 2021

    Five years on GAP, where retention became the job.

    Retail marketing first, across stores and campaigns. Then the loyalty programme, launched and run as a product. Then the same for Sephora India. This is where marketing turned into customer data for Nikhil, and where he learned to think in cohorts and lifecycles rather than campaigns.

    • Marketing Consultant
      Sep – Nov 2021
    • CRM Lead, Sephora India
      Feb – Aug 2021
    • Senior Marketing Executive, GAP
      Jun 2019 – Jan 2021
    • Marketing Executive, GAP
      Aug 2016 – May 2019
    • Launched GAP India's loyalty programme and led CRM for the brand
    • Led the loyalty programme for Sephora India
    • Planned and executed GAP India's retail marketing

  3. Max Fashion

    Value fashion retail · Landmark Group
    2014 – 2016

    First exposure to marketing at retail scale.

    Started as an intern during business school and came back full time. Campaigns, stores, and the gap between what a brand says and what a customer does.

    • Marketing Executive
      Jul 2015 – Aug 2016
    • Marketing Intern
      Oct – Dec 2014
    • Retail marketing for one of India's largest value-fashion chains

  4. Education

    Odisha → Mysore → Bengaluru
    2010 – 2015

    Accounting first, marketing second.

    A commerce degree in Odisha, then business school in Bengaluru with a marketing MBA alongside it. Bengaluru happened, and he has not left.

    • PGPM, International Business · National School of Business, Bengaluru
      2013 – 2015
    • MBA, Marketing · University of Mysore
      2013 – 2015
    • B.Com, Accounting · Government Autonomous College, Bhawanipatna
      2010 – 2013

Titles, for anyone checking

Different publications have used different titles for me. This is the sequence.

  1. Apr 2026Senior Manager II – Growth · leads tech, CRM and catalogue
  2. Apr 2025Senior Manager – Growth
  3. Apr 2023Manager II – CRM
  4. Jul 2022CRM Lead

Press has also described me as Lead, Tech & CRM (Outlook Business, 2025) and Lead CRM (The Tribune, 2025).

How I think

Five rules I keep coming back to.

  1. 01

    Start with the customer

    Every system worth building traces back to a customer moment: a faster page, a more relevant message, a bag that can be found. If it does not change an experience, it is overhead.

  2. 02

    Retention is a design problem

    Get the rules of the relationship right, automate them, and the numbers follow. Messaging comes last.

  3. 03

    Build before buy, when the gap is the problem

    When an off-the-shelf tool almost solves it, understand the gap properly and build exactly what is needed. It is usually smaller than you fear.

  4. 04

    Data should do something

    A report earns its place when it drives a decision, triggers an action or shapes an experience. Otherwise it is decoration.

  5. 05

    Ship, then sharpen

    A first version on a phone this week beats a perfect plan next quarter. Real use is the only reliable roadmap.

Off the clock

A few things that are not on the CV.

  • Bengaluru

    Came for business school in 2013 and stayed. Still the city where I first saw a Mokobara bag, at the airport, before I worked there.

  • Long drives

    Road trips are the hobby. Documenting them became a small app I made for myself, with routes, fuel stops and a map of everywhere I have driven.

  • Making things

    I prototype my own tools with AI, at work and at home. Not because I am an engineer, but because a working version beats a long wait.

  • A customer first

    I notice when service breaks and say so. The same instinct, pointed inward, is why the after-sale experience gets as much attention as the checkout.

  • Fan of the brand

    I posted about Mokobara's Diljit Dosanjh campaign 'as a fan and not as someone who works here'. Still the best qualification for the job.

  • English, Hindi, Odia

    And a working vocabulary in whatever the design team is speaking that week.