Last Updated on 27th September 2021 by ANKIT ALOK

Growth hacking, a word that is creating a buzz all around the world. I am not sure whether you have heard this word or not but if you are a startup founder then definitely you would have heard or read it somewhere. It is like a modern term to introduce a new type of strategy for growing a startup.

Many startup founders use the growth hacking principle to grow their startup, to acquire users, to retain current users with the combination of marketing, engineering, and designing. 

But the main question that arises in your mind is what exactly Growth Hacking is, whether it is a process or a  skill?  But the answer may surprise you because Growth Hacking is referred to as both process and a skill. Let me explain to you in detail. 

The term “Growth Hacker” was coined by Sean Ellis in 2010 and he defined Growth Hacker in a blog post as “a person whose true north is growth. Everything they do is scrutinized by its potential impact on scalable growth”. 

Sean Ellis was a consultant of ‘Dropbox’ and he helped the company to grow rapidly by using his growth hacking techniques and strategies. He also helped several other startups to achieve exponential growth.

What is Growth Hacking?

Growth Hacking can be defined as the experiment-based process, techniques, and digital skills that are solely focused on the growth of a company and that too in a cost-efficient and resourceful manner with the help of data.

In layman’s terms, the aim of Growth Hacking is to find innovative and creative methods to rapidly grow the customer base, retain customers, scaling the idea, abandoning the ideas that don’t work, and many other things that lead to an exponential growth of a company using Digital skills.

Growth Hacking is mainly associated with startups and small companies because it is a concept that facilitates the growth of a company using limited funds as growth hacking focuses on cost-effective methods to grow. 

Startups & small companies at their early stage have limited funds and scarce resources therefore growth hacking is an ideal concept for them to scale their business.

For all these innovative and creative methods, growth hackers are in charge to help the company to achieve accelerated growth at a rapid rate. 

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But you might be thinking who is a Growth Hacker? 

Who is a Growth Hacker?

Growth Hacker is an innovative and shrewd person whose main job and specialty are growing a startup at a rapid and exponential rate, increasing userbase, retaining userbase using creative growth hacking methods.

A competent Growth Hacker knows all the techniques that are used to take a startup to a new height. The main goal of a growth hacker is to focus solely on growing an existing customer base.

As stated by Sean Ellis “a person whose true north is growth. Everything they do is scrutinized by its potential impact on scalable growth”. 

According to him, Growth hackers are a hybrid of marketers and engineers focusing on building the product’s potential growth.

Growth Hacker uses various marketing techniques like A/B testing, email marketing, search engine optimization, referrals, web analytics, and other data-driven tools and techniques. There is a fine line of difference between growth hacker and marketer and that is a growth hacker is more of a data-driven person and possesses technical skills. 

Marketer, Engineer, Product Designer, Developers anyone can be a growth hacker. Their only focus is growth using a cost-effective method.

Difference between Marketer and Growth Hacker

1. Growth hacker has more technical skills such as coding, tooling and various other technical skills.

2. Growth hacker only focuses on the growth of a startup using innovative methods but a marketer is also responsible for several other jobs.

3. Marketer only works for awareness and acquisition of customers in a sales funnel but a Growth hacker is responsible for complete sales funnel including referral and retention of customers.

4. A growth hacker works on data-driven techniques whereas marketers do not work solely on data.

5. A growth hacker is a type of generalist who has knowledge of product designing, marketing, coding as he works on leading growth whereas a marketer has only specific knowledge of marketing.

6. A growth hacker works with people of different backgrounds and departments like technical, marketing, and sales department whereas a marketer works only within the marketing department.

Growth Marketing strategies for startups

1. Use Referral Marketing

Referral marketing is the most ubiquitous and popular form of marketing for acquiring new customers in today’s startup ecosystem. It is a cheaper form of acquiring customers comparatively.  

Referral marketing is based on a reward system in which you get some sort of reward for referring the app, product, or service to your friends, family, and colleagues. This referral program is very beneficial for companies in increasing their current customer base in a short span of time.

2. Create an Email marketing campaign

Another constructive growth hacking strategy is creating an email marketing campaign. Email marketing is one of the most effective strategies to convert potential customers into paying customers. It plays an important role in converting leads in the sales funnel. 

Email marketing has a higher ROI comparatively, this cost-effective nature makes it an important growth hacking strategy for startups.

Create an effective and persuasive message for email marketing campaign so that it can convert leads into a customer. Your message should be clear and convincing which provokes people to take action and buy your products or services.

Mail Chimp, HubSpot, Moosend, SendInBlue are some of the platforms that you can use for your email marketing campaign.

3. Social Media Marketing

Your marketing mix strategy must include Social Media Marketing. You can build relationships with people on social media and leverage its vast user base.

Social media platforms provide the best way to interact and communicate with your current customers and potential customers. 

A smart growth hacker knows how to use social media marketing in the most effective way to increase a current customer base. It facilitates you to get appropriate feedback from your customers and optimize your product or service accordingly. 

You can also use social media platforms to educate people about your offerings and if your customers have any objections and queries then you can solve them using these platforms.

4. Use Content Marketing

Content marketing is the king of growth hacking strategies, you cannot avoid content marketing as it is the most critical form of marketing for growing any company.

Content is the most fundamental part of any marketing campaign because ultimately it is going to help you in communicating with your target audience, your content must be influencing and persuasive enough so that people can exchange their hard-earned money for your sufferings.

Content marketing is not limited to blog writing but also includes video marketing, ebook, whitepaper, guest blogging, webinars, content you share on your social media posts, and anything that includes content writing comes under the umbrella of content marketing.

It is the low-cost growth hacking strategy that helps you in increasing your userbase.

Conclusion

If you are a startup then you must use these growth hacking strategies to grow your company rapidly and exponentially. Growth hacking is not an old concept but it is getting traction at a very rapid rate. Many companies like Uber, Airbnb, Hotmail, and several other billion-dollar companies used these strategies for accelerated growth. 

If you want your company to get on this list of successful companies then you cannot ignore these growth hacking strategies. Use these strategies and make a J-curve of growth.