What is growth marketing?

Often called growth hacking, growth marketing is a new marketing technique focused on quick business growth. To determine what works and what doesn’t, growth marketers use A/B tests and KPI monitoring to always make the right choice. They’re data-driven. 

The difference between growth marketing and growth hacking

It is common to talk about growth marketing and growth hacking as if they were the same thing, and in part it is true, but one small difference is that the growth hacker generally manages a smaller budget and he is called to solve a unique problem that affects growth fast. On the other hand, growth marketers work for a longer time because they have to create a long-term, sustainable overtime strategy to achieve business growth.

Growth marketing Vs digital marketing

Digital marketing is a set of different types of tactics, from SEO to SEM, email marketing, social media marketing, etc. Growth marketing uses these tactics as part of a business growth strategy.

Growth marketing Vs marketing

Between traditional marketing and growth marketing, the difference is much bigger. In traditional marketing we have a funnel of awareness and acquisition, then it stops here, while for growth marketing the road doesn’t end here, it goes deeper. It adds new layers to the funnel: Activation, Retention, Referral, and Revenue. This model is called the AARRR framework.

AARRR Framework

Acquisition is when the customer has a first contact with the company from one of the marketing channels utilized.

Activation represents the start of a company’s relationship with a client, it’s when the customer makes an action toward the company. For example, he can do a purchase, subscribe to the newsletter, leave a review, etc.

Retention is when the customer returns to engage with the company or product, for example, he reads the newsletter from the company or visits the website more times, etc. 

Referral is when a customer attracts other customers to the company and it’s very convenient. The Referral can be tracked with the Number of Active Users Sharing Invites.

Revenue is when the customer spends his money on a company’s product or service.

Acquisition phase strategies and metrics

Strategies:

-Bullseye framework

It’s used to find the best marketing channels. Imagine having 3 rings one external, one intermediate, and one internal. This framework has four steps: 1) add all the marketing channels you can use for your business in the external ring. 2) put in the middle ring the marketing channels you know will actually work based on your marketing team’s experience. 3) all these channels should be tested. 4) put in the internal ring those that generated the highest return with the lowest acquisition cost. 

Metrics:

• Customer acquisition cost
• Traffic and source of traffic
• CTR
• CPC
• Conversion rate

Activation phase strategies and metrics

Strategies:

-Mbu framework (minimum badass user)

It’s used to make the customer reach the wow or aha moment. We have 3 steps for this framework. 1) To make a customer like and trust a business product, you need to demonstrate great outcomes. Hence, show the customers what their future will look like with your product and, to build trust, provide testimonials of other customers who have used it. 2) Make the customer perform some minimum actions to demonstrate their ability to achieve their goal. 3) Show the customers in a simple and clear way their progress and what steps are still missing to reach their goal. For example, we can show a checklist or progress bar.   

-PVP index framework

It’s used to find the best customers for you that drive revenues. Identify each customer segment and then rate them from 1 to 10 for personal fulfillment, so how much you enjoy these customers, for the value you bring to these customers, so how much they value your work, and then for profitably, so how much do you earn from these customers. Then do the average of the results and choose your ideal customers.

-Journey map framework

The purpose of it is to discover why your business loses customers and to visualize the processes your customers go through to accomplish their goals with you product. First, define the actor so the customer that experiences the journey. Then define the user’s actions, thoughts, pain points, and emotions. At last, define the user scenario that depends on the customer’s goal and expectation. After this mapping, you can gain a lot of opportunities to learn how to optimize the customer journey.   

Metrics:

• Activation rate (divide the number of users who reached the activation point by the number of users who signed up. Finally, multiply the result by 100)
• Conversion Rate
• How many customers experienced aha or wow moment
• Bounce rate
• Visitors sign up rate
• Daily active users and monthly active users

Retention phase strategies and metrics

Strategies:

-Kano framework

We use this data to determine which features our customer’s value most and what to add next. The Kano Model of Customer Satisfaction classifies product attributes according to how they affect customer satisfaction. A product or service has a variety of attributes: basic attributes which are the expected and essential features, performance attributes which are optional but improve the product, and excitement attributes which are features the customers don’t expect but can make the customer very happy.

-Create a strong relationship with your clients by writing extremely personal emails. 

-Make your clients feel special by offering them discounts, freebies, offers, etc., as part of a rewards program.  

-Create a feedback system, for example using surveys, to track and analyze Churn metrics.

Metrics:

• Churn rate
• Open rate
• CTR
• Infrequent logins

Referral phase strategies and metrics

Strategies:

-Create a referral program to award your clients when they refer a friend. 

-Use influencer marketing to be recommended by an influencer in your niche.

Metrics:

• Customers who refer other customers
• Positive reviews
• Social media share
• Viral referral loop coefficient (number of invites sent per customer * conversion percentage)
• Net promoter score (deduct the percentage of detractors from the percentage of promoters)

Revenue phase strategies and metrics

Strategies:

-Improve the experience of returning customers and award them.

-Increase the price of your product and if customers still buy it increase it again a little bit, do this until the price becomes an obstacle and the sale drives less revenue. 

Metrics:

• Customer lifetime value
• Customer acquisition cost
• Monthly recurring revenue
• Free customers that become paying customers
• Repeated purchases 
• Average order value

Growth marketing strategies

We have four major strategies from the Ansoff matrix or also called Product/Market Expansion Grid framework:

Market penetration is focused on an existing market where you already sell something or where your competitors already sell something similar to your product or service.   In order to succeed, your product must be different and better than your competitors’. 

Market development focuses on taking products you already have to new markets, by targeting underserved customers. For example, customers from new segments or customers from different geographic regions that have never been targeted.

Product development has different tactics:

–Product updates so when you create a new and improved version of the product;

–New products when you create different kinds of products from your brand and the customers are willing to buy it because they are attached to the brand;

–New upgrades with new features is when you create a better version of the product with more features that customers can buy. Usually, it’s used for Saas and products with subscription plans that you can upgrade and receive more features.

Diversification strategy focuses on new products to add to new markets, and usually includes collaboration with complementary brands that will help you to connect to a new audience. 

Analyze the competitors’ growth strategy

Metrics to audit:

• Pricing
• Copys 
• CTAs
• UVP
• Product features and upgrades
• What is similar and what differs from your product