A Beginner's Guide to Growth Marketing
As an experiment, I decided to create an article using AI. It took me less than 2.5 hours in total, start to finish.
This blog post will answer what growth marketing is, how it differs from other digital marketing strategies like growth hacking, and why every company should employ a growth marketer in order to increase their customer base.
What is growth marketing?
Growth marketing is a strategic approach to digital marketing that focuses on driving growth for your business. Growth marketers are responsible for the acquisition of new leads and engaged customers, as well as increasing revenue from existing customers.
Growth Marketing vs Digital Marketing
Growth marketing is different from digital marketing in that growth focuses more on the customer. Growth marketing is focused on acquisition and retention with the goal of increasing lifetime value for customers.
Digital marketing, however, deals more with lead generation – how to convert prospects into leads or actual sales. It also includes traditional advertising as well as digital channels such as social media ads, paid search engine results pages, and email marketing.
Growth Marketing vs Performance Marketing
Growth marketing differs from performance marketing in that growth marketers are more focused on the customer experience and branding. Growth marketers have a wide net of industry knowledge, making them well-versed in many areas of the customer funnel.
Performance marketers focus on conversion rates and lead generation through paid advertising campaigns. Their time is largely spent acquiring customers through paid advertising channels like digital marketers, but they use more of a scientific approach to lead generation.
Growth Marketing vs. Traditional Marketing
Growth marketing differs from traditional marketing in that growth marketers have to focus on a long-term strategy for the company, while also meeting short-term goals.
Traditional marketers are more focused on immediate benefits, such as short-term promotions and driving pipeline for their sales team. Some traditional marketers run “brand” campaigns that aren’t necessarily rooted in performance metrics. The goal of traditional marketing is to create more mindshare, whereas growth is rooted in data and metrics that can be clearly connected to results.
Growth Marketing vs Growth Hacking
Growth marketing is a strategy that companies use to grow their current user base, while growth hacking focuses on acquiring new users.
Growth marketers have more of an emphasis on customer acquisition and expanding relationships with potential engaged customers than they do increasing conversion rates through optimizing the digital experience for visitors or converting them into paying customers.
Demand Generation vs Growth Marketing
Growth marketing is different from demand generation because it doesn't rely on leads. Demand generation is a strategy that relies on outside sources, such as ads or content marketing to generate sales-ready prospects and the goal of growth marketing is to create and engage more high-quality customers through inbound channels and community building.
What is a growth marketing team? What are the key roles?
A growth team is a group of people who work together to solve business problems. The size of the growth marketing team varies from company to company, but in general, there are two main types: digital marketers and data analysts.
Growth marketing team roles:
Digital Marketers: Work to increase sales, conversions and brand awareness by using a variety of online channels.
Data Analysts: Provide insight into marketing's performance through data analysis and insights on customer behavior. They use digital platforms like Google Analytics, Facebook Insights, etc., as well as in-person research methods such as focus groups or surveys.
What are the top skills of growth marketers?
Growth marketers are skilled at executing campaigns that lead to high levels of customer acquisition and retention.
They have a deep understanding of customer behavior, targeting the right audience with the right message in order to maximize their ROI.
In addition, they are data savvy and analytical, having a good understanding of the metrics that are most relevant to user growth.
They also have experience in testing different strategies and measuring their success, which is an essential skill for any marketer or business owner aiming at growth.
How growth marketing managers influence the growth marketing process
The growth marketing process is a cyclical approach to business development. The process has five phases: create, measure, learn and repeat and it can be deployed for any product or service.
A successful growth marketing manager will own the growth marketing process. They will have a working knowledge of the tools for each phase and how to apply them appropriately.
This can include different marketing channels, analytics programs like Google Analytics, customer research techniques or other growth-oriented tasks.
Being a growth hacker is (mostly) overhyped. Many wins that you achieve as a growth marketing manager are about running a great process. Growth hackers rely on quick wins and silver bullets. A great growth marketing manager runs an engine that produces results time and time again.
What is a growth marketing strategy?
A growth marketing strategy is a way of using marketing tactics to grow your business. To build a growth marketing strategy, you need to understand your growth marketing mix, which is made up of a few components:
Product Positioning
Distribution Channels
Product Pricing
Promotion Strategy
How you communicate with customers will also play into how they engage with your product or service. Nailing these four elements of the growth marketing mix is important so that companies can reach their target audience efficiently.
What are the most effective growth marketing tactics?
Some of the most effective growth tactics are email marketing, search engine optimization (SEO), social media, and referral traffic.
The first step is to identify what platforms work best for your business’s goals before you dive in headfirst.
In order to understand what tactics you should apply, you'll need to know your customer.
Do they use Facebook? Do they like watching YouTube videos on their lunch break? What are some of the blogs that they read religiously every day? The more information you know about them, the better off you'll be when it comes to marketing tactics and strategies.
The role of A/B testing in growth marketing
A/B testing is a marketing technique that refers to the use of experiments. Two versions are created and one version receives traffic while the other does not, at random.
A/B testing is key in growth marketing because it helps you to determine which of your marketing tactics are working best for a particular goal.
For example, if someone is trying to increase newsletter subscriptions on their website and they have started with social media engagement posts as a tactic, the A/B testing will help them measure how well that tactic works compared to other possible options like SEO or banner ads.
The role of data analytics in growth marketing
Data analytics is of course essential in all marketing campaigns, but it's particularly key to understanding growth marketing strategy.
Data analytics helps marketers understand what content attracts the most users to their site, which channels they should be spending more time on, or how well different customer segments are converting into customers.
My favorite quote on this topic is "if you don't have data, you don't have a strategy." In growth marketing, you need to be data-savvy so you can understand the root cause of your funnel problems and implement a solution.
In order for data analytics to work effectively in growth marketing campaigns, it needs to measure not just engagement but also ROI.
The role of content marketing in growth marketing
Growth marketing is about more than just increasing the number of sales you make. It's also about deepening your relationships with customers and driving them to advocate for your brand.
Content marketing makes it easier to achieve these goals because it fosters a sense of community among those who are interested in what you have to offer, establishes yourself as an expert in the eyes of your current customers and future customers.
The role of user experience in growth marketing
User experience (UX) design is a key component of growth marketing. If the website or app has an intuitive interface, customers will be more likely to spend time there and purchase from you again.
User experience plays a key role in keeping your customers engaged throughout the entire customer lifecycle.
What are the 3 most important growth marketing metrics?
The three most important growth marketing metrics are typically a mix of the following:
Conversion Rate: How many visitors took an action you want them to take, such as signing up for your email list. This is one metric that helps measure how effective your growth strategy is and what changes might need to be made in order to grow more effectively.
Visitor Growth Rate: The second most important growth marketing metrics is your site growth rate. This is the number of visits to your website each month, and it helps you measure how well your growth campaign was working by seeing if visitors are coming back or not.
User Engagement: The third most important metric for determining whether a growth marketing strategy has been successful is engagement--how many users engage with content on their visit? Engagement is often a predictor of future performance because if your growth strategy is successful, then your visitors are more likely to engage with and share content.
What role does product play in growth marketing?
Growth marketing is a data-driven, analytical method of achieving growth. The first step in the process to grow any business is identifying its most valuable customers and what they want or need that your company can provide.
It's not about catering to everyone; it's about finding out who is the perfect fit for your product and removing the friction in between their problem, and the solution (your product).
In order to be a great growth marketer, you need to understand how your product solves problems for your target customer and help them become aware that your product solves that problem.
Growth Funnels vs Growth Loops
One of the most popular and misunderstood concepts in growth marketing is growth funnel vs. growth loop. Put simply, they are two different ways to measure success (and failure). A growth funnel captures all user interactions with the product over time; a growth loop only counts those that lead to an outcome or meaningful action—like downloading your app, signing up for a free trial, or adding a product to the cart.
A growth marketing funnel is often used when launching new products and features, so you can analyze how well your marketing efforts led people to take an action that indicates interest in your product.
A growth loop might be more useful for existing products where retention matters most. The best growth loop is one that encompasses the product funnel AND all user interactions with it over time.
In other words, you want to understand both how well your current marketing efforts are performing and what impact they’ve had on your number of active customers (and their lifetime value).
The top 15 growth marketing examples
A few examples of growth marketing campaigns are:
Promoting your blog posts with social media, blogging platforms, and newsletter subscriptions.
Creating a lead magnet to incentivize user actions such as signing up for an email list or subscribing to the blog post RSS feed.
Optimizing onsite content such as SEO keywords, meta descriptions, and website navigation items.
Conversion rate optimization, such as utilizing A/B testing, to test different design features.
Content marketing, such as creating content that attracts users to your blog or website. For example: blog posts with a list of resources to help customers take action after reading it.
Social media marketing, like using Facebook ads and Twitter campaigns.
Personalization, by generating unique user experiences based on different customer profiles.
Email marketing, which can be used in tandem with growth hacking methods (promoting email signups for a new product release).
Building a referral program, such as referral codes or rewards programs.
A/B testing, which tests different design changes for the website to see what will work best.
Google Adwords campaigns to target keywords that are relevant to your industry.
Mobile-first design, targeting the mobile audience with a company website that is optimized for smartphones and tablets.
Sponsoring events to grow customer reach. For example: sponsoring influencers with large followings who will then post about the company's product on social media channels.
Account-based marketing campaigns, in which you target a list of high-value accounts to target instead of relying solely on marketing to individuals.
Improving the user experience on the website to make it easier for customers who get answers to their questions.
Conclusion
We've just discussed some of the many ways to grow a business through growth marketing. I hope you found these examples helpful and I look forward to hearing more about your business growth in the near future.