A guy or gal with a blog is not a growth hacker, they are just a blogger. A growth hacker is more of a mad scientist hypothesis tester with who has done their homework about different, but empirically or theoretically effective, customer acquisition approaches and distribution channels. It doesn't stop with drawing in an audience. You should really check out the Dave McClure presentation titled Startup Metrics for Pirates. There is a lot that needs to be done after a customer hits your web application - things that a functional marketing person will not be able to do. Granted there are some tools out there that would enable that functional marketing person to do some limited A/B testing using wireframes or something like that, but I'm not assuming that amateur hour is the order of the day if someone is hiring someone to help or otherwise substantially engaging in an effort. Creativity goes without saying.
To your point about businesses being technically centered, I guess this topic is one that pivots on web and mobile + web business applications so they are inherently technical in nature. I suppose you could growth hack a dry cleaner's website or retail location, but that isn't the same.
On Wednesday, April 24, 2013 3:38:30 PM UTC-4, mehmet y wrote:
You don't have to have a developer / marketing combo to do any of that; you can growth hack with a hacker and a clever statistician, or even no developer at all - just an influential blog and a service. In fact, it might be more simple creativity and initiative than anything else. You can prove this with the same slides you just showed us.There is a line that isn't clear; a growth hacker in some circles is described as just a developer and marketing person with combined disciplines. In others, it is basically a developer and usability expert able to facilitate the articulation of use through clever means. Still in other circles, it is a consultant who can teach you to create atypical pipelines to feed your business.By all these definitions, its really just about knowing your market and finding unique ways to target and draw in your audience.
What I am hearing is people approaching this matter as though every business is technologically centered - but they aren't. You don't build from technology out unless that is what you are selling, even if you are fairly dependent on it. That being said, can you find creative technological ways to market yourself using technology when it is not the center of your domain? In fact you can. You can use technomarketing.
The only substantial determination I can make from the term is that I, as an employer, can reasonably hold the expectation that this person will have creative initiative and a drive to execute on it.On Wed, Apr 24, 2013 at 2:46 PM, Bob <goo...@neelbauer.com> wrote:
Mehmet,It sounds like you are viewing this from a consulting lens. That is not the trend. Truth be told, this isn't a new thing either. I don't know where the discussion about growth hacking started, but it is closely related to the early stage startup founder team composition discussion. To be clear, an early stage startup for the purpose of this discussion is not a consulting firm, not a service provider, not a government contractor, not an interactive agency that builds websites or web apps for other companies. We're talking about early stage software, web or mobile app product startups that are building something that sells product to either an enterprise or consumers. In most cases this applies to consumer focused startups. And to be even more specific, we are talking about the trendy developer lead startups such as ones that might try to get into Y Combinator or Tech Stars or 500 Startups.
Early stage startup founder teams in these circles are encouraged to have three people: the hacker (developer), the hustler (the customer acquisition person - does customer acquisition), and the hipster (optional in some models, but becoming more mainstream as far as these discussions are going).The key to growth hacking is customer acquisition, retention and growth. The best illustration of this that I know of is a slideshare presentation by Dave McClure, the founder of 500 startups:
http://www.slideshare.net/dmc500hats/startup-metrics- for-pirates-seedcamp-sept-2009
To take things a a bit further, it would be a really bad idea for an early stage startup to outsource customer acquisition to a development firm. This is core to their business and financial model. So the notion of hiring a consulting firm to do growth hacking is a really bad idea, but the idea of getting help from a freelancer who has experience with early stage customer acquisition might work provided it is someone really entrepreneurial AND someone who has some of the type of customer acquisition and distribution experience that Dave McClure talks about in the Startup Metrics for pirates presentation I mentioned above.
There is some additional background this in a related post here:
http://socialmatchbox.com/wp/2013/04/24/should-i-hire-a- growth-hacker-for-my-startup/
On Thursday, April 11, 2013 1:20:51 PM UTC-4, mehmet y wrote:This has created a whole new breed of engineers ready to consult with you to provide unique opportunities to find a disruptive marketing techniques to compensate for what they present as the law of "diminishing clicks".I know of a few firms in the area that sell strategy with their PHP products and services as a package deal.The new beast - the "growth hacker". Let the search engine be your guide.
Seems the latest trend in Silicon Valley is to couple engineering expertise with marketing strategy resulting in:
For firms that don't just create websites but offer strategic consulting (such as a few on this list), I think its time to prepare your understanding of this trend and be prepared to demonstrate how you already think disruptively and account for the "law of diminishing clicks" when it makes sense.
That said, uniquely acquiring volume spurts doesn't secure a product/service with good usability, privacy, security, policies or retention strategies. What is more is that every company pivots its services as it learns - trying to hack growth I imagine negates a critical feedback loop if successful. Without these things it just seems like a new way to burn investment money potentially prematurely.
If you ask me, startups are their prey; the idea that even a ten percent increase in success is worth the money, and I think for what it is worth it may be a dangerous game. I'd rather brainstorm with folks at SCORE working with the SBA or someone with domain expertise before anyone else, but hey that is me.
Any thoughts? Have I missed anything? How do you feel about this?
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