The main goal for any marketer is to channel marketing activities to get customers interested in their offerings. The emphasis now, is on how they are doing it. Rather than a people-centric focus, growth hackers have transitioned to a techno-centric approach. As growth hacking is rooted in best marketing practices, there is a very high chance that it will stick around. Read on to learn more about what growth hacking is and what you can learn from it as a marketer.
What Is Growth Hacking?
Growth hacking uses low-cost alternatives unlike traditional marketing methods. This involves marketing in a more grassroots manner. For instance, using social media platforms to get users to engage with a business’ offerings instead of buying advertising spaces on the radio or television. It is a combination of ingenuity, social metrics and deep analysis, to gain exposure as quickly as possible and achieve growth with a limited budget. Growth hacking works on the principle of testing and measuring results using popular tools like SEO, website analytics, A/B testing and content marketing. Some of the main benefits of growth hacking include –
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Being able to try and test different types of tactics, with lower-cost strategies.
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Making more informed, data-oriented decisions, which will help with greater resource efficiency and prioritization of marketing practices.
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Helps measure success through trial and error. Once a feasible solution is worked out, growth hackers get internal support to advance with the strategies.
What Are The Key Takeaways Of Growth Hacking?
With the sprouting digital landscape, the barriers between marketers, designers and programmers are breaking down and smaller companies are taking large industries by storm with a minimal budget. As a result, the roles of marketers are extending beyond just traditional promotion. Growth hackers leverage technology and analytics to get users to engage with the business’ offerings. Traditional marketers now need to know how to carry out 360-degree promotions, optimize a website, analyse real-time data and use analytical tools to survive. If a marketer is aware of all this and more, there is a greater chance of securing quicker returns and also witnessing considerable progress on the growth chart.
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Let’s take a look at some of the key takeaways of growth hacking that can be applied by any marketer in any frequency or campaign.
Flexibility
When a course for a strategy is chronicled, there really is no looking back. With growth hacking, however, it is different. Growth hacking is flexible and changes by the hour to adapt to customers’ fluctuating reactions. If something isn’t profitable, growth hackers don’t wait for the right time to make a change. If an opportunity arises, they can switch gears immediately to seize it. Growth hackers gauge visitors’ responses and track changes and/or variations to quickly adapt to customers’ needs.
React To Live Data Immediately
Growth hackers focus more on the ‘now’ than on what happened and what is predicted for the future. With live-stream data available over analytics tools, growth hackers can react immediately to the data they have in hand and profit from opportunities immediately.
The Art of Engagement
Growth hacking has been extremely successful because of its casual, non-promotional approach. Remember Hotmail’s famous move of using ‘PS. I Love You’ at the end of every e-mail? That one warm move ended up garnering 12 million users by the end of the year for Hotmail and led to that big purchase by Microsoft. The rest as they say is history.
Instead of targeting audiences with highly promotional content, growth hackers have always looked at ways to connect with customers on an intimate level. Through off-the-cuff conversation and personalized deals, growth hackers capitalize on user-intent to augment brand visibility.
Growth hacking and marketing share the same core principles and are corresponding specialisms. By analyzing the ‘product-market fit’, setting actionable goals, testing combinations and analyzing performance, you will eventually get into the practice of growth hacking. If growth hacking is something you don’t foresee doing yourself, outsource it to professionals who can get it done and help your business scale new heights.
