But, you may still want a clearer picture on what growth hacking actually is and what it can do for you.
Growth Hacking is a marketing method, which first appeared amongst startup companies - specifically technology startups. The basic idea is around using low-cost, high impact (and often highly agile), marketing techniques such as analytics, content marketing, optimisation, and A/B testing, social media marketing and viral marketing instead of traditional marketing media (think TV, radio and print). Not only is growth hacking cheaper for companies, it is also particularly easy to track, analyse and change techniques quickly.
You may be wondering, why the fancy name? Isn’t what I just described digital marketing really? I think it has to do more with focus. Growth hackers main focus is all about growth: “How will I get more customers for my product/service”. This unwavering focus makes a huge difference because it means that it informs every marketing tactic the company uses. It means that innovation, testing, creativity, and connectivity drives marketing.
Think about Twitter for a moment. Marketing is built into the product. It uses connectivity to market itself to anyone that uses it. It is quite ingenious really. Airbnb is another example that used growth hacking to build its customer base quickly, and would likely have had much slower growth if it has used traditional marketing techniques.
It is not to say that traditional marketing is irrelevant, but that growth hacking requires a particular focus, with particular skills that can complement traditional marketing. It isn’t better, just different.
While this technique started with startup tech companies, more and more brick and mortar and big brands are using growth hacking in addition and sometimes in lieu of traditional marketing.
Let’s take a look at growth hacking as it relates to the arts and culture sector. Growth hacking is all about growth. For tech companies that is growing their user base. For theatre and arts companies it is about growing audiences. Growth hacking is extremely relevant for culture companies because they are experiential (when I buy a bottle of shampoo I get a bottle of shampoo, when I buy a ticket to a museum, I get an experience), and they are largely bought online. Similarly many companies that have successfully utilised growth hacking are experiential or software products - again think about Airbnb or Spotify. And because your customer flow (like many tech companies) is online understanding how your customers behave online is critical to growing your audiences.
How do you get customers coming to you? How do you get customers to share with other potential customers?
Since this is a snapshot post we’ll cover a few key areas briefly:
Data
Critical for understanding your customers. Tracking and understanding your customers behaviour online (even prior to their purchase) helps you to get a clearer picture of their wants, needs and desires.
Connectivity and Communication
One of growth hacking strengths is its ability to grow and promote connectivity. That is, building word of mouth. It probably goes without saying that social media is crucial to getting the word out about your brand. Along with connectivity between your audience is communication with your audiences. Email marketing and social media are great trackable ways to connect with your audiences.
Equally, the content that goes into your social media funnel needs to really resonate with your audiences. Creative videos and posts can encourage sharing. But don’t limit yourself to just posts and videos, apps are a great way to get customers engaged. Remember besides humorous content, posts and tools that customers can really use are what get shared the most.
Channels
Your customers are online, for sure. But they are definitely using more than once device to get online. Mobile usage continues to grow fast, don’t forget about this channel when planning growth hacking tactics.
Test, Optimise and Change
One of the great things about growth hacking are the number of tools available to help manage, track and analyse your work. Many of them are free, or with a minimal charge. These tools allow you to get a real heartbeat on your efforts. Great tools mean that A/B testing and optimisation can be managed more easily and readily, which in turn means when things need to change you can make changes fast.
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