What are some of the world’s most experienced marketers saying about Growth Marketing?
Mike Volpe | Angel Investor & Former CMO, HubSpot: “Growth marketing is removing the boundaries of marketing to enable every aspect of the customer experience to focus on attracting more engaged customers.”
Sean Ellis | Founder & CEO, GrowthHackers.com: “For meaningful growth, startups must completely change the rules of traditional channels or innovate outside of those growth channels. They are too desperate and disadvantaged to adapt to the old rules of marketing. They have to dig deep creatively, and relentlessly test new ideas. If they don’t figure it out quickly, they will go out of business.”
Andy Johns | VP Growth, Wealthfront: “Finance owns the flow of cash in and out of a company. Growth owns the flow of customers in and out of a product.”
Chamath Palihapitiya | CEO, Social Capital: “Growth starts with a deep understanding of product value and is about moving new users to the Aha! moment as quickly as possible, measurable in seconds.”
How is Growth Marketing Different from Traditional Marketing?
It’s a simple difference with far-reaching effects. Traditional marketing is focused on lead generation while growth marketing focusses on the entire customer life-cycle.
Traditionally, marketers use a number of lead generation strategies and tactics to get your phones ringing and your mailboxes pinging.
What happens after that is up to you.
Marketers have realised that this isn’t enough. We can use the same insights learnt while getting to know your ideal customers to make sure that they are happy throughout their journey with your company.
We do this by working with the departments in your business to improve the way that they contribute to a customer’s experience with your brand.
Why?
Because generating thousands of new leads is great (and necessary) for growth but also pointless when thousands of those leads aren’t:
- Converting into sales
- Staying converted (customer retention)
- Converting multiple times (repeat business)
- Telling their friends to convert (referrals)
Picture this:
You’ve spent thousands of pounds acquiring new customers. Your sales team has created the “wow factor” during on-boarding and most of your new customers are duly delighted.
Who in your company interacts with them next? Most likely it’s your value delivery squad.
If you’re a financial services business this means your brokers or accountants.
If you’re a product-based business this means your dispatch and logistics team.
Or, if you’re a digital agency like us, this means your team of online marketing specialists.
We speak to a few of your new customers and realise that your value isn’t being delivered in a way that makes your customers happy.
You take our info and improve your value delivery systems, towards a desired outcome. Whether that means more training for your staff, better platforms, or a digital brand activation depends on evidence based on qualitative, quantitative, comparative and competitive data which we contextualise and communicate with the right creative across the right media platforms
In so doing, you plug a leak that was eroding the “wow factor” that your marketing and sales efforts create during on-boarding.
Then we move to the next customer touchpoint.
Maybe it’s your accounts department.
After receiving unsatisfactory service, your new customers are now subjected to incorrect invoice amounts or hostile debtors’ clerks, perhaps cold and abrupt email communications.
Your stock with them falls further.
Down the line, your product or service doesn’t perform up to scratch and your (by now, super-miffed) customer goes through a tedious and combative guarantee/warranty process.
Why This is Bad For You
Unless you are suppling commodities that can’t be purchased elsewhere, wave goodbye to this customer and the money you spent just to put them through this ordeal.
That’s not all you lose either, what about:
- The repeat business?
- The referral business?
- Or the priceless testimonials and 5-star reviews?
In fact, you will probably get negative reviews, negative word-of-mouth and be referring business to your competition – which will end up costing you more to get leads in the first place!
So, Should You Employ Growth Marketing in Your Business?
We think so.
The common scenario above is what leads business owners to believe that marketing doesn’t work and it’s why marketers have seen the need to do more than generate qualified leads –
We need to be growth marketers.
We need to follow your customers through their journey with your company to make sure that they are as happy as they can be.
What Results Can You Expect from Growth Marketing?
- Increased Life-Time-Value of your customers
- Lower cost per acquisition
- More “free” leads from referrals
- Happier customers to engage with
- Improved efficiency of your business systems
- Better paid advertising metrics
AND, everything else that you would usually expect from traditional marketing campaigns.
That’s because growth marketers are still marketers, just a lot more laser- focused and have evolved to adapt to the changing needs of our clients.
If you see the need for a growth marketer in your business get in touch. We have long been shouting about the need for growth marketing and would love to chat more about how we could improve the performance and outcomes of your campaigns.
