Growth marketing is a digital marketing tactic that involves targeting potential customers with online ads and other digital communications that encourages them to take a particular action. These actions can be anything from checking out a company’s website to signing up for a mailing list or making another purchase.
A growth marketer is someone who helps companies identify and meet new customers, partners, and suppliers. These individuals are the ones that leverage their networks, expertise, and knowledge of target markets to help companies achieve their growth objectives. If you’ve ever browsed through your favorite clothing store and come across their “New Arrivals” page, you’ve experienced growth marketing in action. Retailers use it to target potential customers who recently made purchases (and hopefully will make more in the future).
That’s the idea behind this article. We’ll be explaining what growth marketing is, the types of growth marketers, and how to become one yourself.
Growth marketing is a strategy that helps companies identify, meet, and satisfy their customers. It’s not a specific type of digital marketing. Instead, it’s a strategy that can be used in any digital medium, such as email, digital ads, or websites to attract, engage, and retain customers by finding out who they are and what they might want. Companies use growth marketing to grow their businesses.
There are two main types of growth marketing: customer acquisition and customer retention.
Customer acquisition is when companies find out who their customers are and target them. This can be done by asking customers for their email addresses, registering them for a webinar or deminar, logging them into a survey, or purchasing a product and then leaving a review. After gaining an understanding of their customers, companies can then use a variety of marketing tactics to get them to take action, including making an offer they find appealing.
Customer retention is when companies keep their customers. Companies can also use growth marketing to generate new leads and sales.
When companies want to hire a growth marketer, they typically look for someone who has experience in a particular vertical, has a strong network, and has strong business and people skills. Most importantly in today's market is that they find someone who has strong technical skills and growth hacking will be needed. In other words, someone who can stitch systems together the get results.
One of the best ways to find a growth marketer is by attending conferences and events that cater to digital marketers. You can also ask other marketers who they’d recommend, and look online for profiles or reviews of past engagements. You’ll want to find a growth marketer who has experience in your industry or that is focused on your vertical. If you’re a startup, you may want to look for a growth marketer who has experience working with startups.
Email marketing is often used for customer acquisition. It can either be used to drive signups for a new mailing list or to send customers updates about new products or deals. Another type of marketing tactic is email retargeting. This is when companies send a customer an email about something related to their purchase, but the ad doesn’t close. Instead of clicking away, the customer retains their position and is served an ad from the business or from a partner. Companies use retargeting to show customers ads that are specifically tailored to their past purchase history.
One of the best ways to know if you’ve hired a growth marketer is to look at the results you are getting connected to the value they are invoicing you. Typical returns should add up to between 3-5X the costs at the bottom of their invoice. Many growth marketers will bill their clients on a per-engagement basis. This will usually be the case if a company is hiring a consultant to work on a project.
Growth marketing is essentially about driving specific results for your business. With the help of digital growth marketing tactics and growth hacking, you can attract new customers, build awareness of your brand, and increase your sales.
Now that you know what growth marketing is and the types of growth marketing tactics, you can discover how to apply them to your business. When you find someone (even if it's not SMURKE) you think could help your business grow, reach out to them immediately.