Growth marketing is a marketing strategy used to acquire and retain new customers. Many business owners have applied growth marketing with success. But, no two businesses are the same.

So, is growth marketing the right fit for your business?

We hope to help you answer that question in this piece. We will explore:

  • What growth marketing is
  • The difference from other marketing strategies
  • How you can implement it in your business.

What is Growth Marketing?

Growth marketing is a marketing strategy that aims to produce maximum growth using the least resources. It is the sum total of experimental user-focused and tactical marketing methods that bring results and are constantly evolving. 

Think of it as traditional marketing 2.0! You modify traditional marketing strategies with market research and make it user-focused. 

Growth marketing focuses on retaining customers. The goal is to attract new customers and keep them loyal to the brand. Essentially, it is all about building brand loyalty.

Traditional Marketing vs. Growth Marketing

Traditional marketing focuses on selling the brand to customers. It usually has a set budget and fixed timeframe. The goal is to make as many impressions/sales as possible within the set timeline.

Growth marketing is about making the customer identify with the brand. It is a lifelong strategy to integrate the brand into consumers’ lifestyles.

An example of growth marketing is in the Apple customer base. Most people who use an Apple product rarely want to use another brand ‒ it is already a part of their lifestyle. They will go out of their way to convert others into sharing the apple experience.

Growth Hacking vs. Growth Marketing

Growth hacking is a strategy designed to streamline and improve your advertising strategy to increase your ROI. It involves processes like:

  • improving your user experience  
  • offering discounts 
  • special advertisements
  • experimenting with different methods to increase customer engagement.

Growth marketing focuses less on advertising strategies and more on building customer relationships. It seeks to help you create that emotional connection that will make a first-time buyer become a repeat customer.

But, the goal is not just to increase sales. You want to create an environment where your customers make purchases without direct advertisement.

Should You Implement Growth Marketing In Your Business?

Yes! Growth marketing can be the key to unlocking customer loyalty, increasing sales, and accelerating business growth. However, it is not a magic bullet. 

You will still need to carry out traditional marketing and growth hacking to attract more customers. 

If you already have a customer base, you can focus on growth marketing. At this point, your goal is to build a relationship between your business and customers.

Some of the benefits of growth marketing are:

Enhanced brand awareness

Customers are more likely to trust brands they recognize and growth marketing helps you to earn that trust. 

Once potential customers and the general public know about your business, services and the value you create, they will be open to doing business with you. This will increase your brand recognition and help you pitch new products and services without stress. 

Brand Plan
Scalability

Growth marketing allows you to focus on what works rather than blindly spending money on campaigns. 

You can optimize your campaign at different states of the processes based on what works. This means you will be relying on data, A/B testing and campaign outcomes to know where to focus your advertising budget.

Improved return on investment

Growth marketing essentially targets those most likely to connect with your brand. This is the best way to achieve the highest return on investment. 

You have more chances of marketing success by focusing on those who already feel connected with your business. Deepening these connections can turn lukewarm customers into active referrals. The ripple effect can trigger massive growth in sales and brand awareness.

How To Implement Growth Marketing Into Your Business.

There are five stages in growth marketing. These are:

  • Customer acquisition
  • Customer experience
  • Customer retention
  • Customer to referral 
  • Customer revenue
The Customer Acquisition Stage

Before anything, you must understand your target audience. 

Who are your target audiences? How can you connect with them?

Create a customer persona to help you understand your customer behavioral patterns. After this, you want to attract them and generate leads. 

You can use many strategies and channels to generate the right leads. Some of these include:

  • Content marketing: Content marketing is a way to show your expertise in your field, build trust and authority and generate traffic to your websites. You can do this by creating blog posts, online courses, videos, ebooks, and other content that provide information to your audience. If you can’t handle your content marketing, consult a marketing agency for help. 
  • Community: A community is an online meeting place where you and your customers interact and share information. This can be through your social media pages, online group, and forums. 
  • Offer freebies: Everyone likes free things. Offer free tools, trial products, or free consultations to get your audience to subscribe to your email list and generate leads.
  • Use traditional ads: Traditional ads such as social media ads, youtube ads, and PPC advertising can be used at this stage to generate leads.
The Customer Experience Stage

This is the stage where your customers experience your business’ values through your products or services. 

The idea behind this stage is to create a personalized user experience that will turn a one-time purchase into a repeat customer.

You can deliver exceptional customer experience in several ways, including:

  • Optimizing the user experience on your website and other platforms
  • Training your customer service staff to treat customers with understanding and patience
  • Sending our personalized messages and images
  • Offering special treats and discounts
  • Provide welcoming features, products, and services to new customers
  • Improving customer support channels
The Customer Retention Stage

At this stage, you want to retain your existing customers by providing exceptional value, which, in turn, builds customer loyalty. 

The key to retaining customers is to keep them constantly engaged and motivated to take action.

The best way to retain your customers is to give them the best services. Always make them feel special!

You can do this by:

  • Sending personalized emails: Use tools like MailChimp to send personalized emails containing helpful content, support, and offers to your customers. 
  • Retarget customers in advertising campaigns: Retarget consumers who have interacted with your brand before with your campaign. You can use marketing channels like Facebook and Google ads for that. 

You can also use behavioral segmentation to identify leads that have gone cold. Then, use targeted emails and engagement campaigns to identify and resolve the issues that made them go dormant.

  • Offer promotions and reward programs: Reward your repeat customers by offering special discounts, freebies, thank you notes, special access, or products/services specifically tailored to their needs. Many brands also use VIP programs to reward their most loyal customers.
  • Identity and resolve pain points: Identify the key issues your customers face when trying to assess or apply your products and services. Then create a customer support knowledge base or tutorials that help them to resolve these critical issues. 

This will allow you to build brand credibility, deal with issues as they arise and increase customer satisfaction.

The Customer Referral Stage

Referral marketing is one of the best ways to promote your business. People are more likely to purchase products based on a friend’s or loved one’s recommendation. 

You can turn your customers into referrals by rewarding them when they refer others. Here are some tips to make this work:

  • Start a referral program: Offer discounts, vouchers, and freebies to customers who refer their friends.
  • Work with early adopters: Your earliest customers can be your best marketers. This is because they took the initial risk to try out your products and services. Look for the ones still around and design your referral program with them in mind.
  • Use influencers: Social media influencers have a broad reach and dedicated followers. Take advantage of that! Find the top influencers in your niche and work with them.
The Customer Revenue Stage

At this stage, focus on getting the maximum return on investment from your growth marketing efforts. You want to increase customer lifetime value by offering exceptional customer experiences, increasing sales, and boosting retention rates. 

Your goal should be to make the customer lifetime value three times the cost of acquiring those customers. If you executed the previous states correctly, you’re on your way to achieving these. Here are some extra tips to try:

  • Focus on repeat customers
  • Pair popular products with other unknown products to boost attention
  • Experiment with pricing

When carried out properly, growth marketing can take your business growth to greater heights. If this feels like a lot, hire a professional agency to carry out the marketing strategies on your behalf based on your goals and marketing budget. 

Remember, growth marketing can help you turn passive customers into lifestyle purchases and referrals.