10 growth hacks you’re already doing

You are already a growth hacker.

You might not think you are, you might not even know what growth hacking means, but chances are, you’re probably already doing it.

Unlike traditional marketers, growth hackers only care about one thing. You guessed it – growth. Generally speaking, growth hackers think up unconventional ways to increase growth for startups who aren’t ready for, or simply can’t afford, full-blown marketing yet. If you’ve ever done anything (or tried to do something) that has got you an extra customer, lead, sale, page view or increased almost any other desirable metric, you have growth hacked. Congratulations.

Still not following? Never fear. Here are 10 growth hacks you’re probably already doing…

1. You put your website link in your email signature

Do you include a link to your website in your email signature? Why do you do it? Because every single person you email will be exposed to your brand and your website.

One of the best examples of email signature growth hacking is Apple who automatically add “sent from my iPhone” to your email signature when you send an email from your phone. Don’t forget Hotmail who saw massive growth after automatically adding “P.S. Get your free email at Hotmail” to the email signature of all their users.

Try being creative with your email signature and see how much traffic you can drive to your site.

2. You’ve integrated with another product

Product integration can certainly be seen as a growth hack. After all, forming a mutually beneficial relationship with another company can cost nothing but can result in massive user growth.

By teaming up with another company, you can essentially piggy-back off their traffic. Think PayPal and eBay, Facebook and Zynga. PayPal and Zynga were able to pair up with much larger companies (eBay and Facebook) and have since become household names.

3. You’re using social proof

If you’re using any kind of social proof, you’re growth hacking.

What do I mean by social proof? Anything that shows potential customers that other people are already buying your product or service. Displaying reviews, testimonials and clients’ logos on your site will reassure customers making them more likely to buy from you.

4. You offer rewards for referrals

Have you ever offered your users something for recommending you to a friend? It’s a classic growth hack that’s helped a number of startups and is still used by larger corporations.

Think how Virgin Media will give you a discount or Dropbox will offer you more memory when you recommend a friend.

When done right, rewards for referrals cost next to nothing but will encourage every user to become a brand ambassador.

5. You do content marketing

If you’re doing content marketing right then you’re creating quality content with the aim of attracting relevant traffic to your website, increasing conversions or improving any other KPI you’ve identified as important to your business. This is growth hacking.

Combine the essentials of content marketing and growth hacking to get the most out of your strategy.

6. You’ve A/B tested your landing page (or any page!)

A/B testing is one of the fundamentals of growth hacking. A/B testing allows you to test assumptions and make tweaks to your product or website based on what is more effective with your customers/visitors.

If you haven’t already tried A/B testing your landing page then you should probably start right now.

7. You react in “real time”

Reacting to events in realtime, on social media or your blog, is a common growth hack most us of have been using for years. Joining conversations about current events takes minutes and makes us more visible to our target audience gaining us extra followers, pageviews and maybe even sales.

8. You recommend related content

Recommending related content is one of the simplest ways to encourage readers to stay on your site and ideally buy more from you. Think Amazon’s “Customers who bought this item also bought” feature or links to related articles on news websites.

9. You’ve run a competition

Competitions are classic growth hacks. It can cost you next to nothing to run a competition but it can help you expose your brand to thousands of potential new customers and collect their email addresses so you can start selling.

10. You’ve run a drip campaign

A “drip campaign” is when you set up a series of automated emails that go out to users at certain intervals after they’ve given you their email address. You can use drip campaigns to encourage people to subscribe to your service or help them get started when they’ve already signed up.

If you’re selling a SaaS product, a drip campaign can be your best friend, especially if you’re seeing a number of users unsubscribe without really giving your product a chance.

DON’T FORGET TO MEASURE

What makes growth hackers so important is that they measure everything and use these metrics to adapt their methods.

Make sure you measure the results of all of your growth hacks so you know exactly what is and isn’t working for you.

Don’t be afraid to be creative and don’t be discouraged when something doesn’t work. Simply scrap it and try something else.