What Is Growth Marketing? 5 Things You Need to Know as a Marketing Professional

A person’s attention span is becoming shorter and shorter. Now, it’s even less than that of a goldfish.

Fortunately for businesses, marketing continues to evolve as well.

As old as civilization, marketing remains a critical part of business, with its primary goal staying the same: to move goods from producer to consumer in the fastest possible manner.

Of course, many trends led to numerous changes since the formal concept of marketing was first introduced. Now, marketing professionals must become more creative, engaging, and compelling.

Want to know the latest innovation in marketing? This article discusses five essential facts about growth marketing that professionals taking online marketing courses need to know.

 

Also visit: Marketing jobs in Dubai

 

What Is Growth Marketing? 5 Things You Need to Know as a Marketing Professional

1.  What is growth marketing?

Growth marketing updates traditional marketing with additional layers. Besides advertising and sales, it also entails using SEO, A/B testing, data-driven email marketing, user experience (UX) analysis, and other types of campaigns.

Essentially, growth marketing uses these campaigns to gather and analyze data and get insights to help businesses achieve significant and sustainable growth.

With growth marketing, you’ll have a shorter innovation cycle and won’t have to rely on extended efforts. Instead, you can use just-in-time and micro-campaigns that immediately respond to the needs of your target audience at the current moment.

For each campaign or content, you’ll get answers to the following questions that will help you realign your marketing efforts more efficiently:

• Who is your target audience?
• What are their pain points, and how much are they willing to pay to get those resolved?
• How often and deeply do they interact with your product or service?

Furthermore, the “growth” in growth marketing can mean various things, such as:

• More service users or product consumers
• Increased revenue
• Name recognition or better brand reputation

In growth marketing, the trick is to start small.

Once you’ve gathered more information on what campaigns are most effective for the business, you focus your efforts on those instead of maintaining the marketing status quo that isn’t yielding as much result as you want.

After a while, you can already determine how much budget you can devote to specific campaigns and achieve the greatest growth the company desires.

 

2.  How does it differ from traditional marketing?

As mentioned earlier, growth marketing employs a more layered approach than traditional marketing. But that’s not the only difference between the two.

Traditional marketing relies more on tried-and-tested techniques. This includes holding a sale, sending out email blasts, and running advertising campaigns on various platforms (e.g., TV, radio, print, and even Google Ads).

But while this approach can get some results, it tends to diminish over time. This is especially true if you keep on using the same strategy even as consumer interests and trends change.

On the other hand, growth marketing experiments on different tactics and channels. It constantly optimizes tests to determine the best use of the company’s resources and marketing budget.

 

3.  Is growth hacking the same as growth marketing?

While they are usually used interchangeably, “growth hacking” and “growth marketing” are not the same. Read on to learn the subtle differences between the two roles.

• Growth hackers are considered expert consultants who solve specific problems fast. They find creative solutions for tough problems with limited resources and budget. For them, speed is crucial since they find solutions to problems that needed solving yesterday.
• In contrast, growth marketers take the long-term approach. They strategize across various channels and find ways to do marketing sustainably. Their task is to scale various growth metrics across many dimensions.

 

4.  Who needs growth marketing?

Companies that hire growth marketing strategists aim not only to increase their sales but also to expand their market share.

Most firms that build growth marketing teams are emerging tech startups or established giants that aim for a higher market share.

Among the companies that successfully implement growth marketing today are:

• Facebook
• Google
• Amazon

 

5.  What makes a great growth marketing strategist?

A marketing professional needs certain skills to succeed in growth marketing.

Besides undergoing growth marketing training, there are certain qualities you need to possess to become an excellent growth marketing strategist.

You’re set to be great in this field of marketing if you are:

 

Driven by data

Growth marketing is data-driven, which means a professional in this field should also be focused on what the trends have to say rather than people’s gut feeling. They also don’t base their decisions on the highest-paid person’s opinion.

Today, modern growth marketers dig deep into data to get insights on the best strategies that work at that given time. They also learn to use tools that make data analysis easier.

 

Creative

The most successful growth marketers think outside the box. Their creativity is unmatched, and they never shy away from things that have never been done before.

This quality is what made Airbnb’s admirable growth efforts successful. While trying to expand their market share, they came up with the idea of providing complementary professional photography to the people listing on their site. Now, they’re more popular than ever.

 

Focused on the product

Every great sales professional knows that the key to selling a product is to understand it well. Since growth marketers have the same goal, the same rule applies.

Your goal should be to let people understand the value of the product you’re marketing. You can do this by shedding light on all its benefits that you believe will help consumers.

 

Not afraid to fail

Failed experiments are a good use of time, money, and effort. In fact, they are the fastest way you gain useful information that could help you find the best marketing strategy for your company.

As a growth marketing professional, you shouldn’t be afraid to fail. Instead, you should welcome these mistakes and consider them stepping stones to success.

 

A storyteller

Once you’ve gathered all the data, your next task is to showcase them in a way that will engage your target audience. You can do this by weaving them into compelling, relatable stories that resonate with the consumers.

 

A jack of all trades

Growth marketers must also be a jack of all trades. From gathering and analyzing data and conducting A/B testing to creating engaging copies and videos and doing some coding, you need to have a varied skill set to offer the most value to your organization.

 

Start Your Journey in Growth Marketing

Growth marketing is becoming a widely sought skill in sales and marketing. Begin your journey in this dynamic industry with the right knowledge and perception, and you should be able to become one of the greats in no time.