Growth Hacking Techniques, Disruptive Technology – How 40 Companies Made It BIG, by Robert Peters
This is my second book on growth hacking (go me!) and I’m feeling like my understanding of this subject has definitely improved. What this book did well was the examples – loads of 
them.
A few thoughts if you’re thinking of getting this one:
- I thought there would be much more ‘explanation’ in the book. There isn’t. It’s really one chapter on the mindset and then the rest is all examples.
- It’s also quite short. I read 50% of it in a lunch-break. This might be a bonus for you until you realise that the price tag is still similar to other longer books ($10 on kindle).
Those two minor-moans aside, I really did enjoy all the case studies of strategies that ‘real’ companies have implemented.
The key themes for me across the companies were; sharing, referrals, building the marketing into the product design and making it exclusive e.g. beta invites.
For those wondering what (or who) a growth hacker is… Are they coders? Are they marketers? An amazing hybrid? According to the author they could be brilliant at both, but that as he rightly says these people ‘are about as common as mythical unicorns!”
5 tips on adopting a growth hacker mindset
(headings = mine, quotes directly from the book)
1. Consider a freemium model to entice the early adopters
“… Evernote works on a “freemium” model. Users receive access to free, basic service at sign up with an option to upgrade, with more features and storage space.”
2. Get obsessed with metrics and details
“Every two weeks the company tests its site design, user experience, and other features with A/B testing through Kissmetrics.”
3. Focus on the tribe
“Building that army of passionate, loyal users is today’s version of branding.”
4. Build marketing into the product (aka DropBox)
“Growth hackers don’t see marketing as an activity, per se, but a fundamental aspect of how a product or service is designed and built.”
5. Create a strong referral system
“Not surprisingly then, referrals are a strong growth engine. Each user receives an assigned referral code. If a new user signs up with the code, both parties are awarded $10 toward their next Uber ride.”
Happy reading,
C x
p.s. if you like this growth hacking stuff then the other book I have read is Ryan Holiday’s Growth Hacker Marketing, he uses similar examples to this book (hotmail, AirBnb) but has a bit more explanation as to how the craze (or term) came about.
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