15 Growth Marketing Strategies That Actually Work! (With Tips and Examples)

Everyone’s following the same old playbook in their GTM journey - blogs, ads, and a dash of page optimization. But is that truly enough to thrive in a dynamic market where product presence is fleeting and cost sensitivity reigns supreme? 

Not quite. 

The need of the hour is to experiment and explore new horizons - to test and uncover the audience’s preferences and understand the triggers that guide clicks from one point to another. 

Enter growth marketing - your guiding force for captivating prospects, leaving them wanting more, and fostering unwavering customer loyalty. What strategies can you deploy to stand out in a competitive market? 

In this article, you'll find a toolbox of powerful strategies to craft compelling narratives, make data-driven decisions, and create unforgettable customer experiences. 

Are you ready? Let's dive in and uncover the strategies that will fuel your business's success!

What is Growth Marketing?

Growth marketing is an evidence-based approach to attracting and retaining customers by anticipating their needs and constantly experimenting with ways to serve them better.

In other words, unlike traditional marketing, which focuses only on converting a lead to a customer, growth marketing focuses on both customer acquisition and retention. Growth marketers do this by taking a full-funnel approach, serving your customers at each stage of the funnel in the best possible way so they stay loyal to your brand.

Growth-centered marketing efforts go beyond mere growth hacking for customer acquisition - they also focus on metrics like customer engagement, and customer retention rate. The objectives of growth marketing are three-fold:

1. Boost lead generation
2. Boost lead conversion
3. Boost customer retention & lifetime value

With its foundations in strategic thinking, long-term growth thrives on a set of key components. Let's take a look at a few of the aspects of growth marketing that your strategy should include.

15 Growth Marketing Strategies Experts Recommend 

Product-Based 

Product-based growth marketing leverages the product itself as a driver of growth. By focusing on providing a remarkable product experience, you can foster organic growth and enable data-driven decision-making to ensure your ongoing success in the market. Let’s dive into a few specific strategies that can help you do this. 

1. Offer Free Trials or a Freemium Option 

Simon Bacher, CEO and Co-Founder of the Ling App, suggests: 

"One of the most effective growth marketing strategies I can recommend is offering free stuff to grow customer lifetime value organically. Here at Ling, we offer free language tutorials to give prospects a chance to learn how our product works. We educate people about learning new languages in a fun way using gamified content through our website and app. It’s also a way for us to build long-lasting customer relationships, foster loyalty, and create advocacy. This growth marketing strategy has boosted our download rate by 200 percent to date." 

Why this growth strategy works 

Milo Cruz, CMO at Freelance Writing Jobs explains why: 

"Providing a taste of your product without financial commitment reduces the barriers to entry and encourages prospects to experience the value firsthand. Free trials also allow individuals to assess the benefits, functionality, and fit of your offering before making a purchasing decision. This builds trust, nurtures confidence, and increases your conversion opportunities." 

2. A/B Testing for Optimization

Drift, a chat widget for websites, attracts interested visitors with its "Powered by Drift" tagline at the bottom of chats. Clicking on it led to the Drift homepage, where users could learn more and sign up. To optimize for user experience, the team at Drift A/B tested two landing page variations: the original homepage and a stripped-down version. The simplified page, featuring just a headline and sign-up button, brought them a threefold increase in conversion rate. This focused approach helped users stay on track with their intention of exploring and implementing the Drift widget on their own websites. 

Why this growth strategy works

• Optimizes future marketing campaigns and reduces the risk of going wrong next time
• Helps you enhance product experience and performance, with every a/b test outcome pushing you to make a product decision that users will respond to favorably
• Allows for further user segmentation to get more qualified leads

3. Interactive Product Tours

Ignition is the world’s first client engagement and commerce platform for professional services businesses - and they recognized the importance of showcasing their product's value to those who prefer to experience it firsthand before committing. 

Check it Out👇

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Using a demo automation platform like Storylane, Ignition engaged prospects through interactive product demos on their website, resulting in high-intent prospects and increased trial signups. The integration also provided valuable data insights, leading to significant growth in leads and a 10% improvement in trial conversions. They also used Storylane to create demo-leave behinds to nurture prospects in outreach campaigns and follow up with them more effectively based on the engagement they saw on these demos.

Want to see how they used Storylane demos to convert up to 10% of their leads? Check this out: 

Why this growth strategy works

• Turns more website visitors into leads 
• Gets buyers to experience the product before committing 
• Engagement metrics help your outreach campaigns - you’ll be able to understand prospect intent better after analyzing their interaction with the demo leave-behind 

4. Partnerships

Let's talk about something that changed the way we listen to music forever: Spotify's partnership with Facebook. It started way back in 2011, and they continue to mutually benefit from it even over 10 years later. 

This strategic alliance was clearly a successful growth marketing strategy that boosted Spotify's reputation and solidified its position as the ultimate music platform within the massive community of the world's biggest social network. 

Why this growth strategy works

• Helps you build credibility and expand with ease 
• Develop mutually beneficial solutions that make product onboarding and usage more seamless - like Heap does with their Partner Ecosystem 
• Offering to supplement front-facing agencies with enablement and tech gives way to a B2B referral program that brings quality leads - like Shogun does with their Agency Partner Program  

Customer-obsessed

Customer is king - and offering the most value to them is a core component of growth marketing. Here are several customer-facing growth strategies you can employ: 

5. Community Building

Lemlist is an impressive success story here, going from $0 to $6 million ARR in just three years. Their go-to-market strategy is remarkable: They've generated buzz and built a loyal community, with their Email Outreach Family Facebook group at 21K members before they made the shift to a different platform (lemlist family) where they've refined the community even more. It started when, during his discovery calls, co-founder and CEO Guillaume Moubeche realized that the people he was talking to shared similar struggles. To help more customers and prospects with these issues, he built the Lemlist community. This also became a source of content for Lemlist - they picked up popular topics from the community to write problem-solving articles and shared them back with the community - creating a feedback loop that Moubeche calls the ‘growth circle of love’. Lemlist understands the value of meaningful customer connections - and it's paid off for them with loyal advocates ready to spread the word about their products and services. 

Why this growth strategy works

• Meaningful customer connections help with higher customer loyalty 
• An active and engaged customer base is likely to ensure better retention rates 
• Allows for direct communication with customers 

6. Personalized Onboarding

Personalized marketing is a game-changer. Let's take a look at how ConvertKit (email marketing platform) personalized their welcome screen. Right from the start, they ask users what they want to achieve. If you mention that you're switching from a particular tool, they'll provide you with options and customize the instructions to help you make the transition smoothly and quickly. The key here is tailoring the onboarding experience to each user's specific goal. 

Why this growth strategy works

• Personalization accelerates time-to-value for prospects, which cuts acquisition costs by half 
• Offering solutions tailored to the customer contributes to a positive experience, thus increasing retention and boosting revenue by up to 15%
• By delivering a relevant and customized user experience, you can engage customers on a deeper level and make marketing spend 30% more efficient 

7. Referrals

Dropbox nailed it with their "refer-a-friend" program. Here's how it worked: they offered users 500MB free storage space as an incentive for referring friends to join Dropbox - and the friends got 500MB free as well! 

The result? Exponential user growth that skyrocketed their success. From a modest user base of 100K in September 2008, they started doubling their user count every three months. By April 2010, they had sent out a staggering 2.8M invites. Within just 15 months, their registered user count skyrocketed to 4M, marking a phenomenal 3900% growth. 

It's a brilliant example of how a well-designed referral program can be a game-changer for a company's growth.

Why this growth strategy works

• Recommendations from friends and family are more trustworthy to new consumers than advertising 
• Leverage word-of-mouth marketing by offering rewards to happy customers for referring you to others 
• Rewards offered to both the person referring and the person joining through the referral - creating viable leads for your brand 

8. Loyalty/Rewards Programs

Mailchimp has a cool insider program just for freelance marketing experts and agencies.

So, what's in it for the marketing pros? They reward these professionals with exclusive perks, expertise, and access to events in exchange for managing their clients' business through Mailchimp. It's a win-win collaboration that benefits both parties.

Why this growth strategy works

• Offering job-enhancing rewards is a win-win situation for all parties involved 
• Provides priority customer support to loyal customers 
• Serves as a platform to identify potential partners in the future 
• Keeps engaged customers coming back for more 

9. Testimonials and Case Studies

Harnessing the power of customer testimonials and case studies is crucial - when customers not only endorse your products or services but also lend their face or voice to the promotion, it adds an extra layer of authenticity. 

Salesforce has been around forever, and so have its powerful customer testimonials. It's a testament to the value of building strong connections and empowering customers to advocate for your brand. 

Why this growth strategy works

• Buyers are more likely to make a purchasing decision after reading a trustworthy review 
• Excellent way of boosting your product's credibility and connecting with the target audience 
• Enhances community building and loyal customer base 

10. Virtual Events and Webinars

Toplyne's effectively implemented this recently with their on-demand webinar series by their community Bottoms Up. Every week, they drop an email to your inbox with an attention-grabbing title like 'Got any plans for next Tuesday?', and share a registration link for their weekly webinar - where they feature B2B SaaS industry leaders and successful growth marketers to discuss their growth trajectories. 

Why this growth strategy works

• Provides your brand a platform to position itself as a thought leader with industry expertise, deliver value, and establish credibility and trust
• Helps accelerate quality lead generation and networking by allowing you to tailor events to attract and engage with your ideal customer profile
• Increased accessibility for a global audience while having a lower cost of production than an in-person traditional marketing event 
• Generates valuable content directly from industry leaders, and its lifespan and reach can be increased by repurposing into on-demand videos, blog posts, social media snippets, podcast episodes, etc 

Content and Narrative-Based 

11. Storytelling

Customers want to feel a connection to your business - and storytelling can do wonders for forging such a connection. 

Lemlist, for example, understood this early on and created a documentary-like series called 'lemroad' to share their startup journey. By familiarizing customers with the brand and its story, Lemlist was able to lay down the foundation for their community building activities. It was like a “be part of our journey from scratch” kind of moment. 

Why this growth strategy works

• Helps you connect with your audience on a deeper level 
• Drives loyalty forged from a sense of connection with the brand or product 
• Keeps audience engaged, and high engagement with your content establishes credibility for your brand 

12. Video Marketing

Video has been on the rise since around 2014. One of the most iconic examples of video marketing that went viral is Hootsuite's 'A Game of Social Thrones'. As avid Game of Thrones fans, the HootSuite team decided to tap into the show's popularity and created a video inspired by its iconic opening sequence. They cleverly drew parallels between the show's themes and what HootSuite offers for businesses, highlighting the management of different social networks as a battle. Fans instantly connected with the video, and within hours of its release, it gained thousands of likes and shares on social media. With over 1.3M views now, it's one of HootSuite's most successful content pieces to date - and it helped them tap into a whole new market of GoT fans. What's more, the reach of the video was amplified by social sharing - which helped them maintain a low CAC for the campaign. 

Why this growth strategy works

• Engage with your audience where they are - on their preferred social media platforms, like TikTok, Instagram Reels, and YouTube Shorts, capitalizing on short-form content and connecting with them through universally-understood themes. 
• Video content is engaging, informative, and can be entertaining too - making it a great way to empower and inform customers, connect with them, and establish their interest in your product 
• Video is a flexible medium for growth marketing teams with any budget size 
• Leverages the power of social sharing and the potential of virality 

13. LinkedIn and Social Media

LinkedIn is the go-to social network for B2B interactions. Gong is a particularly good example of this - they recognized early on that LinkedIn was the perfect platform to connect with their target audience.

Their goal of reaching 100,000 followers on LinkedIn was achieved by sharing valuable informational content, hosting webinars, and utilizing LinkedIn as the top-of-the-funnel platform. LinkedIn became a powerful engine for Gong, driving email campaigns and events. Overall, their LinkedIn strategy has raised awareness and had a great impact on their growth and popularity - Gong ranked #1 on G2’s (a platform driven by active customer reviews) ‘Top 100 Best Software Products’ in both 2021 and 2022. 

Why this growth strategy works

• LinkedIn is an excellent space for community building, networking, and establishing a presence as an industry leader 
• Social media makes it easier for brands to identify, engage, and connect with qualified leads

14. SEO Blogs

Veed was established in 2019. Since then:

• They reached 500K monthly visitors and achieved $1 million ARR in just a year.
• Their focus on SEO-friendly content earned them the featured snippet position on Google SERP. 

By prioritizing organic SEO growth and building a satisfied user community, Veed has achieved impressive success.

Why this growth strategy works

• Using an intent funnel for SEO keywords means that you're attracting quality leads and guiding them through the purchasing funnel with blog content 
• Increases visibility online through ranking or featured snippets - bringing in a lot more traffic to your website 

15. Gated Content  

When it comes to content marketing, Hubspot is king: few others come close to the amount of free resources that Hubspot offers. They have a repository of:

• E-books, guides
• Free courses and certifications on Hubspot Academy
• Tons of free tools - like Make My Persona, Website Grader, Marketing Plan Generator, and more 

... and all you need to do is fill a lead gen form giving them your email id and company details in order to access them. 

Why this growth strategy works

• Likely to generate more high-quality, high-intent leads - the exclusivity and perceived value of gated content makes interested visitors (leads) more willing to share their details in exchange for valuable information  
• Builds content expertise and brand credibility 
• Gives you a lot of insights into potential customers and ICP behavior when you track the performance of the gated content 
• Can be used as a collaborative tool to co-create reports, e-books, or courses with complementary brands and reach a whole new audience 

Also, check out guide to marketing enablement

What to Include in Your Growth Marketing Strategy

1. A Comprehensive Customer Journey Map 

Blake Smith, Growth Marketing Manager at ClockOn, says:  

"When I'm building a growth marketing strategy, I always include a comprehensive customer journey map. This helps me visualize the entire customer experience, from the initial touchpoint to conversion and beyond. It also makes it easy for stakeholders outside the marketing team to comprehend the strategy. These people are particularly helpful in refining and expanding ideas with their unique perspective." 

2. A Strategic Framework  

The most popular one is AARRR - it's a roadmap that leads you through the vital stages of Acquisition, Activation, Retention, Referral, and Revenue. 

To put this strategy into action, the general advice is to focus on the channels that deliver the most impactful results at each stage. The key factors to consider are conversion rates, the volume of potential customers attracted, and the cost-effectiveness of operating those channels. 

But AARRR is just one example - here are a few others: 

• Lean Analytics Stages 
• Nir Eyal's Hooked Model 
• Jonah Berger's (author of Contagious: Why Things Catch On) STEPPS Framework 

And some newer ones: 

• In The Know's 3-Step Framework
• CrowdTamers' 7-Step Process
• Growthmentor's 90-day strategy

5 Tips to Inspire Your Growth Marketing Strategy

In a world where businesses are constantly vying for the customer's attention, it's essential to have a solid plan in place. That's why we've put together this list of expert tips that will inspire and transform your approach to growth marketing. Let's dive in: 

1. You Are Not Your Customer 

Morris Isaacson, EVP of Marketing and Sales at Empeon, suggests: 

"You are not your customer! Always always give yourself a reality test – you might think your customer consumes your marketing material in a certain order or through a certain medium, you will almost always be surprised if you take the time to ask and poke through the data to see what is really happening. 99 times out of 100 your prospective customer didn’t wake up in the morning saying to her/himself – “How can I get me some more of that brand’s message?!”"

2. Find Your Purple Cow 

John Butterworth, Head of SEO at Viddyoze, says: 

"My best advice, inspired by Seth Godin, is to find your "Purple Cow."

In a world full of brown cows, a purple cow stands out. They're remarkable, extraordinary, and catch people's attention. In the same way, your product or service must be unique, remarkable, and worth talking about. Take the time to analyze your offering and identify what makes it truly special. 

Whether it's a groundbreaking feature, a disruptive approach, or an exceptional user experience, find that element that sets you apart from the competition and make that the focus of every marketing asset you create. This is how you carve your real estate in the marketplace."

3. Repurpose Content: Cross-Channel Marketing 

Nat Miletic, owner and CEO of Clio Websites, suggests: 

"Leverage content repurposing to meet the demands of multiple marketing channels in your growth marketing strategy. Diversifying your marketing channels and complex marketing funnels is the first step, and it needs a great deal of content. Creating fresh content is resource-intensive and takes time. To maximize their value, use old or existing content, update them, and repurpose them into other formats like short-form videos, podcasts, or infographics.

It's a great way to keep multiple marketing channels going consistently as your growth marketing strategy moves forward. Introducing other formats helps attract new people and keep your existing audience engaged."

4. Taking a Microscopic v/s Telescopic Perspective 

Nebojsa Savicic, Co-Founder at Plainly, says: 

"What I advocate and what I think is important when setting goals is to take a microscopic and telescopic perspective. A microscopic perspective helps you see things at a granular level and set short-term goals. A telescopic perspective allows you to see the bigger picture, set long-term goals, and organize growth experiments so that little by little you get closer to the long-term goal." 

5. Avoid Logical Fallacies 

Nebojsa also suggests, from experience, a few common logical fallacies that you should avoid: 

• The Ostrich Effect involves consciously avoiding negative information because the thought of having made a mistake is unpleasant or even unbearable. This is something that can threaten your growth strategy because the entire point is to face the fact your experiment has failed and try something different.
• Confirmation bias is also a dangerous logical fallacy where we subconsciously select from all available data the ones that confirm our point of view or hypothesis. In the context of your growth marketing strategy, it can be quite disastrous because you will not interpret the results you have achieved in the right way.

How Storylane Can Help With Your Growth Marketing

Showcasing your product's key features in action can be a game-changer for your growth marketing strategy, and that's where Storylane comes in. It's a user-friendly, no-code interactive product demo software that empowers you to create engaging demos effortlessly. With interactive product demos, you can reach users throughout the entire customer journey - from the awareness stage and lead generation, and all the way to the end of their journey, to the onboarding stage. 

Bring your product to life with a few drag-and-drop actions👇

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• Create a demo in 10 minutes: You can create a fully functional product demo in no time. It's so easy that you'll be up and running in just about 10 minutes!
• Make personalized product tours: Say goodbye to manual sandbox environments. Storylane enables you to create personalized tours that give potential customers a comprehensive look and feel of your product.
• Create different flows for multiple use cases/personas: With unique step-by-step flows, users can embark on their own adventures within your product. It adds a touch of gamification to the onboarding process, making it even more engaging.

In the fiercely competitive SaaS industry, demo automation can be the secret weapon in your marketing arsenal.