🎯 Ditch the Funnel! Why Growth Loops Reign Supreme.

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In this edition we dive into the captivating world of growth loops and how they outshine traditional marketing funnels. Get ready to unravel the secrets behind sustainable and scalable growth strategies.

This episode at a glance;

• Core Concept → Fundamentals of Growth Loops

• Real World → How the best in the world do it

• Founders’ Secrets → Growth talk from the front line

• New and Trending → Handpicked dopamine hits

🚀 Core Concept → Growth Loops

Growth loops replace traditional marketing funnels.

We all know about funnels. You probably use them every day in marketing. The issue is that funnels are linear. They always require you to put more customers in the top to grow your customer base.

More media, more sales calls, more money.

But, this is now how the fastest growing companies think about growth, and I want you to be one of them.

Growth loops work to create a self-sustaining cycle of growth.

Let’s break that down;

Loops work by creating a cycle. E.g. when someone takes an action on your website, or uses your product, it creates a output that brings more people into your product.

👉 When someone is "tagged” in a product like Airtable or Google Sheets they receive an email inviting a new user to join.

👉 When someone receives a box of Huel in the post, they are invited to share the product with a friend for money off their next order.

👉 When someone receives a Beauty Pie subscription box, they are invited to #postyourpie on social media, meaning that more people see it (free advertising).

Each of these have carefully crafted messaging and incentives to enable the products to grow in a loop. The more people who use the product, the more people share, the more using the product, and so on.

Loops are the difference between linear growth and exponential growth, and are the focuses of the world’s best growth teams.

💡 KEY IDEA: Think about what products have you shared recently. Why did you do it? It’s most likely because of something built into the product to encourage you. That’s a growth loop.

🌎 How the best companies do it

Remember, Growth Loops happen when the actions of one user create an output which create a new user.

It’s important to always start with what your data is telling you. Where are the most promising areas that you could build a loop in your business?

There are a number of different loop types you can use for inspiration;

1) Viral Loops

Inherent Virality - Some products improve when you have more users. E.g. more fun, more useful. So people have a personal incentive to invite their friends.

e.g. Fantasy football, Slack, Airtable, Facebook

Social Virality - Some products are just so good or interesting that people share them. There is a WOW factor to the product, or some social capital gained from sharing.

e.g. ChatGPT, Gymshark, Instagram

Incentivised Virality - As it sounds, this involves providing rewards or incentives to get their friends to use the product. This could be monetary, improved features (e.g. upgrades, storage space), or content.

e.g. DropBox, Huel, BeautyPie

2) Content Loops

User Generated - using user’s content to grow their organic traffic. For example, automatically seeding it via SEO.

e.g. Quora, Reddit

3) Paid Loops

Using paid advertising to drive users to sign up. This gives revenue, which is then reinvested into more advertising.

🚀 How Does This work in practice?

Below is an example from Quizlet, a SAAS learning platform in the US. It’s a great example of how different types of loops can work together to drive overall group.

💡 KEY IDEA: Most companies have a combination of loops, which work together in their overall growth model. They have specific teams or “growth pods” focusing on making them work as well as possible for the business.

🤫 Founders’ Secrets

This month, I spoke to the amazing Russell Schaller, co-founder of Go Mate drinks on his best growth learnings on his founder journey. He didn’t disappoint.

❓ What growth strategies or marketing tactics have been the most effective for Go Mate?

We launched our product during the World Cup with Argentinian football legend Sergio Aguero, unboxing his special edition can via his Twitch and Instagram channels. The unboxing has been viewed more than 4 Million times and continues to drive awareness for the brand. We have gained most conversion through our micro and macro influencer partnerships together with highly tactical performance marketing.

❓ Are there any uncommon approaches you've taken that have yielded impressive results?

Our partnership with Challenger Mode a leading platform for esports competitions has helped us gain credibility amongst the gaming community, one of our key growth areas. We run prize pool tournaments for grass root gamers putting our money where our mouth is in terms of helping gamers thrive. Simply put, where we add value we see high engagement and conversion.

💡 KEY IDEA: You don’t always have to focus on building your own audience for growth. Successfully leveraging partnership or influencers can be great sources, like Russ has managed above.

Ps. If you haven’t already tried Go Mate, you’re missing out! Go and grab yourself a pack.

💁🏻 New & Trending

Durable AI - lets you build a website in less than 30 seconds using AI, including images and copy. Amazing to see how far this tech as come in such a short space.

Dropbox Dash - a great tool from Dropbox that lets you search all your apps and documents from place. I’ve been super impressed with this.

AI2sql - I’ve thought about learning SQL for years, but never got round to it. Now, thanks to AI, I don’t have to. This tools allows you to create SQL queries with no knowledge. Finally my laziness paid off!

Thanks for reading. I really appreciate it.

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