Hacking Growth: How Today's Fastest-Growing Companies Drive Breakout Success

MAKING A PRODUCT compelling enough to pass the must-have test is the prerequisite for fast and sustainable growth, but in itself it’s not sufficient.

In this stage, the growth lead works with her data analyst to dive into the data available from the initial wave of users to identify distinctive groups, starting by separating the regular shoppers from those who have barely ever, or never, used the app after downloading it.

The first step in hacking activation is to identify each point in your customers’ journey toward the aha moment. We are assuming that you have already determined, in the process of making the product must-have, what constitutes this magical moment. To

That said, user data does have limits, even remarkably detailed data. After all, even the most sophisticated analysis can really only tell you definitively what users are doing, not why they’re behaving that way.

To hone your growth equation and narrow your focus, it’s best to choose one, key metric of ultimate success that all growth activity is geared toward.

You want to track, at a minimum, the metrics for each of the steps users must take to reach the aha moment and how often they are taking those steps. Take Uber, whose essential metric for riders is rides completed. So in addition to the number of new people downloading the app, the company would want to track in the number of rides being booked, th

For example, at Netflix, by examining the movies and shows that customers were watching, the company found that Kevin Spacey films and political drama series were both hugely popular with their customers. That insight gave the company confidence to green-light the development of House of Cards, which became not only a huge hit, but also a must-have

After narrowing the reporting to what really matters, the next step is to present information in a way that is actionable. For one, metrics should be presented as ratios rather than static numbers. For example, reporting on the total number of users acquired is static and tells you little, but new users acquired per day or week is much better, beca

If this iterative process sounds familiar, it’s likely because you’ve encountered a similar approach in agile software development or the Lean Startup methodology. What those two approaches have done for new business models and product development, respectively, growth hacking does for customer acquisition, retention, and revenue growth.