This post was originally published on On Deck
Every business has to start somewhere, whether a Silicon Valley tech start-up coding from a garage or a local store selling to its first customers. 2021 was a record year for new companies, with Census Bureau data reporting nearly 5.4 million new establishments. Yet one in 12 go on to close, many as a result of low sales. Founders know they need to grow their organization in order to survive, but how can they achieve this in today’s highly competitive commercial environment?
The term ‘growth hacking’ was first used by Sean Ellis in 2010, who was responsible for scaling some of Silicon Valley’s best-known ventures, including Dropbox and Eventbrite. For ambitious startups, it can be a challenge to scale their operations. Still, Ellis argues that businesses should actively employ people whose sole focus is to scale operations quickly and effectively.
Many of these ‘growth hackers’ have found success with creative and experimental marketing strategies which aim to generate hype around the business and quickly build a solid customer base. However, this shouldn’t come at the expense of conventional marketing strategies. The Small Business Association advises that companies worth less than $5m invest around 8% of their revenue in promoting themselves
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