Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 11, 2014

“Growth hacking perpetuates this myth that you can magically achieve hockey-stick growth by using short-term “hacks.” “ I have always encouraged teams to think about growth as daily blocking-and-tackling rather than a dark art. they’ll flock to your channel with marketing budgets and tech prowess.

Technical Review 384

Technical Review Hockey Stick SEM Channel 384

ConversionXL

APRIL 3, 2019

Invites went up 50%; 35% lift in referral acquisition. Then they noticed that they’d been cannibalizing other channels—people converting as referrals were leads already acquired from other channels. They tested offering 10 free credits for working out with a buddy. Setting up your experiments for success: Define success metrics.

Artificial Inteligence 114

Artificial Inteligence Technical Review Metrics SEO 114

Software By Rob

SEPTEMBER 17, 2013

VC companies need hockey stick growth. Channels can be smaller. Since escape velocity for a bootstrapper might mean having a few thousand customers, not a million customers, then you can focus on growth channels that have a much lower ceiling. Acquisition can be manual. Retention can be relational.

Hockey Stick 69

Hockey Stick Bootstrapping Cofounder Acquisition 69

Hippoland

AUGUST 8, 2018

One thing I’ve noticed is that almost every repeat, previously-successful-founder focuses on the same thing for their respective startups: customer acquisition. Forget about traction and hockey stick growth. Another way is to have unique promotion channels, but these must be scalable.

Founder 48

Founder Sales Cycle Affiliate Retention 48

Hippoland

AUGUST 8, 2018

One thing I’ve noticed is that almost every repeat, previously-successful-founder focuses on the same thing for their respective startups: customer acquisition. Forget about traction and hockey stick growth. Another way is to have unique promotion channels, but these must be scalable.

Founder 48

Founder Sales Cycle Affiliate Retention 48

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 14, 2009

Because they have no presence in the market, they have to find distribution channels to bring in customers. Products can find sources of validation with impressive stats along a number of dimensions, such as high engagement, viral coefficient, or long-term retention. We were limping along at a few hundred dollars a month in revenue.

Customer 167

Customer San Francisco Lean Hockey Stick 167

Software By Rob

SEPTEMBER 17, 2013

VC companies need hockey stick growth. Channels can be smaller. Since escape velocity for a bootstrapper might mean having a few thousand customers, not a million customers, then you can focus on growth channels that have a much lower ceiling. Acquisition can be manual. Retention can be relational.

Hockey Stick 27

Hockey Stick Bootstrapping Cofounder Acquisition 27