Growth Hacking Lessons

Great article about lessons from the Growth Hacker Conference. Best advice: The path to growth follows a process!

"Transition to Growth" - means that you pivot from a technology company to a sales and marketing company. Most companies cannot do this. 8x8 did it very well.

Growth Hacking is the term for sales and marketing by using metrics and methodology to distribute your product through the noise to the best prospects. A/B testing, SEO, SEM, fast launch, Beta, Freemium, social media, PPC, Pull - are all examples of growth hacks. Best article on it is here.

One thing to understand about ILECs: they are NOT technology companies. Bell Labs was the technology company. The Bells were the marketing arm for the utility of the technology. Today, they are just marketing machines that utilize some technology.

Cellcos and their chant of 3G, 4G, soon 5G from VZW. It means very little to the user experience. It is a spin job. Cellcos are not tech companies. Look how many have outsourced all or part of their network to NSN, ALU or Ericcson. They are sales & marketing companies.

Technology is great, but most people are idiots. Your job is to sell to idiots. To do that you have to be the one that makes the technology invisible, disappear or so simple an ID10T can use it.

Then you have to bundle it and tell a story that resonates (just like I wrote in the last blog and talk about constantly. It isn't enough to have the best tech. the best tech doesn't win. the best story does. The best sales apparatus does. The
best marketing machine does.