Growth Marketing is very important for any D2C startup and it is also a hot skill today.
This article will help companies understand what to look for while hiring for this role.
It will also help people who want to build their career in Growth Marketing, understand what they need to have or learn to make a career in this field.
I would also like to reiterate that this is from the point of view of D2C Startups.
I strongly believe that Growth Marketing requires a certain mindset and attitude rather than any skill.
Skills can be learnt and are easy to learn. But if you have the right mindset and attitude then you can be a really good growth marketer.
1. Business Understanding:
It is really important for a Growth Marketer to understand how the business is run. What impacts the profit and loss in the business, how to mitigate the losses, etc? A business mindset gives you an overall & long-term picture.
For Example – Let’s say, changes are made to an FB Campaign and the Customer Acquisition Cost came down from Rs. 400 to Rs. 300. But the COD orders increased suddenly, which also led to the increase in the RTO. Now the Growth marketer should understand this and check if this is happening because of this campaign. They should be able to look at the complete business impact and optimize for profits and not just at the CAC level.
Today especially for smaller D2C startups investors are appreciating startups that are profitable or have a lesser burn. Quality of customers is really important, it is not always about quantity.
Hence, a business mindset is very critical for a Growth Marketer.
2. Good with Strategy:
This is another key skill for a Growth Marketer, because if you make a weak strategy, then you will not be able to plan experiments properly.
You should run experiments that give you conclusive results. It is extremely important; the experiments give us the direction in which we have to move forward to improve the funnel.
And don’t forget the Growth Marketing Loop that we spoke about in the other article on Growth Marketing Framework.
A good strategy requires long-term and in-depth thinking. If you think only, short term while making the strategy it increases the costs in Growth Marketing.
3. Execution Oriented:
A growth marketer has to be biased towards execution. Growth Marketing is an agile process, hence creating a strategy and then running experiments has to happen continuously. Check the data and make changes regularly to improve the funnel metrics.
4. Proactiveness:
I might sound a bit harsh here, but the truth is that a passive or reactive person can never be a good growth marketer.
You have to be PROACTIVE!
That’s the most important mindset or attitude. You have to be proactive in understanding business, and making strategies, while running experiments and everything that you do.
The eCommerce industry changes every minute. If you keep waiting for things to go wrong to act then you have missed the bus. You will be 5 steps behind.
Every day lost is a lost opportunity!
There has to be no compromise on this one, a growth marketer has to be proactive.
5. Customer Understanding:
Understanding the customers and being able to segment them will always give you an advantage over others.
If one understands the customer properly then it is easy to map the customer journey and behaviour online. One can also be realistic in their hypothesis and experiments.
I personally feel that every time I have either spoken to a customer or visited a market, I have been able to implement learnings from that in my Growth Strategy.
Bonus Tip:
What is cognitive rigidity and why should marketers stay away from it?
“Once the mind has accepted a plausible explanation for something, it becomes a framework for all the information that is perceived after it. We’re drawn, subconsciously, to fit and contort all the subsequent knowledge we receive into our framework, whether it fits or not.
Psychologists call this “cognitive rigidity”.
The facts that built an original premise are gone, but the conclusion remains—the general feeling of our opinion floats over the collapsed foundation that established it.
Information overload, “busyness,” speed and emotion all exacerbate this phenomenon. They make it even harder to update our beliefs or remain open-minded.”
- Source is Farnam Street Blog. Credits to Shane Parrish.
Why this is important and how this affects Marketing today -
The digital world is changing every day & every minute.
- We need to look at every marketing strategy, and evaluate every campaign result from first principles thinking, or else there is a high chance that we might fall prey to cognitive rigidity!
- Sometimes cognitive rigidity also stops us from running experiments. Don't let opinions (that might be based on a premise that no longer holds true) distract you.
- Keep reading, listening to podcasts and updating yourself by gaining knowledge! That’s what will make you stand out in the crowd.