How To Think Like A Growth Hacker

Make no mistake about, one of the best skills you can cultivate for yourself and your business is to think like  “growth hacker“. In case you’ve never heard this phrase before, a growth hacker is a fancy term for someone who goes into companies and improves all of the processes at work, improves results, and finds little changes to implement that have a big impact on the long-term success of a company.

What Does It Take To Become A Growth Hacker?

Now you don’t have to be a consultant or a freelancer to do this; you can do this in any company no matter what position you hold. You can do this if you your own company. In fact, you should definitely do this if you own your own company. The original meaning of the world entrepreneur is actually “one who increases the value of things”. If you’re not a growth hacker as an entrepreneur, your company will likely stagnate and you won’t have a very successful business.

The first step to becoming a growth hacker is to stop thinking, “The way that I’m doing things is the ONLY way that works, stay the course, never expand, never take risks, never test anything TOO much”. You must remove this rigid paradigm or it may hinder your personal and professional influence in the long-term.

Begin thinking, “How can I improve the current state of things, regardless of how well or poorly we are performing at this moment? How can I increase the end result for the users, customers, and the company?” If you begin thinking about it in this manner, SUDDENLY you are a growth hacker, and you become an invaluable member to any team and any company.

Real Life Examples of Growth Hacking

Let me give you some real life examples. When you have an opt-in on your page and you’re opting-in people for email or a sale, you need to optimize that opportunity. Yet, surprisingly most companies simply don’t do this. They just put in a cliche opt-in form that looks like EVERYBODY ELSE and says, “Well, looks good, let’s move on”

Now, I’ve personally created opt-in forms that have generated a million euros per month for corporate clients, and I can tell you that these tiny little changes can make a HUGE difference. Any positive tweak in your funnel will increase the revenue generated. Any change you make in the company as a growth hacker can have a MASSIVE influence on the revenue for the clients and you as well.

Begin Growth Hacking Today

To illustrate for yourself through implementation, the next time you’re writing an opt-in on your blog, create two different types of copy. A-B test the two separate forms and track your results. A lot of the time, you’ll see a 20% increase in opt-ins. If you hadn’t tried that, you could have missed a 20% increase in opt-ins.

So look – the next time you have a project for a client or your own business, I want you to start thinking, “What can I test that can improve the results? What can I do that won’t cost a lot, but if successful, it can completely expand what’s possible for our business?” Every little process in your company, you can optimize. Every person in your business has processes that can be improved. Remember that.

Growth Hacking In A Niche

I got a question the other day on one of my videos. A viewer wants to start a fitness company and he says “There are so many fitness companies and everyone around the world knows about them – there are so many great sources of information – can I even deliver anything new or not?” I also had a student ask me the exact same question in a coaching call. I’d figure these were signs that I should discuss this topic.

My beliefs go as follows: You’re never going to find a large niche like health or fitness and just take the whole thing just for yourself – that’s not possible, it’s not going to happen. You’re much better off finding a very small niche like traveling while weight-lifting in Western Europe or something of this nature. Get specific. This is a much better niche than trying to take on the Starbucks or Facebooks of the world.

If you can answer a customer’s question in a very targeted specific way and do it well, you will be doing good business. You don’t need 5 million people following your company in a niche. It’s better to have 10 people pay a million dollars than a million people pay 10 dollars.

Be Yourself and No One Can “Steal” Your Ideas

So, what else should you be focusing on? You should be cultivating the skill of explaining things from your personal perspective in your niche. No one can take that away from you and no one can replicate that because no one has the exact same experience in life as you.

My company for example is a very specific niche for those new to marketing and trying to start a business. If you’re starting a company, you should also be very specific. Choose one guy that you know and answer his question to the best of your ability. Answer it to the point he’s so happy that he wants to pay you even though you didn’t ask for money.

Men Lie, Women Lie, Numbers Don’t

If you can do THAT, you might just have a niche. If you can do that with five people, it’s a very good sign. If you can do that with 20 PEOPLE, even better. I had eight or nine customers in the last couple of weeks in what I’m teaching. This is ideal because though there might be a thousand other guys doing coaching on how to begin marketing your business, no one’s doing exactly what I’m doing. Fair enough, eh?

Another thing is if you’re reading books, implementing knowledge, and you can speak from experience, just by expounding on the issues that concern your niche, you’re going to develop your own material and demonstrate your own point of view more and more. Especially if you listen to your paying customers. Your paying customers will always tell you what to do in the way of your paying content and your product.

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Being a growth hacker is about going against the grain and be willing to improve at all times. Be a trailblazer in your niche, in your company, and in your personal growth. The results of your hard work will pay off soon enough.