This presentation covers how startups can gain traction and find sustainable growth by navigating through Sean Ellis's Startup Pyramid framework. With a focus on product/market fit, product instrumentation, and early-stage acquisition channels, the goal is to give entrepreneurs a framework to manage against with their early stage growth efforts.

1. Unlocking Growth
Building a sustainable growth engine
with the new rules of marketing.

2. “Most startups don’t fail at building a
product. They fail at acquiring customers.”
– Gabriel Weinberg

3. Startup Growth Pyramid
Growth
Stacking the Odds
Product/Market Fit
Source: Sean Ellis

4. Growth
Stacking the Odds
Product/Market Fit
Source: Sean Ellis

5. Get to Product
Market Fit First

6. What is Product/
Market Fit?
A large group wants/needs your product – it’s
a ‘must have’.

7. “Focus obsessively on getting to product/
market fit.”
– Mark Andreessen

8. Do you have PMF?
Ask “How would you feel if you could no
longer use the product?”

9. Source: Sean Ellis

10. “Very Disappointed”
0 – 25%
26 – 39%
40 – 100%
Keep burn low, engage, iterate
Try repositioning, retargeting
Proceed up pyramid

11. After PMF,
transition to
growth

12. Growth
Stacking the Odds
Product/Market Fit
Source: Sean Ellis

13. Race to scale
Instrument your product
Activate users
Increase exposure—the race to scale

14. Instrument your
product
Source data (referral source in user record)
Event & cohorts
Conversion rates
Engagement/retention
Lifetime value

15. Dave McClure’s
Pirate Metrics
Acquisition
Activation
Retention
Revenue
Referral

16. Find your metric
that matters
“x people did x searches in past week”
“y people visited my site x times last month”
“z users send n messages via my app each day”
Source: Josh Elman

17. Build a Value
Delivery Engine

18. Build a must-have product
Understand must-have
experience (MHX)
Calibrate hook & promise
messaging
Optimize flows to deliver MHX
Must-Have
experience
Hook/
Promise
Source: Sean Ellis

19. Steps for value
delivery engine
Understand
MHX
Macro
Optimization
Segment/
Personalize

20. Optimize Value
Delivery Engine

21. Successful optimization process
Funnel
Analytics
Insights
Test
Variations

22. Max % that reach MH experience
Build desire, reduce friction
Must-Have
experience
Hook/
Promise
Goals

23. Desire – Friction =
Conversion Rate
Source: Sean Ellis

24. PIE test
prioritization
Potential
Importance
Ease
Source: Wider Funnel

25. A/B test combos
Messaging Flows
Hooks based on
intent/pain
Promise based on
MHX
Clear description
of solution
Flows that reduce
friction
Flows that frontload
MHX

26. Language market fit
What is this thing you’ve built to your users?
Store your photos Share your photos
Find a date Help people find a
date

27. Developing promise
statements
Focus on a single benefit for each
Limit to about 10 words
Write wildly different statements

28. Segment/personalize last
Default to macro first, then segment
At a minimum manage active vs. inactive
Develop programs to manage full lifecycle

29. Growth
Stacking the Odds
Product/Market Fit
Driving Growth is Last Step
Source: Sean Ellis

30. Four Types of Growth
0
20000
40000
60000
80000
100000
120000
140000
160000
180000
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13
Topline
Activated
Retained
Monetized
Source: James Currier

31. “Growth is about taking your product and
optimizing it to create compound interest.
There are very few (if any) silver bullets when
it comes to growth.”
– Andy Johns

32. Why Growth Hacking?
$0
$20
$40
$60
$80
$100
$120
$140
$160
2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012
US Online Ad
Spend per User

33. “Growth hacking: A cool-sounding euphemism
for making the doer feel good about using the
same old sleazy marketing tricks.”
– David Heinemeier Hansen

34. “Growth hacking is a recognition that when you focus
on understanding your users and how they discover
and adopt your products, you can build features that
help you acquire and retain more users, rather than
just spending marketing dollars.”
– Josh Elman

35. Don’t delegate growth
to a ‘hacker’
Original vision on customer need
Don’t abdicate fate to a marketer
Growth as an organizational priority

36. Growth = fx (Probability of Success, Impact,
Resources Required)
Source: Brian Balfour

37. Right marketing mix
for you?
What are you optimizing for? (Learning, volume,
cost)
What are your constraints? (Time, money,
audience, legal)
Source: Brian Balfour

38. New User
Channels
Email
Facebook
Twitter
Pinterest
Craigslist
Google+
iOS
Android
Blog widget
Google SEO
Tumblr
Twitter
WOM
Press
Appstore
Featured
TV Apps
Mobile ads
Web ads
Online video
TV ads
Radio ads
SEM
Affiliates
Viral Paid
WOM
Source: James Currier

39. Categories of growth
hacks
Platform integrations
Powered by
Instrumented virality
Data-driven hacks
Igniting word of mouth

40. 0
20
40
60
80
100
120
2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013
Viral Channel Effectiveness
WOM
Email
MySpace
Facebook
Craigslist
Twitter
iOS
Android
James Currier

41. Growth
Stacking the Odds
Product/Market Fit
Build Growth on a Solid Foundation
Source: Sean Ellis

42. Growth EnginesCase Studies of How Today's Most Successful
Startups Unlock Extraordinary Growth
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