What Is Growth Marketing?
Growth marketing is exactly what it sounds like. It is a comprehensive marketing strategy
that employs various tactics across multiple channels with the sole goal of achieving and
maintaining growth. Growth marketing arose from the growing interest in growth hacking —
a method of achieving rapid growth through one-off tactics — but has since evolved into a
proven methodology that provides a long-term, strategic roadmap for meeting growth-related
objectives.


Growth marketing makes use of the so-called “pirate funnel” to generate demand and loyal,
repeat customers, with the goal of increasing traffic, revenue, and other growth metrics.
Instead of focusing solely on awareness, acquisition, and activation (as most traditional
marketing does), growth marketing prioritises retention, revenue, and referral, ensuring that
the customers you acquire stick around and tell their friends. Because, in the end, that is how
long-term, sustainable growth is achieved.


What Are Some Business Growth Marketing Strategies?
If approached correctly, almost any marketing technique can be used for growth marketing.
Many aspiring marketers have used growth hacking to great effect, but it’s important to
remember that growth hacking is a one-time win, not a long-term solution. Growth marketing
is a strategic path to growth that employs a variety of tactics, including growth hacking, to
achieve new levels of success through increased leads, traffic, and revenue, resulting in
higher ROI. Here are some tried-and-true growth marketing strategies that have proven to
work.


Using Referral Marketing
What could be better than a satisfied customer? A satisfied customer who recommends your
company to a friend. What could be better than that? A satisfied customer who tells their
entire social network about your company. Word-of-mouth marketing is as old as marketing
itself, and it works. Remember the three most important aspects of referral marketing:
incentivize it, make it simple, and spread the word among existing customers.


Expanding Your Email List
You’ve heard the gossip. Email marketing is extinct. Is that correct? For good reason, email
marketing is the comeback kid of the growth marketing revolution. Not only does it provide
some of the highest ROI of any marketing tactic, but it is also one of the most effective ways
to organically distribute your content and grow your brand.


However, email lists degrade over time, so you’ll need to maintain and update your list on a
regular basis to maximise impact. Here are some ideas for refreshing your list in order to
achieve new growth:
• To older subscribers, send an opt-in email.
• Create content that your readers will want to share.
• Segment lists by buyer persona and provide each with the content they require.
• Increase the number of signups and opt-ins on social media, your website, and
other platforms.


Using Landing Pages to Convert Blog Traffic
Landing pages are a powerful tool for moving leads through the funnel and converting them.
The key is to get people to look at your landing pages. More than half of all Google searches
are now considered zero-click, so getting viewers to where you need them to be isn’t enough.
Instead, use your blog to direct traffic to your most effective landing pages. Readers are
already captivated (thanks to the excellent content provided by your brand) and eager to learn
more.


Going Where Your Audience Is
Over the last five years, social media usage has increased by more than 92 percent, and
chances are, your audience has joined the ranks on the preferred platforms in your industry.
There are numerous hotspots where SaaS and other similar companies can connect and
engage with their customers. The most popular are Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram, and
leveraging groups is one of the best ways to get your brand in front of consumers.


Look beyond social media to sites like Quora and Reddit, where customers are asking
questions about your industry and the services and products you provide. This is an excellent
way to get inside the mind of your ideal buyer, learn about their pain points, and determine
what solutions they require to address them.


What Is Demand Generation Marketing?
The process of increasing awareness and demand for your products or services is known as
demand generation. It broadens your audience, creates urgency, and clarifies your solution,
converting interest into action.


The goal of demand generation marketing is to build and accelerate a predictable pipeline for
your sales team. First, it includes the initial campaigns designed to entice your target
audience to join your mailing list. Furthermore, it encourages your audience to interact with
your content, attend your events, and do other things. Demand generation marketing nurtures
and engages your prospects, keeping your brand at the forefront of their minds.


The objective is to guide them through the buyer’s journey until they become a qualified lead.
Then, with the right sales pitch, you can convert them into a new customer.


What Are Some Demand Generation Strategies for Expanding Your Pipeline?
First and foremost, let us discuss the pipeline. The pipeline differs from the marketing funnel
in that it presents a single path to growth that moves from demand generation to lead
nurturing to sales.


Demand generation employs all of the tactics found in most lead generation strategies, but
takes it a step further by focusing on moving those leads through the pipeline toward the
ultimate goal of sales growth.


Demand generation requires more time in the nurturing process than lead generation,
weeding out leads who aren’t qualified and then converting them to customers who can then
be upsold on new services or features.


Use Buyer Intent Data to Identify In-Market Buyers
The buyer intent path appears to be straightforward: awareness, consideration, and decision.
However, based on key intent data, there are opportunities to acquire (or lose) customers in
each of these areas. Intent data collection can be done internally or externally and provides
you with a much deeper understanding of your persona’s wants and needs.


Using intent data to build demand generation systems will allow you to reach in-market
buyers with the right message at the right time, increasing their likelihood of conversion.


Create Authority by Publishing High-Quality, Relevant Content
Content is essential for successful demand generation, but in order to maximise its impact,
you must first understand where your buyers are in the funnel. Identifying top-of-funnel
(TOFU), middle-of-funnel (MOFU), and bottom-of-funnel (BOFU) leads will assist you in
delivering the appropriate content to increase conversion.


Although TOFU content is more effective in terms of demand generation, in order to move
leads through the funnel, you must also deliver engaging and effective MOFU and BOFU
content.


Determine Your Acquisition Channels
The emphasis is on how to increase lead acquisition through demand generation, resulting in
bigger and better growth for your brand.


Acquisition employs all of the traditional lead generation techniques, but with a twist.
Whereas lead generation focuses on getting as many leads as possible into the funnel,
demand generation focuses on what you do with them once they’re there.


Acquisition, like lead generation, is critical to the success of any demand generation
campaign. The channels you use may not be different, but the way you move leads through
the funnel will be, so think about not only where you’ll find them, but also what you’ll do
with them and how you’ll nurture them toward conversion.


Differences Between Growth Marketing vs. Demand Generation
While both demand generation and growth marketing are current marketing buzzwords, and
both contribute to brand growth, they are not the same thing. Here are the main distinctions
between the two:


Funnel Focus
A more traditional marketing funnel is used for demand generation. It goes beyond lead
generation, but it still focuses most of its efforts on the stages of awareness, acquisition, and
activation. Growth marketing, on the other hand, fully utilises the pirate funnel, delving into
retention, referral, and revenue to create a never-ending cycle of growth.


All Growth Is Not Equal
Growth marketing takes a comprehensive approach, employing a variety of tactics to achieve
various types of growth, such as traffic and revenue. Demand generation, on the other hand,
is more concerned with increasing revenue by moving leads through the pipeline. Each will
use different metrics, as will the ultimate definition of success.


End Objectives
Growth is always growth, except when it isn’t. Growth marketers consider big-picture growth
across a variety of KPIs and business goals, whereas demand generation experts are typically
concerned with the results that come out of their pipeline, which are typically sales and
revenue.


Conclusion
You don’t have to pick and choose between a few marketing strategies that might or might
not work. When you find the right growth marketing agency, they will understand the
importance of demand generation and will work with you to develop a strategy that includes
a variety of growth-focused tactics.


When and how you employ these strategies is determined by a variety of factors. Growth
marketing is more commonly used for tech start-ups and newer businesses, whereas demand
generation is more commonly used for established brands with a ready audience. However,
both can be used effectively for any brand and at any level.


Finding a growth marketing agency that understands demand generation and how to apply it
to your brand is critical.