The framework we used to grow Soothe 600+%

Soothe: Largest on-demand massage service and app now in 50 cities.

Results:

• 12 months of Month over Month double-digit revenue growth.
• 23-31% MoM revenue growth each month in Q4 2015
• Created Adwords and Facebook acquisition programs, scaled them 20X (2000%) between August 2015 and September 2016.
• Increased download to activation rate from 6% to 20% for Soothe App.
• Grew from 1 to 46 cities.
• Placement in 100+ National and Local Publications and TV Shows, including Ellen, USA Today, Bloomberg, Techcrunch, etc.

Funding:

– Angel funding

– $10.6 MM Series A (after 2 years of work together,)

– $ 35 MM Series B (after 2.6 years or work together.)

What is Growth Marketing?

A process ….of research, prioritization, and rapid experimentation…..across marketing channels, product development, and messaging to identify the most effective and efficient ways to grow a business.

Making a Company Grow

Get straight on these first. In this order:

1. Principles
2. Process
3. Team
4. Tactics

ROAARRR: A Simple Growth Framework

Research

Optimization

Acquisition

Activation

Retention

Revenue

Referral

Some Principles of Great Growth Teams:

• Optimize for Impact.
• Growth Is Art And Science.
• Rapid Beats Perfect.
• Growth Is Never Done.

Research: Where is the opportunity?

• Analytics instrumentation and Baseline
  •  Funnels
  •  Devices
  •  New vs Returning User behavior
  •  By Geography
  •  Time of Day
  •  Form Analytics
  •  Speed baseline

Research: WHO are we targeting?

• Google Display
• FB Audience Insights

Research: WHY are they dropping off?

• Moderated User Testing
  • Better than usertesting.com

•   Customer Development
  • Just do it FFS…

•   Polls
  • Hotjar, Qualaroo

Optimization

• Create Experiment Matrix (ranked by what would make you the most money with the least effort).
• Write Your Hypotheses and Run Your Experiments.
• Experiment with Channel, Messaging, Pricing, Page Design, Copy, App Flow, Funnel Length, CTAs, Video, Imagery, Email Frequency, etc.

Acquisition

1. A) Digital

• Adwords – they already want what you are selling.
• Facebook – Lookalikes. Find your best customers. Tell Facebook to find more like them.
• Re-Engagement Ads – Market to existing customers again.
• Remarketing – GDN, Facebook. Market to those that did NOT convert.
• GA Remarking Lists – can do “drip” with creative.

Acquisition – say NO to most things

We said NO to:

• Social media marketing
• Blogging
• Content Marketing
• Outdoor
• Radio
• Cable
• Print  
• Airlines Magazine
• Our board.
• And our CEO.
• Our friends selling us $^%t.  

Earned Media

• National PR
• Financial PR
• Local PR  – launches
  • have a playbook.
  • Coordinate tightly with supply if you are a marketplace.

Activation

• Raised download to register rate from 6% to 20% with 1 before-after test/improvement.
• Moderated user testing in airports while traveling.
• Insight: TOO MUCH NAKEY TIME in the app at first glance for many female customers.

Retention

• Manually, via Mailchimp for 6 months.
• Mainly email, some SMS, etc.
• Then shifted to Autopilot and more automation, triggers.
• Segmentation.
• Testing: Time of Day, Day of Week, Promotion Amount, Subject, Copy, Imagery.

Revenue, Referral

• REVENUE
  • Price testing, esp. in certain cities – e.g New York.

• REFERRAL
  • Incented, unincented.
  • Test them all: after registration. after purchase. after happy service completion.

The Growth Process:

1.Collect Quantitative Data to Find Our WHERE

A) Build funnels for Desktop, Mobile, Native, New, Returning, by Country, etc.

B) See where the friction is in the funnels.

2. Collect Qualitative Data to Find out “WHY?” and “WHY NOT?”

A) Do moderate User Testing, not just UserTesting.com.

B) Use polls (Hotjar, Qualaroo).

3. Create Experiment Matrix (ranked by what would make you the most money with the least effort).

4. Write Your Hypotheses and Run Your Experiments.

5. Experiment with Channel, Messaging, Pricing, Page Design, Copy, App Flow, Funnel Length, CTAs, Video, Imagery, Email Frequency, etc. etc.

Qualities You Want in Growth Team Members:

• Scrappy  – figure out quick and dirty ways to test hypotheses.
• T-shaped or “Pi-Shaped” – has 1-2 areas they are deep in, and broad exposure to all facets of growth/product/digital marketing.
• Data Driven.
• Learns new stuff fast.
• Aggressive/competitive when it comes to hitting numbers.