B2B growth hacking: What is it and how can it work for you?

Holding market position and achieving sustainable growth are big challenges for most early-stage businesses.

Reaching these goals, particularly in a tough economic climate, often requires innovation. In this blog, we explore how growth hacking techniques can help you find inventive ways to expand, even on a limited budget.

Growth hacking is the use of creative, low-cost marketing and sales strategies to boost customer acquisition and drive revenue growth.

There are lots of examples of how it can work. Dropbox, for instance, used a referral marketing growth hack to great effect in its early days. The file-hosting service offered users extra storage space in exchange for successful friend referrals. It subsequently grew by 3,900% in 15 months and brought in millions of new customers¹.

Other common strategies include:

Growth hacking tactics like these can prove particularly effective in the B2B space, where sales cycles are typically much longer than in B2C² and there is more emphasis on building relationships with buyers.

If you're a B2B startup facing these challenges, revenue growth and lead generation hacks could help you drive quick sales and keep your pipeline strong.

B2B growth hacking tips

Stakeholders from various areas of your business might need to be involved for growth hacks to succeed. Marketing and sales leaders, for instance, should be aligned on any campaigns designed to drive customer acquisition.

Decision-makers should also be in full agreement when it comes to spending. Growth hacking is all about cost-effectiveness, so the whole business should feel confident about the budget required and the potential returns.

Metrics are a key tool for any early-stage B2B venture. They can be your most important indicators of success, reflecting everything from revenue and gross margins to cash burn rate and working capital.

Where growth hacking is concerned, clear goals and metrics will help you track performance and, if necessary, shift your strategy.

If you're wondering where to start, look at metrics that fall under the 'AARRR' framework:

• Acquisition: how many potential customers are you attracting?
• Activation: what percentage of these leads become paying customers?
• Retention: what proportion of customers stay engaged and make repeat purchases?
• Referral: how much new business do you get from customer referrals?
• Revenue: how much income do your growth hacks create?

Smart use of budget is a hallmark of effective growth hacks. Get your key decision-makers involved in assessing every outlay and deciding what would be a good return on investment.

Clear budget priorities and measurable goals could lead you towards high-impact marketing techniques that produce quick results.

One example is pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, where you place ads online (often in search engine results) and only pay when a user clicks through to your website. This can be an affordable way to engage with people searching for terms directly relevant to your business and drive online traffic.

4. Engage existing customers

As the Dropbox example shows, there's a lot of potential value waiting to be realised in your existing client base.

Referral marketing can build trust, which is a key factor in B2B buying decisions. It helps you use positive sentiment among past buyers to attract new ones.

There are various ways to engage customers and boost referrals. If you're a product-led business, look for ways to add value for both existing and referred users. This could mean offering free bonuses or unlocking new functionality.

If you run a service-based model, do you have happy clients who could feature in a testimonial or case study to build trust in the market?

Final takeaway: With data and a smart strategy, growth hacks can deliver results

If you're looking for quick, cost-effective ways to drive revenue, growth hacking might be the answer.

But before you commit to anything, make sure you're prepared. Smart spending, a clear strategy and efficient use of the assets at your disposal could all be crucial to success.

For more tips and advice on growing your startup, head to our Insights page.