Top 5 Growth Hacking Courses

Growth hacking is, basically, a term used for any strategy focused on growth, especially in regards to early-stage start-ups. This is usually who needs to see a large amount of growth, in a small amount of time. So, we've gathered up the top 5 growth hacking courses, perfect for any budding growth hacker. 

 

growth hacking course

Think small budget, small amount of time, big growth. So, growth hacking answers the question: "How can I gain as many customers as possible, with limited resources?" It's about focusing on the most cost-effective solutions.

 

No wonder it's become so popular for start-ups. But no one is born a growth hacker. They're made, not born. So, we've started to see a proliferation of courses designed to teach the craft. 

 

The term “growth hacking” was coined by Sean Ellis, founder and CEO of GrowthHackers, in 2010, and offers a term that goes beyond "growth" or "growth marketing", and instead focuses on an extra bit of effort on top of current plans. This is summarised by Ward van Gasteren, who suggests that:

“Growth hacking is great to kickstart growth, test new opportunities and see what tactics work.

Marketers should be there to continue where the growth hackers left off: build out those strategies, maintain customer engagement and keep tactics fresh and relevant.”

So, how will growth hacking benefit your business? Well, it can allow for:

  • Flexibility
  • The discovery of new business models, or product ideas
  • The generation of qualified leads
  • Building brand reputation and identity
  • Cost-effectiveness and improved ROI
  • Scalable marketing strategies
  • The discovery of data-driven strategies 

 

Let's have a look at an example: Tesla

File:Tesla logo.png - Wikipedia

600,000 cars produced. $0 spend on marketing strategy. How did Tesla do it?

Well, as Tesla isn't a traditional car manufacturer, it wouldn't make sense for them to market like traditional car manufacturers. Instead they, like DSC, utilised their customers. 

Selling a lifestyle and an image, not a product, the car company made sure their customers were chomping at the bit to show off their purchases. Plus, when a customer purchased a Tesla, they felt as if they were representing the modern sleek image, and sustainability, that the brand stands for. 

They leveraged also two specific tactics: Scarcity and Exclusivity. 

Car production was made-to-order, so the product, and as a result the experience, was highly personalised.

So, who's out there teaching this stuff? Where can you learn to become a top-tier growth hacker? Well, you can start with:

1. Growth Hacking Tips Online Class from LinkedIn Learning

LinkedIn Learning is well known for its creation and distribution of video courses, taught by the crème-de-la-crème of the software, creative, and business industries. So, it's no surprise they're offering users the chance to get a head start on growth hacking. 

This course allows participants to learn the latest growth hacking techniques being used by big and small companies to unlock exponential growth. 

Led by Brad Batesole, the course reveals the latest growth hacking tips and tricks used by top entrepreneurs. Brad is a marketing exec who has led teams of top marketers at top companies, and has expertise in a ton of fields, such as marketing strategy, user experience, social media, paid media, and SEO. So he knows his stuff. 

With his teaching, students can begin to unlock impressive growth in their own companies, using short, actionable tips. They'll also have the chance to learn new ways to do creative physical marketing, build and deploy landing pages, buy ads, obtain referrals, and create compelling incentives. In fact, each lesson in the course offers an actionable way to supercharge your growth. 

Brad also delves into next-level disruptive techniques, such as making intentional mistakes, reaching journalists offline, and leveraging psychological phenomena such as the decoy and the impressive effects. 

2. Growth Hacking with Digital Marketing from Udemy

Led by Davis Jones and Maja Voje, this course is ideal for people looking to grow an existing organisation's user or customer base and develop the skills necessary to launch a career in digital marketing. Plus, it benefits anyone seeking to add a digital component to their existing marketing skillset. 

This course suggests that, while the returns from digital marketing are good, they can become even better with growth hacking strategies. So, it encourages students to grow in their digital marketing activities, such as SEO, Inbound Marketing, Email Marketing, Viral marketing, and public relations. This is all done by providing working market techniques and strategies. 

Udemy's offering is a good course for individuals looking to become growth hackers, whether they're new to the game, or well established. It runs through the strategies and tools you can use to meet your needs, expand an audience, and increase revenue. 

Students need to have solid online navigation skills to fully grasp the course and have an understanding of a number of concepts such as SEO, social media, email marketing, and online advertising. However, they don't need to be experts in these areas, but the course does not include 101 introductions to get beginners situated. 

The course also covers the following areas:

  • How to integrate the data-driven and adaptive culture of growth hacking to improve digital marketing results
  • Ways to track, analyse, and leverage traffic and product usage data using Google Analytics 
  • Working through the TOFU marketing funnel or 'Top of the Funnel' marketing, in order to increase brand awareness
  • Techniques to design customer action funnels and calculate per-user LTV/ CAC
  • Skills to tell better stories and write marketing content to improve conversion rates
  • How to grow social media audiences using bots and organic techniques
  • Email list segmentation, and how to automate email marketing communications

Then, after successfully completing the course, students will get a completion certificate along with lifetime access to its materials, as well as access to the course on TV and mobile. 

Since its release, its seen regular updates, from adding "Need Narratives" i.e. a way of iteratively prototyping your brand's messaging before deploying a bunch of content or designing email marketing systems, to adding more content on TOFU marketing. For example, there's an interview with Bob Green, a services marketer, on using paid leads and lead qualification systems.  

3. Full Beginners Course to Growth Hacking from Growth University

This course focuses on developing the student's skills as a growth hacker, in order to make themselves more attractive to start-ups and scale-ups, by developing the mindset, toolset, and the knowledge these companies are looking for. 

It is a relatively short course. which will help users get their skills ready in days, rather than weeks. Students have access to 300+ minutes and 40+ lessons, all focusing on the basics of growth hacking. 

Growth University's offering is structured into 4 sections:

1) Growth Hacking in General: What Growth Hacking is Really All About. The first part gives students a clear image of the growth hacking industry and process, so they can understand the theory behind how growth works.

2) Growth Hacking Framework: A Systematic, Repeatable Process for Rapid Experimentation. This is all about the day-to-day. Section 2 includes all the important frameworks, models, and templates to understand the daily way of working. This provides structure and confidence.

3) Growth Hacker Skills: Become a T-shaped Growth Marketer. Section 3 gives an overview of all the skills the student needs to do their job. The course instructor, Ward van Gasteren, outlines all the skills a great growth hacker needs and gives quick tips for tools and learning resources. 

4) Personal Growth. The final part is the career section. It discusses ways to develop personally after the course, moving from being a beginner to an expert. 

Each section consists of 5-10 lessons and includes worksheets, resources in the comments, and videos to explain the content. 

Ward van Gasteren is a well-qualified instructor, being one of the first certified growth hackers in Europe. He has deep knowledge of the space, thanks to his previous experience working for 70+ clients from the fastest growing scale-ups. These include TikTok, Catawiki and Startupbootcamp. He has also worked for some of the biggest Fortune 500 corporates, including Cisco, Miele & KPMG.  He also has a blog GrowWithWard.com, one of the biggest growth hacking blogs, with more than 10K readers every month.

4. Growth Team Management - How to Build a Growth Team From Udemy 

This one moves away from the idea of growth hackers being solely individual. Instead, it suggests that effective growth leaders see that building, managing, and leading a great team is the key to growth. 

Instead of focusing on growth frameworks, the latest viral hack, or the best experimentation frameworks, Udemy suggests moving away from the tactics. Instead, they suggest building from the ground up. This means teaching the students how to hire, build, and lead a high-performing growth team. 

Based on a talk given at 500Startups, participants will find out who to hire, examples of applying the hiring framework, how to measure performance, and how to lead their team. 

So, what else will they learn? Well, by the end of the course the instructor, Archie Abrams, aims to reveal:

  • A framework for identifying and hiring a good growth employee
  • How to apply growth-specific management concepts to help lead a team

According to the site, the course is both for current and aspiring leaders, as well as anyone looking to build better teams. 

Instructor Archie has plenty of experience in the space, too. VP of Product at Udemy, he joined the company as the 10th employee. Before moving to product he led the growth team, which was responsible for student acquisition and retention. He built the growth team from 1 to 25. 

Before this, he was a Strategy Consultant, and founder and CEO of Amplify Teaching, an Edtech company based in Boston. 

5. The What, Why and How of Growth Hacking From LXA

Yet to be released, the growth hacking course from LXA is set to be pretty darn good. We're not biased, promise. 

Focusing on teaching students how to understand the context and content of growth hacking, it delves into exactly how the 4P's apply to the space: process, platform, plans, and people. 

So, students will develop the techniques to become growth hackers and gain knowledge on how to build their growth hacking toolbox. The course also covers the pathway to developing a growth hacking culture, which means developing and aligning a team, testing around high-impact opportunities, and implementing a growth hacking mindset and environment where these techniques thrive. 

What makes this course unique is that it is specifically crafted for marketers, providing them with the knowledge on how to find and utilise specific tools and frameworks to apply in their company. 

The course delves into a number of highly useful and applicable growth hacking frameworks, which explore the relationship between growth hacking and marketing. This includes a five-step framework for embedding a culture of growth hacking within a business. 

LXA is not only researching and teaching about growth hacking but is applying it day-to-day. We're not only talking the talk, but walking the walk. The course is a cumulation of everything we know, have published, and have experienced. 

We have been talking to a number of thought leaders in the space in order to bring you the best instructor for the job, bringing together their individual experience and LXA's IRL experience.