I love the information in the post - some valuable marketing strategies are in there. But the main point the author is making? I don't get it.
As a marketer I love the idea of "growth hacking" - manipulating existing systems for the purpose of growth and customer acquisition. But I'm confused by the new mantra growth hackers are using to define themselves. "Growth hacking is, at its essence, data driven marketing..." Seriously? Who the hell has been marketing without data?
There are some really cool hacks that SEOs can use. .GOV and .EDU links are valued much more highly than normal sites - how can you get those links? I've seen some dirty yet beautiful tricks. Building out blog networks with DNS's linked to different IPs in order to manipulate Google - though rarely worth it (trying to out-engineer Google isn't my cup of tea), it's also impressive, and definitely hacking. Creative and unique ways to get press from out-of-your-league sources? Sure, that's a form of social hacking.
But A/B testing? Using proper markup? "Hooking your app into a network like Facebook?" Call it proficiency if you like, you can define it as expertise, I'll even give you savvy, but it's not hacking. Calling it hacking turns into a giant "we're hackers too!" circle-jerk.
Again, I reiterate that there is some solid stuff in the post. But using that information as evidence that SEO is growth hacking just doesn't make sense.
As a marketer I love the idea of "growth hacking" - manipulating existing systems for the purpose of growth and customer acquisition. But I'm confused by the new mantra growth hackers are using to define themselves. "Growth hacking is, at its essence, data driven marketing..." Seriously? Who the hell has been marketing without data?
There are some really cool hacks that SEOs can use. .GOV and .EDU links are valued much more highly than normal sites - how can you get those links? I've seen some dirty yet beautiful tricks. Building out blog networks with DNS's linked to different IPs in order to manipulate Google - though rarely worth it (trying to out-engineer Google isn't my cup of tea), it's also impressive, and definitely hacking. Creative and unique ways to get press from out-of-your-league sources? Sure, that's a form of social hacking.
But A/B testing? Using proper markup? "Hooking your app into a network like Facebook?" Call it proficiency if you like, you can define it as expertise, I'll even give you savvy, but it's not hacking. Calling it hacking turns into a giant "we're hackers too!" circle-jerk.
Again, I reiterate that there is some solid stuff in the post. But using that information as evidence that SEO is growth hacking just doesn't make sense.