When you think about growth, what comes to mind?

A divisive marketer twiddling away at a click-bait native ad that’ll mislead you to a “buy now” page?

A developer adding in the sweet bells & whistles of features to the product to the point of overwhelming you to ad nauseam?

Growth marketing gets a bad rap but can actually drive incredible value for a startup or small business. If you’ve ever wanted a format to drive and measure marketing tactics or new product features, a well curated growth team could be the truth.

Unlike most teams, a growth team is like Captain Planet, bringing together experts from different fields, each with their own strengths.

At minimum, a growth team will include the following:

• Growth Lead: to execute ideas via project management, to coordinate everyone
• Developer: to code the solution, feature, or product quickly
• Marketer: to design, write copy, & manage the marketing of a new feature or tactic
• Analyst: to dig into metrics, feedback and reporting to help answer: is it working?

Typically, the process would go as follows:

All 4 gather to brainstorm ideas, tactics, and features while the growth lead gets the team to make a final decision for a “Sprint.”

The sprint will last for a set amount of time, say 5 working days, where the idea will be put into action through the combined efforts of everyone.

Then the marketer steps up to create a visual (wireframe) of the idea, and make sure to get feedback from the team 1-2x so to have near-consensus on what they’re testing.

Marketer passes it off to the developer who if needed, will code the idea and once again gather & action feedback from the team.

Third, it’s passed to the growth lead who will act as a make-shift product manager to quality control and make sure all important boxes are checked before “launch.”

They will actually “launch” the idea as well, upon which the marketer & analyst step in to watch the feature’s performance and gather data of how the sample of customers are responding it.

They will then report back to the team, and all will debrief to discuss pivots and next steps for the next sprint.

And wash, rinse, repeat! Wax on, wax off.

Could it be useful for your startup or team? Share your thoughts below.

~JK