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20 Growth: Why You Need a Growth Hire Pre Product-Market-Fit? Why Every Company Will Be a Media Company and How To Do It | Communities; What Really Are They? How To Build Them? What Makes The Best? Why Do Many Not Work? | Kieran Flanagan, SVP Marketing @

Aug 10, 2022

Kieran Flanagan, SVP of Marketing at HubSpot, shares his insights on growth strategies for startups. He explains why hiring growth teams before achieving product-market fit is crucial, highlighting common mistakes founders make. Kieran believes every tech brand must evolve into media companies, tapping into the power of content. He also discusses the nuances of building meaningful communities in marketing and the critical balance needed for genuine engagement. His experience at HubSpot provides a fascinating backdrop to his advice on navigating growth in today's landscape.

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ADVICE

Growth Hiring Strategy

Hire a growth leader when bandwidth becomes an issue, initially a single engineer focused on a core metric can suffice.
Define a core metric for the engineer to focus on, such as retention.

INSIGHT

Pre-Product Market Fit Growth

Growth can exist pre-product market fit by integrating it into the product roadmap.
Focus on building mechanisms into the product for user acquisition, onboarding, and retention.

ANECDOTE

Genius.com's Growth Hack

Genius.com (formerly Rap Genius) differentiated itself by adding annotations to lyrics.
This feature improved search ranking and showcased how growth can be implemented pre-product market fit.

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Kieran Flanagan is SVP Marketing at HubSpot, where he has helped the business grow internationally, move to a product-led business, quadrupled its marketing demand, and built out its media team, including the acquisition of 'The Hustle.' He is also an advisor and investor in early-stage companies.

In Today's Episode with Kieran Flanagan We Discuss:

1.) Entry into Growth and Marketing:

How did Kieran make his way into the world of growth and marketing?
What has been 1-2 of Kieran's biggest lessons from seeing firsthand the hyper-scaling of Hubspot?
On reflection, how would Kieran summarise both Hubspot's community building attempts and also their product messaging?

2.) Why You Need Growth Hires Pre Product Market Fit:

What does "growth" mean to Kieran? Where do so many get it wrong?
Why does Kieran believe that you should have a growth team/people before product market fit? What specifically do they do and work on during this stage?
Pre PMF, what is the core metric that all startups should focus on? How does it change with time?

3.) Building Your Growth Team:

What does Kieran believe are the 3 key stages to hiring for growth?
How should founders determine whether to have external standalone growth teams or integrate them into existing functions?
What are the single biggest mistakes founders make when hiring for growth?

4.) The Future is Content:

Why does Kieran believe every great tech brand will have to become a media brand?
Why is Elon Musk an example of the perfect brand? What has he done right?
Why does Kieran say that data is the best and worst thing that has happened to marketing?

5.) WTF Really is Community:

How does Kieran define "community"? What is it? What is it not?
What makes the best communities? Why do some work and others not?
Should every company have a community approach? Who does it make sense for?
Have Hubspot done a good job at community building? On reflection, is there anything that Kieran would have done differently?