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Comment by mindcrime | Hacker News Reader

OK, now somebody tell me how "growth hacker" is, specifically, different than just saying "marketer" or "marketing strategist?" Not to take anything away from the growth hackers, but I'm curious if this is just a meme, or if there's some actual substance to what a "growth hacker" does that's unique compared to other positions.

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Here is what I think after interviewing 20+ GHs and doing it myself for the past two years.

growth hacker (noun) - one who’s passion and focus is growth through use of a testable, empirical, and scalable methodology.

Basically, a growth hacker is the blend of a product, marketing, and data. They sort of operate as R&D within a startup.

Resources: http://www.quora.com/Growth-Hacking/What-is-growth-hacking/a... http://startup-marketing.com/where-are-all-the-growth-hacker... http://www.vlaskovits.com/2012/07/youre-a-growth-rookie-not-... http://www.aginnt.com/growth-hacker#.UDvRGmPlWPI

Check these threads

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4309345 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4436034 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4069417 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4059580 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4104510 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4297857 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4069417 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4104510

OK, so a marketer who uses scripts to automate things, and is very data focused. Got it. Not sure this justifies creating a new title, but these are marketing people we're talking about...

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