The 10 Best Books for Growth Hackers (+ BONUS)
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When it comes to Growth Hacking, there is always a great confusion created by the ones that started to use the term “Growth Hack” or “Growth Hacking” for every possible thing or action existent in this world.
“7 Growth Hacks to Get Out of Bed (FASTER)”, “10 Growth Hacks to Meditate (QUICK)”. You understand me…
Putting jokes apart.
I will try to make some clarity, then, enlisting exactly the books that served me to understand better what we are talking about.
With the obvious consideration that Growth Hacking is an ever changing world. Then, every year new books will be (fortunately) published with new fresh ideas.
Also, if this is your first approach to Growth Hacking, what I suggest you is to start from the first book enlisted here, continuing to the last. Then, of course, if on the list you find a book that you think it’s closer to what are your current needs just pick it up.
Growth Hacker Marketing — Ryan Holiday
I was in a library in the cold Tallinn, Estonia when I first discovered this book. When I go to libraries, I always pick up something like ten books, sit down and start reading them, and then leave with just one or two of them after a couple of hours. Growth Hacking Marketing was one of them.
I was so hooked up on it that I even wrote my entire bachelor thesis about Growth Hacking just two months later my discovery.
If you’re interested in this topic but don’t know where to start, this is the book you have to pick up.
Around there are very few valuable books entirely dedicated to Growth Hacking; this is one of them.
The Ryan Holiday’s work was also, with all the chance, one of the main responsible for spreading the GH term and approach outside the Startups scene.
Here are three motivating factors to read Growth Hacking Marketing:
It’s short;
Economic;
And easy to read.
And it will give you a general understanding of what Growth Hacking is, and of what are the principal differences between GH and “traditional” marketing.
But I warn you in advance. In this book, you will not find anything practical. There are “just” some case studies from companies like Dropbox and Airbnb, and a series of reflections regarding how “traditional” marketing, needs to evolve according to the author.
Lean Analytics — A. Croll & B. Yoskovitz
One of the pillars of Growth Hacking is numbers. Data.
The whole Growth Hacking approach is data-driven and makes a constant use of Analytics tools of any sort, to analyze both soft data and hard data.
This book is the “bible of metrics.”
It may seem boring if you look at the title, but in reality, it’s more interesting than what it looks. Thanks to real case studies, with this book, you’ll be able to understand the Lean Startup approach, how to take data-driven decisions, how to figure out what is the right metric for your product, and much more.
Traction — G. Weinberg & J. Mares
If you ever wondered “how many methods there are to acquire users for my product?” that’s the book for you.
It covers everything possible about getting tractions for your startup, covering all the 19 channels (Social Media, Press, etc.) that you can leverage to achieve your user acquisition goals.
The 19 channels are analyzed one-on-one, chapters over chapters, with the help of practical examples that shows you how to use them, and more importantly, when to.
Why some products sell more than others?
The author of this book, Nir Eyal, speaker of the famous Ted Talk “What makes some technology so habit-forming?”, tried to understand in his work why some products succeed in “capturing” clients in their net.
According to Eyal, and to what he called the Hook model, each and every successful product needs to be structured over processes with four cycles that capture users and slowly convince them not to abandon the product.
If you’re developing a new product and you have problems with engagement you want to read Hooked!
This book replies to the same question of the one before “Why some products succeed while others flop?”
Differently from the previous book, here you’ll not find a model to follow to develop a successful product. The author decided, in fact, to concentrate on telling different stories about successful products trying to extract a series of practical techniques to reuse.
One of the most interesting aspects of his research, and so of the stories contained in this book, it’s that they are not just limited to the digital or high-tech world.
Sprint — J. Knapp & J. Zeratsky & B. Kowitz
You may already know the Lean Startup approach. I hope you’ve already read the famous book from Eric Ries. If you did not, well, read it!
Anyway, this book takes some of the core elements of the Lean Startup approach and use them to build a model to test every sort of idea in just five days.
The most interesting aspect of this book is that the authors are three partners of Google Ventures, and the “Sprint technique” is the method used by Google to test new ideas rapidly. I believe that this is an excellent motivation to read this book!
This book is focused on the usability of products and during years has become a classic in his sector. Many people believe this is the best book ever wrote on usability.
The Krug’s book was published for the first time in 2000, and it was mainly aimed at the website’s world. In the last updated edition, published in 2013, it also included usability for mobile products.
How does it work virality?
Why some videos reach millions of views in a few days? Why some books sells more than others? Why Facebook succeed while many other social networks don’t?
This book analyzes the phenomenon of virality at 360 degrees, looking deeper at a long series of products that reached tremendous success during the last years.
All these products had something in common: a viral loop.
One fundamental point from the book is, in my opinion, the fact that it says that virality is not a consequence of random factors. The book precisely shows how to create a “perfect machine” to create viral products.
With this book, you can go a lot through the psychological aspects of Growth Hacking.
The author of this book, Shane Snow, conducted for years a long research trying to understand what were the common factors among successful people. In particular, he looked for those people (or companies) that can reach their goals faster than others.
He discovered that all of them were using “shortcuts” (or better, smart cuts) making large use of lateral thinking.
Between the pages of this book, you’ll find stories of successful innovators (not just entrepreneurs) and a long series of practical tips coming from their stories and paths.
You know that moment when you’re on Booking and, while you’re looking for hotels, a popup appears saying “There is only one room left.” It never happened to you to be catch up with a sense of anxiety and to book the chamber as soon as possible?
That’s because of the scarcity principle, one of the six principles of persuasion describes in this book.
Influence, it’s a fantastic book of psychology published in 1984 (!!!) that during years became a classic of marketing and more.
The six principles showed in the book are still the pillars of persuasions and influence. Both offline and online. These are principles valid in every field and that you can apply with success in every product or service you’re developing.
BONUS: The Definitive Guide To Growth Hacking — N. Patel
Neil Patel is of the most famous Growth Hacker worldwide, and among other ventures, he’s the founder of KISSMetrics.
This guide, along with Growth Hacker Marketing by Ryan Holiday is one of the points where to start, and if you’re seriously interested in the Growth Hacking world, you must read it!
This guide is completely free, and it covers in 10 chapters all key aspects of Growth Hacking: from its origin to the primary tools to use, passing from every single step of the conversion funnel.
