Elena Verna: Why rebrands and growth-team hires rarely work

Founders must find initial product–market fit and distribution themselves; a growth team can only optimize existing traction, not conjure it. Wait until you have solid retention, measurable PMF signals (e.g., strong NPS/“can’t live without” scores), and enough users/data to run meaningful experiments.

If your overall metrics are deteriorating, the root causes lie in product, market, or strategy—not in the absence of a growth function. First stabilize or reverse the decline with core product and marketing changes; only then does it make sense to layer in a growth team to amplify improvements.

New marketing sites, product redesigns, and generic simplification efforts typically underperform the optimized incumbent versions and require 3–6+ months of post-launch optimization to even get back to baseline. Treat them as long-term bets on a better ceiling, not short-term growth levers.

You rarely see a competitor’s true control experience, their definitions, or what actually worked in tests. Tear downs are useful to spot patterns and elements, but you still need your own research, design, and experimentation tailored to your users and business model.

Paid channels and SEO make platforms (Google, Meta, etc.) rich and are at the mercy of algorithms; earned loops (referrals, sharing flows, UGC libraries, community) are durable, compounding engines you uniquely own. Allocate serious product and engineering time to at least one such loop.