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

ℹ️ EPISODE INFO

Released

January 19, 2025

Duration

1h 35m

Channel

Lenny's Podcast

Watch on YouTube

▶ Open ↗

📝 EPISODE DESCRIPTION

Elena Verna is one of Silicon Valley’s most sought-after growth advisors and operators. She previously led growth at companies like Amplitude, Miro, Dropbox, and SurveyMonkey and is currently doing full-time advising for high-growth tech companies. In our conversation, Elena and I discuss:

• 10 growth tactics that never work
• Her 3 favorite growth frameworks
• How to increase your career optionality

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• Sinch—Build messaging, email, and calling into your product: https://sinch.com/lenny
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Find the transcript at: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/10-growth-tactics-that-never-work-elena-verna Where to find Elena Verna:

• Newsletter: https://www.elenaverna.com/
• X: https://x.com/elenaverna
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/elenaverna

Where to find Lenny:

• Newsletter: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com
• X: https://twitter.com/lennysan
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lennyrachitsky/

In this episode, we cover: (00:00) Welcome back, Elena! (06:02) Common mistakes growth teams make (08:31) #1: Hiring for growth roles too soon (15:09) #2: Hiring a head of growth to fix your problems (19:20) #3: Doing a rebrand to drive growth (25:11) #4: Obsessing over your competition (34:00) #5: Believing that your problems are unique (42:32) #6: Prioritizing other growth channels above earned channels (50:55) #7: Failing to evolve your growth model (01:01:06) #8: Not hiring advisors (01:05:55) #9: Over experimenting (01:10:44) #10: Color optimizations, third-party signups, one email wonders, and removing friction (01:15:00) Elena’s favorite growth frameworks (01:18:50) Contrarian corner: full-time jobs (01:26:05) Lightning round and final thoughts Referenced:

• Elena Verna on how B2B growth is changing, product-led growth, product-led sales, why you should go freemium not trial, what features to make free, and much more: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/elena-verna-on-why-every-company
• The ultimate guide to product-led sales | Elena Verna: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/the-ultimate-guide-to-product-led
• Six rules of hiring for growth: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/hiring-growth
• Figma: https://www.figma.com/
• Miro: https://www.figma.com/
• Notion: https://www.figma.com/
• Carol Wong on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/carol-wong-14133927/
• Dropbox: https://www.dropbox.com/
• The Law of Shitty Clickthroughs: https://andrewchen.com/the-law-of-shitty-clickthroughs/
• Miroverse: https://miro.com/miroverse/
• GitHub: https://github.com/
• My 9 Favorite Growth Frameworks: https://www.elenaverna.com/p/my-9-favorite-growth-frameworks
• Growth Loops are the New Funnels: https://www.reforge.com/blog/growth-loops
• Racecar Growth Framework: https://www.reforge.com/blog/racecar-growth-framework
• The Adjacent User: https://andrewchen.com/the-adjacent-user-theory/
• Unorthodox frameworks for growing your product, career, and impact | Bangaly Kaba (YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, Instacart): https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/frameworks-for-growing-your-career-bangaly-kaba
• Why I’m Unquitting Full-Time Roles: https://www.elenaverna.com/p/why-im-unquitting-full-time-roles
• Noah Smith’s newsletter: https://www.noahpinion.blog/
• Beef on Netflix: https://www.netflix.com/title/81447461
• Veep on Max: https://www.max.com/shows/veep/37cb4217-c710-4166-8e9f-352a61f2cd3a
• The Last of Us on Max: https://www.max.com/shows/last-of-us/93ba22b1-833e-47ba-ae94-8ee7b9eefa9a
• Heated boots: https://www.amazon.com/heated-boots/s?k=heated+boots
• Airpods Max: https://www.apple.com/airpods-max/
• Memes by Elena: https://www.elenaverna.com/p/ten-funniest-growth-memes

Recommended books:

• Project Hail Mary: https://www.amazon.com/Project-Hail-Mary-Andy-Weir/dp/0593135229/
• The Martian: https://www.amazon.com/Martian-Andy-Weir/dp/0553418025
• We Are Legion (Bobiverse #1): https://www.amazon.com/We-Are-Legion-Bob-Bobiverse/dp/1680680587
• Fire Upon the Deep: https://www.amazon.com/Fire-Upon-Deep-Zones-Thought/dp/0812515285

Production and marketing by https://penname.co/. For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email podcast@lennyrachitsky.com. Lenny may be an investor in the companies discussed.

🎤 SPEAKERS

• Elena Verna

  guest

• Lenny Rachitsky

  host

• Guest

  guest

🧾 EPISODE SUMMARY

In this episode of Lenny's Podcast, featuring Elena Verna and Lenny Rachitsky, Elena Verna: Why rebrands and growth-team hires rarely work explores elena Verna exposes ten costly growth myths wasting teams’ time Growth leader Elena Verna breaks down ten common growth tactics and behaviors that consistently fail yet remain popular in startups and mature companies. She argues that founders over-rely on hiring growth teams, cosmetic redesigns, copying competitors, and over-experimentation instead of fixing fundamentals like product–market fit, data, and strategy. Elena emphasizes building owned/earned acquisition channels (virality, UGC, referrals), layering new growth models over time, and aggressively learning from others via advisors and existing patterns. The conversation closes with her broader philosophy on careers, optionality, and why full-time jobs are just one of many ways to monetize your skills.

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