Hila Qu: The Ultimate Guide to Product Growth at Your Startup | 20VC #967

I caused, actually, some explosions. (explosion)

The world of growth, it's a new world.

Growth advisor actually can help you figure out that growth architect, that map. A lot of founders in early stage, they use Google Analytics. It's okay, but I would say it's less generation of analytic tool. You want to have tools like...

On the equity side, is it like 0.1% or is it like 2%?

Wins change people's perception. You can get more resources, everything else become easier. Product-led growth is fundamentally data-led growth.

You are a star. Hila, I'm so excited for this. I heard so many good things from Josh before the show. So first, thank you so much for joining me today.

Thank you for having me, Harry. It's a, it's a, it'll be a fun experience.

Oh, it'll be a great chat. But I wanna start with a little bit on you and provide some context. We see Acorns, we see GitLab, and the world of growth, it's a new world. So how did you make your way into the world of growth and come to lead some incredible growth orgs at Acorns and GitLab most recently?

So believe it or not, I was a biology major, and I suck at doing experiments in the lab. I caused, actually, some explosions. Um, everyone is safe, so don't worry. But I always loved idea of scientific experiment. So I got my MBA, I transitioned into the business world initially as a data analyst. Uh, but very quickly I found that doing data analysis is awesome, but I don't get to do anything with my awesome recommendations. The PMs, the marketers, they don't take my recommendations. So I joined a very small startup called GrowthHackers.com, um, and I become a product manager, growth. And back then, that title is confusing, like, "Product manager? Growth? What do you exactly do?" Um, but I love that role. It really allow me to use my analytical background, my product manager background, my marketing background, and pretty much do everything. Uh, and from there, I become kind of this growth person. I joined Acorns, uh, and ended up leading their entire growth team as VP Growth. And most recently, I joined GitLab, building their gr- uh, growth team from scratch as well. Now I work as a growth advisor. So, like, I'm really deep into the world of growth.

I, I love it. And I, I spoke to Josh before the show, and he said that I really had to dig in on the Acorns journey because you were so instrumental to building that growth org and really making sure it worked so efficiently. He asked what tactic really worked and what did you learn from that?

Yeah, yeah. I, I think, like, I would say there are definitely some, I would say, mega learning from my Acorns experience. Um, first of all, the company really starts as a product that people love. Like, we have a feature called Roundup. Roundup your spare change so that you can invest with, with very small amount of money. Our early adopters loved it, and that powered the initial word of mouth growth. And from there, I think one thing we did right is that we layered on multiple growth channels. So, like, initially it's word of mouth. We quickly expanded to paid, like Facebook. We're very early in capturing the Facebook, uh, wave. We added paid referral and then we divide- diversified into more paid channels. We added new product lines so that we can charge more, and then that higher revenue a- allow us to unlock a higher, uh, CAC in paid channels or more paid channels. I think that layering on really helped. That's one learning. The other one I would say is, uh, we established a full funnel growth team. By full funnel, I mean marketing, growth product, analytics, design engineer, we sit together. I manage that team. So, um, I'm responsible for acquisition, how to get people download the app, but also I'm responsible for getting them to sign up, invest their money, uh, become a paid customer, retain, and maybe try other products, right? So, like that really full funnel approach allow us to unlock many opportunities and experiments and successes.