Ryan Holiday

nobody knows anything— even the people in charge

screenwriter William
Goldman famously put it, nobody knows anything— even the people in charge

Marketing has
always been about the same
thing—who your customers
are and where they are.
What growth hackers do is focus on the “who” and “where” more scientifically, in a more measurable way

They are data
scientists meets design fiends meets marketers

It Begins
with
Product
Market Fit
Make stuff people
want.
—Paul
Graham

the best marketing decision you can make is to have a product or business that fulfills a real and compelling need for a real and defined group of
people—no matter how much
tweaking and refining this
takes

Product Market Fit (PMF)

At Amazon, for instance, it’s company policy that before
developing a new product the product manager must
submit a press release to
their supervisor for that item before the team even starts working on it. The exercise forces the team to focus on exactly what its potential new product is and what’s
special about it

Who is this product for? Why would they use it? Why do I use it?
Ask your customers
questions, too: What is it that brought you to this product?
What is holding you back
from referring other people
to it? What’s missing?
What’s golden? Don’t ask
random people or your
friends—be scientific about it.

To be successful and
grow your business
and revenues, you
must match the way
you market your products with the way your prospects
learn about and
shop for your
products.
—Brian
Halligan,
founder of