Hila Qu: The Ultimate Guide to Product Growth at Your Startup | 20VC #967
15Hila Qu is one of the leading growth execs of the last decade. Hila helped scale Acorns from 1 million to 5 million users as their VP of growth. Hila then joined GitLab, where she launched their PLG motion (on top of an established sales motion), and built their first-ever growth team. Today Hila is an advisor to amazing companies like Replit and funds like Mucker Capital, Openview and First Round Capital.
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Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
0:59 How did you make your way into the world of growth?
2:25 What tactics worked for growth at Acorn
4:02 How to Optimize Facebook Ads
7:21 Advice on Channel Diversification
12:29 How do you define growth?
14:30 B2B vs B2C Growth Teams
18:05 When to make your first growth hire?
20:09 What Growth Profile to Hire
23:58 When To Hire an Agency
26:05 When To Bring In a Growth Advisor
30:15 How do you structure the hiring process for growth
34:52 Take Home Assignment for Potential Growth Hires
38:35 The First 90 Days
42:50 What Data Should Founders Prepare
46:20 How To Pick The Right Growth Metric
50:03 Activation and Conversion Rates
51:11 What’s a funnel and what’s a loop?
55:15 Systems of Record
57:04 Most Suprising Result
58:35 What tactics have and haven’t changed in growth?
59:10 How do best practices in China and U.S. differ?
60:17 Why do growth teams fail?
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In Today’s Episode with Hila Qu We Discuss:
1.) From Biology and Explosions to Growth:
How Hila made her way into the world of growth with growthhackers.com?
What are 1-2 of the biggest takeaways from her time with Acorns and Gitlab?
How do B2B growth orgs compare to B2C growth orgs? What is different? What is the same?
2.) WTF is Growth? When? How & Why:
How does Hila define growth today? What is it not?
When is the right time for early-stage founders to hire their first growth hire?
Why does Hila always look for data analysts in this first growth hire?
From a data standpoint, what should founders have ready and accessible for their first growth hire to have access to and learn from? Is Google Analytics enough?
3.) Hiring Your First Growth Hire:
How should early-stage founders structure the hiring process for the first growth hire?
What do the best growth job descriptions include? What do they not include?
Once applications are in, how does Hila advise founders screen for the best candidates?
How should founders structure the interview process post-screening? What are the must-ask questions? Who is involved in the interview process? What are some red flags?
4.) The Master of Onboarding:
What should new growth hires want to achieve in the first week?
What should they want to complete in the first month?
In the first quarter, what do the best candidates have completed?
What can founders do to set their growth hires up for success in the best way at this time?
5.) Growth Models, North Stars, Activation and Onboarding and Key KPIs:
What really is a growth model? How do founders and growth teams create one?
How does Hila advise founders on how to pick the right North Star Metric to focus on?
Why are activation and conversion Hila’s two favorite growth metrics?
What are growth loops? What are growth funnels? How do they work together?
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