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The Dark Side of Growth Marketing

What are some of the tactics you've seen people use that give a bad name to honest marketers?

I'll kick things off with 5 practices to watch out for:

  1. Bad products — This first problem is the one I see more than anything else. Your product sucks. Yeah, there’s no sugarcoating it. Sometimes you just need to go back to the drawing board and create something better. Anyone remember Amazon's Fire phone?

  2. Lazy messaging — Ever see a popup on a website that simply says "Get updates! Subscribe!" or something similar? No description of the value behind the offer. No excitement. Just boring copy. That's lazy messaging. Marketers can do so much better.

  3. Mismatched channels — Have you ever launched an ad campaign on Reddit? If so, you might know how difficult it is to break through to that community. It doesn’t mean that the channel itself is bad though. It just means that Reddit has a specific culture and advertisers need to respect and adapt to that culture. Most don’t, and that’s why their ads fail.

  4. Gimmicky tactics — I bet we could all make a long list of such tactics. Some that come to mind: fake countdown timers, copy-and-paste cold emails, LinkedIn connection spam, and obviously fake product reviews just to name a few. What else?

  5. Anecdotal decisions — Lastly, a problem that is cropping up in companies big and small is the issue of anecdotal decision making. In other words, making decisions based on personal accounts rather than facts or research. Let the data inform what you do as a marketer whenever possible.

Well, that's all I've got. If this topic interests you, check out my full article that this was inspired by for even more bad marketing examples with images and all that jazz.

And let me know what YOU would add to this list in the comments below. What are some bad marketing tactics that need to stop? 👇

  1. 4

    in my opinion - your examples are not quite what i would call 'growth marketing'.

    i see them as regular marketing activities - and low quality marketing activities at that, especially when executed sloppily.

    in my opinion, the dark side of growth marketing is taking advantage of peoples underlying subconscious behaviours and patterns to get what you desire from them

    1. 2

      What you're describing sounds more like neuromarketing—without any concern for ethics.

      I would argue however that the line between growth marketing and "regular" marketing is becoming more blurred, as virtually every company tries to accelerate growth through digital channels. A lot of growth marketing is based upon traditional marketing principles, but with a fresh spin on it.

  2. 3

    Very deep and insightful, thank you!

    1. 1

      Dagobert, thanks for reading!

  3. 2

    A few Dark thoughts that come to mind:

    • Click baity headlines
    • Scraping content and spinning it a new
    • Buying backlinks

    This is not necessarily a dark tactic but more of an irritation - when a growth marketer writes an article about tactics and it's all about buying ads.

    1. 1

      Good ones. And yes, too much growth marketing content focuses on ad buying. There are so many other topics that should be explored too.

  4. 2

    Nice post. 👏👏

  5. 2

    Nicholas, I am glad you are talking about this. Sometimes with the marketing receive I feel that I am in a noisy bazaar with merchants yelling and shoving items at my face. I am put off (like many others I am sure) by this.

    I hope and expect that those that can deliver honest and authentic marketing will stand out in the long run.

    Gimmicky tactics --what else? you asked…

    • The fake spinning raffle wheel. (You are a winner!)
    • The test/quiz that at the very end withholds showing your score/result until you enter your email.
    1. 1

      Yes, I agree. Honesty and authenticity always win the long game.

      Good additions to the list. Haha, the spinning raffle wheel. I never win anything good on those... no wonder why.

  6. 2

    This is a great list to think about. Thanks for sharing.

  7. 1

    It takes great marketing to sell a bad product and marketers need to put food on the table too. We can't blame them for that.

    1. 1

      Interesting perspective! Guess it's always important to see it from the flip side.

  8. 1

    Drip newsletter "courses".

    I think it's fair to exchange some info-producty thing for an email, but deliver it immediately. If you do it like this, you have earned the right to send ONE follow-up email (automated is fine). After that, delete me from your email list.

    The internet of today is a mall—mostly manicured garbage. There's still nuggets of gold out there.

    1. 1

      Completely agree! I am careful sending out more messages to my paid subscribers, let alone spamming someone slowly to death.

      Also maybe I’m just impatient but I’ve never received info from one of these “courses” that actually requires me waiting for an automated sequence over a series of days.

      I prefer strong value offer of free content up front and then letting someone make the choice to continue the relationship based on respect and reciprocity. I don’t want to feel like I am in someone’s mailchimp automations sequence.

    2. 1

      Yeah, people are becoming much more protective of their inboxes for sure. It's interesting though, because we're also seeing a resurgence of many successful email newsletters popping up lately.

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