Growth marketing has taken off as more and more businesses realize the importance of interacting with customers in an innovative, creative, and personalized manner. A recent survey conducted by Demand Metric found that 82% of companies utilize their growth team to personalize content to improve the overall customer experience.
In this article, we’ll share eight ways you can use personalization to steer your way towards growth marketing success in 2025.
But before we do this, let’s briefly explain what exactly growth marketing is.
What is Growth Marketing?
Growth marketing brings a new life into traditional marketing disciplines by combining product development and data science practices to measure, optimize, and create new marketing campaigns.
It is a specialization and strategy within marketing which entails new techniques used to generate growth for a company, specifically through paid and organic methods. Growth marketing relies heavily on analytics and tests across multiple channels for lead generation for B2B and B2C companies.
40% of marketers say their biggest challenge with personalization is linking to data-related technologies, while 34% struggle with poor data quality. A well-executed growth marketing strategy will have a more significant impact on all aspects of marketing due to the use of Big Data and advanced analytics tools that provide businesses with better visualization methods, allowing them to make smarter decisions. The idea behind the function is to drive growth through innovation from the general market research data.
Why does personalization matter in Growth Marketing?
The customer journey is never the same. The way you interact with your prospects, customers, and clients depends on many factors: their age, their income level, the industry they work in, their location, the level of engagement with your brand, and more.
Personalization is all about giving people what they want when they want it. And that’s precisely what growth marketers need to do to drive growth in the coming years.
Why does personalization matter?
You can personalize content for different users and contexts. A report from Adobe states that personalization drives business value. 67% of consumers consider that brands should adjust content according to the current context, and 42% get annoyed if cthe ontent isn’t personalized. Data-driven personalization is making the move up the marketing funnel, from acquisition to retention and beyond.
Eight ways personalization can fuel growth Marketing
1. A/B testing
You can’t personalize content without having a clear idea of what you want to say and how you want to say it. This is where A/B testing comes into play — it allows you to test different versions of your landing pages, emails, or other content against one another to see which performs best with your audience.
70% of businesses saw increased sales through A/B testing before launch, as well as improved lead acquisition, higher clickthrough rates, and more. This is an essential part of personalization because it gives you insight into what works and what doesn’t work with your customers.
Additionally, A/B testing can also be used to optimize your designs and UI (User Interface) and improve the conversion rates of your landing pages. For this, designers can check out the UI design best practices available online.
One example of a growth marketing plan is Workzone, a project management software to increase productivity and time management. The company uses A/B testing on its homepage to determine which headline gets users to sign up for its service faster. It also tests different versions of its welcome page to see which copy converts better.
In the example below, WorkZone ran an A/B test of the colors in the logos comparing color logos with black and white logos. They found that the black and white variation outperformed the colored version and projected a 34% increase in form submissions
2. Building a targeted community around the brand
Personalization is not just about serving targeted ads or sending personalized emails. It’s about understanding what content your audience wants to consume, what they like and dislike, and how they want to engage with brands online. To build a community around your brand, you need to know who your audience members are (both current and potential) to communicate with them appropriately through email marketing or social media campaigns.
There’s a new focus on building personalized communities around brands.
For example, Pipedrive has a robust and interactive knowledge base that serves as a platform for customer engagement, product development and innovation, support, and service delivery. Community building is about getting people involved with each other and your brand — through Facebook groups or paid communities. The goal is to create an environment where people can share ideas and experiences, ask questions, and interact with your brand more intimately than just liking posts on Instagram or retweeting Twitter updates.
Harley Davidson would be the best to quote here as they created more than 1400 local chapters for bike enthusiasts to meet and interact about bikes in a personalized way.
Apart from this, Fitbit has a community of more than 25 million members who discuss fitness and share exercise insights.
Consumers want to feel like they belong to a community where they can share experiences with other like-minded people. Hence, marketers need to ensure they create experiences that create this sense of belonging.
3. Sending personalized perks through email
One of the most effective ways to deliver value for customers is by sending them personalized content or offers through email. The more relevant your message is, the higher the chance it will drive engagement and conversion. According to Dynamic Yield, 55% of consumers believe that receiving personalized promotional offers and discounts via inbox can lead to a better email experience. Sending generic messages to all customers — even if they’re interested in your product — isn’t enough anymore. People now expect customized notifications based on their preferences, location, and interests.
Sending a personalized email can be as simple as adding a user’s name into a sentence or asking them how their day is going in your subject line. It might seem small, but if you’re sending mass emails and haven’t added any personalization, you’re missing out on an opportunity to connect with your customers in a way that will win over new ones and keep old ones loyal.
The key is to always think about how you can add value – whether through an incentive or just by showing that you care about their experience with your brand.
Nike’s personalized feedback mail is an excellent example. When Nike sends you an email that has been personalized with your name, it makes you feel special, as if someone has gone through your profile before sending you an email.
4. Account-based marketing
Account-based marketing is a strategy that focuses on identifying and engaging with high-value accounts based on their size, geography, and/or industry verticals. ABM helps companies find and engage with these accounts through specific campaigns designed around their needs, rather than simply trying to break through the noise with generic marketing tactics like PPC ads or email blasts.
Growth marketers are more than just digital marketers — they’re also brand evangelists who help companies grow through strategic customer acquisition programs focused on generating new revenue streams rather than increasing awareness or engagement within an existing audience. This makes them natural fits for account-based marketing strategies because they’re already focused on identifying key players within their industries.
The evolution of account-based marketing (ABM) has driven it to become an essential part of growth marketing. Growth teams use this strategy to target their most valuable customers and prospects, resulting in increased revenue and customer loyalty.
Here’s an example illustrating how Northrop Grumman utilized the power of account-based marketing to win the contract worth 2 billion dollars and a seed investment of 270 million dollars from VITA.
The company had to first determine the target audience using ABM tools and then work on strategies to attract them. Since VITA (Virginia Information Technologies Agency) was looking for someone with expertise in IT infrastructure and distribution services, Northrop Grumman engaged in extensive campaigning that involved advertising, sponsorship, press releases facilitating promotions, and highlights of their subject matter knowledge.
Northrop Grumman first researched their target audience to understand what type of people they were and what they valued most from their product or service offering. They they crafted a message that would resonate with their target audience by creating content that was relevant to them. The content was then distributed across various channels like newspapers, videos and so forth.
Hence, this led to building trust between the customers and the company’s technical knowledge, which reinforced the belief that VITA could have a profitable partnership with them. Northrop Grumman proved their value and commitment to the progress of the people. The efforts paid off when they won the 10-year contract.
However, ABM is not just about targeting accounts. It’s also about understanding them from a holistic perspective — from the context of their organization’s goals, objectives, and challenges. This is where account-based marketing becomes strategic and allows for a more targeted approach to account planning, campaign development, lead generation activities, and even sales enablement.
5. AI-driven personalization
AI will play a massive role in the future of marketing. It has already begun to impact many business areas. According to a McKinsey report, 71% of consumers expect real-time communication, and with AI-powered conversational marketing in place, the solution is right here! If we talk about specific marketing channels, 87% of companies started leveraging AI to improve their email marketing process.
Personalized experiences can be created using AI algorithms that take into account previous interactions with customers and their purchase history and location. For example, if someone has bought from a particular store before and then comes back again looking for something similar, the store could suggest other products that might interest them based on their previous behavior and purchases.
Netflix uses AI-driven personalization to drive growth. This means that each user gets a different experience based on what they’ve done in the past. For example, if someone watches an action movie, they’ll get recommendations for similar movies or shows identical in tone and genre. If they watch a comedy show like Arrested Development, they’ll get suggestions related to it or other comedies that might appeal to them based on what they’ve observed.
AI-driven personalization means using data to predict what customers want before asking for it. This technology can personalize the content on websites or social media channels, display products based on past purchases or preferences, or even predict when someone might be ready to buy something new. AI-driven personalization helps businesses create better customer experiences and increase sales by giving them insight into what their customers want before they even know themselves!
6. Personalization in referral campaigns
Referral programs are one of the oldest and most effective ways to grow your business. It’s not a new concept, but how we implement it is changing.
A brand can use growth marketing to drive referrals by providing a service or product that is so valuable that users want to tell their friends about it.
The role of personalization in growth marketing tools is to ensure that each referral is relevant to the recipient and drives them to take action.
Dropbox, for example, uses referral programs to encourage users to share the service with their friends. Dropbox gives out an extra 500Mb to 1Gb of space for each friend referred who signs up depending upon the type of account owned.
In the above image, you can see Dropbox’s personalized referral email sent to a new user on the platform highlighting the perks and benefits of joining in while retaining the idea of a custom-made message to show that the customer is valued and the user journey matters for the upliftment of the brand.
Similarly, Lyft has an amazing promotional program where they curate specific codes corresponding to the users which can be used as a referral mechanism. Users are given unique codes which can be shared within their network and create a ripple effect where more people sign up through the personalised referral mechanism.
Here, through personalization, there are three main components in focus:
- Acquisition: Attracting new users or customers to your brand
- Activation: Turning those new users into loyal fans who love your product or service
- Retention: Keeping existing customers happy, so they keep coming back
The goal of growth marketing is to increase the number of new customers coming into your business by enticing them with something they want — whether it’s content or a discount on something they already want but could get from anywhere else.
Personalized referrals are a popular way to drive revenue. Referrals are effective because they’re based on trust between you and your customers. If someone trusts you enough to recommend your company to others, they must like what you do enough to want others to try it out for themselves!
7. Cross-channel marketing
Cross-channel marketing, meanwhile, refers to a strategy that integrates multiple channels — such as email, in-app messaging, and social media — into one cohesive campaign. This helps you build relationships with customers across devices and enhance the brand experience through consistent messaging.
Rebecca Minkoff uses cross-channel marketing to align with their strategy. Cross-channel marketing should be planned and executed promptly. With the fast-paced nature of business today, it’s essential that companies stay ahead of the curve and make sure they provide customized experiences for their customers.
The brand’s website takes a unique approach to cross-channel marketing by allowing shoppers to use their mobile phones to scan products in stores, bringing up product information and prices on their screens. This will enable shoppers to make purchases from anywhere in the store without waiting for a sales associate or searching for products themselves (which can take a long time).
Cross-channel marketing allows brands like Rebecca Minkoff to provide an excellent user experience that enhances conversions while providing opportunities for customer engagement at every stage of the journey.
8. Onboarding
Onboarding is a great way to improve customer interaction and convert new users into paying customers. It helps you build trust and establish yourself as an authority on your topic or industry. It also allows you to provide value to your customers before they make any purchases from your site.
The first step in any successful relationship is getting users on board with your product or service. As an entrepreneur or marketer, you want your new users to feel like they’re part of something special from day one — but how do you do that when they’re just strangers?
By using personalized onboarding strategies, you can get new users excited about joining your community and building their relationships with other members of your brand. This will help them feel more invested in your community and encourage them to return once they’ve had time to get familiar with things. Onboarding is also key to improving customer interaction because it can help new visitors get acquainted with your site or app as quickly as possible while also helping them understand how to use it most effectively.
Conclusion
The lines that divide marketing and growth will be blurred in the future. A growth marketing platform will consider a customer’s context, not just their actions. For example, if a customer is visiting your identity site (Identity.com), their experience will be different from your e-commerce site (Brandname.com). These contextual experiences need to be individually crafted instead of on multiple occasions for one site/product. This tapestry of customer interactions provides tremendous personalization and growth opportunities that marketers today can only dream about.
