the growth stack


the growth stack.

A common question I hear after speaking:

“Would you recommend tool X?”

Sometimes it’s a popular one.
Sometimes it’s one I haven’t heard of.
Sometimes it’s an exploitative POS.

I answer on the spot.
Give my impressions and what I think about.
The questions move on.

But “the tool” is the wrong question to ask.
I’ve agitated on this a lot.
The best growth people are tool agnostic.

This means they’re not a Salesforce guru.
They’re not a Zapier wizard.
And they’re certainly not reliant on Ahrefs.

There’s nothing explicitly wrong with these tools.

(Okay - maybe there is a lot wrong with Salesforce).

But true growth expertise doesn’t come from a particular tool.

Here are 4 areas you can keep improving ad infinitum:

- Copywriting
- Design
- Automation
- Data

This “stack” is bulletproof.
You can keep learning this stuff and it will never get old.
This has applied for 20+ years so far.

If you’re a founder - you need to understand these.
If you’re a growing marketer - you need to understand these.
And if you want to grow your knowledge for doing anything persuasive on the Internet - you need to understand these.

I’m learning about these things every day.

There's tools I've been perusing for each of these:

  • Copywriting - Octave, Twain.ai
  • Design - Relume, CreateThat.ai
  • Automation - n8n, Crew.ai
  • Data - Firecrawl.dev

But do you want to know what I think?

Focus on improving your growth stack 😉

-Marshy

p.s. Thanks for the responses to my BULLDOG ask - guide should be in the inboxes of the people who replied

PO Box 378, Kangaroo Ground, Victoria 3097
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