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HIKIAgentic Learning Center ES
Concept

Growth loop: make every customer bring the next one

A growth loop is the system where what your customers produce brings in the next ones. You learn to tell it apart from a funnel and from a one-off push, to name its four parts and to spot the type of loop that fits your business.

What it solves

If every month you have to push just as hard to get customers, this is where you find the wheel your business already has: what a happy customer leaves behind, and how that can bring in the next one.

To get started

In 2018, Brian Balfour, Casey Winters, Kevin Kwok and Andrew Chen published an essay at Reforge with a deliberately provocative title: Growth Loops are the New Funnels. They defined a loop as a closed system where inputs, through some process, generate an output that can be reinvested as new input.

Behind that definition sits one question, and you'll use it throughout this course:

How does one group of customers lead to the next group of customers?

That group is a cohort: the people who started with you in the same period, for example everyone who signed up in March.

Concept chart: The four parts of a growth loop
The wheel shows the four parts with an example: a new customer comes in, does something with your product, leaves an invite or a review, and that brings the next input. Reinvestment is highlighted because it's the part that closes the circle. Use it as a template to draw your own business's loop.

An excerpt from the concept's reading. You study the rest with your tutor, applied to your business.

What you learn

  • The month that starts from zero
  • What a loop is
  • The four parts
  • Types of loops, with real cases

You study it in the course

Growth loops: grow your company faster

Sources

Every number in the concept comes from these sources. Examples and assumptions are labeled as such.