Acquisition growth tactics

Turn attention into visitors, sign-ups and leads. Practical acquisition tactics with steps, examples and pitfalls.

1. First-time visitors
2. Email sign-ups
3. SMS opt-ins
4. Code used on first order
Acquisition
Capture emails and SMS sign-ups with a first-order welcome offer

Offer new visitors a first-order discount or perk in a well-timed pop-up, collect email then SMS with consent, and deliver the code by message.

Impact High Effort Low + free tool
Categories: Conversion, Email
1. 1 Customer finishes a visit or job
2. 2 Same-day text with a direct review link
3. 3 Owner replies to every review
Acquisition
Get a steady flow of Google reviews for a local business

Ask every customer for a Google review at the right moment with a direct link, within Google's rules, so your rating stays fresh and credible.

Impact High Effort Low
Categories: Customer Support, SEO, Email
Form, then wait

Visitor submits form and sees a thank-you page
Rep emails hours or days later with time options
Form, then calendar

Form answers checked against simple fit rules
Qualified visitors see the right rep's calendar at once
Acquisition
Let qualified visitors book a demo instantly from your form

Show a calendar right after the demo form so qualified leads pick a time with the right rep in one step, instead of waiting for an email back.

Impact High Effort Low + free tool
Categories: Conversion, Sales
1. Day 1 Verify the profile, set the real business name and primary category
2. Week 1 Add services, hours, service area, attributes and booking link
3. Week 2 Upload real photos of the place, team and finished work
Acquisition
Optimise your Google Business Profile to show up in local search

Fill in categories, services, photos, hours and posts on your Google Business Profile so you appear in the map results when nearby customers search.

Impact High Effort Low
Categories: SEO, Content
1. Search impression
2. Product page view
3. Install
4. First open
Acquisition
App store optimisation for the App Store and Google Play

Tune your app's name, keywords, screenshots and ratings so more people find it in store search and tap install.

Impact High Effort Medium + free tool
Categories: SEO, Conversion, A/B Testing
1. People searching for the job
2. Tool users
3. Clicks on the next step
4. Trials and signups
Acquisition
Build a free tool your buyers already search for

Ship a small, single-purpose free tool that answers a search your target customers make, and use it to bring qualified visitors to your product.

Impact High Effort Medium
Categories: SEO, Content, Conversion
1. Shopper unsure what to buy
2. Starts the quiz
3. Answers 4 to 7 questions
4. Sees one main match with reasons
Acquisition
Build a product-finder quiz that segments and converts shoppers

Ask shoppers a few quick questions, recommend the right product with a clear reason, and use their answers to personalise follow-up emails.

Impact High Effort Medium + free tool
Categories: Conversion, Email, Customer Research
1. 1 Find jobs people search for
2. 2 Build a template for each job
3. 3 Give each its own landing page
Acquisition
Build a public template gallery that ranks and leads into your product

Publish ready-made templates for common jobs, give each its own searchable page, and let visitors open them straight in your product.

Impact High Effort Medium
Categories: SEO, Content, Conversion
1. 1 Visitor joins and sees their place in line
2. 2 Gets a personal link to skip ahead
3. 3 Shares it with friends who would care
Acquisition
Build a viral pre-launch waitlist where referrals move you up

Give every waitlist sign-up a personal link and a visible place in line, and move them up each time a friend joins through their link.

Impact High Effort Medium + free tool
Categories: Email, Social Media, Conversion
1. 1 Measure the baseline conversion rate
2. 2 Pick the smallest lift worth finding
3. 3 Calculate sample size per variant
Acquisition
Decide your A/B test sample size before you start

Work out how much traffic a test needs up front, then judge it once, so you stop shipping winners that were never real.

Impact High Effort Medium + free tool
Categories: A/B Testing, Analytics
1. 1 Find a platform where your buyers gather
2. 2 Read its rules, API terms and fees
3. 3 Offer real value inside the platform
Acquisition
Grow by piggybacking on a bigger platform's audience

Build where a larger platform's users already gather, give them something useful there, and bring the best of them back to a channel you own.

Impact High Effort Medium
Categories: Partnerships, Content, Social Media
Every ad goes to the homepage

Ad promises one thing, page headline says another
Visitor hunts for the offer they clicked on
One page per ad group

Headline repeats the ad's words and promise
The offer from the ad is above the fold
Acquisition
Match each landing page to the ad and audience that sends traffic

Build a separate landing page for each ad group or audience so the headline, offer and proof repeat exactly what made people click.

Impact High Effort Medium + free tool
Categories: Conversion, Paid Ads, A/B Testing
1. Accelerator and VC partners
2. Startups claim credits
3. Active startups
4. Credits expire or run out
Acquisition
Offer startup credits through accelerators and investor networks

Give early-stage startups free credits on your product via accelerators and VCs so they adopt you early and grow into paying customers.

Impact High Effort Medium
Categories: Partnerships, Pricing
Typical listing

Title stuffed with every keyword variant
Main image plus a few near-identical angles
Optimised listing

Title leads with brand, product type and the key differentiator
Images show scale, use, contents and a comparison
Acquisition
Optimise your Amazon product listing to rank and convert

Improve titles, images, bullets, A+ content and compliant review requests so your product shows up in Amazon search and wins the click.

Impact High Effort Medium
Categories: SEO, Conversion, Content
1. Setup Register a sending domain and add SPF, DKIM and DMARC
2. First weeks Named inboxes send a few personal emails a day
3. Following weeks Raise volume gradually with people likely to reply
Acquisition
Protect deliverability before you send cold email

Set up a separate sending domain, authenticate it, warm it up and keep volume low so your outbound emails reach the inbox and your main domain stays safe.

Impact High Effort Medium
Categories: Email, Sales
1. 1 Define 3 triggers tied to your product
2. 2 Set alerts for funding, hires and job moves
3. 3 Check the account fits your profile
Acquisition
Reach out to prospects when a buying trigger happens

Watch for signals like new funding, key hires or a fresh job title, then send outreach that ties the event to a problem you solve.

Impact High Effort Medium
Categories: Sales, Email
1. 1 Lead submits form or calls
2. 2 Lead routed instantly to an owner
3. 3 Owner alerted by phone push or team chat
Acquisition
Respond to inbound leads within minutes of the request

Route every inbound lead to a person instantly and contact them within minutes, while they still remember why they asked.

Impact High Effort Medium
Categories: Sales, Conversion
1. Visitor sees trial offer
2. Buys or claims a sample
3. Uses the product
4. Buys full size
Acquisition
Use product samples and trial sizes to win first-time buyers

Offer low-cost samples or trial sizes that let new customers try your product with little risk, then guide them to a full-size order.

Impact High Effort Medium
Categories: Conversion, Paid Ads, Email
1. 1 Write hypotheses from customer insight
2. 2 Produce 3 to 5 concepts with hook variants
3. 3 Test with a fixed budget per concept
Acquisition
Build a creative testing system for Meta and TikTok ads

Test ad concepts in a structured weekly cycle, judge them on cost per purchase or install, and move winners into scaling campaigns.

Impact High Effort High + free tool
Categories: Paid Ads, A/B Testing
1. 1 Partner recommends your product
2. 2 Partner implements it for the client
3. 3 Client succeeds and renews
Acquisition
Build an agency and reseller partner programme that sells for you

Recruit agencies and resellers who already serve your buyers, train them to sell and implement your product, and pay them for the customers they bring.

Impact High Effort High
Categories: Partnerships, Sales
Free plan that cannibalises

Limits chosen by gut feel or copied from a competitor
Covers everything a small team ever needs
Free plan that converts

Limits set on usage that grows with success
Full core experience so users reach real value
Acquisition
Design a freemium plan that converts to paid

Set free plan limits around the moment users get serious, so the free tier brings in signups without giving away what people would pay for.

Impact High Effort High
Categories: Pricing, Conversion
1. Week 1-2 List 50 people with the exact problem and contact each one personally
2. Week 2-4 Set up every new user yourself on a call or in person
3. Month 2 Do the hard part by hand behind the scenes for your first accounts
Acquisition
Do things that don't scale to win your first 100 users

Recruit early users and supply by hand, set them up yourself and treat each one like your only customer until the product pulls its own weight.

Impact High Effort High
Categories: Sales, Customer Research
1. 1 Find a search pattern with many variants
2. 2 Collect data unique to each variant
3. 3 Design one template around the data
Acquisition
Programmatic SEO pages that rank for long-tail searches

Generate hundreds of search pages from one template and a real dataset, so each page answers a specific long-tail query better than anything else.

Impact High Effort High + free tool
Categories: SEO, Content
1. Ideal customer profile
2. Named account list
3. Engaged accounts
4. Meetings with the buying group
Acquisition
Run account-based marketing on a short list of target companies

Pick a named list of high-value accounts and coordinate ads, content, email and sales touches so each buying group hears one consistent story.

Impact High Effort High
Categories: Sales, Paid Ads, Content
1. 1 Founder runs discovery calls
2. 2 Logs objections and buying reasons
3. 3 Updates pitch, list and product
Acquisition
Run founder-led sales to learn your market before hiring reps

Founders take the first sales calls themselves to learn who buys, why they buy and what to say, then write it down before hiring a sales team.

Impact High Effort High
Categories: Sales, Customer Research
1. 1 Export customers with value data
2. 2 Keep the top tier by value or retention
3. 3 Upload with consent and hashing
Acquisition
Build lookalike audiences from your best customers

Feed ad platforms a clean list of your highest-value customers so they can find new people who look like them, instead of seeding from everyone.

Impact Medium Effort Low
Categories: Paid Ads, Analytics
1. 1 Claim and complete each profile
2. 2 Spot moments of customer success
3. 3 Ask every customer the same way
Acquisition
Build your presence on G2, Capterra and Trustpilot with real reviews

Claim your review-site profiles, ask happy customers for honest reviews at the right moment, and reply to every review in public.

Impact Medium Effort Low
Categories: Customer Support, Conversion
1. 1 Shortlist newsletters your buyers read
2. 2 Book one test issue each
3. 3 Tag every link and use a unique offer
Acquisition
Buy niche newsletter sponsorships and measure what they return

Place ads in small, focused newsletters your buyers read, test them in small batches, and track each placement with its own link and offer.

Impact Medium Effort Low + free tool
Categories: Paid Ads, Email, Analytics
Generic exit popup

"Wait! Don't go!" on every page
Newsletter signup or a blanket discount
Reason-matched exit offer

Shown only on pricing or a key page
Offer answers why visitors leave
Acquisition
Catch leaving visitors with a useful exit offer

Show a single, genuinely helpful offer when visitors are about to leave a key page, and run it as a proper test to prove it adds conversions.

Impact Medium Effort Low + free tool
Categories: Conversion, A/B Testing
1. 1 Check who bids on your brand name
2. 2 Run a separate brand campaign
3. 3 Pause-test it to measure what it adds
Acquisition
Protect your brand search terms and bid on competitors carefully

Run search ads on your own brand name to hold the top spot, and target competitor terms with honest ads that respect ad policies and trademark rules.

Impact Medium Effort Low + free tool
Categories: Paid Ads, Conversion
No convention

"Facebook", "facebook", "fb" and "meta" logged as four sources
Campaign names made up link by link
Written convention

Short fixed list of mediums and sources
One campaign format, such as 2026-10_launch
Acquisition
Set a UTM naming convention before your next campaign

Agree on how you tag links so your analytics groups traffic correctly instead of splitting it across typos.

Impact Medium Effort Low + free tool
Categories: Analytics, Paid Ads
1. Visitor with a specific problem
2. Sees a matching offer
3. Trades email for the resource
4. Uses it and reads follow-ups
Acquisition
Create lead magnets that people actually want to download

Offer a template, checklist or calculator that solves one specific problem in exchange for an email, then follow up with help that leads to your product.

Impact Medium Effort Medium + free tool
Categories: Content, Email, Conversion
1. 1 List 30 prompts buyers ask AI assistants
2. 2 Record who gets mentioned today
3. 3 Publish clear answer pages on your site
Acquisition
Get your brand recommended in ChatGPT and AI search answers

Make your product easy for AI assistants to understand, cite and recommend by publishing clear answers and earning mentions on sources they read.

Impact Medium Effort Medium
Categories: SEO, Content, Partnerships
1. 1 Visitor joins the waitlist
2. 2 Short survey ranks the queue
3. 3 Batch of users gets access
Acquisition
Launch with invite-only access without faking scarcity

Use a waitlist and limited invites to control load, learn from early users and build demand, with honest reasons for every limit.

Impact Medium Effort Medium
Categories: Conversion, Customer Research
Scripted call

Same opening line for every prospect
Long pitch before any question
Researched call

Opens with a specific reason tied to their business
Asks permission and one sharp question
Acquisition
Make short researched cold calls instead of reading a script

Spend a few minutes researching each prospect, open with a specific reason for calling and ask one good question instead of reciting a pitch.

Impact Medium Effort Medium
Categories: Sales
1. 1 Pick a how-to search with clear intent
2. 2 Check the top videos for gaps
3. 3 Show the result in the first 15 seconds
Acquisition
Make tutorial videos that rank in YouTube search

Publish practical how-to videos built around what people search on YouTube, so new viewers find you for years after you hit publish.

Impact Medium Effort Medium + free tool
Categories: Content, SEO, Social Media
1. 1 Verify students and educators
2. 2 Teachers build the tool into classes
3. 3 Graduates take it to their jobs
Acquisition
Offer free or discounted access to students and educators

Give verified students and teachers free or cheap access so future professionals learn on your product and bring it to work later.

Impact Medium Effort Medium
Categories: Pricing, Partnerships
1. All site visitors
2. Audiences by page intent
3. Customers and trial users removed
4. Matched ads under frequency caps
Acquisition
Retarget visitors with ads that match what they viewed

Show ads to past site visitors based on the pages they read, with frequency caps and exclusions so you spend on people who are still deciding.

Impact Medium Effort Medium + free tool
Categories: Paid Ads, Analytics
1. 1 Pick 20 to 50 high-value accounts
2. 2 Confirm the person and office address
3. 3 Mail a useful item with a personal note
Acquisition
Send direct mail to high-value B2B accounts to open doors

Mail a thoughtful, relevant package to a short list of key decision makers and follow up by phone and email so it starts a real conversation.

Impact Medium Effort Medium
Categories: Sales
1. 1 Make the help centre public and crawlable
2. 2 Mine support tickets for real phrases
3. 3 Title each article as the problem
Acquisition
Turn your help docs into a search channel

Write and structure help articles so they rank for the problems prospects search, and use them to bring in new users as well as support existing ones.

Impact Medium Effort Medium
Categories: SEO, Content, Customer Support
1. Week 1 Build a list of 30 to 50 named prospects and fix your own profile
2. Week 1 to 2 Follow them and leave useful comments on their posts
3. Week 2 to 3 Publish two posts a week on the problem they face
Acquisition
Warm up B2B prospects on LinkedIn before you reach out

Follow, engage and add value on LinkedIn for a few weeks so your first direct message reaches someone who already knows your name.

Impact Medium Effort Medium
Categories: Sales, Social Media
1. Marketplace search or category browse
2. Listing view
3. Install
4. Activated account
Acquisition
Get customers from app marketplace listings like Shopify and Slack

Build an integration, list it in a partner's app marketplace, and optimise the listing so the platform's users find and install you.

Impact Medium Effort High
Categories: Partnerships, SEO, Conversion
1. 6 weeks before Get the attendee or exhibitor list and pick target accounts
2. 4 weeks before Email and call targets to book meetings at the booth
3. Show days Qualify every visitor with three questions and tag them
Acquisition
Turn a trade show booth into qualified pipeline

Book meetings before the show, qualify visitors at the booth and follow up within days so your trade show spend turns into real sales conversations.

Impact Medium Effort High
Categories: Sales, Partnerships
1. 1 User installs a single-purpose extension
2. 2 Extension saves time on a real task
3. 3 Ratings lift its Web Store ranking
Acquisition
Use a Chrome extension as a customer acquisition channel

Ship a small, single-purpose browser extension that solves a real problem where people work, then lead active users toward your main product.

Impact Medium Effort High
Categories: SEO, Conversion, Onboarding

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Acquisition growth tactics

Capture emails and SMS sign-ups with a first-order welcome offer

Get a steady flow of Google reviews for a local business

Let qualified visitors book a demo instantly from your form

Optimise your Google Business Profile to show up in local search

App store optimisation for the App Store and Google Play

Build a free tool your buyers already search for

Build a product-finder quiz that segments and converts shoppers

Build a public template gallery that ranks and leads into your product

Build a viral pre-launch waitlist where referrals move you up

Decide your A/B test sample size before you start

Grow by piggybacking on a bigger platform's audience

Match each landing page to the ad and audience that sends traffic

Offer startup credits through accelerators and investor networks

Optimise your Amazon product listing to rank and convert

Protect deliverability before you send cold email

Reach out to prospects when a buying trigger happens

Respond to inbound leads within minutes of the request

Use product samples and trial sizes to win first-time buyers

Build a creative testing system for Meta and TikTok ads

Build an agency and reseller partner programme that sells for you

Design a freemium plan that converts to paid

Do things that don't scale to win your first 100 users

Programmatic SEO pages that rank for long-tail searches

Run account-based marketing on a short list of target companies

Run founder-led sales to learn your market before hiring reps

Build lookalike audiences from your best customers

Build your presence on G2, Capterra and Trustpilot with real reviews

Buy niche newsletter sponsorships and measure what they return

Catch leaving visitors with a useful exit offer

Protect your brand search terms and bid on competitors carefully

Set a UTM naming convention before your next campaign

Create lead magnets that people actually want to download

Get your brand recommended in ChatGPT and AI search answers

Launch with invite-only access without faking scarcity

Make short researched cold calls instead of reading a script

Make tutorial videos that rank in YouTube search

Offer free or discounted access to students and educators

Retarget visitors with ads that match what they viewed

Send direct mail to high-value B2B accounts to open doors

Turn your help docs into a search channel

Warm up B2B prospects on LinkedIn before you reach out

Get customers from app marketplace listings like Shopify and Slack

Turn a trade show booth into qualified pipeline

Use a Chrome extension as a customer acquisition channel

New tactics and tools, once a week