The first 6 marketing experiments every startup should run
Discover practical strategies to improve your design process, save time, and deliver quality work more efficiently.
Tutorials
Apr 27, 2025
In the early days of a startup, marketing can feel overwhelming. With limited time, budget, and people, where do you even start? The good news: you don’t need a 12-month marketing plan or a full team to test what works.
What you do need are smart experiments that give you quick feedback, validate your assumptions, and guide where to double down. Here are five marketing experiments every startup should run early on:
Acquisition: Get more people in the door
Channel Sprint Test: Run a 2-week sprint testing 3 channels (e.g., LinkedIn Ads, cold email, and a guest blog). Track CAC (cost per acquisition) → double down on the one with the lowest cost + highest conversion.
Launch on Niche Communities: Share your product or a free tool in focused groups (Product Hunt, Indie Hackers, Slack communities, or LinkedIn groups). Test which communities actually drive signups.
Mini-SEO Test: Publish 3 SEO-optimized articles targeting long-tail keywords. See which gains traction fastest → use learnings to shape your content strategy.
Activation: Turn signups into active users
Onboarding Email Experiments: Test 2–3 different onboarding sequences (short & punchy vs. educational deep dive) to see which drives more product usage in week 1.
“Aha!” Moment Challenge: Create a campaign where new users are guided toward their first “Aha!” moment in 24h (e.g., with tooltips, welcome videos, or mini-challenges).
Personalized Demos: Offer quick 15-min founder-led demos for new signups and measure retention vs. self-serve onboarding.
How to run these experiments effectively
Keep it small: You don’t need thousands of impressions or huge budgets—just enough to see a pattern.
Document results: Record what you tested, what happened, and what you’ll change. This becomes gold for investors and your future team.
Focus on learnings, not vanity metrics: It’s not about likes—it’s about conversions, replies, and paying customers.
More to Discover
The first 6 marketing experiments every startup should run
Discover practical strategies to improve your design process, save time, and deliver quality work more efficiently.
Tutorials
Apr 27, 2025
In the early days of a startup, marketing can feel overwhelming. With limited time, budget, and people, where do you even start? The good news: you don’t need a 12-month marketing plan or a full team to test what works.
What you do need are smart experiments that give you quick feedback, validate your assumptions, and guide where to double down. Here are five marketing experiments every startup should run early on:
Acquisition: Get more people in the door
Channel Sprint Test: Run a 2-week sprint testing 3 channels (e.g., LinkedIn Ads, cold email, and a guest blog). Track CAC (cost per acquisition) → double down on the one with the lowest cost + highest conversion.
Launch on Niche Communities: Share your product or a free tool in focused groups (Product Hunt, Indie Hackers, Slack communities, or LinkedIn groups). Test which communities actually drive signups.
Mini-SEO Test: Publish 3 SEO-optimized articles targeting long-tail keywords. See which gains traction fastest → use learnings to shape your content strategy.
Activation: Turn signups into active users
Onboarding Email Experiments: Test 2–3 different onboarding sequences (short & punchy vs. educational deep dive) to see which drives more product usage in week 1.
“Aha!” Moment Challenge: Create a campaign where new users are guided toward their first “Aha!” moment in 24h (e.g., with tooltips, welcome videos, or mini-challenges).
Personalized Demos: Offer quick 15-min founder-led demos for new signups and measure retention vs. self-serve onboarding.
How to run these experiments effectively
Keep it small: You don’t need thousands of impressions or huge budgets—just enough to see a pattern.
Document results: Record what you tested, what happened, and what you’ll change. This becomes gold for investors and your future team.
Focus on learnings, not vanity metrics: It’s not about likes—it’s about conversions, replies, and paying customers.
More to Discover
The first 6 marketing experiments every startup should run
Discover practical strategies to improve your design process, save time, and deliver quality work more efficiently.
Tutorials
Apr 27, 2025
In the early days of a startup, marketing can feel overwhelming. With limited time, budget, and people, where do you even start? The good news: you don’t need a 12-month marketing plan or a full team to test what works.
What you do need are smart experiments that give you quick feedback, validate your assumptions, and guide where to double down. Here are five marketing experiments every startup should run early on:
Acquisition: Get more people in the door
Channel Sprint Test: Run a 2-week sprint testing 3 channels (e.g., LinkedIn Ads, cold email, and a guest blog). Track CAC (cost per acquisition) → double down on the one with the lowest cost + highest conversion.
Launch on Niche Communities: Share your product or a free tool in focused groups (Product Hunt, Indie Hackers, Slack communities, or LinkedIn groups). Test which communities actually drive signups.
Mini-SEO Test: Publish 3 SEO-optimized articles targeting long-tail keywords. See which gains traction fastest → use learnings to shape your content strategy.
Activation: Turn signups into active users
Onboarding Email Experiments: Test 2–3 different onboarding sequences (short & punchy vs. educational deep dive) to see which drives more product usage in week 1.
“Aha!” Moment Challenge: Create a campaign where new users are guided toward their first “Aha!” moment in 24h (e.g., with tooltips, welcome videos, or mini-challenges).
Personalized Demos: Offer quick 15-min founder-led demos for new signups and measure retention vs. self-serve onboarding.
How to run these experiments effectively
Keep it small: You don’t need thousands of impressions or huge budgets—just enough to see a pattern.
Document results: Record what you tested, what happened, and what you’ll change. This becomes gold for investors and your future team.
Focus on learnings, not vanity metrics: It’s not about likes—it’s about conversions, replies, and paying customers.