Hacking Growth: How Today's Fastest-Growing Companies Drive Breakout Success

The definitive playbook for growth hacking, co-written with Morgan Brown. Ellis and Brown lay out the complete methodology for building growth teams and running rapid experimentation across the full customer funnel.

Why Start Here

This is the only book Sean Ellis has written, and it represents the sum of everything he learned building growth engines at some of the most successful startups of the past two decades. Rather than a memoir or thought piece, it is a practical operating manual. Ellis and Brown walk you through how to set up a cross-functional growth team, how to identify your product’s core value moment, how to design and prioritize experiments, and how to systematically optimize acquisition, activation, retention, revenue, and referral.

The book draws on case studies from companies Ellis worked with directly, including Dropbox, Uber, Pinterest, LinkedIn, and BitTorrent. Each example illustrates a specific technique: how Dropbox used its referral program to grow 3,900% in fifteen months, how Pinterest redesigned onboarding to boost activation, and how Uber expanded city by city using localized growth loops.

What to Expect

A comprehensive 320-page guide that balances strategic thinking with actionable tactics. The writing is clear and business-focused, aimed at founders, product managers, and marketers. Some familiarity with digital products and startup terminology is helpful but not strictly necessary.