Startup growth that compounds

Funnels — money in (ads) → customers out. You pay for each one. Stop paying, growth stops.

Loops — each customer produces more customers (or more usage that produces more customers). Compound without continuous spend.

Three common loop shapes:

1. Viral loop — users invite users (Calendly, Loom, Slack). Works when the product naturally involves a second person.
2. Content loop — content earns search traffic / shares → traffic converts to customers → customers create more content. Slow-build (3-12 months) but compounding.
3. Paid loop — ads acquire customer → LTV > CAC by enough → reinvest in more ads. Looks like a funnel; works like a loop if the unit economics actually compound.

Most founders default to ads (a funnel). They die when the spend slows. Builders who win usually have one paid funnel for short-term + one loop for long-term.

There are ~15 distribution channels. Almost every successful company has 1-2 that produce ≥80% of growth. The job is to find which ones, not to do all of them.

A 90-day channel test:

• Week 1: Pick 3 channels to test (one slow-loop, two faster) based on where your buyer actually spends time
• Week 2-8: Run each channel with a minimum-viable budget for 4-6 weeks
• Week 9-10: Measure cost-per-customer and LTV signal; rank
• Week 11-12: Double down on the best one; kill the others

What "where your buyer actually spends time" means: B2B devs → Twitter / dev forums / SEO. SMB owners → LinkedIn / podcasts / referrals. Consumer prosumers → TikTok / Instagram / influencer partnerships. Get this wrong and you can run great ads in a place no one's looking.

Stall causes, in order of frequency:

1. Onboarding leak — activation dropped before retention. Fix the onboarding funnel first, always.
2. Product-market fit narrowed — segment you grew with is tapped; you need a second segment or a wider wedge.
3. Channel saturation — you've reached the limit of the audience on the one channel that worked. Time to add a second.
4. Brand confusion — buyers don't know what you do anymore because you added features for three segments. Sharpen positioning.

What it's almost never:

• "We need more growth hacks." If you're stalled, the hack won't fix the underlying issue.
• "We need a new website." Usually a distraction.
• "We need to raise more money." If growth has stalled, more money typically buys more of the same stall.