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Grow & market

What is community-led growth and is it right for my startup?

Community-led growth means users create value for each other so the product spreads and retains through belonging, not just features. It's powerful when your product is more useful with peers around it, and a distraction when there's no real reason for users to connect. Don't build a community because it's trendy; build it because your users genuinely benefit from each other.

Go deeper

2 resources, 1 link-checked.

📄 Article
✓ Link checked Freemium Intermediate

From the founder of CMX and author of The Business of Belonging, a practical framework for deciding whether to build community and tying it to real business goals.

A Founder's Guide to Community

From Lenny's Newsletter by David Spinks ~25 min read

  • To build community you help people help each other, not build an audience.
  • Use the SPACES model to map community goals to business outcomes.
  • Start with founding members and events before scaling to a big open space.
Open lennysnewsletter.com →
📖 Book
Paid Advanced

The definitive playbook for network and community-led products, drawn from Andrew Chen's a16z experience and interviews with Slack, Uber, Tinder, Airbnb and more.

The Cold Start Problem: How to Start and Scale Network Effects

From Harper Business by Andrew Chen Book (~368 pages)

  • Build the smallest self-sustaining 'atomic network' before trying to scale.
  • Focus on the hard side of the network and give it a magic moment.
  • Networks are anti-viral until they cross a density threshold, so start narrow.
Open coldstart.com →

Terms in this answer

Community-Led Growth

People also ask

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