Selecting Growth Tactics

Strategic intent: Pick the right tactics for the right side at the right stage — drawing from a known menu of 10 canonical tactics rather than improvising.

#Overview

The Boundaryless framework catalogs 10 key growth tactics to achieve initial liquidity, each matched to specific network properties. The Growth Tactics Cheat Sheet (an addendum to the Platform Growth & Product Guide) and the Growth Tactics Cards systematically link each tactic to:

• Why it works — the underlying mechanic
• When to use it — which network property combination it fits
• Priority — when in the launch sequence to deploy it

This technique is a card-sort exercise on those 10 tactics, ending with a chosen 3–5 that will form the launch playbook.

#When to use it

• After Building Liquidity has set thresholds and constraining strategy
• When designing the launch playbook
• When growth has stalled and the team is searching for new tactics
• When entering a new market segment that requires different tactics

#The 10 canonical growth tactics

Drawn from the Boundaryless Growth Tactics catalogue (full descriptions in Legacy PDT Growth):

#1. Building Trust

When risk and unfamiliarity slow adoption, designing trust mechanisms is often the unlock. Airbnb's Host Guarantee is the canonical example: insurance covering host risk reduced perceived risk and unlocked supply at a critical scale moment. Reviews, escrows, verifications, money-back guarantees all belong to this family.

#2. Marquee strategy

Acquire a small set of high-prestige suppliers/users that signal quality and attract others. Especially powerful for marketplaces where supply differentiation matters.

#3. Single-User Value (mainly through SaaS)

Make the product valuable for one side even without the other. The classic "SaaS-then-marketplace" pattern: users adopt for individual utility, then the network emerges naturally. Notably effective when the harder side is supply.

#4. Constraining the Market

Discussed in detail in Building Liquidity — geographic and/or categorical constraints to reach density.

#5. Single-Side Subsidies

Pay or otherwise subsidize one side to bring it on board. Define exit criteria explicitly to prevent permanent cost lines.

#6. Concierge / Manual Matching

Manually match buyers and sellers in the early days. Doesn't scale, but unlocks the first transactions and provides invaluable learning about what actually drives matches.

#7. Piggyback on Existing Networks

Leverage adjacent communities, channels, or services where target users already gather. Often combined with single-user value.

#8. Demand Aggregation Before Supply

Pre-collect demand commitments before activating supply. Useful when supply requires investment to participate.

#9. Cross-Side Referral

Convert one side's users into referrers of the other side. The PayPal classic: members got incentives to invite non-members via email, who then converted on the receiving side.

#10. Existing-Asset Leverage

If your organization or founders bring existing audiences, distribution channels, or relationships, deploy them surgically for cold-start.

#How to choose

1. #1. Match tactics to the harder side

   The marketplace type and properties analysis identified which side is harder to attract. Filter to tactics that primarily serve that side.

2. #2. Filter by network properties

   Match each candidate against your seven properties:

   • High frequency tactics (loyalty loops, push notifications, daily prompts) don't work on yearly-frequency platforms
   • Local tactics (street teams, partnerships with local merchants) don't scale globally
   • Viral mechanics require shareable transactions
   • Trust-heavy tactics apply when transaction value or risk is high

3. #3. Filter by liquidity stage

   Different stages call for different tactics:

   • Pre-liquidity — concierge, single-side subsidies, marquee strategy, constraining
   • Approaching liquidity — referrals, retention, organic SEO, partnerships
   • Post-liquidity — flywheel optimization, expansion to adjacent markets, premium tiers (this is where Growth Loops takes over)

4. #4. Choose 3–5 tactics

   Pick 3–5 tactics, no more. For each, specify:

   • Targeted side (supply / demand / both)
   • Mechanism (how exactly it works)
   • Investment (people, money, time)
   • Success metric (what number tells you it's working)
   • Time horizon (when do you re-evaluate)

5. #5. Design experiments per tactic

   For each chosen tactic, write a one-paragraph experiment description: how it will run, for how long, what counts as success or failure.

#Inputs

• Required: marketplace type and seven-property characterization
• Required: liquidity strategy with thresholds and constraining decisions
• Required: the Growth Tactics Cards deck and Growth Tactics Cheat Sheet
• Recommended: budget allocated for the launch period
• Recommended: competitive intelligence — which tactics competitors are already using

#Outputs

• Tactic shortlist — 3–5 tactics chosen with reasoning
• Per-tactic playbook — mechanism, investment, success metric, time horizon
• Experiment design — for each tactic, the structured test
• A prioritization of which tactic to launch first

#Process heuristics

• One side per tactic — tactics that "do everything" usually do nothing well
• Match horizon to expected payback — don't run an SEO play with a 3-month horizon
• Beware vanity tactics — referral programs that reward sign-ups (not transactions) inflate numbers without liquidity
• Localize before globalizing — early tactics should target the launch geography
• Consider supply-led growth — for many marketplaces, attracting suppliers is the key, not buyers
• Trust mechanisms unlock latent demand — when an existing population isn't transacting because of perceived risk, trust design is the unlock (not acquisition)

#Validation criteria

• 3–5 tactics chosen
• Each tactic targets a specific side
• Each tactic matches the marketplace type and liquidity stage
• Each tactic has a quantitative success metric
• Each tactic has a time horizon for re-evaluation
• Experiments are designed with explicit success/failure criteria

#Common mistakes

• Copying competitors blindly — their tactic worked because of their context, not the tactic itself
• Vanity metrics — sign-ups, downloads, MAU without transactions don't indicate liquidity
• Mixed objectives — running too many tactics in parallel makes attribution impossible
• Ignoring the supply side — demand acquisition is easy; supply attraction is usually the bottleneck
• Over-investing in marquee — a marquee strategy without depth becomes a vanity exercise

#Used in pipelines

• Go-to-market & Liquidity — as Phase 3

#Connections

• Requires: Marketplace Type & Properties and Building Liquidity
• Feeds: Achieving Growth pipeline — once tactics are running, growth loops take over for sustained compounding

#Related reading

• The PDT Growth & Product Guide — section "List of growth tactics to reach liquidity and relationship with Network Properties" plus the Growth Tactics Cheat Sheet in Legacy PDT Growth
• Identifying a Platform Strategy Model and its potential go-to-market strategy — connects PSM to launch tactics