25 Best Growth Hacking Books for Startups

All the books below have been written by experts with years of industry experience. The advice and guidance held in each book can immediately impact your business. 

Here are the best growth hacking books to read for startups and the actionable steps you can take from each. 

Also Recommended: Check out our list of the best startup books.

Ryan Holiday is a celebrated marketing author, and his work has been featured in many publications, including The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and Forbes. In “Growth Hacker Marketing,” Holiday teaches startups how to use creative marketing tactics to grow their businesses quickly. He provides detailed case studies and real-world examples to show how entrepreneurs can use growth hacking effectively.

Entrepreneurs will learn how to adapt to new technologies and adopt modern growth strategies. Growth hacking a business means constantly interesting until a product elicits an extreme reaction. Holiday gives a go-to playbook on how to create desire for your company.

The entire growth hacking methodology is broken down into accessible parts in “Hacking Growth.” Sean Ellis, the creator of the term “growth hacking,” teams up with Morgan Brown to provide an actionable guide on how startups can use growth hacking to scale their businesses.

The book is packed with stories from some of the world’s most successful companies, including Airbnb, Facebook, and Uber. You’ll learn how these companies have used growth hacking to achieve massive success. “Hacking Growth” serves as a practical toolkit for your company to use to increase your customer base and market share.

Gabriel Weinberg and Justin Mares highlight the difficulties in acquiring new customers and gives nineteen different channels startups can use to get traction. Their book, “Traction,” makes a case that growing your customer base is the key ingredient to scaling your company.

Traction is an essential read for any startup looking for ways to generate buzz and interest in their product. The book showcases interviews with over 40 of the most successful founders in the world, including the founders of Wikipedia, Reddit, Kayak, and HubSpot.

Both Ramond Fond and Chad Riddersen both developed their growth hacking skills in the tech community. Now, they look to share a growth marketing blueprint they've developed in “Growth Hacking: Silicon Valley's Best Kept Secret.”

The ASP framework gives entrepreneurs the path towards scaling their business successfully with key components the authors have outlined. This book is perfect for entrepreneurs who want to increase their company’s user base and revenue. Silicon Valley’s secrets are revealed in this book, offering entrepreneurs a chance to learn from the best in the business.

The focus of most growth books is on acquiring more customers and driving up revenue at all costs. Daphne Tideman and Ward Gasteren take the concept one step further in “Growing Happy Clients” and show you how to take care of customers after you've converted them.

The book covers kickoff to project reflection and teaches entrepreneurs how to keep clients happy through every step of the process. “Growing Happy Clients” targets growth consultants and freelancers, but anyone growing a business can learn from the helpful advice contained within.

Looking for more book recommendations? We asked startup founders to share their favorite books on entrepreneurship, and here's what they said.

While most of the other books on this list target product-based companies, “The Paper Plane Plan” talks directly to B2B service-based businesses looking to implement growth hacking. Ross Davies does an excellent job taking the growth hacking concepts prevalent in the tech industry and translating them into a format that any business can understand.

The Paper Plane Plan is a look into the years of trial and error Davies experienced when using growth hacking qualities for his own business. Any entrepreneur in the B2B service space will gain valuable insights from “The Paper Plane Plan.”

Nir Eyal is a successful entrepreneur in his own right, and he’s also an expert on the topic of building habit-forming products. In “Hooked,” he takes the reader on a journey to understand how some of the world’s most successful companies have built their businesses by creating products people can’t put down.

You’ll learn about the psychology behind why we get hooked on certain products and how you can use those same techniques to make your own product addictive. If you’re looking for a growth hacking book that will change the way you think about product development, “Hooked” is a must-read.

Elad Gil is no stranger to high-growth tech companies and has been involved with some of the most successful in recent years including Airbnb, Twitter, Square, and Stripe. In the “High Growth Handbook,” he shares his insights on what it takes to scale a startup from 10 to 10,000 users.

The book is full of actionable advice and case studies that any entrepreneur can learn from. Managing a board, recruiting, mergers, IPOs, and even late-stage funding are all explored in Gil's book.

In “Startup Growth Engines,” Sean Ellis and Morgan Brown dive into the different growth models used by startups to achieve hockey stick growth. Key insights are gained from case studies on the most successful growth companies like Uber, Square, LinkedIn, and HubSpot.

The authors do a great job of breaking down each growth model and giving real-world examples of companies that have used them to achieve success. This is the type of growth hacking book to make notes in and come back to throughout your career. You'll always be able to gain new insights.

Entrepreneurs looking for the most practical step-by-step guide to growth hacking should check out “Secret Sauce.” The book is co-authored by Vin Clancy, who’s been responsible for growth at companies like HubSpot and Red Bull, and Austen Allred, the founder of Lambda School.

In Secret Sauce, Clancy and Allred take the reader through each stage of the customer journey and provide growth hacking tactics that can be used to increase conversion rates. If you’re looking for a book with actionable advice that you can implement immediately, Secret Sauce is the book for you.

For actionable advice you can start immediately applying to your business, look no further than “100 Days of Growth.” The book is co-authored by Sujan Patel, a growth marketing expert, and it’s packed full of growth hacking tips and tactics you can start using right away.

There is a collection of 100 different growth strategies in the book based on the strategies and techniques Patel has learned to help his clients grow their businesses.

Verne Harnish is the author of the best-selling book Mastering the Rockefeller Habits and in “Scaling Up,” he shares his insights on how to scale a business from $0 to $100 million in revenue.

The book is based on Harnish’s experience working with over 50,000 businesses and it’s packed full of practical tools and techniques used to grow businesses quickly. Readers will gain access to the One-Page Strategic Plan and the Rockefeller Habits Checklist firms are using to scale their companies.

Peter Thiel is one of the co-founders of PayPal and an early investor in Facebook, so it’s no surprise that his book “Zero to One” is a must-read for entrepreneurs. In the book, Thiel shares his insights on how to create something new and valuable in the world.

Thiel argues that even in the age of technological innovation there isn't enough progress in every sector. The focus on change has been on computers but Thiel believes that when people learn to think for themselves, they can add something new instead of improving what already exists.

Jonah Berger is a Wharton marketing professor and has done the legwork on why something becomes popular. In “Contagious,” he reveals the science behind why things go viral and provides actionable steps businesses can take to make their products and services more contagious.

Berger draws on over 200 scientific studies to explain how social contagion works and how businesses can harness its power to make their product or service catch on.

Snap Interactive was the first online dating app ever created and quickly grew Cliff Lerner's business to 100 million users. In “Explosive Growth,” Lerner shares the story of how he did it and provides readers with actionable advice they can use to grow their own businesses.

Lerner draws on his experience growing Snap to share best practices for user acquisition, product development, and learning when to pivot. He also provides insights into how to manage explosive growth once you achieve it.

Celebrities like Taylor Swift and Rihanna have used Brendan Kane's social media experience to grow their private brands — now you have access, too. In “One Million Followers,” Kane shares insights on gaining a following from scratch, creating unique and valuable content, and engaging an audience.

On top of the practical advice, Kane also includes interviews with celebrities, influencers, and marketing experts, including Phil Ranta, Chris Barton, and Julius Dein.

“Smartcuts” is an inside look into the minds of people and companies that accomplish amazing feats in an incredibly short period of time. Shane Snow shatters the old myths surrounding success and gives readers a new framework for achieving their goals.

Entrepreneurs will gain knowledge about how to work smarter and not harder. The book will teach you how to think like a computer hacker and how to lean into lateral thinking to break conventions and set your own rules.

“The 1-Page Marketing Plan” is perfect for entrepreneurs looking to get started quickly but want a solid strategy to guide them. The book provides a simple framework that can be used to create an effective marketing plan.

In the book, Dib outlines the exact process for creating a fully-fledged marketing plan that shows a direct path to getting new customers. Readers will learn how to close sales and get results on a shoestring budget.

Reid Hoffman is the host of the Masters of Scale podcast and the co-founder of LinkedIn. Chris Yeh is a startup investor, advisor, and entrepreneur. In “Blitzscaling,” they team up to share their insights on how to scale a business quickly.

The book provides entrepreneurs with a framework for making decisions at every stage of growth. Hoffman and Yeh also share case studies of companies that have used blitzscaling to achieve massive success.

Malcom Gladwell's "The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference” is a bestseller that has helped entrepreneurs learn more about what makes something popular. He breaks down the tipping point that all massively successful products and services reach.

Gladwell provides readers with a deep understanding of how social epidemics work. He also shares insights into how businesses can make their products and services more irresistible.

Seth Godin has been a thought leader in the marketing industry for decades. In “Permission Marketing,” he shares his insights on how to create long-term relationships with customers with radical thinking.

Godin lays out a framework for building trust and rapport with potential customers by creating incentives for customers to accept advertising voluntarily. Businesses who are looking for alternative ways to create more customer acquisition, Permission Marketing paves a new way forward.

Adam Penenberg highlights the power of a Viral Loop and how some of the most successful entrepreneurs have used it to achieve massive growth. A viral loop is a process whereby a product or service gains popularity through word-of-mouth.

Penenberg provides readers with a step-by-step guide on how to create and implement a viral loop for their business. He also shares case studies of companies that have used viral loops to achieve incredible success. The book is great for entrepreneurs who need to scale quickly but don't have a large budget to spend on resources.

Josh Fechter is the CEO of BAMF Media, a growth agency that has helped companies like Airbnb, Google, and Microsoft grow their businesses. In the “BAMF Bible,” he shares his insights on how to scale a business quickly without sacrificing quality.

The book provides entrepreneurs with a step-by-step guide on how to implement a growth hacking strategy. You'll learn all the major traction channels and technical strategies to gain a massive following. More than 50% of the content from the book is outsourced from members of the BAMF group.

In order to make lightning-quick decisions that can make or break your company, you need data. Alistair Croll's “Lean Analytics” shows startups how they can use data to make better decisions and drive growth.

Lean Analytics gives you the information your business needs to validate problems, find the right customers, and decide what to build and how to monetize it. The book is for businesses that are going from initial idea to bringing a product to market, and beyond.

“Hacking Independence” is a strategy book that includes 40 different growth hacking tips that anyone can try immediately. Each tip has a clear summary detailing what the strategy is and how it should be implemented. The summary also gives a clear idea of what result you should be aiming for.

There are actionable steps outlined for each strategy so your team doesn't have to waste time researching how to get them done.