Grateful for this one.
The Readers’ Favorite International Book Award Contest gets thousands of entries from over a dozen countries every year. We’re talking NYT bestsellers, celebrity authors, submissions from Random House, HarperCollins, and Simon & Schuster. The contest breaks entries into 140+ genres so books only compete against books in the same category, which makes placing actually mean something. Past contestants have included James Rollins, Daniel Silva, Jim Carrey, and Henry Winkler. Readers’ Favorite itself is one of the most established book review and award platforms on the internet, fully accredited by the BBB with an A+ rating, and recognized by the Association of Independent Authors with their “Best Websites for Authors” and “Honoring Excellence” awards.
In the Non-Fiction – Marketing category, Outrageous Startup Growth won Bronze. [link]
The full category results: Gold went to The Strategy Trap by Kevin Ertell and How to Sell 1,000 Books a Month by Susan U. Neal; Silver to Profit Generating Pipeline by Leslie Venetz; and Honorable Mention to The Yoga of Marketing by Jeanna Valenti.
The book also received a 5-star review from Readers’ Favorite reviewer Pikasho Deka. His full review is worth reading if you want to understand what the book is actually about:
“Colin Hodge is a startup founder with over two decades of experience in the tech industry. In Outrageous Startup Growth, Hodge presents the Outrageous Growth Framework that focuses on the psychology of both the entrepreneur and the customer. This book explores the very psychology of user experience. It delves into cognitive biases and how they affect our judgment of authenticity. You will discover various principles of the growth framework, including mindset, resilience, data-driven growth, building optionality, and more. You will also learn about FOMO, game-winning strategies, seizing opportunities for scaling, the user psychology toolbox, and more.
Outrageous Startup Growth is a transformative guide for business owners and product managers, at least for the ones who prioritize their customers’ needs. In this rapidly changing world, a book like this helps highlight the importance of the customer experience. It enables startup founders to not only focus on profits and scaling but also to make sure they provide products and services that their targeted customers actually want. Colin Hodge goes through the particulars of his framework in great detail, thoroughly covering every aspect of business growth. Highly recommended.”
That kind of feedback is what I actually care about. Awards are nice, but a reviewer saying they doubt there’s a better guide out there for startup founders, that’s the stuff that keeps you going.
I wrote this book because I spent nearly two decades learning things the hard way, scaling companies to over 100 million users, navigating acquisitions, watching things fail, and figuring out what actually works when it comes to growth. The framework in the book isn’t theoretical. It’s built from real experiments, real data, and a lot of real mistakes.
Bronze is bronze. But showing up in a field that includes some of the biggest names in publishing and walking away recognized, I’ll take it. There’s more work to do, and I’m not done yet.
You can read the full review and learn more about the book at Readers’ Favorite.