.png){kind=spacer}
Casey Reid loves helping companies grow. As Thin Air Labs’ Product Growth Lead they get to do this every day, removing blockers and bottlenecks so startups and scaleups can grow faster.
“For me,” explains Casey, “the impact is really about saving people time and money, by unlocking their business.”
In the world of Product Growth, Casey unlocks businesses by deeply understanding what a company is building, examining their data for insights then developing strategies that will help their company get to the next stage.
“Product Growth is looking at products in the technology space,” says Casey, “understanding how they can be built, the ways in which they can work better and grow to encourage more people to use those products.”
Casey has years of experience developing features and products as well as product management. And they recognize, in today’s world, just building the product or platform is not enough.
“In 2023 there is way less funding than there has been. Historically in tech, you used to see a reliance on product market fit, but companies didn’t need to have a fully running product analytics ship,” explains Casey, “you were able to build a business off of hunches and early adopters. Now, it’s important to not only understand who your customers are and how to get more of them, but to also understand the long term vision for your company.”
“There are so many opportunities to get it wrong when you’re trying to build something, and it seems silly to me not to look at all the information that you have available to you, and your data is a fundamental part of that information.” ---Casey Reid, Product Growth Lead
Essentially, growth looks a lot different now than it did even a few years ago.
“Ideally you want your company to grow from both a revenue perspective and user perspective,” says Casey. “But what that looks like now, is not just this up and to the right growth. Instead, companies need a more realistic outlook that accounts for the peaks and valleys of their users’ interest and planning their business around that.”
And data is the most effective asset to get this broad insight into a company.
“I’ve always been interested in data,” admits Casey. “There are so many opportunities to get it wrong when you’re trying to build something, and it seems silly to me not to look at all the information that you have available to you, and your data is a fundamental part of that information.”
Casey has worked for numerous startups over the years, as well as larger enterprises. But what drew them to Thin Air was the opportunity to work with startups again in an ecosystem that was growing rapidly.
“In Calgary, you still have that newness in technology that existed in Toronto maybe a decade ago,” says Casey. “It’s exciting here, people are building, and that is very enticing to me. I want to be a part of roads that have not been driven down before.”
It’s an opportunity for Casey to use their expertise to help new founders grow their companies more efficiently.
“A lot of founders get really wrapped up in their idea of how to solve a problem. But as a third party, we can come in not as tied to the same approach to a value proposition,” explains Casey. “It’s easier for us to look at the data, leverage our expertise and empower founders to make data-driven decisions and ultimately help them understand where to spend their money.”
And so far, Casey is inspired by the ideas and founders in Calgary, willing to work hard to solve global problems that will change the world.
“Anything in history we know now to be common sense started out as a new idea,” says Casey. “I don’t believe new ideas are just thrown into the world and immediately accepted. Instead, there’s time, thoughtfulness and effort. True innovation will come from those toiling away at their idea for years. That’s where we’re going to see some of the life changing technologies that will be relevant to us 5 to 10 years from now.”
