Grammarly's Secret to 30M Daily Users

Imagine having a personal writing teacher available each time you type something on your screen - no more rejected proposals or failed essay papers 🤗

That's what Grammarly has become for many people. Which once started as a simple spelling and grammar checker, addresses all aspects of the writing industry today.

Amid hundreds of competitors, people still chose years-old Grammarly 🤔 But how did this AI-driven platform become the go-to writing assistant for individuals and businesses?

Let's see…

Understanding the Customer

Grammarly's success comes from its deep knowledge of its customer base, from students and professionals to businesses and casual writers. The company saw the challenges people face in written communication extend beyond basic grammatical mistakes.

They saw that people often struggle with crucial aspects such as clarity, tone, and style.

While these are the building blocks of engaging and professional content, they highlighted the need for targeted solutions to improve writing skills. With that in mind, Grammarly addresses several customer segments, each with specific requirements.

Here’s a screenshot of the age distribution of Grammarly’s audience:

And here’s another screenshot showing the majority of Grammarly’s target audience:

• Students

Academic writing is a focus area for this group. Students often struggle with sticking to formal writing standards, structuring arguments, and ensuring their essays and papers are plagiarism-free.

Grammarly’s plagiarism detection tool, advanced grammar checking, and contextual writing suggestions directly address these needs. Statistics show that 35% of Grammarly’s active users are students.

• Professionals

Business professionals need polished, concise, and persuasive writing. For this target audience, direct and professional writing skills take them a long way, whether it is writing emails, reports, or proposals.

Grammarly helps these people ensure that their writing aligns with their intended tone and helps them maintain the perfect balance between casual and formal tones. The tone detector helps here, helping 85% of users improve business communications.

• Content Creators and Marketers

With a surge in content marketing, bloggers, copywriters, and social media managers rely more on Grammarly to maintain a consistent tone, avoid awkward phrasing, and write error-free content quickly.

For content creators, it improves readability and engagement, ensuring that their messages resonate the intended way with the audience.

According to Grammarly’s internal data, 70% of content creators using the platform saw improved engagement rates on social media posts after using Grammarly.

Brand Strategy

Grammarly’s brand strategy revolves around solving user problems we just discussed above. The company's approach addresses these problems so intelligently that it retains and attracts many customers.

Freemium model

Grammarly’s freemium model is one of its core strategies. It allows users to access basic features for free. And this encourages them to upgrade to a premium version for more advanced capabilities. This model is a growth driver for Grammarly.

• Free version

It provides features like basic grammar, punctuation, and spelling corrections. It attracted over 30 million daily active users, making Grammarly a part of their everyday writing routine.

• Premium version

This version has advanced tools like plagiarism detection, tone adjustment, and vocabulary improvement. The premium user base has converted 40% of free users to paid subscribers.

Here are all the benefits of freemium and paid models:

Personalization through AI

Grammarly’s AI-powered engine is the heart of its strategy. The company has invested in artificial intelligence to give personalized suggestions based on each user's writing style, tone, and goals.

This AI engine processes billions of words daily, continuously learning and improving the feedback it gives to users.

• Tone adjustments

Grammarly's tone detector helps users ensure their message fits their audience. For example, it might suggest making an email sound more professional or a social media post sound more casual.

This feature is one of the reasons why 85% of business people feel more confident using Grammarly for work-related communications.

• Style and clarity suggestions

Grammarly's AI does more than catch grammar mistakes. It helps users write clearer and more concise sentences. Over 70% of content creators using Grammarly said applying Grammarly’s style suggestions improved audience engagement.

Check out this video to see how this feature can put you in a different position:

Multi-Platform Integration

Grammarly knew that to make its product successful, it had to integrate it across all the platforms where users write. This strategy ensures that users can get Grammarly’s suggestions no matter where they work.

• Web browser extensions

Grammarly has extensions for Google Chrome, Safari, and Firefox. These allow users to get real-time suggestions while typing emails or writing on social media platforms like LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook.

• Mobile and desktop applications

The Grammarly Keyboard app for iOS and Android ensures users have writing support on their mobile devices. Similarly, Grammarly for Microsoft Word and Google Docs helps users write better reports or essays.

These integrations have led to over 30 million daily active users, making Grammarly an essential tool for their writing needs.

Content Marketing and SEO

Grammarly’s content marketing and SEO strategy plays a role in growing the brand.

With helpful and educational content on its blog, Grammarly attracts millions of users searching for tips and solutions to common writing problems. This strategy has helped Grammarly become an authority in the writing space.

• Grammarly Blog

The company’s blog gives actionable writing tips and covers grammar rules, style guides, and professional writing techniques. The blog alone attracts over 20 million monthly visitors, many of whom become Grammarly users.

• SEO Strategy

Grammarly's website ranks highly on search engines for writing-related keywords like grammar checker, writing tips, and plagiarism checker.

The company has mastered SEO to ensure that it always gets organic traffic. SEO alone contributes to 40% of Grammarly’s user acquisition.

Here are the top 3 results for the keyword, grammar checker:

Expanding the product for businesses

Grammarly focused initially on individuals, but the company later grew to target businesses. In 2021, Grammarly launched Grammarly Business.

It is a service for teams and companies that need professional writing tools to improve internal communication. This move allowed Grammarly to tap into a new market, and by 2023, over 50,000 companies had adopted Grammarly Business.

• Team collaboration

Grammarly Business offers features that help teams collaborate more effectively by maintaining a consistent tone and style in company emails, documents, and reports.

Here’s a video explaining how Grammarly Business works for teams:

Check out this another video to see how Grammarly uses its own product internally:

According to Grammarly’s internal data, businesses that used Grammarly Business reported a 30% increase in writing efficiency and reduced email miscommunications.

Also, Grammarly’s strategy involves expanding beyond English-speaking markets. The brand aims to broaden its customer base by making the tool accessible worldwide. Currently, 40% of Grammarly’s users are non-native English speakers.

Here’s a screenshot of Grammarly’s traffic worldwide:

Execution

Grammarly's growth and customer engagement strategy has been precise and well-timed. The company’s attention to detail in product growth, user feedback, and scaling across industries has allowed it to stay ahead in the competitive world of writing tools.

Continuous Product Improvement

The brand improves its core product regularly. The team prioritizes frequent updates to ensure the tool remains relevant for its users. Beyond basic grammar and spelling corrections, Grammarly has grown its features to improve the overall quality of writing.

With its focus on AI and customer experience, Grammarly provides more accurate grammar, style, tone, and clarity suggestions using advanced AI, which they regularly refine.

A notable example is the Tone Detector in 2019, which improved user engagement by 20% by helping users match their tone to the context of their writing.

Grammarly's commitment extends to new tools, such as the Clarity and Engagement Score, which can give insights into sentence complexity and reader engagement to empower writers to revise their text effectively.

User-Centric Feedback Loop

Grammarly believes in building a product shaped by user feedback. So, the company actively listens to its users and uses their insights to fine-tune features and offer more personalized suggestions.

Through regular user studies and feedback surveys, Grammarly identifies areas for improvement and updates the product accordingly.

According to the company, over 70% of product updates come from user feedback to ensure the tool aligns perfectly with customer needs.

Before launching new features, Grammarly engages a large user base in beta testing to seek feedback and address potential issues before full-scale release. For example, over 10,000 businesses tested the beta version of the Business Writing Style Guide.

Partnerships and Integrations

Grammarly also focuses on partnerships and integrations to broaden its accessibility to diverse audiences across various industries. These collaborations have expanded the brand's reach and attracted millions.

One of the most successful integrations has been Grammarly's simplified compatibility with Microsoft Word, Google Docs, and Gmail.

By meeting users where they already write, Grammarly has gained traction. Since integrating with Google Docs in 2020, Grammarly has reported a 35% increase in usage among content creators, students, and professionals.

Grammarly has also partnered with educational institutions. In 2021, they partnered with over 1,000 universities and educational platforms to empower millions of students in academic writing.

Customer Acquisition and Retention

Grammarly's customer acquisition campaigns scale rapidly while ensuring long-term retention. The company's freemium marketing strategy attracts a large user base for free and converts them into paid customers later.

Can you believe they have converted 40% of free users into paying customers through free trials or periodic access to premium features?

They also work on paid marketing campaigns to reach even more customers through targeted ads across search engines and social media.

They spent $80 million in digital marketing in 2021 with highly targeted campaigns based on user behavior and preferences. This resulted in a 30% year-over-year increase in active users.

Results

• As of 2023, Grammarly has over 30 million daily active users, and over 50 million people use Grammarly regularly, with over 50,000 teams using it for professional purposes.

• In 2022, Grammarly generated an estimated $100 million in annual revenue from its premium plans and business offerings, while 40% of Grammarly's users have converted from free to paid plans.

• Grammarly Business is used by 70% of Fortune 500 companies, contributing to the company’s overall revenue.

• Grammarly’s focus on product improvement and customer feedback has led to a retention rate of over 90% for paid users.

Conclusion

Grammarly's journey shows the power of a customer-centric approach combined with AI-driven innovation. By addressing users' core writing challenges and offering personalized solutions across multiple platforms, Grammarly has become a trusted tool for millions.

Grammarly has set a benchmark in the tech industry proving that understanding and evolving with customer needs leads to long-term success.

Now, it's your chance:

1. What strategies can you implement to retain customers long-term, ensuring consistent growth and loyalty?

2. How can you leverage content marketing to position your brand as an industry authority while driving user growth?

We will feature the best answer in the following post. Hurry up!