Tik-Tok. This is a wake up call to all the entrepreneurs out there testing their services in BETA.
The most critical situation for any product/service is when it has its first 1000 customers or users. Now what happens with most of the entrepreneurs/Startups who have their services in a BETA, the founders usually get in an user acquisition mode, which is not wrong, but again is hugely disruptive in the early stages.
Let me explain that,when we start working on something which we think is huge and can make an impact on the industry (Every Entrepreneur thinks this way about his startup :P), we set out certain goals and, milestones which are actually good for a startups growth. They make out a potential customers/users list, target market entering plans, investor decks, etc., And get down to User acquisition mode (which i call Bullshitting 101 Mode) and focuses all their energy on it. Now the way it turns into an earthquake is, they starts investing in wrong areas, like Ads, promoted content, events, etc., which are good only when you have a remarkable presence, But forgets that those first adopters of your service, those early Beta users of yours, should be the one offered with rewards, rewards of gentleness, regular interactions, caring. All these things can create a lasting impact to that one user who will spread out word about your product and service.
Now consider, all the potential users, are on social media (On Facebook/twitter/pinterest, & if 14 to 21 years old id your target, then they area at Snapchat/Instagram/Vine) and are interacting with each other. Now imagine the potential of this thing, if your potential users are interacting to each other, they can be probably interacting about our products and services. This is how a thing spreads, this is how word of mouth comes to play, so to be able to come in a state you need to give these users on social media a reason to speak about you.
And this is where i say, this is the time to stop focusing on user acquisition (As it is all mapped, you can do it anytime), and start to concentrate all your attention to users retention.
So how should one do the ‘Retention’ thing?
Its very simple, stop marketing, start interacting.
A regular interaction with every user or every top user will help you build a strong base. Don’t expect things to be like rocket ship, things will take time. So its better to build relationships than Customer list.
As you build great relationships with your early users, they will not hesitate to spread a word about your product and services on other networks and in their community. And this is what word of mouth is, this is how the real things spread.
So lets stop Bullshitting everywhere, stop spamming for sometime, start interacting, start building relationships with your users, early users, late users. Build a great product.
About The Author – Veer Mishra
An Artist, Disrupter and a Blogger, Author of the book JumpOff (Pre-Order at Jumpoff.me). Co-founder of mYwindow.
