I used to do that Apple store trick with reddit.
How the biggest consumer apps got their first 1k users
21–30 of 107 posts
Re: How the biggest consumer apps got their first 1k users
#22What about the PayPal way? They took a certain amount of VC money and used it to buy and sell on EBay and demand to pay/sell using only PayPal. It basically acted as a parasite on EBay until they reached critical mass. I call it "gamification of established platform". Diabolical but effective. PayPal's company mascot should be the Sea Lamprey.
Re: How the biggest consumer apps got their first 1k users
#23Surprised the Reddit 'solution' to this (fake accounts and activity until real people decide to join) isn't on the list. Fake it til you make it is definitely a strategy that a fair few successful products, services and communities used to kick things off.
That's not a strategy to get new users though. It makes a social site more appealing to new users, but it doesn't attract them. Reddit used the "tell your friends" method first, and then "have PG blog about us", which really accelerated their growth, and falls under "Leverage Influencers".
[deleted]
Re: How the biggest consumer apps got their first 1k users
#24What about the PayPal way? They took a certain amount of VC money and used it to buy and sell on EBay and demand to pay/sell using only PayPal. It basically acted as a parasite on EBay until they reached critical mass. I call it "gamification of established platform". Diabolical but effective. PayPal's company mascot should be the Sea Lamprey.
Heh, this is the first time I've heard this. Before I was only familiar with the up-from-bootstraps "we just became so popular through a pay button everyone loved" success story.
Re: How the biggest consumer apps got their first 1k users
#25I bet the companies using inventive ways to get their first users like the ones listed in the article are in the minority (but certainly make for more interesting stories to read/write about).
I launched a SaaS product recently, and after a pretty successful HN launch, I've been trying different ways of marketing.
What I learned, and this may be obvious to many, is that the boring path of getting users by gamifying SEO actually works. I firmly believe that you can get your first 1K visitors by just using the formula of writing content. You don't even have to be good at writing -- target some keywords, use good SEO hygiene, have a high enough word count, and people will at least come.
I pumped out some mediocre blog posts with clickbaity titles [1] just to test it, and I was surprised to see it work, bringing in consistent weekly traffic. A popular Chinese blogger including a one-liner about my product in his blog in February is the sole source that brings ~1-2 Chinese users (actually signed up) to my app every day 3 months later.
[1] https://terrastruct.com/blog/10-tips-diagrams-system-design-...
Re: How the biggest consumer apps got their first 1k users
#26Surprised the Reddit 'solution' to this (fake accounts and activity until real people decide to join) isn't on the list. Fake it til you make it is definitely a strategy that a fair few successful products, services and communities used to kick things off.
The Spiegel used a similar strategy at the beginning. The founder didn't have any money to hire people, but knew that a magazine written by only one guy wouldn't be taken seriously, so he just published his own writing under different names.
Re: How the biggest consumer apps got their first 1k users
#27What about the PayPal way? They took a certain amount of VC money and used it to buy and sell on EBay and demand to pay/sell using only PayPal. It basically acted as a parasite on EBay until they reached critical mass. I call it "gamification of established platform". Diabolical but effective. PayPal's company mascot should be the Sea Lamprey.
Heh, this is the first time I've heard this. Before I was only familiar with the up-from-bootstraps "we just became so popular through a pay button everyone loved" success story.
But some many online payment companies had already tried and failed at "traditional" growth. PayPal crossed the chasm by essentially bad faith gamesmanship. Nothing illegal, mind you; but I would consider it highly unethical. Not to mention difficult to stop if you're EBay.
Re: How the biggest consumer apps got their first 1k users
#28A strategy I've been thinking of for my startup (10-20 WAU currently ) is going through old HN discussions that are relevant to my product, finding people who I think would be interested in it based on their comments, and emailing them with a quote from their comment and an explanation of why I think they specifically would be interested. (and then ask them to try it out & give feedback).
I thought of this since I was reading a discussion last night that made me think "this is a perfect use case for what I'm building!", and I've had the same thought with a few other discussions in the past.
I'd be interested to hear if anyone else has tried something like this.
Re: How the biggest consumer apps got their first 1k users
#29A strategy I've been thinking of for my startup (10-20 WAU currently ) is going through old HN discussions that are relevant to my product, finding people who I think would be interested in it based on their comments, and emailing them with a quote from their comment and an explanation of why I think they specifically would be interested. (and then ask them to try it out & give feedback). I thought of this since I wa…
I've done this once, pretty high response rates compared to regular cold emails. Especially the ones who seem passionate/opinionated in their comment.
Re: How the biggest consumer apps got their first 1k users
#30This article fails to include how Airbnb really got their first users - creating several accounts and mass emailing all the landlords on Craigslist
That's how they (allegedly) got supply, not demand, which is what I focused on in the post