Hey there!
We’re building Viral Loops, a referral marketing platform, which among others, offers the option of building prelaunch campaigns for both web and mobile apps.
Currently you can run 3 types of prelaunch campaigns with us:
The Startup Prelaunch, inspired by Robinhood
The idea is that you let people join your campaign, and then prompt them to invite their friends to get earlier access to your app than others.
When to use this concept:
- Your eCommerce store, web or mobile app, is not ready yet, but you want to get traction and early adopters.
Tips:
- Engage people at leat once every two weeks (weekly is preferable) with product updates and relevant content. You can also build your startup publicly.
- Run short surveys and schedule calls to find your pricing. This is super important. Don’t build your product, marketing but leave your pricing last. This is how you make money.
The Private Beta, inspired by Monzo.
This campaign can work really well if your app is ready but you want to a) market it around exclusivity and b) onboard gradually your users. People first join the campaign through your landing page.
You can then send an onboarding email automatically, to a specific amount of people based on their position in the queue. This email includes a link to the app store to download your app and a unique access code so people can enter it and use it. When someone redeems his access code, he is removed from the queue.
When to use this concept:
- Your app is ready but you want to test it with people you don’t know. Normally, friends and family are not brutal enough 🙂
Tips:
- Make sure to automate the access code sendings and onboard people on time. You don’t have time to manage it manually.
- Even if you don’t want to onboard people every week, keep them engaged (e.g. build a community) or send some value bomb emails. Else, they will forget you.
The Milestone Prelaunch, inspired by Harry’s
The main difference with this campaign, is that participants are rewarded instantly when they reach a specific amount of referrals. Basically, you offer different rewards based on the number of friends each person invites.
For example, in Harry’s campaign it worked like this:
- for 5 friends, you got a shave cream
- for 10 friends, you got a Truman handle w/ blade
- for 25 friends, you got a shave set
- for 50 friends, you got one year free blades
When to use this concept:
- You offer physical goods (perfect for eCommerce stores)
Tips:
- Build email automations to prompt people invite their friends based on the number of referrals they have. For example, if they invited 5 friends and got a shave cream, email them to tell them that if they invite 5 more friends, they will get a blade.
- Don’t be afraid to give stuff. Just do the math and calculate how much your Cost Per Email is, based on the prizes.
We also published some more tips for a successful product launch campaign on this awesome post.
Hope that helps! 🙂