7 Brilliant Marketing Moves That Helped Clubhouse Explode

Clubhouse is a hot mess. Or it's the future of social media.

The drop-in audio app is a much needed source of human connection and sometimes a breeding ground for bigotry. China has already banned it. Facebook is looking to clone it. Clubhouse owes much of its growth over the past year (and recent $1B valuation) to the black hip-hop community, but risks losing audience if some of the growing pains around community and inclusion continue.

It took me months to accept an invitation to join the app, mainly because it is only available for iPhone users (an Android app is rumored to finally be in development). Finally, last month I found an old iPhone 4 and joined.

Like many early users, I struggled to find the right way to like it. Some rooms, filled with old friends I hadn't seen in years were a delight. It felt like a virtual replacement for those serendipitous conversations that would otherwise have happened passing someone at CES or SXSW. Other rooms felt filled with people desperate to shed their imposter syndrome by trying to sound as smart as possible.

There are plenty of articles and experts right now debating what the future will hold for Clubhouse. To be honest, I'm more interested in the underappreciated and subtle marketing choices the creators made to help the app get here.

It's tempting when reading about the rise of Clubhouse to credit simple word of mouth for their success. It was actually brilliant marketing. Here are seven specific tactics Clubhouse uses to :

1. Start with the cool kids.

Reading the origin story of Clubhouse, "much of the initial outreach went to Black musicians, comedians and influencers: the community of clout creation." The app became popular among vocal groups of users who were at the front of culture creation and who others were watching. The place where they were chatting was, by extension, also cool and everyone else wanted to be part of it.

2. Make it hard to join.

Being invite-only and locked into a single device platform has made Clubhouse hard to join from the start. Some people waited for weeks or months to score an invite. Others (like me) had to dig through kitchen drawers to find an old iPhone to use. Either way, when you did finally get onto the app, you felt like you had to earn your spot there ... which made it much more likely that you'd take the time to actually try it out and see how it works.

3. Incentivize the evangelists.

After joining, users get five invitations to use for others. When you do invite someone, and they accept, their profile is forever tied to yours as the one who originally invited them. This visibility creates a social proof element for super-users. It's a reward for those who are most active in inviting others - and offers a constant incentive and subtle reminder for people that they should be using those invitations sitting in their account to evangelize the platform to others.

4. Use the existing plumbing.

Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn have become like plumbing. We expect them to work and be available on demand for basic functions. One of the underappreciated brilliant moves from Clubhouse was to choose what NOT to create in their app. They don't have messaging. There are no posts or updates. Instead, users can connect their existing Instagram and Twitter accounts (ie - the plumbing) and message one another that way. By cleverly leaving these feature out of the app, Clubhouse focuses on its purpose and keeps users focused there as well. It also helps users feel that the app is respecting their privacy more by asking for less personal information, though ironically recent reports having been spotlighting growing privacy and security issues.

5. Leverage the moment.

The app initially launched in April 2020, just weeks after most of the world locked down due to the pandemic. In that time, we have all adjusted to virtual work and dealt with the constant pressure of being on video all the time. Zoom fatigue is real, and the more time we spend on video during the day - the more we appreciate the moments where we can just talk without having to worry what we look like or what we are wearing on the top half of our body. In other words, this past year was the absolute perfect time for an audio-only platform to take off.

6. Spotlight the creators.

Rather than focus on brand and logo, the icon for the Clubhouse app changes regularly to feature a new creator. In the past the app featured podcaster Espree Devora, guitarist and singer Bomani X and recently updated to feature singer Axel Mansoor. Using the valuable real estate of an app logo to feature a different creator is an unusual choice and one that many other app developers might not make for fear that it could create confusion or reduce their download numbers. Doing the opposite signals to the entire community of creators that Clubhouse relies on that they are willing to shine the spotlight on those doing great things on their platform ... which reinforces the creators to stay engaged and produce even more.

7. Innovate around what matters.

While this may not seem like a marketing choice, what you choose to innovate on creates the story for what you stand for. After getting hundreds of millions of dollars in funding over the past eleven months, the team at Clubhouse could easily have hired an Android developer and focused on making the app available to everyone months ago. Instead, they spent the time focused on community moderation and making the platform a safer space for everyone. Last month, they laid out a new road map of priorities in a blog post last month titled "Welcoming More Voices," that focused on helping their creators get paid, removing trolls from the platform, making it easier to share rooms and (finally) starting work on that Android app.

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Do you see other marketing choices that have contributed to the growth of Clubhouse? Are you on the the platform and finding it useful? Share your thoughts in a comment below.