8 Methods to Drive Membership For Your Social Network

Gregarious Narain
Jul 20, 2017 · 5 min read
Photo by rawpixel.com on Unsplash

Launching a new social network is a daunting task, to say the least. That hasn’t prevented many the company, small and big alike, from tempting fate. Yesterday, Amazon launched Amazon Spark, a quasi Instagram competitor organized around on sharing media, but focused on commerce.

Early days on social networks are often like the wild west. Like any new society, it starts with curiosity and early settlers followed by their peers and followers. At the same time, norms, relationships, and commitment are all in short supply. Your earliest users can have an outsized impact on the future of your platform.

Building that initial cohort is a challenge, but there are a number of techniques for growing that initial base of users.

8 Methods For Recruitment

1. Find Disgruntled Users

500px successfully employed this feature to lure frustrated professional photographers off of Flickr after Yahoo! failed to innovate in a timely manner.

2. Make Migration Easy

Leveraging existing APIs and methods from the source network offers a simple way to ease the transition. Remember, there are 2 parts to migrate at all times: relationships and content. Too often, we focus on the graph, but the content itself is equally valuable — especially to barren interfaces.

Instagram still offers to link with Facebook and brings users into the fold by reminding them when a user from a better-known network becomes a member for the newer one.

3. Recruit Based on Unique Features / Advantages

Facebook successfully leveraged Stories across its portfolio to stifle Snapchat’s growth. Their unique advantage was the pre-existing network graphs and the simplicity of doing it all with one tool.

4. VIP / Early Access for Desired Users

Curating the types of users who have the ethic, aesthetic, and audience that you most destine is necessary for every new network. Limited betas and gated access have been staples of the network recruitment toolkit.

5. Create Multiple Pedestals

To counter this, designing user pedestals in one form or another allows you to point to the users and uses that you endorse. Pedestals can be created via in-network placement, as email promotion, or as individual blog posts and interviews.

New communities leverage leaderboards often to highlight the top users.

6. Curate a Story

Early on and often, seed threads that will be both interesting to create for and engaging to consume. By pointing users in the right direction, we facilitate quality conversations. The volume can be funneled readily and highlighted, as above.

Flipboard still leads in this domain, providing that the insights of one and many can lead to compelling, engaging stories.

7. Have a Contest

Caution is required here. First, avoid forcing staging too much. As many the brand marketer knows too well, forcing people to feature specific things or act specific ways is hard to do and diminishes the quality. Second, make the incentive meaningful both from your eyes and theirs. If financial reward isn’t possible or at a size that seems meaningful, find alternative ways to create value.

8. Pay Individuals

One note here, though. Don’t set the bar too high if you don’t believe your customers can match. When users feel that their contributions may not live up to the standard you’ve set, they may opt out before even trying.

Amazon is currently doing this with Spark.

Amazon Spark Bonus

Import Vendor and Partner Content

Upvert Existing Customer Content

Leverage Existing Influencer Program

Outreach to Existing Purchasers

Integrate Spark into Amazon.com

Additional Reading


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Gregarious Narain is a serial entrepreneur and product strategist. A reformed designer and developer, he writes on his experiences as a founder, strategist, and father on the regular. Work with him at Before Alpha, connect on LinkedIn, follow on Facebook, or say hi on Twitter.

Under the Influencer

Dissecting influencers, marketing and influencer marketing

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Gregarious Narain

Written by

Perpetual entrepreneur. Advisor to founding teams. Husband to Maria. Father to Solomon. Fan of fashion. Trying to stay fit.

Under the Influencer

Dissecting influencers, marketing and influencer marketing

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