Growth is hard. There’s no universal recipe for growing a startup, and those who say that they know everything about growth are lying.
There’re lots of strategies you can choose, and today I’d like to focus on one of the most shiny but still least covered – Velvet Rope Strategy. The one that was the main early growth driver for such companies as Superhuman, Robinhood, and Clubhouse.
People value scarcity. There’s a real magic, an “a-ha!” moment in owning something everyone wants but can not get.
Velvet Rope Strategy is all about utilizing this intrinsic motivation. At the top level it’s quite simple – you use certain mechanics to add the sense of exclusivity to your product.
So there’re basically 3 major steps:
you offer a quality product/service (important! VRS doesn’t work for low-quality offers);
you limit access to this offer;
that leverages the internal motivation to become a member of this exclusive tribe and translates into a “I want to have this” mindset.
This not only boosts organic growth but also:
turns your early users into super-loyal evangelists, and
allows you attract only most valuable users and clients.
All god, but how can you apply VRS to your startup? I see 5 main mechanics that can be used either separately or in a combination. I cover these mechanics in this thread.