Blog 70: How did Slack create a viral loop?

A product that created and leveraged the viral loop effectively is Slack. It went from 0 to $1 billion in value in 8 months. And 0 to $4 billion in less than four years. Refer blog 69 to know more about what a viral loop is.

No amount of marketing or viral loop can rescue a poor product. Viral loop and related marketing strategies will work only if the product is great. Slack is a great product that addresses a real-world pain point. Before Slack, team communication happened across emails and other apps, leading to inefficiencies. In addition, Slack's core features such as seamless search, leave-state synchronisation, and file-sharing capabilities delighted the target audience.

What did Slack do to create a viral loop?

Firstly, because the product was loved by existing customers the word-of-mouth marketing was extremely positive. Upon its preview release Slack acquired 8,000 users within 24 hours and 15,000 in two weeks. The team preferred the word ‘preview release’ over ‘beta release’. According to the founder, beta is perceived as unreliable. So, the team chose a word that would get the audience excited. Refer blog 97 for more on good writing in product management.

Secondly, Slack backed up the positive word-of-mouth by providing good customer service. The team proactively addressed feedback and user suggestions. If a user feels connected with a product/service, they are likely to share that experience with others. Like it happened with the ice-bucket challenge (refer blog 69). Slack started the Twitter Wall of Love that amplified user testimonials.

Thirdly, the platform is intuitive and easy to use. They made it very easy for existing customers to invite friends and family. In addition, Slack’s freemium model meant everyone could join and experience the product. This facilitated widespread adoption and because users were invested into the product they stuck on. Resulting in high user retention rates (refer to blog 22 Hooked model). The chain of events will usually be like this:

·       An employee is made aware of Slack through an advertisement etc.

·       He/she downloads Slack. Recommends it to other team-mates so that everyone can seamlessly collaborate. As new users join, the growth compounds and the number of users explode.

Slack is a great success story that achieved viral growth in the competitive world of B2B SaaS.

Jump to blog 100 to refer to the overall product management mind map.

All the best! 😊