🔮 Community-led Growth, Day 1 users and Monzo stories w/ Tom Davies, Head of Marketing at Yonder

Marketing and Community Strategy

00:10 - 1:03:57

• Marketing is about value and being clear on what we want people to know about us.
• A recent post on LinkedIn received over a thousand likes, leading to the host shaving his beard.
• The post went viral because it resonated with both boomers and 23-year-olds.
• The guest has a background in marketing, starting in San Francisco and working for Transfowise and Monzo before joining Yonder.
• He discusses the challenges of marketing at Monzo and the broader role he took on at Yonder.
• The guest studied in San Francisco and played college soccer there before moving to London.
• They discuss the focus of the podcast episode.
• Building community with our first 500 customers was a success
• Monzo struggled to balance satisfying early customers and building for mass adoption
• A community strategy needs to evolve as the company grows
• Honesty is important in managing community expectations
• Don't have preconceived notions of what a community should look like, start from your goals
• We were fortunate to have the right type of customers early on
• Our community helps with marketing and provides valuable feedback
• We incentivize user participation with rewards and value their time
• Yonder has a small number of super engaged customers who support them and help them succeed.
• Trustpilot reviews have helped Yonder gain a nearly five-star rating and build trust with their customers.
• Yonder initially struggled to build a community on Facebook, but eventually found success using Slack.
• Yonder targeted people in the tech industry for their community, as they are more likely to give feedback and support new products.
• Yonder's product is used daily by their customers, which keeps them engaged and provides constant opportunities for feedback.
• Yonder focuses their marketing efforts on platforms where their target audience spends time.
• Getting people who don't use Slack to engage with the community is a challenge
• Community engagement is not just a marketing problem, it's a company culture
• Engineers, support team, and founders all interact with the community in our Slack
• Early on, we had a more intentional engagement plan, now it's more organic
• We encourage challenging feedback and value face-to-face interactions in Slack
• There are always discussion points coming up in the community
• We ask the community for their input before making decisions
• Bringing the whole company behind the community is important for brand building.
• Smartly used intercom built into their products to provide support and involve the entire company.
• The podcast host also participates in customer support during late hours.
• Onboarding customers personally and offering referrals helps build a strong connection with them.
• Adding customers to the community when they are most excited about the product is crucial.
• The moment of receiving a physical product can be a good time to invite customers to join the community.
• Yonder launched multiple times, starting with their own team as initial customers.
• They focused on ensuring that the card worked well rather than aiming for a large customer base from day one.
• Marketers often focus on big launches and going viral, but it's important to test if the product works first.
• Yonder initially launched with a small group of 10 people to test their product and fix any issues.
• They gradually increased their customer base by inviting friends and family, reaching about 150 customers.
• Yonder then launched a PR campaign and got another 2,000 people on their waitlist.
• They implemented referral programs to further grow their customer base.
• Yonder believes in starting with a small group of friends to launch a product before seeking wider exposure.
• The balance between launching an MVP and crafting the ideal experience depends on factors like pricing and functionality.
• For Yonder, being a paid upfront product meant they needed a certain level of polish before launching.
• As a payment card, it was crucial for Yonder's product to work flawlessly to retain users' trust.
• Transitioning from community effort to other channels for growth
• Risk and fraud considerations in bringing on new customers
• Facebook testing resulted in wrong customer types
• Paid social format was not viable for growth
• Exploring different channels like sponsoring podcasts and newsletters
• Considered purchase that requires time for decision-making
• Current growth mix includes word of mouth and aggregators
• Balancing hyper-rational customers with brand-focused ones
• Desire to test more paid channels with a thoughtful approach
• Challenges with social platforms blocking credit education content
• Importance of educating younger people on responsible credit use
• Out-of-home advertising as a brand building exercise and tracking results
• Raising funding at a time when other startups couldn't lowered media costs
• Opportunity to expose product to London market
• Using out-of-home advertising effectively generated interest and web traffic
• Community is a competitive advantage for the company
• One-on-one conversations with customers in Slack channel still valuable
• Challenges of maintaining reflective feedback from broader user base in community
• Community will always be part of the company's strategy, but may change in form
• Potential to batch customers based on joining date in community
• Exploring ways to integrate community into product experience
• Gamification and rituals can enhance engagement within the community
• A shift is happening in the product where conversations between customers are becoming more prevalent.
• The company wants to set a positive culture early on to combat toxicity that can develop in online forums.
• Looking to gaming communities and apps like Duolingo for inspiration on fostering good behavior and engagement.
• A community should be treated differently from an audience, with a focus on building relationships and connections.
• Some users value being part of the community even if they don't actively use the product or service.
• The company has had instances where people want to stay in the community even after canceling their subscription.
• Growth is seen as everyone's responsibility within the business, not just the marketing team.
• Initially, there was pressure on the head of marketing to drive growth, but now it is a collective effort.
• The company learned through trial and error to find an effective approach to growing the business.
• Growth is everyone's responsibility, not just the job of a growth marketer.
• Marketing is responsible for bringing high-value, high-intent people to the website or app.
• Different teams handle different stages of the customer journey, from top of funnel to application process and member value.
• Marketers cannot fix growth alone without support in verification tools, processes, and risk models.
• The whole company should be working on growth, including reducing churn and increasing engagement.
• Being in a startup means learning as you go and figuring things out together.
• The podcast hosts discuss community insights and how they can improve their own strategies.
• They consider printing stickers as a reward for reaching 1,000 listeners by a certain date.