Post the demonetization announcement by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in India, we published our story about how the startup should rise to the challenge of a smooth demonetization roll out India. We did our bit by showing the nearby utility index(ATMwithcash in this case). We build a discussion platform on top of it to facilitate discussion with their nearby community to ask for help on Poletalks.The Economic Times featured a story showing how it has become a trend which made us realize the need to open-source our story.We had an overwhelming response to our campaign. 1500+ Downloads, 40% of MAU’s, 2.53 minutes of an average session length with zero marketing spend! People took notice of our product and readily used it to solve their problem of getting status of working ATM’s nearby, directions to it and sharing that status with their friends/groups. But, we followed four golden rules to grow further:Minimalism- We made sure the user does not need to share any personal information to kick start his/her experience. On boarding was reduced to the just an OTP verification. We eliminated 70% of the features from our first version. (Tip: Interacting with people in malls and cafes helps!)Listening - Usage patterns, session times and feedbacks helped us to understand the latent desires of our user.(Fabric for quick observation and Google for detailed analysis). We learned that people want to express themselves. Demonetization was a mass phenomenon that affected everyone. Public opinion forums (Reddit, Quora etc) cover only 1% of the masses(Opinion drivers) and the common citizen finds it difficult to articulate ( ‘Friends/followers filter makes it difficult for new users to be heard). We simplified it. Every important topic was broken into objective questions. Using location context, we build a heat map of how each location is responding to a question.Empathy - We learned from the gaps of similar information providers (CashNoCash etc). We allowed user to share status of ATM with friends which made us valuable without irritating ads. We made it the information visual than textual for quick understanding. User responded and app grew due to networking effects. We learned that the answer to “What’s important” is not what we want in the product but what the user needs right now. After the user has responded to the Poll, he/she is most likely to share his perspective. We added an anonymous discussion board to each question.This helped people to freely express their opinion and get into healthy discussionsClarity- Our social media message clearly stated what we believed. Poletalks is about the community you live in and it affects you 24X7. Demonetization affects just reinforced our vision in an immediate user case. We motivated the user to empathize with his/her community. We crowd-sourced the information of working ATM’s nearby and questions for National Polls. Everyone contributed with their interests. Current affairs, Sports, Entertainment and Philosophy- diverse interests helped to engage everyoneWe will continue sharing our experiences in future posts. Anyone building an experience should benefit from our journey(Building an experience is tough and it is high time we crowd-hack the shit out of it). Choose community over silos! (Hint: Good time to think about putting a comment :)In case of any follow-up questions, DM me at [email protected] and I will get back to you. For all the marketers out there, check out our social media handles for insights our brand message roll out. Hope it helps. Cheers!Get Poletalks now!
