What we cover in EP35?
We're big fans of product-led companies, and Loom is an example of how growth for them can be rapid if you get all of the key elements correct.
Loom is a product that has natural virality and easily spread within companies through one individual's usage.
We talk to Joe about:
- Where the idea for Loom came from
- The benefits of an incentivized referral program
- Customer acquisition channels the company are planning to invest in
- Why they switched from focusing on acquisition to activation
- How they decided on what features to charge for
Happy Growing
Time Stamped Notes
- [03.50] Joe talks about his early entrepreneurial life, how he started an agency, his first product manager role, how he met his co-founders and how they came up with the idea for Loom.
- [09.07] Loom was part of another product that gathered user feedback. They noticed users loved the video app to record a summary of their feedback, so they broke it out into a standalone product.
- [12.20] Joe gives a hint at how many users Loom has :)
- [14:48] Joe talks about their initial launch on product hunt, and how he knew they had product market fit in the first 24 hours.
- [15.45] Loom released an incentivized referral program, but the team soon switched their efforts from acquisition to core platform, retention, and activation.
- [18.10] An incentivized referral program can add a bunch of noise to your funnel.
- [19.10] Focus on the core value of your product instead of trying to gamify acquisition
- [20.20] Joe went through the Reforge program, and it opened his eyes to the importance of activation. They focused all their efforts on increasing the activation from 17% to 35%.
- [22.40] Joe discusses what Looms activation metric is.
- [25.00] Loom hired a growth engineer far earlier than most startups so they could focus on activation for nine months.
- [27.10] Why Joe would only build product-led products in the future
- [29.10] Aside from virality Loom are considering both SEO and performance marketing as potential customer acquisition channels to invest in.
- [31:50] Kieran pitches a customer acquisition tactic for Loom
- [33.40] Scott also pitches a customer acquisition tactic for Loom to try and outdo Kieran :)
- [38.14] Joe talks about how Loom came up with their paid plan through surveys available in Reforge (MaxDiff, Van Westendorp) and how they choose the option that provided the core value to users for free. They charged for storage but gave that storage away for free to existing users who had already stored a lot of videos with Loom. You should reward your earliest users.
- [42:11] One surprising outcome from launching a paid plan is Looms daily activation rate has gone up because companies now trust they're a legitimate business as they've got paid features.
Subscribe Rate and Review
>> Stitcher
>> Google Play
>> Spotify
Follow Joe on Social Media
Follow us on Social Media
>> @Searchbrat
>> @SJTousley
