Friday, March 29

When We Trended on Twitter By Spending Rs. 200!

I suffer from all sorts of mania — often conflicting, always annoying for others:

  • Chai-o-mania: drinking chai to the point that my stomach cries of acidity.
  • Fitbit-o-mania: completing my daily 8k steps even if that means that I have to run clumsily at 11:45 pm on my arguably fragile terrace.
  • Passion-o-mania: keep talking about that one idea so passionately that everyone around me starts believing in it.
  • List-o-mania: writing everything in the form of lists.
  • And the list goes on!

 

Some maniacs are short-lived, some last for a few months and some have been there since forever. One such mania is my obsession with lists and striking off an item from the list is my equivalent to the big O.

So, it is only right if I say that the bucket list of our one-year-old start-up, NewsBytes App is around a mile long. The items vary from having 1 million concurrent users from every planet to getting funded from Travis Kalanick to meeting Steve Jobs (!) over dinner.

The list also includes breaking a news story (checked), creating a viral piece of content (unchecked), getting banned from Whatsapp (checked), hearing good words about the app from an absolute stranger (checked), seeing your hashtag trending on Twitter (hell yeah, checked!).

Now, let me be a good person and suggest you the recipe for the last item; because I know it is on your bucket list too. And, once it happens it feels magical. It is bigger than you, it is bigger than me.

 

So here it goes:

  • Find a smart employee — someone who knows his shit, someone who is optimistic, someone who does not shy away from hard-work, someone like him. 😉 This is an absolute must.
  • Brainstorm, brainstorm, brainstorm — sit across that cramped table for hours, scratch your head, drink 2 cups of tea in between, give up hope. And, then do all of this tomorrow. Viola, you would get an idea! Don’t claim ownership of that idea, it is always a team work.
  • Be aware -Timing is important, run your campaign around a major event. Plan at least a week in advance.
  • Think of a catchy hashtag — always use nostalgia when wit fails. Never use if someone has used its modified version before. Write it down, take that paper to the loo, keep looking at it, keep talking about it with the technical team over lunch, make them fall in love with the hashtag. Yes, even them!
  • Be a nice person — Always be a nice person, help your friends, take that extra step for your acquaintance. And, if they have the tickets to the India vs WI semi-final T-20 match, grab it from them. (Thanks, Shagun).Talk to fellow start-ups, they would help you too without expecting anything in return! (Shout-out to Bharat and PosterGully.com)
  • Think frugal — Even if you are the most heavily funded company, think frugal. Repeat after me, investors’ money is not your privilege. Use it wisely. Don’t waste it on agencies who tweet on your behalf. Don’t just eat organic food, use organic marketing techniques too!
  • Put all of this together and you get a highly successful Twitter campaign. Your hashtag would trend in top 3 just by spending Rs. 200 on the courier.

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    NewsBytes App NewsBytes App, provide the CONTEXT, and not just CONTENT to your news. In bullet points. With images. Across sources. Read all the news you ever need to know, in 7 minutes.