How can a startup team quickly acquire seed users and detonate a user nuclear reactor?

After the product is launched, someone is needed to use it, so everyone naturally thinks of finding a group of seed users, but many people have no idea about this. I don’t know where to find it, and even if I find it I don’t know how to get it? There is another group of people who are very good at attracting seed users, and it seems very good, but the results are always not very good. What's the problem?

A common dilemma in seed user operation is that a very common scenario for attracting seed users is as follows: each person in the company team is assigned a certain recruitment target, and each person is responsible for attracting enough people to meet the target and bring them into the seed user group. As long as I have a good relationship with my friends, I might invite them all. I thought that no matter what, I would just add people in to make the group look more popular, and I could replace them if they are not suitable later.

Soon, hundreds of people were added to the group. The group owner sent a product link and gave out a red envelope, asking everyone to download the product, experience it, and share their opinions. Most people received the red envelopes, and only a small number of people downloaded the product, and these people put forward some suggestions. Since they are all friends, they were pulled in for the sake of face. Most of them are not users with urgent needs in this area that need to be solved. Therefore, I basically have no motivation to download it. The first thing I do after joining a group is to block the group immediately, and then check it out occasionally when I have time. After watching for a while, the people in the group found that the content in the group had nothing to do with them. In order to avoid being disturbed by too much information, they chose to quit.

Those who are still in the group are either the type who receive so many group messages that they don’t read them at all, or they are the ones who want to use the group in the future, so that when they need it, they can post their own advertisements in the group. Since there is not much valuable output in this group, the operator is also very distressed. Every time he asks everyone to give their opinions, he finds that fewer and fewer people give feedback. On the contrary, from time to time, someone would pop up to post advertisements. Since many of them are acquaintances and friends, and some even sent red envelopes, it would be embarrassing to ask them to leave the group. The "bandwagon effect" and "broken window effect" began to take effect at this time. Some people saw that others could also post advertisements, so they also began to post advertisements boldly. In this way, the discussion about the product was completely drowned out by a bunch of miscellaneous news.

After operating for a while, the team found that this group was not only inactive, but when it was active it was mostly filled with advertisements or gossip, and users did not offer many feedback on the product. So I was puzzled: Why is it so difficult to manage seed users? So they thought that maybe "this batch of seed users are not good", and found a new batch of seed users. However, history always repeats itself, and the tragedy repeats itself, and finally it becomes a dead group that posts advertisements. The seed user operation method seems to be correct, so why can't it be operated? At what stage did the problem occur?

The main reason for the above dilemma is that most operators make two major mistakes:

1. Misunderstanding what seed users are, mistaking the first batch of users and early users for seed users;
2. Focus on the quantity of seed-stage operations rather than the quality of operations for seed users.

For operators, acquiring the first batch of seed users is indeed a dirty and tiring job. However, if they can successfully dig out hardcore users in related fields and make them internal test members of their own products, this is a joyous event. We have seen many successful cases, heard many methods, and tried many methods. Today we will sort out the seed user operations here:

1. What is a seed user?

1. Analyze what kind of seed users are there?

So what exactly is a seed user? Seed users must meet the following three conditions:

1. They are the target users of this product, and their pain points are even more severe than those of general users;
2. Dare to try new things and be willing to use them even if the products are not perfect;
3. Willing to provide feedback and suggestions for the product.

Why must the above three conditions be met in the seed stage of product development to be called seed users? This is closely related to the first stage of the product: the seed stage.

Some people may say, isn’t the operational goal of the first phase to attract the first batch of users and start building barriers with competitors? Wrong! It is this typical misunderstanding that leads to the problems mentioned at the beginning of the article.

The operational goal of the first phase is not to attract a certain number of users, the most critical goal is to verify the product model! Please note that there is no mention of quantity in the above goals. To achieve the goal of verifying the product model, the most important thing is actually the quality of users, not the number of users.

On the contrary, if the product model can be verified, the fewer users the better. Yes, you read that right. Unlike the user number targets that many bosses set at the beginning of the product, if user verification can be achieved at this stage, the fewer the number of users, the better. Why? Because to achieve the same verification purpose, a smaller number of users means lower costs and it is easier to make major modifications and adjustments. Too many users is actually harmful.

But why in this situation, most people still hope that the number of users at this stage is as large as possible? Because they believe that in the process of verifying the success of the project, it is better to accumulate more users. Once the verification is successful, it will be easier to make the next step with a larger user base. but! They overlooked one fact:

99% of products will fail. Most of the reasons for failure are that the product itself does not meet user needs well. In other words, the product model is not good. Most entrepreneurial product ideas come from the founders. Based on their own experiences and observations, they often have a flash of inspiration at some point in time and come up with an idea that they think is brilliant. I felt that few people could think of this idea, and I thought that this product would be used by many people and would have a bright future, so I started my business. However, the founder must think that his idea is great, otherwise he would not start a business. However, the facts have proved that there are only very few projects that are truly reliable and can ultimately be recognized by users and prosper. Including Tencent, which is recognized as the best product developer in China, new projects are launched every day, but most projects will stop investment within two years. Therefore, an important task in the early stages of an Internet startup is to strive to become one of the 1% of successful companies that can pass product model verification. For the 1% of projects that ultimately survived, many of their product directions were completely different from what was originally envisioned.

How to increase the success rate of your product? One of the most successful methodologies used here is "lean entrepreneurship", which uses the minimum viable product, takes small steps, and iterates quickly. This means that during the start-up period, timely feedback from seed users should be obtained to shorten the iteration time of each version as much as possible, quickly improve the product, and polish out a product that can basically meet user needs.

Therefore, it can be seen that the most important thing in the seed stage is to quickly iterate the product, achieve the product retention rate target, and prepare for the next outbreak; if the retention rate is not good enough, quickly adjust and iterate based on user feedback and product judgment to make products that meet user needs; if the retention and activity are very low for a long time, it is very likely that there is a problem with the product itself. It is a wise choice to give up in time if you have chosen the wrong product direction.

If problems with product direction are discovered in time, there will still be time and funds to adjust the direction and invest in trying new directions. Therefore, in the process of verifying the product model, a very important role is the seed user. Only such users can provide the suggestions needed for rapid product iteration. At this stage, the number is really not too important. If you increase the number of users at the expense of accurate users, it would be a loss-making choice.

2. Is it really necessary to introduce seed users accurately?

Do seed users really need to be so precise? Accurate seed users are helpful in making accurate decisions. Different user groups have different demands for similar products, and the conflicts between these different demands are difficult to balance and reconcile.

For example, for the same social product, business people value security and privacy, literary young people pay attention to temperament and atmosphere; those born after 1995 value new trends; middle-aged and elderly people value simple operation and the ability to view family photos; corporate users value work collaboration; and those who want to have sex must be able to view people nearby. It is difficult to meet the needs of different user groups at the same time at the beginning, especially for a startup company. Moreover, if these different types of people are in the same group, they cannot convince each other of the demands they raise, and quarrels and divisions are inevitable. If the product manager is not very skilled, he or she can easily be led astray by users.

For example: MIUI's seed users; shortly after its launch, MIUI quickly polished a product with a good reputation through rapid iteration, and at the same time gained a large number of users. How were MIUI's early seed users chosen?

MIUI's seed users are Android enthusiasts who like to flash their phones. This choice is very clever and meets the three characteristics of seed users mentioned above: They are Android enthusiasts, not Apple fans, not Nokia users, not ordinary Android users, but the kind of enthusiasts who can't wait to flash their phones every day. They are eager for the functional iterations on their phones and constantly give various suggestions to the products. Then everyone votes together to decide what features to add to the next version. They feel a great sense of accomplishment when they see their suggestions being adopted, and will spontaneously introduce them to their friends and tell them which optimization they proposed.

With the help of these seed users, MIUI updated and iterated with many excellent features. It could be said that it was the best Android system on the market at that time. Therefore, it quickly accumulated a large number of users, laying a good foundation for the next step of Xiaomi mobile phone development and listing.

Where do these MIUI seed users come from? At that time, the team went to Jifeng and Anzhi forums to post messages and recruited them one by one. Only 100 users were selected for the first batch of internal test users, and then they were expanded step by step. If the seed users are replaced by another group of novice users, they may be led astray. They will say, "Ah! Why does it crash again? I actually need to flash the phone to install the system?" The suggestions they put forward may be some very sparse and ordinary suggestions, and it is difficult for MIUI to have such excellent changes in a short period of time.

3. Expand seed users to a certain density?

People prefer to be with people who are similar to themselves. When there is a certain density of similar people, it is easier to open up and communicate better.

For example, if the MIUI enthusiasts mentioned above tell people around them that they spend several hours every day installing the mobile phone system and achieve a small change in the boot screen in a few days, people around them will definitely think they are crazy. But if you tell everyone about this in the MIUI forum, your post will definitely be worshipped and topped by others. This completely different kind of experience is also what the precise seed user group wants to provide.

2. How can a startup team quickly acquire seed users?

Actively look for target fish ponds and acquire seed users in the early stages of entrepreneurship; different companies definitely have different ways of acquiring early seed users. Large companies such as Mogujie and Didi Chuxing have different ways of acquiring users in the early stages. Furthermore, because early users have higher tolerance and loyalty to products, these seed users will greatly influence the future development of your business.

To acquire early seed users, you still have to focus on quality. The reason is simple. Such users are more valuable. So how can you find the most suitable seed users for you? First of all, it is important to make it clear that seed user acquisition is the stage with the highest labor cost for acquiring a single user. It is possible that you accumulate them one by one. Therefore, you must start accumulating users when you decide to do this project, so that you can accumulate enough seed users. Then the number of seed users is about the same. Personally, I think it should be at least between 100-1000. These must be loyal and accurate users, not those you pull off the streets. So what are the ways everyone uses to acquire seed users?

1. Poach from your competitors’ fan base

This tactic has been tried and tested by many companies. For example, Xiaomi, which is very successful, conducted one-on-one screening in major mobile phone forums before releasing the first version of its mobile phone, contacted seed users, and eventually became the first batch of internal testers of the first version of Xiaomi. For example, a browser that was launched in 2012, in order to recruit the first batch of seed users, used a small account to join the user group of the same industry, added friends one by one, and then pulled them into the internal testing group of its own product. This is really a family style.

2. Long-term accumulation, people around you start

There are two ways, long-term accumulation and bringing in friends around you. I put them together because they are easy to explain. Long-term accumulation means sending private messages to your target users one by one on forums or social networks such as QQ, and bringing in people. This requires a period of accumulation and screening out the user groups that are suitable for you, so it takes relatively long time. My experience is about two months. To put it bluntly, starting with people around you is killing the familiar.

3. Invite mechanism, don’t go the public route

It's not necessarily a good thing to have your product interviewed too early in the early stages of a startup. Problems and bugs are inevitable, that’s why there is such a thing as a beta period. The invitation mechanism is that when the product is closed, you need to focus on cultivating users in the first phase by sending invitation codes, invitation links, or invitation emails, verbal invitations, etc. From the very beginning, Facebook, China's Kaixin.com, Zhihu and others all used this method in the early days. Now, under the guidance of Xiaomi's fan economy theory, various heroes have also started to promote their products through invitation mechanism internal testing and other methods in the early days.

4. Grasp the key V or opinion leaders’ recommendations

This is also very obvious and the effect is very good. Find a big V or opinion leader who is very compatible with your product. If he can make some recommendations for your product, the effect will be huge. It may bring many accurate seed users in an instant. This requires you to pay attention to maintaining your relationship with them at ordinary times. They will help you at critical moments. Of course, if you have money, it’s another matter.

5. Segment your users and start from one point

If your users are scenario users or a relatively large group of users. For example, your users are those born in the 1990s, and those born in the 1990s themselves are divided into many different groups. You can enter from either direction. There are many successful products that first precisely target users from a point and then expand and grow. Duowan.com, founded by Li Xueling, focused all its energy on "World of Warcraft" in the initial stage. Then, relying on the "World of Warcraft" section, it emerged from a second- or third-rate game portal website, and the website traffic exceeded 1 million in 3 months.

6. There is also a way for rich people to play, which is simple and crude

Channel reflux and promotion on large traffic platforms. I won’t elaborate on this, as Tencent’s own products have such a huge user base that it’s difficult for them to fail. 360 and others, started with free antivirus software and quickly launched a large number of other products.

Of course, there are many other more sophisticated ways of promotion, and there is no rule to follow in entrepreneurship. The word "creation" explains it all. Every successful product has its own set of methods to gain a foothold in the market.

7. How Xiaomi found 100 seed users in five steps

How did Xiaomi find 100 seed users? Any product cold start cannot be separated from these five steps:

1. Who are your seed users?
2. Find influential users quickly
3. Where do these hardcore users often hang out?
4. How to establish relationships with these senior users and develop marketing and communication strategies
5. Successfully hooked up with users and completed the cold start of the product

（1）Who are your seed users?

Who are your so-called seed users? That is, user portraits. Before we start looking for users, we need to build a temporary user model. The user model refers to who uses your product, when and where they use it. We need to know the basic attributes of these people, such as age, occupation, hobbies, etc. The following is the basic model I built according to Xiaomi's user portraits. You can build your own user model based on your product positioning. For example, the establishment of Xiaomi user model:

(2) Quickly find highly influential users

The so-called target users are not the core users of the product. The first batch of seed users requires us to find the most core people among thousands of target users. For example, Xiaomi makes mobile phones. What they are looking for are not ordinary mobile phone users, but mobile phone enthusiasts who do not just use mobile phones as communication tools but are also happy to study every application in the phone.

(3) Where do these hardcore users often hang out?

Mobile phone enthusiasts are usually senior users of mobile phone forums. In order to find core users, Xiaomi co-founder Li Wanqiang and the R&D team, under various aliases, lurked in mobile phone forums and kept posting and replying to posts, as well as various QQ groups, QQ spaces, Weibo and other larger social platforms.

(4) How to establish relationships with these senior users and develop marketing and communication strategies

To find the user habitat, Xiaomi’s co-founders and the entire product R&D team constantly interacted with forum users, answered their questions, posted about Xiaomi, and interacted continuously, thus attracting core users one by one. Use the large platform of Weibo to create topics and hype up products, such as "Retweet Weibo to win a Xiaomi phone or exquisite gifts" and other extremely tempting activities.

(5) Successfully hook up with users and complete the cold start of the product

By mining users from forums, BBS, QQ groups, etc., we found 100 seed users. These 100 high-quality seed users brought a steady stream of users to Xiaomi, up to several hundred million users now. It has been proven that high-quality seed users can become a powerful team, bringing in users to a product or platform in a snowball-like manner.

3. Detonating a User Nuclear Reactor

High-quality seed users are an important factor in the launch of new products. These people become living billboards for your products, spreading and promoting your products for free. Finding seed users is a very difficult task that requires strong execution, but when you complete it, it is also a very fulfilling thing.

This is no longer the era of decades ago when there were few websites and the only way to read news was on Yahoo. The cost of making an APP is constantly decreasing. There are a large number of APPs in almost every field. Trying to make a large and comprehensive product from the beginning is simply courting death.

However, there are still many teams that do this and simply think that if the product is already online but no users are using it, it is the responsibility of the operation itself. This is the common responsibility of the team, and the root cause lies with the boss. In addition to the mistake of mistaking early users for seed users, another fundamental reason why many companies have difficulty finding seed users is that they do not clearly define the product and do not segment the population as target users. They try to make a perfect product from the beginning and want to meet the needs of multiple groups of people. Therefore, the pain points that the product satisfies are unclear and the population is not specific. It is of course very difficult to find users in such a vast crowd.

Instead of looking for users in a general way, find a specific group of people for the product; instead of doing all the functions in a big way, solve the user's pain point in a differentiated way. After the product is launched, it is just the beginning. Product, operation, design, development and seed users come together to create an excellent product.

Conclusion

In order to detonate a user nuclear reactor, the following four points need to be implemented:

1. Seed users are not equal to initial users;

2. Only those who meet the following three conditions can be called seed users;

3. The quality of seed users is far more important than the quantity;

4. Only after defining the product can you know who the seed users are.