Marketing Techniques to Gain Critical Mass

Critical mass can be simply defined as the minimum amount or size requirement to kick-start and maintain a venture and in the specific case of an online venture, this minimum size or amount requirement refers to the number of users who make use of the online platform. Think about the Social Network movie, which as you probably know is a story about how Facebook came into existence (or at least one version of the popular social networking site’s genesis and development). If the three or four founders who created the platform were the only ones using it, its intended effect would be nowhere close to getting realised.

The platform needs a certain number of people in order for it to be valuable to those very people on it, so you can see why gaining critical mass can be so challenging. If you’re operating a newly-created online venture which requires a certain number of users to make up the critical mass, there are a couple of very powerful marketing techniques you can use to gain that critical mass. Remember though that at the end of the day it’s about gauging whether or not there is indeed a market for your platform or your online business, something which you may not be able to gauge if you don’t test it out with an organically assembled critical mass.

Beta Mode Release

Releasing a piece of software or opening up your online platform for use in beta mode is a common way to gauge initial interest in the market, but the catch-22 scenario very quickly comes into play — the fact that you perhaps need critical mass to operate the platform while at the same time the gaining of that critical mass symbolises the success of that platform due to its organic adoption.

So yes, release or open up the platform in beta mode and see just how far you can go to reaching critical mass organically, otherwise there’s nothing wrong with throwing a catalyst into the market and perhaps guiding users in the right direction so that they can see the value you envisioned. This leads us the next critical-mass-gaining marketing technique, which takes the form of offering incentives.

Incentivise Users to Join

Offering incentives to early adopters of your platform is not only one of the best ways to try and accelerate the process of gaining critical mass, but is often so effective that it has become somewhat of a standard practice. You see it on all types of online platforms, from the gambling site which has a special offer available to those who join to the revenue-sharing publishing platform that pays members a referral bonus for recruiting new members.

The incentive you offer through your platform should be one you can afford to give away however and it shouldn’t be the only reason why the users of your platform remain active members. The incentive is only there to lure users in so that they can ultimately get a feel for the underlying value you have on offer for them, after which time the critical mass gained should continue using the platform organically, for the primary value it was built to deliver.