Just Ride the Waves
How Party Round CRUSHES Viral Marketing
What’s up everyone - I know it’s super late but felt compelled to write a post, so here we are. Let’s get to it. There’s a relatively new startup called Party Round, that is absolutely crushing it at Twitter.
Party Round is a really interesting flavor of fintech that is building software that makes it wildly simple for early stage companies to raise money. They also happen to be widly good at viral marketing and I think anyone that is thinking about founding a startup, working at a startup, or working in marketing in general should take notice. Iron sharpens iron and when you see something that works you should absolutely study it and adapt it for yourself. Kobe stole moves from MJ, so why shouldn’t you?
Earlier today, Party Round dropped this tweet
And in VC, tech, startup twitter - it kinda blew up. A lot of well followed twitter accounts, engaged with the tweet. Case in point.
In that list, you’ve got the founder of Figma, the youngest and first-ever Black female partner Google Ventures (GV), and one of the biggest finance meme accounts/media brands on the internet. These people are *ahem* ACCOMPLISHED, and if you’re trying to stretch your dollars, or as I recently heard on a podcast “grow your business if you had zero marketing dollars behind it” this is a fanstastic way to do it.
So why did it work?
In my opinion, just two things:
The tweet capitalized on an existing trend that was familiar, AFTER it quieted down
There was a speculative opportunity to make money
For those who are less involved in the crypto/web3 ecosystem on twitter, one trend that had been consistent for weeks if not months was the,
“Insert random statement hinting that you’ll share something with people & follow up by telling them to drop their ENS to collect”
Here’s an example that basically cuts through all the BS of what these tweets are about
If you’re not sure what an ENS is, it’s like a website domain for Web3, but it’s associated to a unique wallet address that you own. If you’re totally lost and need some help learning more about Web3 in general, check out my onboarding/reading list here.
Anyways, this trend had quieted down to a certain extent where it wasn’t filling up feeds (at least not mine) but it hadn’t completely gone away. The whole premise of tweets like these is that because the tweeter can directly send you data that currently has value, or has the potential to have value (i.e Ethereum, NFTs, etc.) they believe you’ll engage with their tweet, which gets Twitter to boost their tweet, which gets more people to engage in the tweet, and the cycle goes on. The magic of Web3 is that it’s exactly like sending a digital marketing email, except that you as the recipient of the email believe there is a non-zero chance that whatever you receive could be worth THOUSANDS of dollars.
So kudos to Party Round, and kudos to Josh, who I believe is the mastermind behind the tweet because it absolutely worked. I think the fundamental lessons we can draw here for modern day digital/viral growth are two things:
Before you try and get something from your audience, do your best to give them something. If you are giving people some form of utility - as long as you are providing upfront value for people in some way, with no expectations of making a sale - that’s a good way to keep your brand top of mind
And I’m learning this alongside you all, just ride the wave of recent trends. If something has already gone viral. Replicate it. Remix it. Save it down, and sit bring it out at the right cultural moment when you can suck all of the oxygen out of the room and BOOM, make a viral explosion. I think if Party Round had tweeted this out 2 or 3 weeks ago, it would have gotten lost in the noise. Maybe I’m wrong, maybe I’m right. Either way, what is clear is that for this particular tweet - they got the timing right and that’s all that matters
Anyways, sorry again for the super late/irregular email. I’ll hopefully have the next article on the comparative advantages of Web3 finished for you all next week, keepit locked everyone and HAPPY FRIDAY!!