On the outside

The most effective way to start a hype about a new service today is to give away a limited number of invites, spread some rumors and post some sneak-peak youtube teasers. This will most certain start a viral explosion. Everybody will want to be among the lucky who get invited, inside the exclusive bunch. This is the vip-list, the red carpet of the virtual world. Although part of the phenomenon with invites is that the curve of exclusiveness wears off the more people who joins up.

My first experience with the phenomenon was getting an early betaversion invite to Google mail some years ago. I remember the feeling of being invited to something that i obviously felt was the next big thing. A new way of handling webmail that made it so much more fun and felt like lightyears ahead of hotmail. Google mailsearch was done in a blink and Ajaxsuggestions for contacts was nice new feature at that time. This said: i'm not completely convinced that it would have been such a thrilling experience without the invitation hype. I could pick whom i wanted to be invited to the inner circle. This is clearly a supersmart viral marketing plan. Me being part of it, by commenting on it. You spread half the word and - woosh - your customers do the rest of the job. Everybody will want what they might or might not get. Noone wants to be excluded.


Recent examples are spotify, voddler and of course the super-hype-coolest-of-the-

cool-future-is-already-here: Google wave! A drawback of the invite hype, and at the same time part of the concept: a fact is as satisfying as it may to be part of the latest hype, when you're not invited it's as frustrating and painful as being turned down on the dancefloor or like you're shut out of a party. The good news are: the invite hype WILL soon wear off for every new service. The once so rare spotify invites are thrown away in heeps today, while Wave invites are sold on E-bay at a cost of hundreds of dollars. So i will have to wait, wont i? I can wait... I can! Outside. It's a bit cold outside. But hey, I can wait, Lars. Don't pity me. I will rub my hands to keep 'em warm and try to think of something else. (starts humming): "at first i was afraid. i was petrified..."