3 Low-Cost Strategies We Used To Boost User Growth to 50K

These have been low-cost strategies that have helped us get to 50,000 users in over a year.

Subly
4 min readApr 13, 2021

We recently hit 50,000 users on our platform, and it has led us to reflect on the most impactful campaigns we’ve run so far. Campaigns that have helped us build a real connection with our users and customers.

How Did We Do It Then?‍

We focused on building genuine and organic relationships with our first-ever users.

We boosted our user growth along the way by offering real value at a time of need for our customers.

We nurtured those relationships by staying active and engaged with our users and customers.

These have been low-cost strategies that have helped us get to 50,000 users in over a year.

So, what were these magical campaigns? Let’s dive deeper into it

Launch Special Offers For Our ‘Founding Members’

Our first ever campaign focused on getting to know our first users. We understood that what made Subly different was the community of users we were building and the real quality we offer to our community. We also learned that the way to ensure that quality was to make what our earliest supporters needed.

Our Founding Members campaign launched in July 2020 with a very special offer. We helped early users access a much-needed product with the promise of improving. All we asked for in return was feedback — lots of it.

We implemented feedback as it came in and focused our marketing around letting our users know that we were all ears.

It helped us to capture initial traction from real supporters who believed in us.

‍Help Key Users At a Time of Need ‍

When the time came to launch paid subscriptions, we were confident in support of our Founding Members. We kept them informed of our every move.

At the same time, we were ready to build new relationships, too.

Our early users and customers helped us spread the word. They loved the product so much they worked with us to get the word out there– and helped our small team create a growth loop.

When Subly Pro launched, we wanted to give back and expand our reach to those in education because we knew how valuable they would find creating quality e-learning content without worry.

Unfortunately, this came when the education sector was taking a serious hit with the rise of online-only teaching. We knew that these customers needed our support.

So despite a paid subscription launch, we offered the product for free to everybody in education.

Without asking more much in return, we provided value upfront — only spread the word and send us feedback.

We developed meaningful relationships with a new user base — users who would later become customers.

Help Others Grow, Too ‍

Halfway through our first official year, we began to see the seeds of our efforts blossom. User-generated content began popping up and positive feedback flowing our way. It was an excellent opportunity to support creators who spread the word about us!

In September, we launched our Content Ambassador program. We asked for creators to join our mission, and we eagerly offered our channels up for them to share their creations with the world.

We helped their channels grow by offering a product they needed to increase engagement, improve reach and repurpose their content.

We kept building these organic relationships. We kept offering value upfront. And you guessed it; we kept asking for feedback, even from our ambassadors.

That’s helped us boost our user growth to the crazy number it’s at today.

The 50,000 mark would never have been possible if it wasn’t for early users’ support, the flexibility of our plans to cancel any time and supporting our creators in every way we could.

What was the real key to all these campaigns being effective for us? It was the fact that we always asked for feedback.

We kept our plans flexible, knowing that with each new campaign, our direction could change. Our marketing efforts would only be practical if we kept listening, and being true to our users, and offering value where they needed it.

That’s how we did it, and with the hard work of our whole team, of course. But now, the next challenge is to make it to 100,000 happy users. Want to join?

Discover more about our ambassador program today.

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