🤾 Seize the narrative
Hello! Adam Thornhill here. ‘The Podcast Guy’ saving you 10 hours a week.
Enjoy the 70th Podup with the best bits from My First Million.
It's not enough to build a great product. Sometimes, you need to seize the narrative to drive growth. Shaan Puri shows us how to take a trending topic and turn it into an advantage.
Riding the Reddit wave
Over 7,000 subreddits rallied against a new Reddit policy by staging a 48-hour blackout. Reddit may have forgotten, but this was exactly how they started. When Digg, the popular forum of the day, implemented a widely-hated update, its users migrated en masse to Reddit.
Today, it's hard to believe that nobody is creating an alternative to this. By replicating the site's structure but changing how decisions are made and where the money flows, someone could harness this narrative and surf the resulting momentum.
Shaan Puri
Vampire attacks
A similar situation occurred in the crypto world when OpenSea, the largest NFT marketplace, altered their royalty rate. This incensed users. Within 48 hours, a competitor emerged, executing what's known as a 'vampire attack'.
By identifying all the wallets that used OpenSea and airdropping them tokens, they lured users to their platform with the promise of free tokens. These vampire attacks aren't always 100% successful, but they can rapidly propel a platform from non-existence to millions of users - assuming they provide a great user experience.
Shaan Puri
Why it matters
Shaan has the best recipe for going viral:
Identify a major trend
Highlight why something within that trend is broken
Propose a unique, alternative solution
This strategy doesn't just create viral story. It can even lay the foundation for a viable business. Case in point - Reddit's victory over Digg and LooksRare’s entrance into the NFT market.
Next steps
Looking to adopt Shaan's strategy? Do this:
Identify controversial topics within your industry.
Decide which topics you're willing to take a strong stance on and which ones you want to avoid. Ironically, the ones you avoid are often the ones that generate the most attention.
Use tools like Google Alerts to follow key topics related to your business.
Cultivate relationships with journalists and influencers within your space.
Be the first to comment on emerging stories through your relationships and owned channels. Pick a side, be vocal, and provide a unique perspective.
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Quotes were pulled at different points of the episode. Sentences were left out to make the narrative more concise. Podup is not associated or affiliated with any podcast.