smingl

One month has passed since the site went live. What have I learned so far?
First, I'm really pleased with the number of users. It's 4 times what I expected at this stage so that's a really positive outcome. Second, I'm beginning to see what works and what doesn't in the site. There doesn't seem to be an elephant on the table - phew! But the activity is not working in the way I expected. I was expecting lots of deep, narrow interaction with the site: people setting up networks and motivated to join to friends (hey it's free and you get a really good choice of dating partners) but this isn't happening. The hierarchy is relatively flat at the moment - people joining up and then not linking to any friends. OK, so I need to work on this with more interactive elements, more marketing to pull people back to the site and improved navigation within the site. There's a temptation (big) to add lots of cool new features to the site - hey, what if you could send flowers to someone you like?? Yes, great but my primary aim is to build volume and will this build volume? I doubt it. I think these features will increase stickiness and make the site a more pleasurable experience but building volume is about getting the name out there and marketing it.
My first bit of 'paid' marketing is going to be a sticker campaign. I am about to get some cool stickers printed and will do some underground marketing sticking them on the back of loo doors, tube posters, lamposts etc; It's a low cost option and I will be able to measure the effect by looking at my google hits after posting in one geographical area. I have some more low cost marketing ideas but the challenge is to keep these ideas clean and separate and give each one a good go without getting over-excited (or depressed) about every twist and turn on the site.
I will update this blog when I have some results from the sticker campaign. Keep smingling!