Dissecting Clubhouse’s invite only strategy !

Clubhouse invites have been the buzz for quite some time now. The monthly downloads for the app had shooted from 0.5m in Nov’20 to 10m in Feb’21 and saw a sharp decline to 1m in April’21. Why is the invite only strategy not working for clubhouse anymore?

Also called as “velvet rope strategy”, invite only helps brands create exclusivity & desirability and also maintain the quality of their offerings.

The FOMO of not being on a new platform is a real thing, triggering emotions of social exclusion followed by a sense of urgency to join the platform. Users having limited invites further adds to the preciousness of the membership.

Another great example of using a velvet rope is leap .club— a professional networking platform for women. The long waitlist is to control the quality of membership but also instantly communicates the platform’s high value.

Invite-only has also helped brands like One Plus in estimating demand, controlling production & for gathering initial responses before rolling it out to the larger crowd.

With downloads hitting the skids and quality of content deteriorating, it is quite evident that this marketing move served as a dramatic way for clubhouse to grab attention & bring users on board but was not of much help sustain it’s popularity.

Is exclusivity even possible for platforms which have the end goal of a large user base?