Design Learnings from Viral ApplicationsApril 2008
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Who is RockYou?
Over 50 Applications and Widgets
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“To engage the world through social applications”
The RockYou Mission
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Stats!
Invented the Space
Double Digit penetration across leading social networks (MySpace, Facebook, Bebo..)
105 Million Uniques
1.5 Billion Pageviews
150+Million Widget views a day
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Agenda
The Social Space
Product Design
Development Phasing
Tuning in Depth
Q&A
The Opportunity
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Wikipedia.org
Alexa Global Traffic Rankings
Market for Social Apps is Exploding
2008
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2005
(U.K.)
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Social Applications Increase Site Traffic
26MM
66MM
Pre-f8 Active Users Active Users Today
Over 150%
Growth!
Over 18,000 applications
95% have an application
60%+ have a RockYou app
RockYouIntegration
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Months (1)
Source: eBay Investor Presentation, RockYou(1) eBay starts Q2 98, PayPal starts Q1’00, Yahoo! starts Q1’95, AOL starts Q1’92, Facebook starts Q4’04, and RockYou Starts Q4’05(2) Facebook data represents active users, which was disclosed on 12/05 and 12/06. Undisclosed active user data is extrapolated by applying an average active user penetration to
global Unique Visitors (per comScore Media Metrix)
Facebook platform launch
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Huge Growth Potential
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How did we grow so fast?
Rise of open platforms + laser-like focus on metrics and viral channels
Flash Widget Era- Profile- Bulletin
- Profile- Requests- Notifications- Email- News Feed- Profile action
- Profile- Messages- Notifications- Email- Activity stream- Home surface
Product Design
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RockYou approach to product design
Apply advertising principles to user-facing web design
Build fast and launch asap
Iterate on original design
Let data guide product decisions
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Apply advertising principles to user-facing web design
Its all about Conversion Rate
Each touch point equivalent to an ad pageview– Profile Views– Canvas Pages– Invites– Feeds
Grow by increasing number of touch points and maximizing conversion on each touch point
Have a plan to maximize use of every channel
Must consider implications for long-term user experience– Don’t abuse the channels
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Build fast and launch asap
Design simple concepts
Focus on virality and growth
Accept the fact that channels >> features– Channels bring in new users and keep them coming back– Only the top 0.1% of features can accomplish this alone
Validate concepts quickly– User tests– Just launch it
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Iterate Rapidly
Viral channels should drive product concept and feature development– Not the other way around!
Tune the viral loop
A/B Test
Release Often
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Let data guide product decisions
Don’t Be Emotional– Numbers don’t lie
There are no user experts– 60% + female– 15-25
Do user studies when you don’t have web metrics
Viral channels should drive product concept and feature development– Not the other way around!
Have a plan to maximize use of every channel
Development Process
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Development Process
1.Marketing / Validation
2.Growth
3.Engagement
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Application Types
Channel– Superwall, HugMe
Content– Flixster, iLike, Watercooler
Dating– Likeness, Compare People
Games– Zombies, FluffFriends, SpeedRacer, Friends for Sale
Gifts – Grow-a-gift, Free Gifts, Boozemail
Self Expression – Cities I’ve Visitied, Bumper Sticker
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Marketing / Validation
Audience
Channels
Messaging
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Skew heavily to teen and young adult women—brand influencers
Audience
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Audience
What’s the total size of market
What percentage penetration is goal– Whats possible virality of market?– Average number of friends– Myspace vs Ning vs iGoogle
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Messaging
Develop your concept around high-converting calls to action– Simplicity– Universal– Social persuasion– Novelty (art)
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Channels
Focus on 1 to 1 channels
Map out several different flows to test– Install to invite to interacting– Install to interacting to invite
Balance relevance to throughput– Channel vs Content Applications
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Viral Channels
News Feed
Notifications
Profile
Invites
Non-user pages
Profile Action
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Growth Phase
Break viral barrier
Tune growth (Install vs uninstall)
Promote It
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The Viral Loop
UserCall to action to
invite friends x = invited friends
Accept?Yes
y% = invite accept rate
x * y > 1 gives you viral growth!
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Tune It
Superwall Launched in 2 days tuned for 2 weeks
Preview page
Invite Messaging
Targeting
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Promote It
You know the math works
All about throughput to multiply
Give it a boost!
Ad Networks
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Engagement Phase
Saturated social circles (audiences)
Critical mass makes features more useful
Tune for experience
Build new features to keep users engaged and happy!
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Critical Mass
You’ve achieved your goal
Percentage of Social Circle supernodes– 40% Active– 10 % of that– 4% of Market
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Channels
Focus on 1-to-Many to get People Engaged– News Feed– Profile– Notifications– Non User Pages
Focus on 1-to-1 to re-engage current users– Email– Notifications
Viral Tuning in Depth
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Metrics for your viral loop
UserCall to action to
invite friends x = invited friends
Accept?Yes
y% = invite accept rate
x * y > 1 gives you viral growth!
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Hypothetical viral numbers
Install flow– x = 5 (friends invited on average)– y = 22% (acceptance rate for invites)– Viral factor = 5 * 0.22 = 1.1 VIRAL!
Engagement flow– Repeat users can generated additional virality!
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Combine multiple flows and channels
Install flow– x = 5 – y = 10%– Viral factor = 5 * 0.1 = 0.5
Engagement flow, request channel– x = 3 (invites)– y = 10% (acceptance rate for invites)– Viral factor = 3 * 0.1 = 0.3
Engagement flow, notification channel– x = 6 (notifications)– y = 5% (acceptance rate for notifications)– Viral factor = 6 * 0.05 = 0.3
0.5 + 0.3 + 0.3 = 1.1
VIRAL!
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What to track– Requests sent & request CTR– Notifications sent & notification CTR– Feed events & feed CTR– Adds / removes– And everything else…platform tracking is not 100% reliable
How to track– …if you’re tight on resources (aren’t we all)– Paid or home grown if you’re serious about growing big
– Get stats in real time instead of waiting a day– Store events that can’t be tied to a page (i.e. number of requests sent)– Slice and dice data however you want
Tuning the viral loop – watch your metrics
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Using metrics to drive product decisions
A/B test entire user flows
A/B test calls to action
Base decisions off of statistically significant data
Flow A
Flow B
An new users
Bn new users
X% user dropoff Y invites sent/user Z% invites accepted
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Making the most of viral channels
Graph and compare activity metrics over time to analyze trends
Focus resources on tuning the largest traffic drivers
All viral channels eventually decay – why?– Invites sent decreases due to saturation– Response rate decreases due to user conditioning
So keep tuning to stay ahead of the curve!
…and when you’ve exhausted your primary channels it might be time to explore some creative alternatives
Questions?
