What, Why, And How Of Clubhouse For Sales And Marketing Growth

Businesses are sometimes reluctant to use social networks for their growth but in vain. By low or no participation on social media platforms, you are missing your chance to create brand awareness, get new possibilities for lead generation, and build connections to influencers.

Last year was prominent for giving marketers and sales pros another opportunity for growth — there appeared Clubhouse, a new social networking app we are hurrying up to talk about in our post. 

So what is Clubhouse?

Clubhouse, in a broad sense, is a new social networking platform that allows people all over the world to get together for a public talk. It’s an app with audio chat rooms where participants can communicate not only with their friends but with big bosses and world-known gurus — something like a free-flowing podcast.

Clubhouse is an audio-only application, meaning you won’t find any video or visual content there. Right now, it’s available only on iOS and requires 13.0 or a later version. Besides, while you can easily download it, you’ll need to receive an invitation from a Clubhouse member to join the audio chat.

Some history

The platform celebrates its first anniversary this year. It saw the world in March 2020, launched by Paul Davison and Rohan Seth, both of whom had previously worked for Google. Creating this app was not easy and cost the founders dozens of social media app experiments. Yet they were persistent to achieve their goal:

“Our goal was to build a social experience that felt more human — where instead of posting, you could gather with other people and talk.”

Initially, Clubhouse targeted celebrities, top gurus, industry thought leaders, and Silicon Valley investors (By the way, Andreessen Horowitz, a venture capital firm, was generous to invest $12 million in the development of the app).

After a while, the platform started growing its public with jet speed, so now it boasts more than 10 million users as of February 2021 and has its doors open for everyone who has an interest and invitation.

Considering the geography of Clubhouse, the app has the biggest popularity among Americans (around 2.6 million downloads), while about 36% of total downloads come from outside the U.S., the top countries being Germany, Japan, and the U.K. Here are some statistics from January 2021:

How Clubhouse works

Now that you have a bit of understanding of what this new social networking monster is and where it comes from, let’s find out more about how it works.

Joining Clubhouse app

There are two ways you can enter the platform:

By personal invitation: as soon as someone joins Clubhouse, they automatically receive one invitation they can send to another person who’ll use their phone number. Besides, once someone has been actively participating in Clubhouse life for a while (e.g., speaking and moderating rooms), they may earn more invites to share.

By reserving your username: If you haven’t got an invitation, you may download the app and reserve your username there. Those of your friends who already use Clubhouse will get a notification and be able to let you in even if they don’t have any invites to send.

Setting up your Clubhouse profile

As soon as you are in Clubhouse, you’ll need to set up your profile, something which will let people know about you, and write a catching bio (information that will tell others about your job position, product, achievements, and so on).

Browsing all Clubhouse tabs

Like many other social media platforms, Clubhouse will offer you a hallway, i.e., a feed where you’ll find the list of current conversations, scheduled rooms, clubs, and recommended people to chat with.

In the menu above the hallway, you’ll see navigation icons that will enable you to search for members, invite new people, check the calendar, review notifications, and edit your profile.

Visiting Clubhouse Rooms

Rooms are where all Clubhouse magic happens. As you’re scrolling through the hallway, you’ll see details about each room (its name and the number of people and speakers), so you can decide if you want to join in. Clubhouse rooms listed in the hallway are open for anyone to join.

Entering a room, you’ll be automatically muted. So, if you’d like to raise a word, you should tap the “Raise Hand” icon in the lower right corner of the Room page. Besides, moderators may add people to the room by clicking the “+” icon in the same right corner below.

Starting the room

To start the room, you should click the “Start a Room” button at the bottom of the homepage and choose among “Closed,” “Social,” or “Open” rooms.

• Closed room is open only to specific attendees.
• Social room is open to all people who the moderator is already following.
• Open room is the one anyone on Clubhouse may view or join.

You may also start a private room with specific people available online. Just click on this 9-dot icon next to the “Start a Room” button:

Visiting Clubs

Aside from Clubhouse rooms, you may join or create Clubs — interest-oriented groups.

To join a club, you only need to click the “Follow” button.

And here’s the list of roles you may take within the club:

• Founder: You are the owner of the club. You set the rules and invite people. But you should host at least one recurring conversation.
• Admin: This role is given to you by the club founder. You can approve and remove club members. Besides, you may open public or private rooms.
• Members: You may create private rooms and participate in both public and private rooms.
• Follower: You are not allowed to create rooms but you may follow the public club activities.

Not to get lost on Clubhouse space, Medium has prepared a diagram of your first days on the platform, which I would personally recommend using as a roadmap:

Should I use Clubhouse for my business?

So you have some understanding of what Clubhouse is and how to get started there. Now, I guess, the logical question you might wish to ask is a sort of “May Clubhouse be an option for my business?”

If you did ask, my answer is an absolute “Yes” ―  provided you understand how to benefit from this social networking app.

Let’s discuss cases when Clubhouse may be of real value to your business:

You are running a blog

Clubhouse may provide a good deal of useful primary data for your blog posts. Just start the room, listen to what experts say about the topic of your interest, interview other members, and put together what you’ve heard into a compelling article for your blog.

You want to create awareness and increase engagement around your sales pitch

Say, you have something valuable to offer. Why not use Clubhouse as another opportunity for people to hear about your solution?

What you need to do is to adjust your pitch to the audio format, share invites with your sales team members, and give them a word during the presentation. That way, you’ll build your own sales network for users to engage with your product right in the app.

You want to reach more audience for your sales training programs

Clubhouse may serve as a good idea for fulfilling your sales coaching ambitions. With this app, you may easily find a new audience for your sales training programs. And even though you can’t send unlimited invites on Clubhouse, people with whom you are networking on this platform may start following you on other social media.

You are interested in collaborations

Well, if you are in a business world, you definitely ARE. Clubhouse is a wonderful option to start a private conhversation about networking and collaboration opportunities. And when you say ‘private,’ it is indeed private, because after you close the chat, nothing you’d been talking about with your potential business partner will be saved.

You’d wish to hold or participate in online business events

The pandemic year has set a new trend in the business event industry — we all went virtual. And that’s where Clubhouse comes on stage.

Using this app, you may hold or visit sales and marketing events for free! But what if after your brilliant webinar, attendees will start contacting you directly? With Clubhouse, that’s more than real, as switching to private chat with you will cost users a couple of seconds.

Benefits and challenges of using Clubhouse for sales and marketing

We’ve just scoped the opportunities for your business with Clubhouse. That still doesn’t mean you rush downloading the app, yeah? A clever person thinks twice and weighs all pros and cons.

Let’s do the same and talk about benefits you can earn from Clubhouse, as well as some challenges you should be prepared to face if you decide to use this app for your sales and marketing growth.

Benefits of using Clubhouse

1. It helps create brand awareness

Clubhouse is a word-of-mouth platform. No matter what room you attend, once given a word, you can make the public aware of what you are doing. In other words, Clubhouse is your chance to tell the world about your brand and establish your product as a go-to solution.

2. It helps build trust and develop community

With Clubhouse, you have a good opportunity to promote your expertise, increase your audience, and boost the public interest in your brand. And if you tell your story candidly, be sure you’ll get people’s trust as a valuable bonus.

3. Its prime audience consists of influencers and decision-makers

Let’s not forget that Clubhouse was first created for influencers, thought leaders, and other Mr./Mrs. Biggs. That’s why this app attracts people who crave exclusiveness, expertise, and business tights. Clubhouse is the platform where you may get in touch with top decision-makers in a much easier way than, say, hunting for their attention with your cold emails.

4. It may be your additional channel for lead generation

In a scenario where you are on the stage talking to hundreds or even thousands of people, getting new leads for your brand sounds like something pleasantly inevitable. If you have a real value to offer, communicate it to your audience and connect this value with your brand. People will wish to find your landing page or talk to you directly.

You may say: “It sounds like I’ll be advertising… No one likes ads”.

Yes, about 96% of people don’t trust ads. The truth is that people trust people. So if you sound like you are on Clubhouse to tell the story, not to advertise, they will be more likely to join your prospect list.

Challenges of using Clubhouse

Despite all the above-mentioned merits of Clubhouse, you should still consider the factors that may prevent this platform from meeting your expectations:

1. Its audience is still limited

Considering that Clubhouse is still unavailable on Android devices and its rooms are capped to 5K users, you don’t have that many chances of meeting the right partners or potential customers. So, if you aim to find as many users as possible, I don’t think this platform should be your primary source.

2. Its attendance is always changing

Imagine, you have created the list of points to cover during your sales webinar. But your listeners are unpredictable. People may enter the room whenever they wish and start asking questions you’ve already answered. As a result, you fail to charm your audience the way you wished to. Seems a bit frustrating, doesn’t it?

3. There is no record of your content

Brands strive to rank high on search engines because they know this will bring them awareness and increased reach. With Clubhouse, however, that won’t happen. At least within the nearest time. No one can find your conversation on Clubhouse search, let alone Google search. So, be prepared that what’s said in the chat will be left in the chat.

4. Its rapid growth may lead to “overpopulation”

Clubhouse has become popular owing to its exclusiveness. But the public is growing every day, so very soon the app may be overpopulated. Managing rooms with millions of people who are constantly raising their hands? Seems fantastically complicated.

Well, of course, devs will try to adjust the functionality of the app to the growing user density. But the times of these changes and new conditions may be rather turbulent for your business.

Tips on how to use Clubhouse for your business

If you have decided that Clubhouse may help you achieve your marketing and sales goals, congrats! You like trends, you’re not afraid of challenges, and you don’t wish to miss opportunities.

Now that you are in the game, consider some small tips on how to use this platform for your business:

Elaborate on your bio

Your Clubhouse bio is your business card, where you can leave any piece of information you wish. So, don’t be shy. Tell the audience about yourself, your brand, and your product right there.

And even though Clubhouse doesn’t allow links in the bio, you may still provide a good call to action and mention your social media profiles so that people could visit these pages if they are interested in your solution.

Here’s a good example:

Think of a compelling room title

When you start your room, ensure its title mentions your brand, product, or service and is related to the main topic you’d like to raise, for example, Sales prospecting: the best practices from Snov.io.

Bring value

People will enter your rooms expecting to get value, not to hear a thousand times how perfect your product is. So if you are planning to sell via Clubhouse, do it, but wisely. Pose yourself like an expert in the topic by providing tips, best practices, and use cases. Meanwhile, you will give soft references to your company and product whenever they are relevant.

Speak up

You may also successfully represent your brand outside your room. Sometimes a good option is to visit other rooms related to your industry and raise a hand. But the recommendation here is the same: don’t bother attendees by selling your product or service. Speak on the topic and discreetly mention your solution.

Listen

The universal business rule: be ethical and respect others. Some entrepreneurs make the same mistake on Clubhouse — they interfere while one of their room attendees speaks. Never do this. First of all, it may ruin your image. Second, you never know when there is something extra valuable you may hear from the speaker, so do listen.

Top 10 Clubhouse rooms and clubs for sales and marketing

For you to get the most value from Clubhouse, we’ve collected the list of best clubs & rooms for sales and marketing so that you could make a good start on the platform right after I wind up the post.

Clubhouse rooms and clubs for sales

The Sales Club

This club is all about SaaS companies, networking, and sales. Its founder, Dre Smith (@dre.smith), has a lot to offer on the topic, so don’t hesitate to visit his account and find out about upcoming rooms.

Sally Sparks-Cousins (@sallysparkle)

Visit Sally’s club to get insights into how to grow your revenue with marketing automation, as well as to learn from her best sales strategies and ad management tricks. She’s commonly on stage every day except weekends, so pay a visit and follow her.

Marvin Reid (@sales_marketing)

As a CEO at Volume 2 Agency and renowned sales and marketing consultant, he helps businesses plan their roadmap and pave their strategies. Follow him to get notifications when he starts speaking out.

Ed Nusbaum (@ed)

Ed is a successful startup owner with several projects such as Startup.club, OG.club, Talk.club, Community.club, etc. He knows the trick and helps other founders launch successful companies, now on Clubhouse too. Follow!

Sales Training for Online Business Owners

In this room, you’ll find some live sales training, Q&A sessions, as well as interviews with successful business owners. Joining this club will be your perfect start on Clubhouse, and you’ll learn how to improve your lead generation strategy and sales overall.

Clubhouse rooms and clubs for marketing

Mike Prasad (@mikeprasad)

Mike is a co-founder of several businesses and owns @Marketing Club with more than 212K followers. He’s also a world-known public speaker at weekly Monday 12 pm conferences where he shares his knowledge and experience in digital marketing. Don’t miss a chance to upgrade your skills with the guru.

Mark Evans (@marketingspark)

A CMO for SaaS & B2B, Mark Evans is concerned about improving lead generation strategies. Following him on Clubhouse won’t only bring you marketing insights but also chances of valuable cooperation. Besides, I’d recommend you to visit his weekly B2B marketing podcast called “Marketing Spark (The B2B Marketing Podcast‪)‬” for a bigger portion of knowledge.

Katie Patterson (@salessisters)

Katie is a co-owner of a Sales Sisters business, a social media guru, and a business coach. What is so charming about her is that she raises the female word in marketing and helps women find their place in the sales market. But that’s not a girl club only ― everyone interested in social media marketing strategies is welcomed.

Social Media Mavens

This is the community for all businesses who strive to get the most out of digital marketing and make their brand shine. Social Media Mavens brings up marketing on platforms like Pinterest, Youtube, Instagram, and others, so this club is worthy of visiting.

Marketers Quest

What I like about this club is that it is for anyone on the marketing path, without exception. No matter how much you know, you’ll find your topic there. And the topic range is big: sales, e-commerce, SaaS marketing, entrepreneurship bootstrapping, etc. Board the club to start boosting your skills already today.

Wrapping up

Clubhouse is a new reality for your business opportunities. Being social by nature, it gathers audiences from all over the world under the same roof.

So, if you have a real value to offer, you should consider this platform as another place to speak about your brand, find influencers and partners, get more leads — everything that will help you pave the way for your successful business growth.

And when it comes to choosing the right tool for your sales and marketing strategy, Snov.io is one click away to help you find and reach the right people at the right time.