GTM Sauce

NGL · B2C · anonymous messaging app

Have every user post their link, so friends who quit see it and return

Churn offset by a very high redownload rate; still popular 3 years on

Workedproduct-viralityretention

What they did

Every user posts their NGL link to their Story or keeps it as their link-in-bio. In some countries it is every 17-19-year-old's link-in-bio, so a user who churns keeps seeing friends' links, sends a message, and comes back to make their own.

What happened

NGL had churn but a very high redownload rate, which Hunter credits for its staying power.
Stage
scale

In their words

Hunter Isaacson - Meet The Guy Who Solved Growing Apps

Play from 5:16
5:03

HostI've seen some people criticize like mass virality on TikTok like for consumer apps, and they say like, even if you get a bunch of users, they'll churn out. So, but it seems like that wasn't the case for you guys. How did you like handle the virality and actually take advantage of it?

5:16

Hunter IsaacsonThe beauty of NGL is it's like a really tight viral loop. We found that a lot of people that turned out of the product ended up coming back in, because their friends would still post NGL links. You know, in in some countries, it's like every teenager, you know, all the 17, 18, 19-year-olds, right, all those people that are in like that that high school, college era, it's their link-in-bio. If you churn out, you're going to ultimately come back in, because you're going to see your friend post their link.

5:40

Hunter IsaacsonMaybe it'll be in their bio, you'll send them a message, and you'll realize, "Oh wait, I kind of want to do this now, too." So, it had churn, for sure, but it also had this like very high redownload rate, which I think is what's allowed it to continue to be so popular today.

5:54

HostThat's interesting. Yeah, so it really became a habit and part of people's core day-to-day, but then, also, you got that real estate, which is the link-in-bio. This is consumer social. Like, people are interacting with each other, but you guys are also monetized. So, can you talk about the the the revenue side of things?

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Tags: instagram, viral-loop, link-in-bio, resurrection, redownloads