Harry's page 1

Harry's - How to collect 100k emails in one week (8 min read) 

Harry's - Launched in 2013 men's grooming brand that collected over 100k emails in a week before their website launch.

?Strategy & Tools

Highlights

  • March 2013 - One week of the Harry's Promo Referral Campaign

  • A Week later - Launch of Harry's website

Stats

  • 100k emails collected
  • 77% of the emails were collected via referrals program 
  • 1,308 users referred 5 people
  • 966 users referred 10 people
  • 411 users referred 25 people
  • 211 users referred 50 people

Teamwork
Harry’s involved the whole team in the referral campaign process.
This gave the campaign the initial traction boost it needed to succeed.

Start with friends
The whole team emailed all of their friends about the product.
The contacts were categorized into two groups:

Emails
Harry's mailing strategy involved:

  • Personalized message,
  • Bold encouragement to spread the word,
  • Email signatures with links back to the prelaunch site and social channels,
  • Email template:

Title: “Harry’s is Coming!” 

Friends and Family, 

After months of closely examining the weight of razor handles, natural ingredient mixtures in shaving cream and angles of razor blades, we are really excited to only be days away from launching Harry’s. 

You’re important to me and I wanted you to be the first to know about our plans for launch. We have just put up our pre-launch site, you can check it out at www.harrys.com. 

Our full site will be up in about a week and I’ll be sure let you know when it’s live! 

In the meantime, I’d love your help in spreading the word! Here’s how: 

1) Go to our website www.harrys.com 

2) On the first page of the site, enter your email to join our mailing list 

3) On the second page, refer friends using your own custom link back to Harry’s – and as a bonus you can earn free Harry’s products! 

Thank you so much for all of your help and support. I can’t tell you how much we appreciate it. Look forward to continuing to share Harry’s with you and appreciate you telling the world! 

All the best, [name]

  • They also reached out personally to some people that are well connected
  • Email template: 

Hey [CEO],

Hope you’re great and everything is going really well at [Company].

I wanted to drop you a quick note and let you know that we just put up prelaunch site for Harry’s – check it out and sign up at www.harrys.com. We plan to launch in about a week. Super excited. Would love for you to pass the prelaunch site on to the [company] team and anyone else who you think might appreciate it.

Thanks for your help. You’re the best. Hope to see you soon.

Jeff

Social media
Harry's team launched Facebook and Twitter fan pages.

The whole team did the following:

  • Liked company’s page on Facebook
  • Followed company’s Twitter
  • Tweeted about the campaign, and @tagged its profile
  • Posted a personal Facebook post about the campaign.

Simplicity
Two-page website.

  • First page - It only consisted of the lead generation form collecting emails, and the short text:
    "Harry's is Coming! Respecting the face and wallet since like... right now". 
  • Second page - It contained a referral link, CTA (call to action) buttons for Facebook and Twitter, and the tracker, where users could see how many friends they had referred and what prize they had achieved.

Referral program
By sharing the unique referral link with friends, users had the opportunity to earn free products.
The more friends signed up, the bigger the prize they earned:

  • 5 users referred - Shave cream
  • 10 users - Truman Handle Blade - Razor blade
  • 25 users - Winston Shave set - Premium Handle
  • 50 - One year free blades

Tangible and achievable rewards
Tangible rewards: Free Harry’s products.

Achievable rewards: The first award was easily attainable (5 users referred) and each subsequent tier wasn’t discouragingly difficult to achieve.

Even the grand prize was within reach (50 users) - Over 200 people achieved this tier. 

Tracker
The campaign page included a tracker, where users could see how many friends they had referred and what prize they had achieved, or not yet achieved.

Make sharing stupid simple
The second page included social sharing buttons.
When they clicked the icons, a dialogue box popped up with a pre-created message. All users needed to do was just to click "send".

Tools
Email
Facebook
Twitter
Their own Referral Program - tools for your own Referral programs, below

Harry's page 2

?Psychology

Playfulness
The copywriting of the website was playful and witty.
This approach differs from the regular more official approach other brands represent. 

The main page said, “Respecting the face, and wallet since like right now.”

On the second page, the picture of a wooly mammoth was coupled with the words: “Shaving is evolving. Don’t leave your friends behind.” 

Mystery
Mystery is a powerful marketing tool. It creates a strong level of customer engagement.

Founders of Harry's wanted to make sure their new customers had an impression there were entering the mysterious place.

Words like "STEP INSIDE", "Be the first to know" and a small drawing of a key were created to reinforce their early customers that they were getting insider access.

Gamification
The dynamic progress tracker served a few purposes:

  • Keeping track of users referral,
  • Motivated users who were close to the next tier to keep sharing,
  • People were comparing their progress to their friends and competing.

?Window of Opportunity

Referral programs are extremely powerful!
Here are a few types that you can use in your own business, today:

You can create similar Referral Programs using these sites:

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