A hand-drawn poster and tight marketing budget helped the team behind Tonight, an iPhone-only social network for sharing evening plans, pull together a stellar cast to produce their promo video; they managed to get Graham Shearer, a photographer who has taken cover shots for publications like Vogue, to direct the shoot.
“We went to get a video made and found it was going to cost fifteen or twenty-thousand dollars,” says Robert Kawalsky, co-founder of Tonight.
“Our budget was more like one-hundred dollars so we drew this poster and stuck it up at film schools.”
Kawalsky says the team were hoping for a bunch of film students to volunteer to make the video, and were surprised when they found out Shearer had heard about the project and wanted to get involved.
“I can safely say that the hundred dollars was responsible for hundreds of downloads.”
The best advice my boss ever gave me was for every decision that was going to be made, I always had to develop point of view.
An unconventional approach to marketing has seen the Tonight team host pop-up events, use guerilla marketing and even organise their own festival.
Events have helped Tonight get publicity and acquire users. Kawalsky says a well-planned event offers:
- Cut-through with the media. Tonight received coverage in more than 30 publications for their Tonight in Bondi festival, including the Sydney Morning Herald and Daily Addict;
- A chance to acquire a bunch of users in one go. Some startups can afford to acquire users slowly, but Tonight works only when you’ve got a group of friends to share with;
- An ideal set of circumstances to use the app. People are out and about, and have something to share with friends.
The Tonight app was officially launched in May, just as the team were gearing up for the PushStart program. It has now been downloaded more than 7,000 times.
The poster which caught the attention of experienced photographer Graham Shearer. He ended up producing the Tonight promo video with a group of Sydney film students.
Kawalsky says growing the user base, although important, is not the primary concern at this point; instead the team are focussed on getting it working smoothly at a “micro-level”. That means they want to “answer questions” that come with being a startup: determining when people are using the app, how they are sharing content etc.
While he can’t share exact numbers, Kawalsky says the team have found a social “tipping point” where users become more active, once a certain number of their friends start using the app.
“We send a reminder out at 4pm each day asking people what they are doing tonight. We tested the time we sent it and have found that is the best.”
Being able to make decisions using data seems to be a strength. It could be a result of Kawalsky’s background as an accountant and investment manager for Keybridge Capital, where he managed around $100 million worth of investments for others.
“The best advice my boss ever gave me was for every decision that was going to be made, I always had to develop point of view.
“That forces you to really think through the problem and allows you to learn even if you don’t have the responsibility.”