1 Billion Users in 29 days: Threads Handbook - Breakdown of the Threads Product, Launch, Brand, and Growth

Hey, it’s Dave. This is my first post for our new Entrepreneur’s Handbook publication on BeeHiiv. Let me know what you think.

If you were online today you probably heard Meta Platforms is filling out the “platforms” side of its name, with the launch of a new Twitter-like conversations app called Threads.

I downloaded Threads and used it heavily in the last 24 hours.

Here are my observations from a product and marketing perspective and some takeaways for startups on creating and launching new products.

By the way, ChatGPT, the popular chatbot from OpenAI, is estimated to have reached 100 million monthly active users just two months after launch, making it the fastest-growing consumer application in history, according to a UBS study.

Threads is on pace to break ChatGPT’s record in just a matter of days…

Let’s discuss a few of the strategies and takeaways they’re using to achieve massive adoption.

Threads Launch Strategy Was Textbook 🎯 

Threads is a good example of how to launch an MVP. Its design is sleek, sharp, familiar yet new, thoughtful, simple app. Nothing is broken except it seems Zuck’s threads didn’t load on his profile at 9:30am ET today, but other than that, no errors down to the last bit of microcopy. But it’s missing core functionality for a social media app, or at least a proper Twitter copycat It doesn’t even have direct messaging, discovery or trending news, analytics, web compatibility, or account switching (you have to log out every time). These missing features are exactly what makes it a minimum viable product - meaning, you don’t need to have all the features ready in time to launch your startup.

Experience PLG to perfection. I’ve never seen a more seamless signup experience - the ability to instantaneously import your Instagram account, profile and followers. It gave everyone a fast start in just a few taps and avoided “empty room syndrome.”

A few days of pre-ordering really helped. Apple now allows not only beta testers but pre-ordering of an app before it launches, both of which Threads did, where you download the app from the App Store before it’s ready and the developer (Instagram, Inc.) chooses to turn it “on.” When it does, it’s automatically available — this is a smart way to ensure a powerful launch day.

Timing: Apparently, the app launched earlier than scheduled. Why? That never happens. If anything, launches get delayed. But Instagram showed impressive nimbleness and leadership to move up its launch date to capitalize on Elon Musk’s usage crackdown on Twitter, where the bird app now limits the number of tweets free users can view to 600 tweets per day. Takeaway: Want to know if you have a good marketing team? See how fast they can move to take advantage of market trends, like when your number one competitor decides to light itself on fire.

Where Are the Ads?

When the Meta Business Suite first launched, it confused me… it seemed like cumbersome overkill to create content there for Instagram and Facebook, but now, it all makes sense. When it’s time, they’ll just plop Threads in and now you can advertise on Facebook, Instagram, and Threads — from one dashboard.

• Threads has no ads right now. But I am seeing a lot of organic posts by brands in my feed. I’m sure they’re just waiting for the brand and product to land before introducing ads. Curious what milestone they’re waiting for. Number of days? Number of users? Some sort of NPS score? Mosseri made it sound like number of users, but that they’re not concerned about ads at all and just want to build a fantastic user experience.

• Now Meta has yet another surface to show ads to audiences, all controlled from the Meta Business dashboard — really smart for Meta’s core business and helping marketers.

Gobbling Up Twitter

• Zuck told Bloomberg, “There should be a public conversations app with 1 billion-plus people on it,” and that “Twitter hasn’t nailed it. Hopefully we will.”

• Twitter reportedly has a user base of 300 million, while Instagram is at 2 billion, and Facebook is at 2.9 billion. Between the integration and inter-marketing Meta can do with Instagram and Facebook, it probably won’t take very long for Threads to leapfrog Twitter. According to Zuck’s thread post “10 million sign-ups in the first 7 hours” - at that rate continues it would take 29 days to cross 1 billion users. 30 million in 12 hours is the last I heard.

Brand - Dot Net?!

Positioned as “Threads, an INSTAGRAM app” in the App Store — Threads is knit close to Instagram’s existing platform, which might lead to cannibalization — I know I’m using Threads 10x more than Instagram because I like to write more than make visuals — but on the contrary, it’s actually good for Instagram’s growth. Case in point: my tech-skeptical co-editor Stephen Moore actually created an Instagram account to download Threads. Adam Mosseri, Head of Instagram, says he sees Instagram and Threads as complementary. At Hopin, we have a similar “problem” with overlapping webinar offerings, but we always say, “Better a customer choose between our platforms than choose between us and a competitor’s platform.”

Threads’ go-to-market strategy uses the strength of an existing brand to launch a new one. If you trust Instagram, you trust Threads. This is actually really risky. The new product could flop, tainting the established one. If you use one brand to launch another, you really have to invest in the new brand to protect the old one. And it really seems like the whole company was behind Threads’ success.

Zuckerberg as a leader is becoming more and more likable. He’s doing a good job of dogfooding his own products to market them. He’s recording selfies, posting family pictures and hobbies, and Threading actively as a part of the launch. Shout out to the Comms teams at Meta have done really well with Zuckerberg’s personal brand turning him into a major growth lever.

How to Use Threads for Growth and Innovation

This moment is what Warren Buffet and Shaan Puri call a “fat pitch” - a platform shift like the launch of a new technology (i.e., iPhone, AI) presenting a greenfield of opportunity for entrepreneurs and founders to get in the game.

1. Get moving. Take first mover advantage. Try to capture your niche. I did this on Medium when it first launched and now I have one of the top publications with 226k followers. Don’t strike out looking. Lean in.

2. Create content. Threads makes it very easy to post. Feels like a tweet. Writers know that it’s a volume game = the more at-bats, the more likely you’ll gain traction. Consistency wins.

3. Build new relationships, this is your chance to meet other new tech adopters. Network, respond to threads, try to be funny, at least be positive. Create opportunities for others to succeed and you will succeed yourself.

4. Ask questions. Content that celebrities like Jimmy Fallon, Tony Robbins, and Ellen Degeneres are using to explode their followership is asking questions. Shameless plug if you’re looking for thoughtful questions: check out my free conversation starter app app.partyqs.com.

Great summary of Threads on (ironically) Twitter to learn more:

Good podcast episode on Threads:

Thanks for reading.

If you liked this breakdown and would like to see more like it, let’s connect on Threads.

-Dave
Founding editor of Entrepreneur’s Handbook