9 epic lessons I've learned from watching Calendly grow
It's much easier to admire in hindsight, but still lots of great lessons to reverse engineer
I originally posted this on Twitter on January 28th 2022. You may see the embedded tweet above, otherwise the thread has also been unrolled.
Everyone is talking about Calendly for personal reasons.
We should be talking about how their MASTERFUL marketing and product strategy works in concert.
Here's 9 epic lessons I've learned from watching them grow.
*ZERO have to do with power dynamics
1/ Running their own race
I've been a Calendly user since 2016.
Despite the rise of competitors adding more 🔔📯 over the years, they haven't been suckered into a "feature" race to keep up.
*They've kept it simple as they know their audience.
2/ Sneaky massive market
Everyone thought calendar scheduling was a small market at that time.
It wasn't.
Calendly unlocked an under-served market that was sitting in plain sight.
*Can you find a sleepy market that has a organic a shared experience?
3/ UI and UX was innovative
At that time, their booking experience was 10x better.
A 🤯 impression was made on every booking for both sides of the experience.
*Where are you 10x better where it matters?
4/ No fancy marketing
Creating a category a strategic narrative has been all the rage in the past years.
Calendly has done none of that, they have kept it simple. (so far)
Look at their page.
No jargon.
Clear and to the point.
*Double down on what is working for you
5/ Growth powered by network effects
Every person booking is a future user, they made sure you saw who it was "powered by".
Calendly created brand awareness with every experience.
Simplicity + Network effects = Winning Combination
*reminds me of the genius of the OG Hotmail
6/ Smartly gated pricing
Calendly knew the base value prop could be given away for free (to drive awareness)
Their advanced business features aligned for MORE value from a user base that was happy to pay.
*We're paying customers using routing to our sales people from one link.
7/ Earned brand love
Calendly fulfils a promise with their product and marketing.
That's earned them tons of brand affinity.
*Just look at the public response and all the brand love they are getting
8/ Strong confident leadership
Any time I've heard Tope on a podcast I've learned something.
Look how he's handled the this all with class and a little bit of fun.
https://twitter.com/TopeAwotona/status/1486791245003464706
9/ Unblinking confidence in their vision
HubSpot was an early adopter, then later made their own version for their CRM.
Competitors have risen every day following their lead trying to position against them and take some niches.
*Yeah, I'm back to running their own race.