Have you heard of this luxury SAAS called “Superhuman”? For those new to this product, it has inspired an almost cult-like following among its users.
Superhuman wants to get you to inbox-zero for $30 a month.
Coming back to the first question, what and who is superhuman? It’s an email client. It’s fast, beautiful, and powerful, but at the end of the day, it’s an email app. Right?
So, what’s so special about it?
“I want to take on Gmail and build the fastest email experience ever, and users would pay $30 a month for it." Rahul Vohra (CEO, Superhuman)
What does Superhuman do differently than Gmail or any other email app?
1. Superhuman has speed: It is built from scratch with speed in mind and commits to every interaction being faster than 50ms as compared to 100ms for Gmail.
2. Superhuman induces the right habits in its users: It forces you to use the keyboard by design (as opposed to a trackpad) with its very own set of uncustomizable command lines. It almost forces you to get into the habit of achieving “Inbox-zero”.
3. Superhuman has super-automation workflows and spilt inbox: everything that’s not possible with Gmail is available here. It sets up workflow, and processes and lets you divide the email into split inboxes, which helps to master complex cases with just one command!
So, what does it takes to be on superhuman?
An invite from its user. An old-school invitation. You can’t access Superhuman just like that.
Coming to the elephant in the room: An eye-watering $30 cost per month.
It is even more impressive that the actual Gmail service, which superhuman piggyback on top of, is free yet prices itself in the premium bracket. Unlike premium products like Microsoft Office Suite (OneNote, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneDrive), Adobe (Photoshop + lightroom) costs $6.99 and $10 respectively.
Here’s a quick question for you: Will you pay for it? Considering it’s a productivity app for emails?
Let’s understand, how did they acquire their users? Here’s the breakdown:
1. The point of superhuman is exclusivity
People want nothing more than what they can’t have. Superhuman supercharges demand by denying access to its users. It's a VIP club for 1% of tight-knit users (founders and executives).
To implement the point of exclusivity, Superhuman has a mandatory waitlist for its users, and you can only gain access if you receive an invite from an existing user.
Do you know that Superhuman has ~15000 users and a whooping 2,20,000+ on the waitlist?
2. The referral loop
Superhuman activates it’s user base via the power of referrals. It’s existing users become their marketers. It uses invite as currency. The ability to skip the waiting list makes the invite valuable.
Say, you got an invite, and you are invited to Superhuman. You will receive a long questionnaire to fill up accurately (or you won’t hear back from them if you are a poor fit for the product). After the questionnaire round, you will have to attend a mandatory VIP onboarding call with Superhuman.
Yes, the superhuman team manually onboards each of its users!
If you survive all the above steps, you will receive the privilege right to pay $30/month and be a superhuman! Phew.
3. Social proof marketing: Twitter (only Twitter)
Superhuman has a following of 47k Twitter followers. And is not available on any other social media platform (except occasional meta). Superhuman is one of the hottest tech companies — while being the least advertised. It retweets praise which sounds better coming from others. They stoke the fires of FOMO by amplifying the voices of happy users.
4. Status signaling
“-Sent via Superhuman” is a status signal and virality trigger. Rising demand using the virality tactic while limiting access boosts the scarcity ratio.
5. Press & Interviews
Lots of articles were written and shared about the company charging $30 for a service that is available free in the marketing as a remarkable phenomenon.
6. Superhuman Blog
The use of blogging provides superhuman leverage. The team shares content on technical topics to addressing criticism.
7. Niche Marketing:
Superhuman is not for everyone. It’s for that 1% of the dense Silicon Valley network, from founders to executives, who have similar interests.
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And, that’s how Superhuman stood apart in acquiring its users in contrast to typical and needy sales funnels.
What’s your one take-a-away from this breakdown? Mention them below!
