Use These Best Practices When Using the New Clubhouse App
Combine the idea of late 1990’s chat rooms, add early 2000’s teleconferencing and bridge lines, subtract Zoom fatigue and having to look good on video and what do you get? Drop-in group audio chat…and it’s going viral!
What is Clubhouse?
Clubhouse is the fore-runner of a series of voice-driven audio conferencing apps you will see launching over the next year or two. Blab was its closest likeness (went out of business in 2016), featuring live streaming, combined with the immediacy and reach of something along the lines of Periscope (being removed from app stores in 2021). But, Clubhouse is different.
Clubhouse is attracting ongoing participation (and near addiction) from some big names like Kevin Harrington and Damond John (Shark Tank), Grant Cardone (featured this season on (Undercover Billionaire), Les Brown, and Sophia Amouruso, to name a few.
Celebrity women have been a bit slower to jump on the Clubhouse bandwagon, but there are plenty of millionaire women and men participating in the discussions.
Seeing industry moguls taking time out of their hurrendous schedules to spend a few minutes or a few hours in a Clubhouse room is a daily occurrence!
Imagine sitting in on a three- or four-hour phone call and then asking one of those guys a few questions! That’s the allure of Clubhouse.
Benefits of Clubhouse
Many benefits exist when getting involved with the new Clubhouse app. Some of them include:
- Getting introduced to new, and potentially very high-profile, people.
- Ask a question about your business or life and get advice from experts for free!
- Get visibility in front of hundreds or thousands of people you have never met.
- Attract new people to your business.
- Attract potential investors to your business.
- Share your story and receive support from those who have been there too.
- Connect with new people without the long task of courting like we have to do on typical social media.
- Grab the interest of potential mentors.
Your participation in Clubhouse is definitely a time commitment. I usually wake-up at 6am and the first thing I’ll grab is my phone to see what conversations are happening on Clubhouse.
While I’m getting my first cup of coffee, I’m listening to to a conversation that started nine hours before in the U.K. and has 30 speakers and 1,200 listening in the audience.
On Friday, January 14, 2021 (I only joined Clubhouse a week before), I led a 3.5-hour room where anyone and everyone was able to share their experiences with Clubhouse so far and ask questions. My number of followers went from 32 (which took me since Sunday to attract) to 65 by the time I ended the discussion.
You will see the benefits of your investment of time almost immediately by participating in Clubhouse. Not only will you get to be a fly on the wall during discussions held by head leaders of your industry, and learn amazing strategies you would normally have to pay thousands of dollars for them to deliver one-on-one, but you will get the chance to interact with them too, as if you were on a simple phone call.
Now that you know what Clubhouse is, and that it will provide many benefits for you and your business if you choose to engage and invest some time, let’s cover the ongoing list of best practices for using Clubhouse so you can get started and look like a pro right from the start.
Clubhouse Best Practices by Category
Listed below are best practices for using Clubhouse. Many of these were determined and discussed on my live call on January 9, 2021. Just some of the amazing contributors of this list include: @maira_brnadwave, @shacannoncoo, @carabell, @lindsaywoods, @socialsavvygeek, @meravrichter, @vinniefisher, @mikerespects, (sorry if I missed anyone!!)
I will host future live sessions related to best practices, probably once per month, and will add to this list as we go forward. Be sure to follow me on Clubhouse at @martydickinson and tap on the image of the bell so that you are sure to receive announcements when I startup another room.
BIO (Account Profile)
- The first 3 Lines – The first 3 lines are your most important real estate. It’s what people see when they tap on your photo from inside a room and it’s what inspires them (or doesn’t) to view your entire profile and, ultimately, connect with you. Use those three lines to test what gets more people to take a look at your full profile and follow you. Try making a claim to show social proof or specify a service you provide to catch they eye of a person in need of what you offer. Try using your positioning statement and changing your top three lines every time you go into a new room.
- Photo – Your photo should be bright and clear.
- Emoji Power – Use emojis within your bio. They are part of Clubhouse’s search algorithm. Plus, they break up your text so the follower sees something other than a bunch of paragraphs. Be sure the emojis you choose are related to the topic and they are emojis your audience would expect to see for that topic.
- Connection – Activate Twitter and Instagram accounts and integrate them with your Clubhouse account. These are the two most common forms of providing Direct Messaging communications when someone wishes to make contact with someone they’ve recently started following.
- Consistent Branding – Keep your Twitter and Instagram pages, screen names and hero (header graphic) images consistent with your bio details in your Clubhouse account.
- Get Notified – Set your notifications in settings to “on” so that you receive notices when people you are following join rooms and club events.
- Keywords – Add intentional keywords into your bio so that your name comes up in search when people are using Clubhouse’s search function to find people with key skills or interests.
- Be READY! – Have your offer setup in advance. People will visit your profile whether you ask them to or not. Give them some place to go to connect with you further.
Audience Participant
- Follow – Follow room and club hosts, moderators and speakers that you would like to learn more about.
- Follow Many – Following more people than the number of people following you is completely fine. But, avoid following an unnatural of Clubhouse members because the system might put you into Clubhouse jail (or prevent you from following others for a period of time) as penalty for trying to game the system.
- Ask to Speak – Tap the image of the hand at the bottom of your phone screen to raise your hand to alert monitors that you would like to speak.
- Mute Yourself – When you become approved to the Stage as a speaker, your mic is LIVE. Immediately mute yourself when you are upgraded to speaker until you are called on or find an opportunity on your own to speak if moderators are not calling on speakers in any specific order.
- Help Grow the Room – Contribute to the room by tapping the + sign next to the hand and invite at least three people to join the room so they can benefit from the topic as well.
- Remember People – Take screenshots of bio photos and save them off into a list so you remember who they are and why you connected with them. You will probably see them in future rooms so you will want to acknowledge them, especially if they are monitors.
Speaker
- Introduce Yourself – Test different ways to introduce yourself. Observe the room for at least ten minutes before asking to be invited to the stage to ask a question or share. If the moderator wants all speakers to provide a quick intro, then go ahead, give your positioning statement (Thanks Lois Creamer!) and see how it goes over. But, also, try NOT introducing yourself first. Instead, try asking a question first. Every time I ask a question first, my involvement in the discussion is triple the length than when I formally introduce myself and my business. In fact, every time I do NOT introduce myself, the moderator brings up my Lions Always Win book so I don’t have to. The moderators will sell you for you if you put away your sales hat and delay your introduction. (Revised 2/06/2021)
- Get Identified – In a large room, mention something about your thumbnail photo so that people can recognize you as you’re speaking. At the end of sharing advise, restate your name and something at the end that’s quick to tell moderators you are done speaking. “Marty Dickinson, these are my thoughts.” @JTFox
- Brevity – Keep your questions to one minute or less.
- Watch Your Time – If you are assigned a certain amount of time to present, which is common in larger rooms, be respectful of the time you are given.
- Clarity – After introducing yourself and how you help people, state your question or golden nugget of wisdom clearly. If needed, and ONLY if time allows, give some back story for why you’re asking the question and an example so that everyone understands the question. Then, listen.
- Follow-up? – You can usually ask one follow-up question, but then be respectful of the other participants in the room by allowing them to be introduced and ask a question.
- Be Thankful – Show your gratitude for the answers. You’re getting top-quality advice from people who want to help you and no one asks for payment for the advice.
- Speaking Rate – Speak a little faster than normal conversation.
- Vocal Variety – Use vocal variety to show enthusiasm for your topic, question, and for the responses you’ve received from the panel of speakers and moderators.
- Humor is Okay! – I still remember Les Brown in a room “revealing” to the audience how he was wearing his Mickey Mouse underwear!
- Be Positive – Nobody wants to stick around listening to a pessimist.
- Quiet! – Eliminate background noise before you have tap the hand to be brought in as a speaker. Find a location where you will be alone and without disruption for the duration of your question or statement.
- Applaud Speakers – Toggle your mute button off and on a few times to show your support for a speaker that says something you appreciate.
- Listen More than You Speak – Good listening is the key from making the most out of Clubhouse…even when you are a speaker.
- Realize Speaking on Clubhouse is Different than Professional Speaking – People on Clubhouse cannot see your face or your hand gestures. There is no screen sharing or Powerpoint. Clubhouse is a great way to have discussions and even promote yourself. Just don’t confuse it with true public speaking or professional speaking. For practicing true speaking and presentation skills, join us for Speakers Speak LIVE every Wednesday.
Where Can You Practice Speaking on Virtual Live Every Week for FREE?
Moderator
- Establish Guidelines – Setup cues for the audience to rembember, such as double-tap the mic when you are in the speaker room and that will indicate you have a comment for the person speaking.
- Include – Be welcoming and recognize new arrivals.
- Watch – Upgrade audience members to speaker when they raise their hand and welcome them to the stage.
- Organize – Keep track of the order that speakers are brought into the stage area so you can call on them in the order they were promoted.
- Follow – Ask all participants to follow the speakers and moderators.
- Invite – Invite audience participants when and how to raise their hand to speak.
- Instruct – Instruct exactly what you want participants to speak about when they are given the open mic. The typical instruction is to use 20 or 30 seconds to introduce yourself and your business, then ask a question or share words of wisdom for someone who has provided a question.
- Globalize – Mention your time zone, especially when talking about topics like how many hours the room has been active or what time it started.
- Limit – Eventually, you will have someone in your room who takes advantage of the situation and tries to own the room. Be polite. Mention something from the person’s profile and acknowledge how great it is to have the person in the room and then mention that you need to get to others with questions or coments.
Host
Use all the best practices as listed in the moderator category, plus:
- Prep – Develop a list of people you want to have as core moderators and speakers for the room. A few may offer to be present for the duration, but most Clubhouse rooms extend for at least two hours. So, be accepting that most moderators will only stay in your room for 30 minutes before moving to another room or attending another appointment outside Clubhouse.
- RECRUIT A CO-HOST – Choose at least one person you know well (or have just recently come into contact with because of an alignment in your businesses) who is willing to be your co-host from the beginning of your room to the end. If your room is planned to go over two hours, I suggest you seek an additional co-host volunteer for every two hours your event is planned to run.
- Practice – First-time hosts should start a room and get a few people together to experiment with features and controls within Clubhouse. In your practice session, give Host rights to each attendee and have each person practice advancing participants to the stage as a speaker and demoting them back to the audience. Give your session a title that is obvious to experienced Clubhouse attendees that your room is for newbs to practice getting used to the system.
- Go Live Early – Activate your room 10-15 minutes before the start time so that people see you are actually going to be there.
- Reset the Room – Watch for new attendees coming into the room and, when you feel the time is right, tell the group you are going to “reset the room.” That means you are going to recap some things that have already been talked about and re-state the purpose and focus of the room. Provide any special instructions or things to avoid.
- Promote the Speakers – Routinely ask new arrivals to enter the bios of the speakers and moderators to follow them and also to tap the + sign at the bottom of the screen to invite 3 or more people.
- Avoid Too Much Self-Promotion – Pretty much every attendee will visit your profile when you are the host. Let your profile sell you instead of pitching your services.
Room
- Schedule Rooms in Advance – Schedule rooms using the calendar graphic at the top of your hallway screen.
- Develop a Good Title – Use a title that “sells the sizzle, not the steak.” Remember, your room title is a headline just like a headline is used for a YouTube video or blog post. It’s job is to get passers-by to read the description of the event so they can determine if it will be worth their time to attend.
- Timing – Schedule your room at least one day before it is supposed to go active.
Club
Within Clubhouse, there are rooms and there are clubs. When you are getting started with Clubhouse, your first hosting will be to start a room and invite people to be a part of the conversation in the Room. If you want to keep a specific topic in discussion over time, you would request the setup of a Club by completing an online request form.
Your “club” is expected to meet regularly. So, Clubhouse requires you to host a few rooms and participate actively before you will be awarded the approval of your request to start a room. From various sources, we have been advised that club development will be the future emphasis (and potential monetization) for Clubhouse. Here are some best practices our participants informed us about rooms so far and we will keep adding to this list as we start a room of our own.
- Title – Use a title that hooks, is incluseive and does not offend.
- Promote – Plan to promote your club actively since people only want to become a part of clubs that are growing.
Best Practices for Using Instagram as Part of Your Marketing Plan with Clubhouse
Special thanks to Terry Brock for making a best practices suggestion about Instagram while I was sharing Clubhouse best practices. Since most people will communicate with you first through Instagram (since there is currently no DM feature in Clubhouse), you should have these these Insta best practices in place.
- Whatever you typically include as posts to Instagram (photos or videos), be sure to have balance in the content of those photos. If your primary focus on Instagram is to showcase your business, be sure to include some posts to show your personal side too. Thanks @TerryBrock!
- Get used to your DM (Direct Messaging) inside Instagram. That’s where people from Clubhouse are going to contact you. Be sure to check it every day for incoming messages and reply in a timely manner.
What to Do Next
If you have already installed Clubhouse on your iPhone, but have not engaged, go into your settings and set your notifications to “on.” That way you will be alerted to topics being covered in active rooms and clubs. Start participating by listening while doing something else. Go for a walk or clean the house. Do something with your time while listening in on Clubhouse so you don’t feel like you are trading time for participation. Only a few hours, or maybe a couple of days later, you will see the true benefit of Clubhouse and you will want to become more engaged in your participation.
If you are only hearing about Clubhouse now, go to your App Store and download the free Clubhouse app. Setup your profile and make sure to use a good photo of yourself and maximize the use of the first three lines of real estate in your profile so people will quickly and easily learn what you’re about when you participate.
Most importantly, learn and apply these guidelines and best practices. Then, experiment! If you try a new technique, let us know and we may cite your Clubhouse name here as someone to follow. Bookmark this post or opt-in to my alerts list so you can be notified when additions to this Clubhouse best practices list are made.
