Launched in 2007, Airbnb has grown to become a $1 billion company.
When Airbnb launched, they faced a tall task:
How do we get people to learn about and trust our little-known website?
In other words…
How do we acquire users?
So what approach did they take? Post on Craigslist!
In a story posted by Dave Gooden, he finds out that Airbnb would contact people who were offering their homes to rent on Craigslist. The email would come from a random person (who was really from Airbnb) telling them of a “lovely site” known as Airbnb. Here’s a sample email:
