What is this new social platform that has everyone buzzing?
Check 1,2,3… It’s Clubhouse!
It’s new, and people still have many questions, like how it works, how to join, should they join, and most importantly, how to use it to promote their business.
In the next seven minutes, I’ll teach you everything you need to know to get started with Clubhouse.
Clubhouse is a voice-only app where users can move around virtual rooms discussing business, music, education, art, and everything else in-between.
It is a space for casual, drop-in audio conversations—with friends and other interesting people worldwide.
You can go on the app anytime to chat with the people you follow or hop in as a listener and hear what others are talking about.
Early Clubhouse user and successful entrepreneur, Felecia Hatcher (@feleciahatcher on Clubhouse) shared her experience as a user:
“During a year of little to no human connection, I feel like Clubhouse solved that problem in so many ways. There’s something really personal about voice. And I felt, from a business standpoint, much more authentic about the connections being made. I have been in rooms for hours as a fly on the wall, and I have hosted rooms for hours as well. The quality of the people has been nothing short of amazing, and if you are not careful, very time-consuming, but none of my time has ever been wasted.”
And to add to that, Clubhouse Superuser, marketing guru, and multi-platinum artist, Spectacular Smith (@Spectacular on Clubhouse) also shared his experience with the app:
“You can network and build relationships in realtime, learn people’s personalities, get to consistently bump in and run into them to start building that rapport. You can have conversations that you wouldn’t really have with somebody of that caliber. And you get to normalize your relationship vs being all snooty doodie. Conversations feel normal, and it’s not like someone has a mask on the whole time. You get to take the mask off and really build authentic relationships.”
You can use these tips to get started with Clubhouse or enhance your Clubhouse experience.
With privacy on social networks and how they use our data being a huge issue recently, it’s important to know what you’re getting into before signing up for Clubhouse.
The great thing about Clubhouse now is that the privacy policy is not as complicated as other social networks. The privacy policy explains what personal data it collects, how it uses and shares that data, and your choices concerning data practices.
Before using the service or submitting any personal data to Clubhouse, please review the privacy policy carefully and contact the company if you have any questions.
By using Clubhouse, you agree to their practices described in the privacy policy. If you do not agree with their privacy policy, please do not sign up.
If you’re OK with how your data is being used, move to the next step.
According to its website, Clubhouse is still in private beta, but its team is working hard to open things up soon.
You can still download the app to reserve your username and join the waitlist.
But, if someone in your contact list is already on the app, they can nominate you to get access, or you can ask an existing user for an invite.
But don’t get mad if they say no, because each user is only allowed a limited amount of user invites. I started with 1, now I have 6 as of writing this article.
Note: Clubhouse recommends that you use your real name and identity on the service. For privacy reasons, you can only change your name and username once.
Protect your account by verifying your email.
That’s it. Your account is verified.
Since you cannot direct message other users on the platform, you can attach your Instagram and Twitter accounts for people to use to contact you.
If someone wants to contact you outside the platform, they can easily follow you on Twitter or Instagram.
The people that you follow will help you get exposed to more relevant rooms in Clubhouse.
This gives you the opportunity to be intentional as to what rooms you see and join based on the people you’re following.
For example, if you don’t want to miss out on high-value marketing, franchising, entrepreneur, and investment conversations and rooms, then you need to follow marketers like myself (@AndreKay on Clubhouse).
If you want to see rooms about music, then follow musicians. Are investments your interest? Follow investors.
According to the user, Ivy, the ‘hallway’ is what a user will see when they first log in. It displays all the rooms, as well as a top menu bar, a reminder of the upcoming scheduled events, and a bottom menu bar for starting a room of your own.
When you open the app, you can see “rooms” full of people talking—all open so you can hop in and out, exploring different conversations.
There are currently 2 sections in a room: the speaker “stage” and the “audience” of listeners.
You enter each room as an audience member, but if you want to talk, you just raise your hand, and the speakers can choose to invite you up to the stage.
If the room you’re in is hosted by a club, you can follow that room. To follow, when in the room, click on the little green “house” icon beside the name of the room. Then hit “follow.”
If you want to leave a room, just click the “Leave quietly button” to close the room, and it won’t notify the speakers that you left.
Unlike Instagram, no one is looking at how many followers you have to determine if you’re “important” or not.
Most importantly, don’t kill yourself trying to amass a million followers.
Remember, the platform is still very new.
Create a room of your own to meet with friends and with new people around the world—to tell stories, ask questions, debate, learn and have impromptu conversations on thousands of different topics.
Spectacular also noted, “You’re also able to search based on keywords. So if you’re looking for investors or looking for a Facebook ad guy or girl, you can search that keyword and go to that person’s profile and go to their Instagram and message them. It’s an excellent recruiting tool. You also get to build a community, and you get to build your own clubs. And that is the future of the Clubhouse. To be able to build your own clubs and be able to broadcast to an audience at the snap of a finger, and I think that’s super powerful to have. The bigger you can build your clubs, the more access you have, the more reach you have. Literally, at the snap of a finger, you can reach a massive audience and get whatever message you want out, and you can build a real following that really supports you.”
This is absolutely an amazing way to build your personal brand as an entrepreneur and share your knowledge and expertise with other users.
You can start an open room for others to join, a social room with people you follow, or a closed room for intimate conversations with only those you choose.
In addition to starting rooms with engaging topics, you can invite experienced speakers who provide value to help drive more users to listen in.
Click the big green Start a room button at the bottom of the screen to start a room.
One of your goals is to get the ability to create your own club. Clubs are for people who have already hosted a weekly room 3 times. Each user will only be able to create 1 club.
According to Clubhouse, “clubs are a way to host a series of intimate conversations with a defined community of people. They want to see clubs grow into communities of people that come together regularly based on shared interests, identities, activities, and more.” You will know it’s a club when you see the green “house” icon next to the title.
They also plan to have a self-serve clubs feature built in the app soon so if you wait til then, you’ll be able to set one up instantly!
If you don’t want to miss when gems are being dropped in the rooms or from the people you follow, turn on your notifications.
According to O Magazine, nothing is saved on the app, so you have to be there or risk missing the conversation.
Unlike most social media apps where you can get caught up on the day’s news after the fact, Clubhouse is one where you’ve got to be there to avoid missing out.
From the home feed (the hallway), tap on the calendar icon at the top to see upcoming events. You can switch between “Upcoming for you” (events from your extended network) or “All Upcoming” to see all public events. You can also see a preview of upcoming events above the current rooms in the hallway.
When you click on an event, you will see the time and title of the event. If a club is hosting the event, you’ll see that below next to the green “house” icon. Also displayed will be a short description and the pictures and names of the hosts.
From there, you can either share, tweet, copy the link, or add the event to your calendar.
Clubhouse is great for entrepreneurs, artists, entertainers, or anyone that might not like to be on video.
With no camera on, you don’t have to worry about eye contact, what you’re wearing, or where you are.
You can talk on Clubhouse while you’re folding laundry, breastfeeding, commuting, working on your couch, or going for a run.
Instead of typing something and hitting send, you’re engaged in a back-and-forth dialogue with others.
The emotion conveyed through voice allows you to pick up on nuance and form uniquely human connections with others.
Clubhouse user, artist, and creator Mark Phi (@markphi on Clubhouse), shared his experience about Clubhouse: “If only other addicting mediums provided this much value. Real-time socializing at scale, excavating beyond the curated photo and witty tweet, it allows me to connect with people in an intentional and meaningful way.”
You can challenge others in a room and have tough conversations—but with a two-way voice conversation, there is often an ability to build more empathy.
Bottom line, just go for it!
Find me on Clubhouse: Andre Kay
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