Clubhouse is the new kid on the social media block. In a nutshell, it is an audio-based social media app, it is like a collection of podcasts that you can interact with.
It is real time chats, no recordings, pretty low tech and allows you to actually be social on social media!
It is great for networking and relationship building and a fresh way to learn.
You currently need an invite to join which is causing the FOMO, more on that in a moment.
But first things first…
The Clubhouse App
At the time of writing Clubhouse is only available on iOS and only on newer phones, my iphone 6s is having non of it! BUT I was able to download it onto my ipad pro.
The app is still in beta and they are stingy with the invites. Just like gmail and Pinterest before them, Clubhouse have taken the invite only route which is causing a huge amount of FOMO in social media circles, I have seen people offering to pay for an invite!
And because of this there is a huge amount of buzz about it.
How Do I Get A Clubhouse Invite?
The best way is to find a friend who is already on there. Or post on Facebook and someone is likely to have one going. I have seen several invite chains where once you get an invite you then share your invite with the next person on the list.
You can also sign up on the via the clubhouse site, you might get lucky and they send you an invite but you don’t know how long you will be on the waiting list for.
But before you rush off, there are a few things to note…
First, you want to download the app and reserve your username.
For someone to invite you, you need to be in their contacts list on their phone, this will mean sharing your phone number. I HIGHLY recommend that if this is a new contact, you exchange a couple of text messages first so you are certain your invite will go through.
If you are sharing an invite you most definitely want to test this because if you send an invite and the other person doesn’t pick it up, you lose it and it ends up being a wasted invitation! Boo.
What I learned through this process is that someone in the US trying to invite a friend who is outside the US, they need to input an exit code plus the country code of their friend.
This is why testing via text first is important.
Once you are all set, you can invite or receive the invitation. And the you are in – WHOO-HOO.
To invite others you will find the invites in the envelope icon. The more active you are, the more invites you get.
Word Of Warning – you are responsible for the behaviour of those you invite and if your invitee turns out to be a complete dick, you run the chance of being kicked out too. So be cautious with your invites.
How To Set Up Your Clubhouse Bio
The first thing to do is to set up your profile and connect your Instagram and Twitter profiles these are the only clickable profile links available. Use the cog icon to access the settings and follow the instructions, it’s pretty straight forward.
Add a photo of you, people want to see who they are talking to. This photo will be used everywhere yo appear on the app so make it a clear, approachable image, bright backgrounds pop well against the app branding. Tap on the profile image to change your profile picture, either take a selfie or upload from your camera roll.
Tap below that to add your bio information. One important thing here is to make sure your bio includes keywords. When you later go onto the search for people to connect with the search function pulls up people depending on the content of their bio.
Your first three lines are important as they are the ones first shown, you want to hook people in withe that tiny piece of real estate.
But don’t just drop a load of random words in there, it needs to be readable too! Montessori, homeschooling, education, productivity, creativity and travel are my jam so those are the words I wanted to weave into my bio. Hopefully then when someone lands on my bio it will resonate with them and we can connect.
If you add links to your bio make it an easy url to remember as it won’t be clickable.
Next you want to add topic of interest, there are quite a few to choose from and I noticed yesterday they have added more so it might be worth popping back every now and then to update your interests lists.
There are also clubs to join where the club organizer hosts regular rooms, they are worth checking out too.
From what I hear the algorithm works differently to what we usually expect, I can’t expand on that as of yet. It did feel a bit wonky when I first signed up because I was shown lots of rooms with black rappers and music producers! Not my people! But as I have searched and entered more rooms of people and subjects that I am actually interested in I have found the feed is showing me more relevant rooms to join.
What’s with the party popper on my profile?
The party popper/party hat icon is to show everyone that you are new to the Clubhouse. It will disappear after a week. It is just to let others know that you are new and probably have no idea what you are doing 🙂
The Clubhouse Hallway
The hallway is the main feed, shown above.
Let’s take a look around. Use the magnifying glass (1) to look for people, search for keywords and clubs.
When you log in you will be also be shown a few scheduled rooms (6) and the time they will start. You can also see more scheduled rooms using the calendar icon (3).
The bell is your notifications (4) and your profile can be found clicking your image (5).
Below the next scheduled rooms, in the white boxes are a handful of rooms that are already in session (7). The main image is the creator of the room and sometimes you will see moderators pics there too. It’s not shown above but you will see at the bottom of each box how many people are in the room and how many are on stage.
If none of those rooms takes your fancy you can use the search tool (1) and looks for something on a topic you want to listen to.
The screen shot above I was actually listening to a room (8) there were the two guys shown +64 others in there.
Bored of the room? Just use the ✌️button and leave. (9)
If you are in a great room and you think one of your friends would enjoy it, you can use the (+) (10) button to ping your friend and they will get a notification.
To join a room simply click on it, inside you will see all the profile pics of everyone in the room. Those with a green star before their name are moderators.
The speaker is the one with a grey ring around their picture. The people at the top of the screen are the ones who are on stage, you raise your hand using the little hand icon (11) if you want to speak and then one of the mods will bring you on stage. Sometimes mods will turn this feature off.
The middle section are people that are in the room that are followed by the speakers, rather than those who follow the speakers, which is how other social platforms tend to be set up.
Then the people at the bottom are “everybody else”
The final icon above, the keypad (12) shows your friends and their availability.
Finally, one of the cool things is that you stay listening to a room but click out and about around the rest of the app. So whilst you are listening to someone speak, you can click on their profile pic and check them out.
Is Clubhouse a Time Suck?
Potentially yes, but like anything, you need to set up your own boundaries on there. Before you charge on in, ask yourself a couple of questions?
- What am I planning to get out of this?
- Do I want to use this as a learning tool, marketing tool or a combo of both?
- Do I honestly have time to dedicate to this or is it better for me to walk away from the shiny object and focus on what I need to be doing?
I have heard many people call it “crack” addictive and I have been in many rooms where the owner of the group has been in the there for hours! One technique seems to be very intentional and clear on how long you are holding the room for.
I highly recommend using the notification toggle and turn it off when you don’t want to be distracted.
Is Clubhouse Good For Marketing and Networking?
Yes… IF you get in there and participate, not just listen. I think to gain any traction you need to be an active member of the community. Running your own rooms and joining collaborative rooms very much looks like the way to go to position yourself as an expert.
It is a great place for coaches at the moment, hopefully the marketeers who tend to ruin everything once they get their foot in the door will hold off for a while!
The rooms I have gotten the most value out of are ones that have just been giving great advice and tips and certainly not selling.
I’ve also found it to be a great way to find new people, I feel like Facebook has got somewhat inbred, there is a LOT of overlap with the same old people in the same old groups, this is a like a breath of fresh air!
Plus jumping into random rooms and seeing what is happening, you never know who you will meet and connect with.
Final Tips
When you first join, check out the “Welcome To Clubhouse” rooms, they seem to run them daily. They will answer any questions you have and you will learn a lot from those rooms.
I am a BIG fan of jumping in and trying things out but I know some people find this anxiety inducing, hence this post! But now you have a rough idea, go and play around with it.
For all things holy, check the background noise when you are speaking. You might have the cutest 3-year-old or the friendliest of pups but for those listening in, the background noise is can be really annoying.
Finally, when you want to start a room get together with a couple of friends to do a test room so you can all get used to which buttons to press etc!
If you want to connect with me over there – please do! I am @jojoebi and feel free to follow me on insta and connect with me there too.
@blueprint4joy – is a great one to follow, she is a happiness coach and just happens to be a Wonder Mom Success Club guest expert.
And @abraxas often runs the community rooms welcoming new members.