I’ve learned quickly that building a habit-forming product is nuanced. You can’t just copy the “greatest hits” from the apps everyone loves.

We’d been discussing for a while the idea of incorporating a Posting Streak into @Buffer. When the @Lenny’s Newsletter podcast episode came out about Duolingo’s Streaks feature (link in comments), we felt an urgency to jump on it, and we did! And people really like it.

But the thing that really caused our user retention to start growing was not this alone, but Posting Goals – the idea of setting a specific goal for how often you want to post each week to each particular social channel.

The truth is that each social channel is different, thus “consistency” on each is different. And most creators need to manage multiple channels (the typical Buffer user has 2-4 connected accounts).

~4 months after our Posting Goals launch, we’re seeing that:

• users who set at least 1 channel-specific posting goal stick with Buffer for longer
• nearly 2x as likely to still be posting via Buffer after 12 weeks post-signup
• that consistent habit really settles into a weekly cadence, and retention grows each week you post
• users who stick to a consistent weekly schedule (even 2-5 posts per week) are far more likely to steadily grow their follower bases on the most popular social channels – which I believe is why setting a specific Goal (and not just keeping a basic, did-you-post-this-week Streak) is driving the retention gains)

Not only are Posting Goals good for Buffer’s business (users who stay active in the first 90 days are far more likely to upgrade to a paid plan 😜 ), but they directly help users looking to grow a social presence by helping keep to those posting habits.

As I said earlier, you can’t just copy the hot feature that led to explosive growth for one company, especially on its own. You need to think about what your customers want/need out of your product, the ways in which they interact with your product and the overall ecosystem.

We’re not done yet with Goals (or Streaks for that matter). These are still early features and we have much more to do to further embed them into the Buffer experience and make them more useful for more aspiring & rising creators. And our retention rates can be better still. But this is a good start 💁

(Shoutout to @Julian Winternheimer for your help analyzing & visualizing this data!)