In the book Growth Hacker Marketing, by Ryan Holiday (
http://www.amazon.com/Growth-Hacker-Marketing-Primer-Advertising/dp/1591847389) the author discusses the number 1 technique for growth hacking is making your product go viral from inside of your app. An example would be Apples 'sent from my iphone' messages it made as its default email signature. The book has other examples similar companies have used to hack their growth, absent large traditional marketing departments, although I can't remember off the top of my head - but you get the point.
I am writing this thread in order to get ideas flowing, but here is one of my own which I think can be very powerful:
Allow users to send money to an email address. Something similar may have been discussed in the past, but here is how I think it could work:
1. User clicks on the 'email money to a friend' button somewhere in the application, and user is brought to a referral form
2. User enters the destination email address
3. User enters the amount of money to send, and the type of asset. It could be BitShares, BitAssets, or UIAs
4. User selects the timeframe in which the money can be redeemed.
5. User clicks send. The blockchain holds onto the money they want to send as if it were market collateral
6. An email is sent to the friend. Would we need to host an external mail server somewhere?
7. Friend receives email that says 'BitShares user sschechter has sent you 10 bitUSD'
8. Friend follows link in the email (which has some referer id like 'r=sschechter')
9. Friend signs up for BitShares account. When they download the blockchain, the collateral is released from step 5.
10. If the friend never signs up, the collateral is refunded to the user after the gift expires (step 4)
Is this technically feasible? What would be needed to get this done? What are the security risks?
-Scott