One thing I'm having trouble with (that I haven't seen mentioned anywhere) is getting alpha testers. I'm building extensible analytics software (www.instahero.com, not all ready yet), and I need people who could use something like that, but I haven't been able to find any.
You can't try marketing at this stage (people will expect something that works) and all the people I know are at least slightly out of the target market.
Maybe it all comes down to having a good network... If anyone would like to try Instahero (even for very custom stuff, like hardware sensor tracking), get in touch with me (info is in my profile) and I'll set you up.
Actually, you can market before you've written a line of code. Ideally you've figured out some pain point that Instahero will solve, so why not pitch that? "X sucks, and we're doing something about it"
Write a sales letter. A great example can be found here: http://charmhq.com/ Start collecting email addresses, and send a lot of mail keeping everyone abreast of your progress.
My network is pitiful, yet I was able to get 300+ emails on my announcement list before launching. And when I flipped the switch, about 1/3rd of the list signed up within a day.
Can you please tell us about your product where you got 300 people on you pre-launch list? How you promoted it - simply through blogging? I"m doing pretty much the same thing right now and wondering how to attract people to my landing pages for my pre-launch product ideas.
These are amazing ideas, thanks. I was thinking that I could only do that after I've launched, but, as you say, there's really no reason to delay it. Especially with blogging, where I can still offer insight without having signups open.
You NEED a free forever plan, especially if you're in alpha. Do something like MailChimp where you get a low number of monthly 'credits', and when websites gain traffic if they're getting value from your product they will upgrade. The other thing this does is gets you a lot of 'leads' -- people who are clearly interested in your product and already have it on their site. You can send a monthly newsletter reminding them of all the great features that come with the paid plan and stay in the back of their mind. (You can always kill the free plan if it's costing you a ton of money)
This is true, except when it's false. Stormpulse was free for years and is now collecting subscription revenues from customers that used to be free users. And they are not the slightest bit angry about paying.
Yep, that's planned but it's not ready for the general public yet (otherwise I would be less reticent about advertising it). Right now it needs some users who will help guide development, lean-style.
Thanks for the resources, unfortunately I need people who will give me more hands-on feedback about using the product, how it fulfils their needs, what else they need, etc.
Those sites are great for what they do, but my case is a bit more involved...
You can't try marketing at this stage (people will expect something that works) and all the people I know are at least slightly out of the target market.
Maybe it all comes down to having a good network... If anyone would like to try Instahero (even for very custom stuff, like hardware sensor tracking), get in touch with me (info is in my profile) and I'll set you up.