| My best tools for getting beta users when I was kicking around Draft as an idea: 1) Build your own audience through teaching. Stop looking for the one time hit. The odds your startup/project is going to last the long term are probably low, and if you move onto the next thing, you'll be in the same spot. Start trying to build an audience around you of people and students who share your world views, and build stuff for them. Blog, write articles, do webcasts, talk at one of the many co-working spaces that look for speakers now. Many people reading this are saying "But I don't know anything to teach." That's ridiculous. You just learned something last week that someone still doesn't know. I was teaching an entire Freshman Chemistry class as a Senior. There were juniors doing it. Sure, I took the class myself, but I didn't think I knew it well enough to even teach them. But I did the work to prepare, and teaching made me learn it backwards and forwards. Teaching isn't just good for the student; it's good for you. "What is obvious to you is obvious to you" -John Medina (author of BabyBrainRules). There is so much you know that someone else would love to acquire. 2) User testing. Get some beta testers simply by paying some people to use your app. (Read: Don't Make Me Think) I got some early folks on Usertesting.com. They were invaluable in finding problems and providing feedback in way you just don't get from some comments on a forum or thread about your product. 3) Go do some volunteer/non-profit work for 2 hours a week. Join something that has a big group of people you can help out and commit to for awhile. You'll quickly find when you start working for groups have a cause much bigger than you, you make a lot of new friends. And when you help them out, they love helping you out. You'll have these new groups to reach out to kick around new ideas. And they are the first ones spreading your stuff. Even better if you can find some groups to help with stuff you are building, but definitely not required to get some great benefits. |