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Ask HN: Closed beta or release the product now?

7 points by grag ↗ HN
I'm working on a community generated media (images) website for a particular niche, that's almost ready for release (or beta testing). I've never launched a website which relies so much on the creation of a very active community.

My current thought is that it would make sense to have a closed beta to begin with and actively recruit people who may be interested in participating, and then allow each beta tester to invite a specified number of other people to the website.

There of course will be very little content and community interaction to begin with, and by making it a closed beta I'm thinking that early users won't be put off by that fact, as they understand it hasn't been released to the public and that they can have a role in shaping the community and the website. If I just release the thing now with little content and no community then it could just look like a failed website to anyone visiting.

Also, it seems that users would be more likely to invite others if it's a closed beta because it's a bit more exclusive.

Does this sound logical, or would it make more sense to release the website to the public right away?

6 comments

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ajbatac
If you think you have a great product and will surely hit the roof with traffic, an invite only service is recommended. Else, you might as well open it up now and see what happens.
nickb
If you have no beta testers currently, I think it's unadvisable to open it up fully. Have a closed beta, get 50-100 people in there and get some feedback ASAP. Fix outstanding issues and then think about launching openly.
aaron4411
Closed releases seem to give you 2 chances at publicity (closed release, open release) to at least an immediate circle, which can't hurt
mechanical_fish
If I just release the thing now with little content and no community then it could just look like a failed website...

To paraphrase Twain [1], which would you rather do? Launch an open version of your website and let people think that its userbase is too small? Or deliberately limit the size of the userbase and remove all doubt?

If the site is really not ready, you should recruit a handful of testers -- only five or six are necessary to tell you what you need to know. Otherwise you should just launch the darn thing. Actively recruiting people to help fill it up is still a good idea, but don't put some up some stupid barrier that prevents these people from inviting their friends, their friends' friends, and anyone else in the world. Don't worry, if (while?) the site sucks most people won't ever see it anyway.

[1]: http://www.quotedb.com/quotes/1098

warwick
Limiting te number of people each tester can invite seems silly if part of the goal is to generate content. You could even add a beta signup page so people could get in without an invite. They'd still understand that you were still building content that way.
dshah
I just went through this same questioning for a free tool for analyzing press releases (http://www.pressreleasegrader.com)

Based on this recent experience (and past experience), I generally lean towards just getting it out there and then iterating like hell.

Closed betas are nice to "control the flow", but most products don't have a "flood of traffic" problem, but a "nobody cares" problem.

Make it easy for people to try it out and give feedback, and respond swiftly to the feedback.