SL Entrepeneurs, Do You Beta Test Your Products?

Philippe Pascal, partner of the metaverse company SnowCrash Digital (he's ppmediadev Blinker in SL), suggests Second Life entrepreneurs have a beta release of their products:

Based on their feedback you can decide if the product is ready to go, or if it needs another round on the drawing board... Secondly there is the marketing side of beta testing. Firstly, it shows (potential) customers you care about their experience with your product. Having people beta test your product also engages your end users in the product development process.

He offers many other reasons for having a beta period, and advice for organizing one.

Comments

[Nexus Burbclave]

I currently use the "try it on an alt" approach that is probably the more common approach on the grid for now.

I definitely see value in a real beta process like the one that he described, however I have a challenge that I think many people may share. I develop niche products, so my pool of potential buyers is already relatively small. Implementing a beta process could significantly cut into my already small pool of potential customers.

[AnnOtooleInSL]

I give out stuff to get honest constructive feedback. There are not that many people you can actually trust for that sort of evaluation though. Thus why sometimes it takes a very long time to make something that might sell one copy and then be copybotted all over the grid. I even watched one brazen LL fanboi copybot parts of one of my avatars right at a Linden Office Hour. LL doesn't care. It is all funny to them. After all their incomes don't depend on our content creations.

[Eren Padar]

As owner of DragonForge, I 100% beta test ever single product I release. I do so in two ways:

1) Having an alt test it to check permissions and end-user function

2) Giving a copy to 3 or 4 friends and having them test it

I stress high quality, top-notch performance in my builds. That can only come form making sure the product works right, the first time, with the very first release. Yes, sometimes I make improvements after the release (as do many avid builders)... and provide free lifetime updates on all of my products.

To me, that's the only way for a legitimate pro-level merchant to do business. Others may not take these steps. I admit, sometimes when I see the garbage that sells for high $ I wonder if it's worth it. But when someone IMs me out of nowhere and tells me such and such is the best of its kind they've ever seen... yeah, it's worth it. : )

Regarding Copybot (which Ann just mentioned), I agree with you. Linden Lab may be laughing now, but they won't be when the consequences hit. When the SL economy buckles due to content theft and quality merchants leaving SL because it's no longer worth their effort, then we'll see how long LL laughs.

I have several high-level merchant friends who are actually talking about closing shop because they're having difficulty meeting rent payments. Part of that is directly LL's fault ($295 a sim is just ridiculous), part of it because of the recession (very little I think) and most of it because every low-ethics clown on the grid is using copybot to steal and resell things as fast as their little fingers can fly.

I'm sure the increased overall sales makes LL grin all the way to the bank. I don't think they'll grin so much when the consequences for those actions finally hit.

But as far as beta testing: IMO good merchants do, poor merchants don't. I know of merchants who don't even fix their stuff once end users report serious flaws. They just don't care. Makes me wish there were in-world merchant reviews from buyers like there is on Xstreet.

I beta-test. And follow up after-sales. I believe in support.

[Impalah Shenzhou]

For software(including scripting) products:
- Full unit testing with limited testing for LSL scripts (deleted on production).
- Use of patterns for prim/textures managers.
- Days or weeks of manual testing before releasing.

And, of course, I use my products. If I don't feel comfortable with them, something is wrong.

Public beta, rarely. I prefer to release and patch later depending on user's feedback.