Comments on: Launch – The Week After http://blog.stunf.com/launch-the-week-after/ About the web, software development, productivity, startups and our products. Sun, 13 Nov 2011 22:10:52 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0.5 By: Stephen Morrison http://blog.stunf.com/launch-the-week-after/#comment-249 Stephen Morrison Thu, 05 Nov 2009 01:43:31 +0000 http://stunf.com/blog/?p=591#comment-249 Congrats and thanks for this great app! What day this week are you expecting to launch the new features (approximately)? I am eagerly looking forward to the new features and all the features coming up! Congrats and thanks for this great app!
What day this week are you expecting to launch the new features (approximately)? I am eagerly looking forward to the new features and all the features coming up!

]]> By: wim http://blog.stunf.com/launch-the-week-after/#comment-248 wim Tue, 03 Nov 2009 18:54:34 +0000 http://stunf.com/blog/?p=591#comment-248 Concerning free signups: yes, we have a relative high number of free signups, but in general these free users are not as active as the paying ones. So right now we're not concerned about maintaining these. If - in the worst case, and I really don't think this is going to happen - you get flooded by free accounts, it means there's so much interest you're probably able to do something with it. If it becomes a problem so big you can't solve it in time, maybe there's some last resort solutions, like make a waiting list for free accounts? "Phantom signups" is also something we get. People are sometimes curious to see what your product is like, even if they have no interest in using it. Or people can read about your product, without knowing what it is, sign up and then find out they can't really use it. We don't really mind about this, inactive accounts don't cost us anything. If it does, try to find some way of doing a "live demo" without a real signup, or maybe explain more about your service so that signing up is not necessary to find questions to the answers some visitors of your site might have. I hope this helps. Thanks, and good luck to you as well! Concerning free signups: yes, we have a relative high number of free signups, but in general these free users are not as active as the paying ones. So right now we’re not concerned about maintaining these. If – in the worst case, and I really don’t think this is going to happen – you get flooded by free accounts, it means there’s so much interest you’re probably able to do something with it. If it becomes a problem so big you can’t solve it in time, maybe there’s some last resort solutions, like make a waiting list for free accounts?

“Phantom signups” is also something we get. People are sometimes curious to see what your product is like, even if they have no interest in using it. Or people can read about your product, without knowing what it is, sign up and then find out they can’t really use it. We don’t really mind about this, inactive accounts don’t cost us anything. If it does, try to find some way of doing a “live demo” without a real signup, or maybe explain more about your service so that signing up is not necessary to find questions to the answers some visitors of your site might have.

I hope this helps.

Thanks, and good luck to you as well!

]]> By: Fred http://blog.stunf.com/launch-the-week-after/#comment-247 Fred Tue, 03 Nov 2009 18:37:37 +0000 http://stunf.com/blog/?p=591#comment-247 Thanks for this and congrats! We're going to be in a similar boat I hope when we release later this year. Did you get a lot of free signups relatively speaking? and are you concerned about maintaining the free accounts? Another thing we're worried about is getting tons of phantom signups (they signup once but never use it again).. which could also cost us. I'd love to hear your thoughts on the matter. Thanks again! Thanks for this and congrats!

We’re going to be in a similar boat I hope when we release later this year.

Did you get a lot of free signups relatively speaking?

and are you concerned about maintaining the free accounts? Another thing we’re worried about is getting tons of phantom signups (they signup once but never use it again).. which could also cost us.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on the matter.

Thanks again!

]]> By: Paul Stamatiou http://blog.stunf.com/launch-the-week-after/#comment-246 Paul Stamatiou Tue, 03 Nov 2009 16:53:36 +0000 http://stunf.com/blog/?p=591#comment-246 Wow, grats on the fantastic launch guys! My startup never had a "launch", we've always been open and available but we did not publicize anything while we were still in heavy development. Now we think we're about ready to do a large marketing push so we'll see how that goes! Best, Paul Wow, grats on the fantastic launch guys! My startup never had a “launch”, we’ve always been open and available but we did not publicize anything while we were still in heavy development. Now we think we’re about ready to do a large marketing push so we’ll see how that goes!

Best,
Paul

]]> By: wim http://blog.stunf.com/launch-the-week-after/#comment-245 wim Tue, 03 Nov 2009 15:00:16 +0000 http://stunf.com/blog/?p=591#comment-245 Thanks everyone! After we put up the splash page, we posted about Thymer on a couple of forums. We mainly attracted the tech crowd with this, but it was a start, and it resulted in the first 50 email addresses or so. Apparently the first visitors liked the idea and the video enough to also result in some mentions on Twitter. Eventually, this is how we got roughly two hundred addresses. When we sent out the first small batch of beta invite emails, we put 3 invite codes in every email. This worked really well, and people started sharing those with friends and colleagues. This gave us another couple of hundred sign-ups. We then decided to release our private beta, and we sent out an announcement to some blogs, along with some beta invites for their readers. We got quite some coverage, and we made it very easy for people to invite people to Thymer after they signed up. All the social networks sites like Twitter and FriendFeed also made a big difference. After that the number of beta users grew with thousands. Thanks everyone!

After we put up the splash page, we posted about Thymer on a couple of forums. We mainly attracted the tech crowd with this, but it was a start, and it resulted in the first 50 email addresses or so. Apparently the first visitors liked the idea and the video enough to also result in some mentions on Twitter. Eventually, this is how we got roughly two hundred addresses.

When we sent out the first small batch of beta invite emails, we put 3 invite codes in every email. This worked really well, and people started sharing those with friends and colleagues. This gave us another couple of hundred sign-ups. We then decided to release our private beta, and we sent out an announcement to some blogs, along with some beta invites for their readers. We got quite some coverage, and we made it very easy for people to invite people to Thymer after they signed up. All the social networks sites like Twitter and FriendFeed also made a big difference. After that the number of beta users grew with thousands.

]]> By: Peter Cooper http://blog.stunf.com/launch-the-week-after/#comment-244 Peter Cooper Tue, 03 Nov 2009 14:27:29 +0000 http://stunf.com/blog/?p=591#comment-244 Congratulations - I had a very similar experience to you with a startup in 2005 (I sold it two years later for a nice sum). Good luck! One question though. Back when I did it, I had a free service that already had thousands of users I could promote to. You say you set up a splash page, etc, but how did you promote that splash page and get the thousands of e-mail addresses from people? Congratulations – I had a very similar experience to you with a startup in 2005 (I sold it two years later for a nice sum). Good luck!

One question though. Back when I did it, I had a free service that already had thousands of users I could promote to. You say you set up a splash page, etc, but how did you promote that splash page and get the thousands of e-mail addresses from people?

]]> By: Jay Goldman http://blog.stunf.com/launch-the-week-after/#comment-243 Jay Goldman Tue, 03 Nov 2009 14:22:50 +0000 http://stunf.com/blog/?p=591#comment-243 Thanks for sharing this publicly! The world could use more entrepreneurs who help everyone else understand how startups function in their real world natural environment. Good luck! Thanks for sharing this publicly! The world could use more entrepreneurs who help everyone else understand how startups function in their real world natural environment.

Good luck!

]]> By: Sillycasper http://blog.stunf.com/launch-the-week-after/#comment-242 Sillycasper Tue, 03 Nov 2009 01:47:12 +0000 http://stunf.com/blog/?p=591#comment-242 Congrats again on a fine app and something that really does fill a gap in the market. Looking forward to the new feature! Congrats again on a fine app and something that really does fill a gap in the market. Looking forward to the new feature!

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