One of the unusual experiences I had growing up in LA was a high school club fundraiser where we all went to a sitcom. Yes, we were hired as a studio audience for an evening.
This was clever because they gave us a reason, not just an individual reason but a collective reason, to be there. We felt more engaged with the experience, even when it dragged into the late evening. We actually ended up laughing, at jokes that were not that funny when they ended up on TV.
Ultimately, what they did to get us there enhanced the enjoyment of the later users... I mean viewers. I wouldn't hesitate to get early users the same way, for the same reason.
Getting people to sit in a seat in a studio and laugh for an evening is basically a solved problem. But getting a sharper-than-average, engaged group of early app or site users is still tough. And it's desperately needed.
As others mention, Mechanical Turk is a pretty bad fit. You're probably better off getting a few friends to be sockpuppets (be sure to pick less silly names than "Nutshapio" though). Maybe a startup founder could try taking inspiration from this story to turn their public beta into a fundraiser. Oh, and I can't miss this opportunity to mention the BetaArmy subreddit:
That's about it as far as resources I've run across for getting a great first hundred users. So what are the best ways everyone else has found (apart from being in YC)? Does anyone run a service to satisfy this need?
This was clever because they gave us a reason, not just an individual reason but a collective reason, to be there. We felt more engaged with the experience, even when it dragged into the late evening. We actually ended up laughing, at jokes that were not that funny when they ended up on TV.
Ultimately, what they did to get us there enhanced the enjoyment of the later users... I mean viewers. I wouldn't hesitate to get early users the same way, for the same reason.
Getting people to sit in a seat in a studio and laugh for an evening is basically a solved problem. But getting a sharper-than-average, engaged group of early app or site users is still tough. And it's desperately needed.
As others mention, Mechanical Turk is a pretty bad fit. You're probably better off getting a few friends to be sockpuppets (be sure to pick less silly names than "Nutshapio" though). Maybe a startup founder could try taking inspiration from this story to turn their public beta into a fundraiser. Oh, and I can't miss this opportunity to mention the BetaArmy subreddit:
http://www.reddit.com/r/BetaArmy
That's about it as far as resources I've run across for getting a great first hundred users. So what are the best ways everyone else has found (apart from being in YC)? Does anyone run a service to satisfy this need?