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Subject: Re: UKNM: Big band or little whimper...
From: Chris Heathcote
Date: Mon, 22 Nov 1999 15:57:58 GMT

At 12:56 pm +0000 on 22/11/99, Sam Michel wrote:

>So, what works best? Big bang or sprouting from an acorn. Better still, can
>anyone think of a big launch which went well, none spring to my mine (but it
>is Mon morning)...?

I think there's a lot of pressure on start-ups to actually start up
as soon as possible - hence there are often stupidly short deadlines
and almost no testing of either the site, the technology, or the
fulfillment.

These .coms are not just websites - they're entire businesses. That
means every single part of the process has to be rigorously tested
and fail-safe procedures put in place.

boo and smile both implied they were doing user testing (for "friends
and family" in boo's case, for anyone that had entered their email
address for smile). Neither seemed to have garnered any information
from the initial testing - mainly because they left about a week for
it. A soft launch with a second phase maybe 3 months down the line to
iron out bugs, do extensive user testing, and just generally make the
site slicker, before any advertising happens, seems to be the most
pragmatic approach.

Unfortunately lots of the business models (such as letsbuyit.com)
require some volume of demand before the site gains momentum. You
can't get that momentum without advertising, and you're stuck having
to be perfect first time for all these customers.

c.
______________________________________________________
Chris Heathcote <Head> New Media
http://www.head-newmedia.com/ tel: +44(0)1717377579
http://www.head-space.org/ fax: +44(0)1717377971
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Replies
  UKNM: Big band or little whimper..., Sam Michel

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