How to launch a successful product beta

Do you want to make sure your new product launch is a success? Or, are you wondering how customers will feel about the new features you're adding to an existing product? If so, your small business could benefit from beta testing.

You're likely already familiar with the concept of beta testing. Simply put, beta testing is when businesses allow customers and influencers to try their product weeks or months before launch day. Several benefits come with this marketing and UX strategy. Notably, brands can fine-tune their product or service before it hits the rest of the market, which can lead to a surge in day-one sales and engagement.

A little beta testing can go a long way towards smoothing out your product launch. That's why today, I'm going to walk you through the steps of setting up your beta test. I'll go over a few crucial takeaways from each part of the process -- preparation, testing, and analyzing the results.

Determine the Goals of Your Beta Test

The first part of every beta test is determining your goals in relation to the product you're getting ready to launch.

Some brands -- specifically, the video game industry -- use beta tests to build hype around their product so they can quickly generate sales. In the process, they can gather testimonials to use in their marketing leading up to launch day.

While it makes sense to want to get people excited about your product, I suggest focusing on more than this one goal.

Most importantly, you should focus on fine-tuning your product for the rest of your audience. Regardless of your sub-goals, this is, without a doubt, the most significant advantage of running a beta test.

Think about it. If you spend a ton of time getting people excited for a product that isn't good, do you think this will be advantageous to your business? The short answer is no.

You should also use this time to figure out how many testers you need, how long the beta will run, and which key performance indicators (KPIs) you'll track to determine the success of your program.

Reach Out to Loyal Customers

Next, let's talk about reaching out to customers and asking if they would like to participate in your test. My preferred method for reaching out to users is email. I found that our most loyal customers subscribe to our email list because they want to stay involved in the industry. It's also worth mentioning that 61% of online shoppers prefer to be contacted by brands through email.

We don't send beta invites to everyone on our list. Instead, we segment users based on their specific interests and pain points. Our goal is to find the target audience for our new product or feature.

Our email explains to users that they are invited to our beta and why we think they would benefit. A handy link at the bottom of the message leads readers to an on-site landing page so they can learn more about the test.

Social media is another excellent place to reach out to loyal customers and prospects. Globally, nearly 5 billion people use social media, and more people join websites like Twitter and Instagram daily.

The big difference between this testing method is we invite our social media followers to apply to the program instead of sending an instant invitation. This screening process allows us to determine if the user is a good fit for our beta.

Set Realistic Expectations

One mistake I've seen many marketers make is they don't set realistic expectations for their beta tests. They make promises they can't keep or fail to disclose information that would impact a customer's decision to join your beta program.

Whether you're writing copy for your emails, landing pages, or social media, setting expectations is crucial to maximizing the value of each test. If users are opening your program well-aware of the benefits, drawbacks, and quirks of your beta, they can give you accurate results.

Consequently, you'll spend less time sorting through useless data or dealing with unhappy testers and more time fine-tuning your product.

Encourage Users to Give Feedback

Now, let's talk about gathering feedback from your testers. After all, one of the main points of running a beta test is to learn what existing customers think of your new product or updated feature.

You have quite a few options for reaching out to your testers. We use two primary methods to gather feedback. First, we include a questionnaire within the app that users can fill out at the end of their first beta session.

We also send a feedback form to email subscribers once the testing period closes. At this point, we ask them to sum up their experience with our new product. Common questions include:

• What did you like most/least?
• How can we improve for launch day?
• Did you find anything that needs additional clarification?
• Can you see yourself using our product in your daily life?

These questions can help you shape your product and build a better user experience for everyone who decides to invest in your product or service.

Track Your Results + Make Improvements

The last steps, measuring your results and improving your product or service, go hand-in-hand. If you want your beta program to be successful, you must dig into the analytics and find out what people enjoyed about their time with your test and where you can improve.

I recommend looking for patterns or potential roadblocks. For example, if over half of your testers expressed frustration around the same feature, then it's clear that you need to make a change.

Depending on your industry and the complexity of your product, I suggest giving your team at least two weeks to one month to put what you learned into action.

Final Thoughts

Overall, I think there's a ton of value in beta testing for business leaders across all industries. The steps discussed above cover the basic framework we use every time we decide to launch a new beta program. You'll need to consider your resources, team size, and product when developing your detailed beta test strategy.