A pretty common question on software development forums:

Should I release my new product in July or postpone it for a couple of months?

I recommend to release your new software product as soon as possible to quickly test the product idea and to start communication with users.

July is a good time for pilot release also. Just make it soft and relatively silent. Don’t put much money in promotion and marketing. Your primary goal must be gathering as much feedback from users as possible. Put all your efforts into testing of all aspects of your new project in live environment: application, setup, website, order process, statistics collecting, support, feature request management, etc…

If you start now, you will have enough time to collect and to analyze initial feedback and to polish everything before majority of businesses gets back to work. Then make a second release in August or September. The second version will be more stable and tested, and likely even with several new features. Then, you may put more efforts and money into marketing and promotion of your product: post announcements, send press release to media, buy ad, and so on.

Posted in Application Distribution Testing
No Comments Yet Posted by Dennis Crane