This is actually quite a useful technique yet equally unknown method of figuring out product viability from your own user cohort.
The overall concept...
- Not sure if a some FizzBuzz feature is required on your site?
- Not sure if people are interested in your awesome newsletter series on Blue Widgets?
- And in any event, after you've created FooBar... What will the take up be if you add it to your site?
Well, before you spend 4 days coding your new and exciting product, only to find out that no one actually wants to use it... do some market research on your own visitors!
How?
Easy... put the feature on some of your sites pages and purposefully 404 it, and when they click through, record the event.
Just provide some message saying "Ooopsey, looks like we are having some problems!".
Run the test until you are sure that either: it's working, or it's a total flop.
Guess who's already doing this? TripAdvisor. Listen to Kaufer explaining how at TripAdvisor they purposefully 404 their users into figuring out if something is worth doing.
The overall concept...
- Not sure if a some FizzBuzz feature is required on your site?
- Not sure if people are interested in your awesome newsletter series on Blue Widgets?
- And in any event, after you've created FooBar... What will the take up be if you add it to your site?
Well, before you spend 4 days coding your new and exciting product, only to find out that no one actually wants to use it... do some market research on your own visitors!
How?
Easy... put the feature on some of your sites pages and purposefully 404 it, and when they click through, record the event.
Just provide some message saying "Ooopsey, looks like we are having some problems!".
Run the test until you are sure that either: it's working, or it's a total flop.
Guess who's already doing this? TripAdvisor. Listen to Kaufer explaining how at TripAdvisor they purposefully 404 their users into figuring out if something is worth doing.
http://techcrunch.com/2011/12/22/founder-stories-tripadvisor...