What are good ways to get large number of feedback on startup idea? | Hacker News Reader

What are good ways to get large number of feedback on startup idea?

3 pointsxweili8 comments

My startup has created an alpha version of mobile app. Before investing more time and effort, we created a demo video of our idea to get feedbacks and to make sure we are not building something that no one wants. How do we get large number of people to watch the demo at http://www.scribbleeverywhere.com so we can get statistically relevant feedback? We tried adwords but trailing search has too low of a volume, we tried digg/reddit/stumbleupon/youtube/quora but it has not been discovered by the masses. Facebook/social media got us the same unsatisfactory result. It felt like we are standing on an empty street trying to give out free samples for people to try and give feedback but can't find enough people. Any ideas? I know hacker news is one of the great place, so if you have any feedback on our idea ( http://www.scribbleeverywhere.com ), it will be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

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It is hard to be positive about this idea. I think that may be the reason people are reluctant to say anything. No one wants to be a downer.

I'll stick to the important facts. Take me or leave 'em, but don't ascribe any emotion to them.

This has not been done before because it would draw all ages of user, but some people would post inappropriate material.

The cost of policing the uploads could prevent it from being profitable. Also, it would be possible to become a mainstream product but then lose that status through a series of mistakes.

I could go on at length so in case perhaps you've solved this problem there are others. I'm not saying you can't solve these problems, Twitter is successful because they solved the policing problem by limiting everyone to 140 characters.

But there are definitely other problems. Pick a demographic and think how they would view your service. Solve all those problems and you've got a winner.

You can submit to various sites for feedback (HN is an example). There are a few other places (reddit - /r/startups) - or you can submit it to the site I'm currently maintaining SideProjectors

http://sideprojectors.com

We let people showcase their side projects to receive feedback.

https://www.sideprojectors.com/showcase/submit

I really like the map idea.

One issue that I have found though is that everything your app does or wants to do is exactly what Twitter is for.

Twitter + your map idea = your app = people will actually use it. I would use it that is for damn sure. Instead of creating a new app seriously consider Twitter.

Agree. The value prop appears to be "what people are talking about or at a specific location that you are interested in". The OP will be better of harvesting and consolidating information posted on other social platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram, Pinterest, Yelp and presenting in his/her app. Like you suggested, Twitter + Map is a good starting point for the app.

why not release the app and try to get that discovered and get feedback. Unless your video is viral material, its hard to get it discovered. You could try virool.com, youtube.com ads, collegehumor.com, facebook promotions. If you release your app in the app store, try freemyapps.com, submit to app review sites (search google), email to some campus list servers to get college students to use it. If worried about ratings, release it with different name than planned, get feedback, tune, and release it again with planned name / branding.

I would go small instead of targeting the masses. Figure out who would be your most passionate users and go after them. If you can get traction there, then target the next group of people.

I just saw doubt_me and I agree. Twitter with a map would be doable. Would it gain traction? I don't know off the top of my head, but lots of problems would be solved.

http://www.google.com/insights/consumersurveys/home

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