Organization rules your beta test! The last two parts tought us that, in case you missed them, find them here:
The Art of beta testing-Completely outsourcing tests is dangerous
The Art of beta testing-Random testing is useless-structured testing rules
Today, we will cover a topic that could easily have been taken from Murphy’s law: the amount of beta testers active is high at two points over time: Registration and Code giveaways!
Zombietesters and other troubles
Beta testers are like a can of worms. Once opened, the only way to recan them is to use a bigger can. The very same thing happens to many developers. You have an excellent team for version x, and three to six months later, you start betaing version y. An email goes out to the old gang-and you get one reply at best. Where did the beta testers go to?
People tend to forget stuff after some time. Thus, you need to do only one thing to keep them active-keep releasing new betas.
Alternatively, you could also follow the approach of the bazaar-users want updates. So, you could dismiss your beta team after initial release-and use registered customers as voluntary testers! This approach pays out, because registered customers usually are interested in the development of the program as they paid for it. As an additional bonus, you can save the licences that you need to give the testers!
Any ideas here? Did you ever do a registered user test?