When to go public beta?

So I've been working on this new service/app of mine and I've been getting quite far on it.

Does anyone have any suggestions for when might be a good time to open it to the public?

Some things that run through my head...
- Don't want to release too soon with TOO MANY bugs, or early enough to just let someone else copy before we're complete
- Don't want to release too late and essentially not be beta and not developing additional things as per user feedback

 

I would think that public beta should commence only when you are pretty sure the service is pretty much bug-free. It needs to be functional, may not need to look pretty but it should generally work with the core features.

Try keeping the public beta stage short so that you have an edge over your competitors.

Take a queue from Google when they offered Gmail. Although it is on almost perpetual beta, it was working since day one of its launch. They basically revise the site base on feedback to improve the site.

Yeah, you are right about not letting your secret out too soon.

 

If you or your team still have a robust pipeline of features you would like completed pre-launch, a public beta just adds noise.

If you have significant available resources, a beta might be quite useful.

From there it's more a matter of your industry and competitors, which we don't know.

 

Has it been tested? Not by you, but other users.

Has it been tested by the lamest person who would be using it? If it hasn't been tested by anybody other than you or a few buddies/developers, I think you should go for a limited beta (invite only or let people sign up for beta)

Also it all depends on the product. If it is another clone of Youtube, then don't worry no one can steal it but if it is something that people haven't seen in the market, you should be cautious about it.

Have you filed a patent for it?

 

Haha, a couple weeks ago I sent an e-mail to one of my clients and bragged about how nice and efficient it was. His immediate reply was that he thought it was so confusing and he needed help.

So, I tailored things that even he would understand. Not to make him out to be dumb in any way, but if he now likes it, I imagine anyone can use it easily

It is not unique. I do know of other sites offering similar, except that they have some or all of these:
- No free account (only paid options)
- More than 2x expensive, up to 15x more expensive for paid options, offering virtually same thing
- Outdated and generally visually unappealing
- Cubersome "techy" interface - mine puts it to shame

 

If you can market it on these points virally and if you can do it fast enough before your competitors adjust to the features you have I think you should have a quick (week or 2) limited beta and then just dive into the market with open beta.