

Ask HN: Launching a new site next week, what do you suggest to promote it? - iuguy

Hi,<p>I'm launching a site this Tuesday and was wondering if there was anyone from the HN crowd who'd like to share their experiences and advice. I followed some of the advice on the balsamiq blog (http://www.balsamiq.com/blog/?p=198). My projected ramp up is as follows:<p>1. Set up a beta test with about 30 users. This has started to die off a little so I'm going to try to get users motivated with number 3.
2. Contacted bloggers in the niche I'm targeting (Information Security) and the people hosting the platform I'm using to promote the site on launch.
3. Set up a competition for beta testers with £100 for the first to reach 100 posts/comments.<p>Is there anything else others would recommend? Have any HN users had any similar experiences, if so what would you do?
======
emmett
Just launch. Don't promote at first, except to those 30 users. When you stop
getting useful complaints from the 30, start expanding it. Eventually you'll
have to think about promotion, but not yet.

~~~
iuguy
That's an interesting approach, similar to the soft/hollywood launch
discussion earlier (sorry can't find the link).

Have you got any examples of startups that have launched successfully in this
manner?

~~~
emmett
Google comes to mind. The traffic you get from bloggers/early adopters is
rarely useful anyway, unless your service is particularly targeted at them.
Before you spend resources on marketing, make sure you have your product where
you want it. Unless you have a vast budget, the only way to do that is
iteratively.

------
ScottWhigham
* Start running AdWords even if for no other reason to start learning how to run it successfully 2-4 months from now (there is a learning curve)

* Set up a Google Sitemap.

* Crete your blog, post useful content, and get it indexed

* Make great products

