Asterisk Reports Made Simple – SAM Reports

What I’ve done so far

In preparation for the beta I’ve done several things:

• Set up “The SAM Reports Beta Testing” Google group.
• Collected the email addresses form the beta sign-ups.
• Made an extensible online help for testers and future users as well.
• Added  mailing list (mailChimp) to our “About” page for anyone who cares to join. (Beta testers will NOT be added there automatically, only people who subscribe to the list will be added.)
• Started blogging about the experience, and will continue once the beta starts.

My (company) policy

• I will not send unsolicited and non-related emails to those who signed-up for beta.
• I will send them just one email with the download link and an invitation to the previously mentioned Google group.
• I will not disclose any identifiable information concerning the beta testers to anyone.
• I will be giving free licenses to all who provide helpful feedback.

What is yet to be done

• I will make some survey available for the testers later in the process. I’m still not sure on which tool to use. Maybe some hosted solution, maybe Google docs…
• I’m just finishing the installation script with the fabulous InnoSetup. Once that’s completed I will host the installer on FileKicker.  I’m using a download service, even though I have an Amazon S3 (for hosting video files), because I want to keep things separate.

Looking for beta testers within a niche

Ten days ago I sent an open invite to would-be beta testers of SAM Reports to some Asterisk related sources:

• Asterisk mailing list (I’ve been subscribed for three years, a great resource of information, specially when easily searchable in GMail)
• voip-info.org (I submitted links to relevant pages)
• LinkedIn (posted to three Asterisk groups)
• venturevoip.com
• twitter (I just updated my link on the profile, didn’t tweet anything)
• younoodle.com (submitted SAM Reports)

The goal was to reach highly targeted audience, something like a pseudo-private beta.

Traffic sources for SAM Reports beta test

Most of my traffic came form three sources:

• Asterisk mailing list (probably the part with direct traffic)
• LinkedIn
• voip-info.org

There were 130 Absolute Unique Visitors of which I ruled out 4 from my friends at  micropreneur.com (I was asking for their opinion of the site), so that summed up to 126 uniques.

I started submitting the links on February 7th, and today is 17th, so that makes it 10 days. I’ve had 32 sign-ups for a beta test, that is 25%. A very good conversion but not that uncommon for a niche product.

Lesson learned : relevant traffic is much more important that volume.

Where do people click

People clicked the most on the “Tour” button. “Signup for beta” is the biggest button on the page, but I guess people first wanted to see what it’s all about.  The “About” section was also popular. I guess visitors want to know who are they dealing with. That made me rethink my about page, and I will be adding more content.

SAM Reports content traffic

The funny thing is that I have put six video demonstrations of the product on the first page, but just a handful clicked on those:

Video Presentations On SAM Reports From Page

I have even added the appropriate hint for the buttons:

SAM Reports Hint Screaming: VIDEO

Even though the hint is screaming “VIDEO” almost no one bothered to pass the mouse over the buttons.

Lesson learned : if you want visitors to see you Camtasia screen cast, why don’t just say so.

Where do the people come from

When I attended the AstriCon conference in London in 2006, Mark Spencer said that on their first conference a guy came all the way from Nigeria to attend. It was his first visit to the United States. And in London it seemed like  a mini UN meeting. Asterisk is truly a multi-national product, connecting people all over the world.

SAM Reports has visitors from all over the world

Northern America does take take the single biggest space, but it’s only 26%. We had visitors from over 40 countries.

This sums up my quest for relevant beta testers and what I have learned about them by looking at Google Analytics. There’s still a lot to be done. The actual beta test is yet to be conducted , so is this post to be continued…