Beta testing 101

Should you beta test?

I often get asked about beta testing.
Should I beta test?
How many students should I put through?
Should I charge for beta testing?

When it comes to beta testing, there is a lot to consider… but here is the 101.

Should I beta test?

Yes, I honestly believe that everything should be tested in some way before it goes live. This could be anything from just getting someone to read over your content, to running a full trial run of your course.

I recommend testing your course just as you would want it to run. That means getting someone to go through the whole process of being a student, from sign up and welcome package, to content, through to the course close.

However, if for some reason you don’t want to do this, at least get someone to go through the content for you. You can see if it makes sense to them, if it flows well and how it is interpreted.

How many students should I put through?

This will depend on the course you are running and the experience you want your students to have.
If you want to run big courses on a huge scale, then you’ll want to put a big group of beta testers through to test the process.
If you want to run small, intimate course, with great relationships, then you’ll want to put through a small group of beta testers.

Remember, the aim of beta testing is to see if the course works, and if a big part of your course is group interaction, or the feeling that comes from connecting with others, then you need to test that bit during the beta testing as well.

Should I charge for beta testing?

This one is completely up to you.

Here’s my 2 cents.

If the course is ready, that is to say that everything is finished and ready to go, and you will be giving your beta testers the same experience that any other student would get, then charge them for it.
They will be more involved and engaged if they’ve had to pay (even part of the full fee) for the course.

On the other hand, if you course isn’t ready, that is to say that you are still working out lots of kinks, the system isn’t ready yet and you need a lot of feedback and input from your beta testers, then you might not want to charge them for it.

Moral of the story.

Testing is great! You should definitely test your course.
And the closer you can make test conditions to your “actual” course… the better.

I’d love to hear from you.

How do you feel about beta testing?
Have you/will you beta test?

Let me know,