There are many advantages to hand-picking your first rounds of users when launching your startup tech company.
Finding ways to spread the word about your new product or service is one of the biggest challenges for startup tech entrepreneurs. You have to build a good reputation almost immediately, convincing your first generation users that they need your product and that it’s the best on the market. Some entrepreneurs attempt to do this by building up the product with an aggressive marketing campaign, which can be effective, but more modern entrepreneurs are opting for a more social route.
Yes, that does mean spreading the word through social media, but not completely in the way you’re used to. It’s important to build your brand through social channels like Twitter and Facebook, but when you’re first starting out, it’s almost more important to leverage the social presence of consumers who already command some level of attention.
Your goal here is handpicking certain members of your target audience to try your product for the first time. If everything goes according to plan, they’ll spread the word for you, and their peers will be far more likely to trust them immediately than you.
Look for these three types of social users to help get the word out about your product:
1.      Connectors. These are individuals with thousands of connections, the socialites who seem able to make friends anywhere and connect with anyone. These people have fleeting conversations with their contacts, but their contacts are innumerable.
2.      Persuaders. As a foil to connectors, persuaders have a smaller circle of contacts, but have more in-depth conversations. What they lack in raw followership, they make up for in the ability to influence opinions.
3.      Authorities. These may be harder to get a hold of, and if you aren’t 100 percent confident in your product’s quality it could be risky, but the potential rewards here are worth it. Authorities are blogs, companies, and other brands that are known for being experts in their space. It’s a level of credibility beyond the individual that could go a long way to support your brand.
It can be tough to find users like these, but if you can persuade them to like and share information about your product, you’ll be in a terrific position for growth.
