Mister Bleigh

In the 37signals book Getting Real the authors make a compelling argument for the Agile development method and creating small apps that grow. An interesting consequence of the agile methodology can actually provide a way to keep users interested in the site and keep them coming back. Use your “push early, push often” mindset and let your users in on some of the fun.

Let’s say I have an application that has just reached the 1.0 stage. Using the principles from Getting Real, it has the absolute minimum feature set that can get it up and running. Now I take a look at my development schedule and map out releases. Instead of working in stealth and pushing out releases on an unknowable schedule, I announce that there will be a major feature added every week (or 2 weeks, or 4 days, or whatever your cycle allows). Now users have a reason to come back to the site every Monday, because they know that there will be something new for them to do.

This has already been used to much success in other industries: DVDs all come out on Tuesday, movies come out on Friday, and Xbox Live pushes out new content every Wednesday. As an extreme case, Big Fish Games pulls in users by offering a new casual game each and every day of the year. People have a natural addiction to novelty; if they know they can go somewhere and see something new, chances are, they will.

Now there are some warnings with this model: you must be able to make your deadlines and you must have interesting features to push. Changing the color on a couple of buttons isn’t going to satiate the need for novelty, and have a couple ho-hum weeks and people will stop coming back. But if you can push out interesting new content on a regular basis, you might get a following you wouldn’t otherwise find. Make your development process part of your product.