We were preparing for a semi-public beta of the myColts.net site. Our focus is on trying to release as high of a quality site from the start so that users can focus on the usability of the site and overall experience and less on the functionality side. The Crowe development team and Colts testing team has spent hours and hours testing the site in various ways and scenarios. However, I firmly believe anyone involved in the project eventually hits an educated capacity where they have used the site enough and are familiar with quarks and nuances enough it is easy to start over looking things.
Quality is a big focus for us at Crowe. We firmly believe in trying to get the deliverable right the first time around, which can certainly be difficult in an iterative development process. We talk a good game, but how real is it really? I decided we could put it to the test to find out as well as help advance the testing of the myColts.net site. Enter the contest. I put some of my money at stake. It is either going to the development team for a quality product or being doled out to those that find and report legit defects within the application. The contest lasted two weeks with credit going to bug testers and payout at the end. If there are remaining funds they get split up amongst the development team. It is a bragging rights type of thing and a little friendly competition within my group.
The end results were extremely positive. Within less than a day of sending the message issuing the challenge there were a half dozen to a dozen folks registered within the site and trying it out. I received a dozen legit errors and lots of questions, which are also great as they help expose areas where we may have been starting at and adopted to already where as a new user has not. Got some good suggestions too which made their way in to the end site. This very well could be a fan interest thing, or a novelty that applies here but isn't repeatable. However, I've become a fan of community testing based on the results.
