Why we're launching FREE

When you kick off a start-up, a lot of people (we’re talking pretty much ALL the people you talk to) will rave on about the power of Early Adopters. For ease, let's refer to them 'EAs'. We’re not talking Angelina and Brad adopting mind you. These are the people who uncover the ‘cool and new’ things, and who are such apparent trend setters the rest will follow their lead if they think your new business idea is fantastic.

So compelling is the theory that this is the group a lot of businesses (especially ones online) aim for when they first kick off because even if the EAs don’t necessarily have a need for your product, they will tell someone who will. And you see it in a lot of Australian start-ups.

But does it make it right?

We’re stepping out on a limb and going against the grain.

TaskRunners won’t be launching in the heart of EA territory. It’ll be launching in the heartlands of where people need the help the most – right in the heart of suburbia.

We can’t ignore the need to ‘monetise the product’ but we will be skinning this cat in a way that is different to most through offering both cash and in-kind as a payment option (so swapping or bartering basically) and taking a little more of a creative route to the road of a sustainable business (stay tuned for more on this).

We want to roll up our sleeves, get in there and help people get things done as quickly and as stress free as possible.

<Drum roll please>

We’re making TaskRunners completely FREE until the end of 2012. We’re testing our theories related to sharing tasks to create a better way of using time without our community of members paying for it.  

If you can hear a gasping, screaming sound right now, it’s probably the collective groans of the start-up community because we’re not trying to romance trend setters or looking at this from a plainly cash perspective.

We’re in this for the right reasons and for the long haul so we have to reinvent things a little to make sure it works the way it should.

That’s why we’re diving right in at the deep end to save your sanity. Because we wouldn’t have it any other way.

What do you think? Crazy stupid or crazy smart?