To anyone who thinks a beta test needs to be limited to your friends and investors, you are missing out on precious stat sig data from a more diverse sample pool. Expanding your sample size to be outside of your bubble means you'll build a better product and scale globally.

When we were building Instagram we realized that people were using it very differently in Japan. They didn't like following their friends and rather liked following brands and celebrities so we changed the new user onboarding flow for suggested accounts to be brands/celebs.

When we user-tested Opower's SaaS platform in HK we learned that Asian utility companies didn't want a smiley face on their home energy reports, they wanted a frowning face for their energy costly users. Culture norms matter in building product! Localization is very humbling.