Designing for Social Traction – Solving 3 Big Problems of Social Software

This is a nice presentation on how to design a web service in order to gain social traction.

It targets three main problems basically all web-based platforms face: 

  1. The Sign-up Problem: People seem interested in your software, but aren’t motivated enough to give it a try. 
  2. The First-time Use Problem: People are giving your software a try, but don’t know what to do or how to get started. 
  3. The Ongoing Engagement Problem: The chicken/egg problem endemic to social software – which comes first, the users or the value.

The presentation gives some useful recommendations and shows some nice best practices. I believe this is a must-read for all web-based startups.