Gitroom Weblog – The right way to run Hackathons in 2024

Our major technique in Novu was to grow to be trending over the Main GitHub Feed. And whereas it behaves a bit bizarre generally, there’s one thing that we all know – deliver plenty of exercise in a brief interval, and also you’ll be trending.

In Novu, we had two essential Hackathons, “ConnectNovu” and “HackSquad.”
The speculation was that if individuals participated in these Hackathons, we’d have sufficient exercise over GitHub to grow to be trending.

For the noobies, a hackathon is a (bodily or digital) competitors the place individuals contribute code to you in a fashion you resolve on and get prizes.

However do these Hackathons get you sufficient GitHub exercise to grow to be trending?
The reply is it relies upon.

When you inform individuals to make use of the cloud model of your product by operating pip set up or npm set up (for instance) to jot down demos in your Hackathons, You get 0 exercise in your GitHub; therefore, there isn’t a trending.

The principle aim is to make sure individuals clone your repository within the course of.
That may be:

• A mission Listing with all of the demos.

• A hackathon about options in your product (code contribution, principally)

• A requirement to put in the mission (with git clone) to make demos.

This is among the essential causes HackSquad made Novu trending for every week.

I’ve run a number of Hackathon and discovered from every, so listed here are the ideas I can present.

Let’s deal with the commonest one: Get demos and contributions to your repository.

• Guarantee you have got SDKs for the commonest languages individuals can use within the Hackathon.

• Resolve on prizes – the extra useful the prize, the extra contributors it can appeal to (from digital badges to a Macbook Professional and a trip in Thailand)

• Write clear directions on learn how to take part on the primary web page.

I’ve discovered that most individuals have a fallback: when you inform them to jot down packages with Novu, they will do a easy demo of utilizing Novu.

I recommend you choose round 100 topics and let individuals select from them slightly than letting them select.

For instance, in a Novu bodily Hackathon with the brightest individuals, virtually all selected the identical topic (as a result of it was the simplest.)

The Hackathon must be two weeks:

• One week for “pre-registration” – reveal the topic of the Hackathon and the prizes; don’t write directions and stuff (so individuals don’t begin) – it is advisable to lead gen right here; we are going to talk about it within the subsequent part.

• One week for the competitors – don’t add multiple week; you need individuals to really feel pressured a few good contest; if it’s extra, individuals will even neglect to submit initiatives (the FOMO impact)

I might normally add a fast GitHub authentication (already on the “pre-registration” part) and acquire individuals’s emails so I can instantly inform all of the individuals when it begins.

Right here’s the trick, and that’s what we now have carried out with HackSquad.
When you make a number of Hackathons, use the earlier contesters’ electronic mail + new ones.

Essentially the most vital development can occur when individuals deliver others, and there are a number of methods.

1. Share a card on Twitter / Linkedin that you simply take part within the Hackathon and take part in a giveaway.

2. Make the competitors as groups – give factors to individuals who invite their associates.

3. Bonuses give individuals bonuses to finish totally different duties. For instance, star your repository.

Change your launches – as an alternative of doing weekly launches with a CTA to your GitHub, do it to the Hackathon.

Don’t be afraid of the demographics – Most probably, 90% of your viewers will probably be college students from India, however we would like two essential issues:

• Development on GitHub

• Demos / Contributions

The viewers doesn’t matter, as they received’t have to buy your product at any level.

To present you a brief instance, Novu “HackSquad” had 90% of the scholars from India, however in consequence, we had been trending on GitHub for every week and grew from 24k to 31k stars.

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