I hit 500 total downloads yesterday, just a week shy of App Pause‘s 3 months Birthday. I know it’s not a huge number and compared to other apps that go viral, the growth has been very modest, but it still feels like a big deal to me. I have come far considering I started from scratch as an App Developer.
When I started 3 months ago, all I had an idea.
- No MVP.
- No app.
- No website.
- No company.
- No social media presence.
Today, I have:
- An app with 500 downloads, 180 MAU and 40 DAU.
- I am now director of a Private Ltd Company called “Unrushed Apps Ltd”
- I have my own website, landing page and a blog with 0 subscribers.
- A threads account with ~300 followers.
- More experience. I have made quite a few mistakes, so I feel wiser now.
But how did I reach here? What went well and what went bad? This is the reflection on my journey.
Things that went well
Luck is always a factor and I would be lying if I denied the random fortunate events. Few places where I got lucky:
- Quick MVP creation and its release: My first git commit was on April 23 and I published my app on May 20. So around a month to complete my MVP AND publish it live on Google PlayStore. That was quick. The journey wasn’t smooth and there were multiple challenges, but it could have taken much longer easily and had it done so, my motivation would have drained quickly.
- Bypassed PlayStore Internal Testing Policy: I created a private ltd company to mostly hide my personal information on Google PlayStore page (didn’t feel comfortable showing my name and full address to millions of people). Turns out, if you have a corporate account with Google PlayStore, you are not required to do fullfill Google Play’s policy of getting your app tested by 12 internal testers for 14 days. That saved a lot of time!
- Got Early Genuine Feedback: Right after publishing my app, I posted on Reddit to promote it. It didn’t get much traction – just a single comment from one user. But this single person gave my app a try and sent very detailed feedback by email. Next day, another user emailed me with detailed feedback. So right off the bat, I got two kind users who gave me detailed feedback for improving the app. That helped shape my road map as continued adding more features and polishing the app.
- Early Positive Feedback: I got 8 five-star reviews for my app very quickly (within a month). That was motivating. I haven’t been getting a lot of reviews since then though.
- Building in Public: Right before publishing, I opened a threads account to promote my app. (My first post here). After few posts, the algorithm started showing me accounts that were “building in public”. I got inspired by them. These folks were friendly, so I asked them questions on comments and they answered. Learned a ton. I started doing the same with my app and quickly built up a following base (as of today, 293 followers).
Things that didn’t go well
Let’s take a look at all the mistakes I made.
- AdSense Account Suspension for Silly Reason: Got my AdSense account blocked. I wasn’t even trying to show ads 🤦♂️. I just needed to use Admob’s UMP SDK for consent management to handle GDPR and they suspended my account (for life) due to “suspicious activity”. Bruh. You can appeal it once and I already wasted my chance.
- I have since then switched to a different CMP SDK and my advice to new app devs would be to stay away from Admob UNTIL you have significant userbase.
- User Data Corruption During Update: Botched up a database migration during v0.11.0 release and impacted 26 users. You can read more about it here.
- Didn’t Market with Trackable Link: At one point, I suddenly got a surge of new users, but I didn’t have a clue about the source. Learned the hard way about using UTM sources for creating trackable links.
Things where I need to improve
- Improve the landing page: Even though I don’t get a lot of traffic to my website at all. Is there any point? I guess it’s better to stay prepared in case I start getting more visitors.
- Track Referrals Better: I still have no clue where I am getting all my users from, other than organic PlayStore traffic. I have been using UTM sources with my link, but the traffic has been so little that PlayStore reports them as “Others” on the dashboard. Perhaps I can improve the accuracy somehow? Maybe integrating with Play Referral API would do the trick?
- Add more features: Spend more time in development instead of worrying about marketing. Marketing really hurts the pace.
- More Marketing: Launch it on more sites. I have been feeling shy about it.
- Monetisation: Add a tip jar such that Google gets a cut. I hear they tend to promote apps that earn them money.
- Keep on Writing on my Blog: Write about my lessons on the blog. Try to build up a newsletter on the side (why not?). I currently have 0 subscribers. If you are reading this, maybe consider signing up? 🙏
- Keep on building in public
