Nice revenue bump there! Looks like people really like what you have. I’m wondering if ads would work for you we good positioning. Maybe in that poker sub Reddit you’ve been participating in?
Also, curious to see how YouTube goes for you. I’d love to give it a shot at some point. I find text is fun but video is a great way to connect as well!
I was curious about reading your issue since it’s been a while I saw something from you here, and what a nice surprise to see a mention in it. Thank you 🙏
Yeah I definitely plan to try ads. I had run some test ones that didn't work great but I do want to try again since the content creation is so slow.
On that point, the Youtube got off to a great start (~3k views and 50 new subscribers per video) , which is way better than past attempts on YouTube for other niches, but it's even more time consuming. Though very fun.
I really wish I started YouTube earlier because I always wanted to have a "creative outlet" but I'm not good at "creative" stuff but the nice thing about YouTube is you can make content on an topic and viewers will watch for that content even if the editing sucks, but over time if you feel inspired, tons of room to improve the creative aspects. But, also probably strething myself too thin and maybe just need an editors who's good at it :)
Great update. Congrats on your growth. It is awesome to see your progress.
You touched up on topics that I have struggled or still struggling with. Below are my thoughts / learnings / questions for you.
1. Recurring Revenue
A normal consumer has become used to subscriptions. Fatigued? Yes. But they assume all apps have a subscription plan. My app had "pay per use" plan (e.g. buy credits valid for 1 year). I have responded to so many emails explaining my customers that they won't be charged monthly.
3 months ago, I launched a monthly subscription plan. First month saw 10 subscribers. I was elated. Monthly revenue was up. Numbers looked great. By the third month the churn started and I was scratching my head. Feedback suggested it was a low value for money plan. However in 2 months, I got addicted to that MRR. It was like "monthly salary" from my 9-5 - very similar to your experience about "predictable" revenue. To be honest it was disappointed to see monthly revenue go down. All this while, the pay-per-use plans saw a steady growth.
Lesson - It is hard to change consumer mindset. MRR is great but don't let it become the new addiction. Let customers decide - monthly or lifetime. In your case you may want to experiment with annual plans if you think the lifetime pricing is underpriced.
2. YouTube
I have been very poor on producing content consistently - whether it is X, my newsletter or videos. How long do you spend on videos? Have you faced a challenge being consistent with your videos?
3. Redo the UX
It is great you are spending time upfront to improve the UX of your app. I made some early decisions for my app and it is had become harder to rewrite some parts. For example, the use of Amazon Cognito for user sign ups / sign ins. The UX is subpar (being polite here) and it is a size able effort to move to another provider. I don't regret the choice since it helped me validate the idea quickly. The lesson for me is to keep reevaluating the UX as you grow. Don't let it become a monster.
Yeah these are all massive struggles for me and I have no good answers.
Grats on getting some growth on your end as well!
I agree with "letting the customer decide", I'm just going to offer a few options and run experiments. But most of my competition has no lifetime option and the poker market - especially people willing to seriously study - isn't massive. There's something like 5000 pro poker players in the USA. So I'm just nervous about "running out" of customers. Which iswhy I really want to figure out is a way to "partition" product so I can sell something valuable but still leave room to sell something new in the future.
Youtube, I posted two videos in January and none since but working on a new one now. It's a massive challenge for me. Not only am I new to editing, but as mentioned I do deep dives on hands with complex software so it takes at least 10+ hours for a video. I also have sped up growth by writing an associated article for Reddit.
I've gotten the advice to do quicker, easier videos but I'm happy with my straetgy . I'm getting 2.5k views per video and 50k views per post because people really like the content so forgive poor editing. And the thing is that I really want to make in-depth videos on strategy since it attracts my target market (very casual poker players don't pay for an app to help them study).
But it's a serious challenge. Plus feeling like I should _probably_ update this newsletter occasionally.
I'm actually not re-doing the UX but writing a native version of the app, I plan to have both web and mobile. However, the UX also need a massive amount of work. I am paying some upwork UX contractors for some help here where we collab in Figma. I use Firebase for auth and database and everything btw. And I think it's the same thing as the videos - there's a subset of the market that forgives poor design if there's underlying value. But just go look at www.livepokertheory.com, the landing page does not look professional and I keep starting to re-do it but I'm swamped by a million other things (including stuff I haven't even mentioned like SEO ).
My productivity has also been really weak due to personal bad habits I need to work on, a few trips with the family, but, I do think focusing on monetization has helped with motivation.
So anyway, sounds like we're in the same boat, basically infinite things to do . I'm just figuring it out as I go, following the typical of advice of just get started, iterate on what works, experiment, etc. Thanks for the comment and look forward to updates from you as well.
Nice revenue bump there! Looks like people really like what you have. I’m wondering if ads would work for you we good positioning. Maybe in that poker sub Reddit you’ve been participating in?
Also, curious to see how YouTube goes for you. I’d love to give it a shot at some point. I find text is fun but video is a great way to connect as well!
I was curious about reading your issue since it’s been a while I saw something from you here, and what a nice surprise to see a mention in it. Thank you 🙏
Yeah I definitely plan to try ads. I had run some test ones that didn't work great but I do want to try again since the content creation is so slow.
On that point, the Youtube got off to a great start (~3k views and 50 new subscribers per video) , which is way better than past attempts on YouTube for other niches, but it's even more time consuming. Though very fun.
I really wish I started YouTube earlier because I always wanted to have a "creative outlet" but I'm not good at "creative" stuff but the nice thing about YouTube is you can make content on an topic and viewers will watch for that content even if the editing sucks, but over time if you feel inspired, tons of room to improve the creative aspects. But, also probably strething myself too thin and maybe just need an editors who's good at it :)
Thanks for the comment!
Let us know how the ads run. Always curious to see how people manage to make it work!
How long does it take you to make the videos? I’ve done a few and it’s fun but can definitely take way more time than writing lol
Great update. Congrats on your growth. It is awesome to see your progress.
You touched up on topics that I have struggled or still struggling with. Below are my thoughts / learnings / questions for you.
1. Recurring Revenue
A normal consumer has become used to subscriptions. Fatigued? Yes. But they assume all apps have a subscription plan. My app had "pay per use" plan (e.g. buy credits valid for 1 year). I have responded to so many emails explaining my customers that they won't be charged monthly.
3 months ago, I launched a monthly subscription plan. First month saw 10 subscribers. I was elated. Monthly revenue was up. Numbers looked great. By the third month the churn started and I was scratching my head. Feedback suggested it was a low value for money plan. However in 2 months, I got addicted to that MRR. It was like "monthly salary" from my 9-5 - very similar to your experience about "predictable" revenue. To be honest it was disappointed to see monthly revenue go down. All this while, the pay-per-use plans saw a steady growth.
Lesson - It is hard to change consumer mindset. MRR is great but don't let it become the new addiction. Let customers decide - monthly or lifetime. In your case you may want to experiment with annual plans if you think the lifetime pricing is underpriced.
2. YouTube
I have been very poor on producing content consistently - whether it is X, my newsletter or videos. How long do you spend on videos? Have you faced a challenge being consistent with your videos?
3. Redo the UX
It is great you are spending time upfront to improve the UX of your app. I made some early decisions for my app and it is had become harder to rewrite some parts. For example, the use of Amazon Cognito for user sign ups / sign ins. The UX is subpar (being polite here) and it is a size able effort to move to another provider. I don't regret the choice since it helped me validate the idea quickly. The lesson for me is to keep reevaluating the UX as you grow. Don't let it become a monster.
4. Agree 100% - Kenny's content is awesome.
Yeah these are all massive struggles for me and I have no good answers.
Grats on getting some growth on your end as well!
I agree with "letting the customer decide", I'm just going to offer a few options and run experiments. But most of my competition has no lifetime option and the poker market - especially people willing to seriously study - isn't massive. There's something like 5000 pro poker players in the USA. So I'm just nervous about "running out" of customers. Which iswhy I really want to figure out is a way to "partition" product so I can sell something valuable but still leave room to sell something new in the future.
Youtube, I posted two videos in January and none since but working on a new one now. It's a massive challenge for me. Not only am I new to editing, but as mentioned I do deep dives on hands with complex software so it takes at least 10+ hours for a video. I also have sped up growth by writing an associated article for Reddit.
I've gotten the advice to do quicker, easier videos but I'm happy with my straetgy . I'm getting 2.5k views per video and 50k views per post because people really like the content so forgive poor editing. And the thing is that I really want to make in-depth videos on strategy since it attracts my target market (very casual poker players don't pay for an app to help them study).
But it's a serious challenge. Plus feeling like I should _probably_ update this newsletter occasionally.
I'm actually not re-doing the UX but writing a native version of the app, I plan to have both web and mobile. However, the UX also need a massive amount of work. I am paying some upwork UX contractors for some help here where we collab in Figma. I use Firebase for auth and database and everything btw. And I think it's the same thing as the videos - there's a subset of the market that forgives poor design if there's underlying value. But just go look at www.livepokertheory.com, the landing page does not look professional and I keep starting to re-do it but I'm swamped by a million other things (including stuff I haven't even mentioned like SEO ).
My productivity has also been really weak due to personal bad habits I need to work on, a few trips with the family, but, I do think focusing on monetization has helped with motivation.
So anyway, sounds like we're in the same boat, basically infinite things to do . I'm just figuring it out as I go, following the typical of advice of just get started, iterate on what works, experiment, etc. Thanks for the comment and look forward to updates from you as well.