Product Hunt launch, Android app release, and more
Back to my regularly scheduled bi-weekly update!
TL;DR
Today is Hyperlink’s Product Hunt launch day! This week I rolled out a Chrome extension for desktop users and an Android app for all of my Google fan-boys out there. We’ve got 583 monthly active users, and 2 paying(!) customers that have subscribed to our monthly subscription plan for custom domains. I sent cold emails asking for feedback to all of the small businesses that had created Hyperlinks (that I could find contact information for). I also had really exciting conversations with folks from 5 venture capital firms over the past 2 weeks (not looking to raise, just intro chats). Finally, my YCombinator interview is scheduled for Halloween morning — this Thursday at 10:30 am!
Product Hunt
Today is my first launch on Product Hunt. If you’re not familiar with Product Hunt — it’s a site where you can find new websites, apps, and products. Up until now, all of Hyperlink’s growth has come from word of mouth and app store search. This launch is my first foray into getting some publicity for the app. I typically avoid focusing on publicity as a means of growth because it’s not a scalable growth channel. However, having more feedback from more users is valuable — and following YC’s advice to launch early and launch often — now seems like as good a time as any.
New platforms
A handful of you have been asking for a web version of Hyperlink so you can create links quickly while browsing on your desktop. I decided that the best format for this would be a browser plugin, so I built the Hyperlink Chrome Extension. If you sign in with the same account on mobile and on web, you’ll still get your push notifications delivered to your mobile device. There are more features to come, like a quick creation flow based on your current webpage, but this version should scratch the itch for now.
I’ve also gotten requests for an Android version of the app, so I built that as well. It’s a little less fully featured than the iOS version for now, but all of the basic functionality is there. For all you fellow nerds out there — while the iOS app is built in native Swift, the Chrome extension, the Android app, and the web app were built in React — with hooks into native functionality, like push notifications.
Growth
We’re continuing to grow monthly active users to 583, up from 346 at the time of the last update. Two of these users have signed up for our monthly subscription plan for custom domains! Most of this growth has come from app store search from keywords like “url shortener”. I’ve started experimenting with Apple Search Ads, as these were the most cost effective channel for user acquisition at my previous startup. Apple gives you a free $100 for signing up (of which I’ve currently spent $5.50). My average cost per install has been $0.50 ($5.50 across 11 installs from ads). These are very small numbers, but I’m dipping my toes in here to get some ballpark figures for when it’s time to ramp up acquisition.
Funding & feedback
Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve met with VCs from 5 firms in the Bay Area. These were intro conversations setup by a couple of friends who had prior relationships with these partners, and thought they might be interested in what I was working on. I was initially reluctant to schedule these meetings, as I’m not looking to raise, and taking these meetings can be a massive distraction from building the business. On the other hand, I thought it might be helpful to have some of these conversations now — in case I ever decide to go down that road in the future. Overall, I really enjoyed these chats and the people I met with — the conversations were interesting, and often gave me new insights and ways of thinking about Hyperlink. I probably won’t be doing too many more of these until I go into fundraising mode (if it comes to that).
In addition to the feedback I get from you, from friends, and from these chats with VCs — I’m also actively collecting feedback from users every chance I get. Yesterday morning I sent out personalized cold emails to every small business user of Hyperlink asking for feedback and educating them on our custom domain option. I’m still waiting on responses to a lot of these (cold email conversion rates aren’t great), but I’m hoping to get some higher level insights that I’m not able to get from analytics or from users that I have access to in-person.
Here’s a screenshot of one of these cold emails:
Thank you
That’s it! Thanks again for following and reading my progress updates. They not only help me get the word out about what I’m working on, but they help me keep myself accountable. If you’d prefer to get these updates via email, you can subscribe to them here.
Please feel free to send me an email! Try out Hyperlink. I’d love your thoughts, feedback, ideas and comments on anything I mentioned. I promise I’ll respond to every last one!
Some replies to previous newsletters somehow got filtered into my spam folder. That issue should be sorted out now, but if you want to be 100% sure I’ll get it — email me directly at siggisim@gmail.com.
Until next time,
Siggi
