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$6,116 from my product launch - no audience, here is how, full breakdown.

Howdy IH, you probably know me... I've been hanging around here for ages. Today I want to share the exact steps I took to generate $6.1k with my info product. Even though it's an info product, I think there are some potential takeaways for SaaS as well.

I had no audience, other than ~500 Twitter followers, and a handful of friends I chat with via DMs all the time.

This is meant to be inspirational and hopefully replicable for anyone with an info product, or even working on a SaaS and getting ready to launch at some point.

TLDR; at the bottom if you are strapped for time.

Final Launch Stats:

  • ๐Ÿ’ต Prelaunch sales: ~$700
  • ๐Ÿ’ต Sales from Product Hunt featured: $3,797
  • ๐Ÿ’ต Sales from PH newsletter the next day: $1,131
  • ๐Ÿ’ต $ 488 residual sales
  • ๐Ÿ’ต $ 6,116 total sales
  • ๐Ÿ“„ 85 sales
  • ๐Ÿ“„ 15 short of 100 goal
  • ๐Ÿ’” Refunds: 1
  • ๐Ÿ”ฃ 7.45% conversion rate (includes PH newsletter)
  • ๐Ÿ’ต Average sales is $69
  • ๐Ÿค 2 new affiliates added - 4 total now.

It seems the conversion rate went up as the day went on. Typically it flattens out or drops a bit, but my guess is that the number of comments and upvotes increased confidence and made it easier for people to buy.

Background

My product is called Swipe. It's a collection of strategies to help startups improve conversions and sales. The inspiration for this product came from another product called Scrapbook by a fellow IHer @kacper.

Before I ever encountered Scrapbook, I partnered up with another Indie Hacker to create a conversion checklist extension. I launched it on PH and it was received fairly well, but generated zero sales (because there was no paid tier).

At the time, I thought, well this is pointless. Why did we make this with some product links with zero sales to show for it. So, I wanted a do-over. But, this time, I thought I would focus the product specifically to one audience - SaaS startups and bootstrappers who are working on SaaS.

Scrapbook encouraged me to put everything I know and did professionally for clients (in consulting capacity), into one database.

After a lot of struggle and borderline giving up, I finally had a decent version. I'd add to it over time. Then I ran into several setbacks that put the breaks on wrapping it up...

Setbacks

The product was created in May, but it was largely idle due to some setbacks.

  • #1. We had an incident where I live -- my neighbor's house burned down and 2 people died. This left me somewhat traumatized for a while as I had to run my family out of the house in the middle of the night.

  • #2. We had our 2nd child. Life has its ways to delay things ;) This is a good setback though, I don't regret it for one bit.

It was after this time that I joined another community called IndieLog and started picking up where I left off on Swipe (on nights and weekends).

Crafting the Product Page

Before launching, I made sure to apply many of the strategies from my own product on the landing page. Once the page was complete, I literally scanned my own product to see if there was anything else I could improve or add. It acted as a checklist for the landing page.

The Headline

enter image description here

My original headline was "Hundreds of the best A/B test ideas at your fingertips". It was a terrible headline!

The purpose of a headline is to capture the reader to read further down the page. The original headline did a very poor job of this. While it made it clear WHAT I'm getting, it didn't communicate WHO it's for and WHY I should care.

I decided to continue refining the headline until I came across Headlime.io Danny's tool was great at generating the headline you see now.

While it is still unclear what exactly you are getting, the subheading connects the dots. I left the first line a bit vague on purpose -- somewhat defying the convention of aiming for crystal clarity -- because I thought it might still work.

  • What: Unclear, but mysterious. I broke the rule for this.
  • Who it's for: SaaS companies. I added bootstrappers because many could use the file to build a foundation for their products.
  • Why I should care: Because it makes me money (as a SaaS company). More conversions, signups, and revenue. Pretty straight forward.

Subheading, call to action, sample

Next, I added a subheading, a call to action, and a sample. I really liked how Scrapbook provided a sample with a locked view, so adopted this style for myself.

enter image description here

The subheading makes it very clear what you're getting, and the sample file connects the dots:

Unlock a database of 190 tested conversion strategies that have generated $10M in revenue.

The "$10M" part is important - it acts as initial social proof. Ideally, I'd say something like "$10,083,235 in revenue" to be as specific as possible, but once again I broke this rule because I didn't want to lie.

The clients I've worked for actually generated over $40 million in sales -- but I took it down a few notches because someone expressed to me that it felt untrue or hard to believe.

Seeing how I don't have a whole ton of social cred, I decided to take it down to 10M. No lies, just conservative presentation.

Product Hunt Embed

Once I had the PH banner, I put that on the page up top as additional social validation and a way of getting upvotes.

Everyone knows you need some social proof, so I included some logos of some of my clients:
enter image description here

The sales letter

The sales letter is critical for info products, especially those with a higher price tag. Most people buying my type of product would have no idea what it's worth. Heck, I didn't even know what the appropriate price should be.

I used the PAS copywriting formula to create the sales letter. Pain, Agitate, Solution.

Here are the basic principles and methodologies behind the sales letter:

  1. State the pain: lack of sales is frustrating when people are coming but not buying.
  2. Agitate - You work really hard on your product only to see few sales... this is extremely frustrating.
  3. Solution - I've got strategies to help you overcome the conversion/onboarding / sales problems. They are super easily accessible, all there for you, save a ton of time and money.

"But people hate reading!".

This is true in many cases for SaaS pages, but for an info product, context is crucial. Here comes the context:

You could be paying a ton of money for an audit, or get something very accessible and affordable right now that will likely help you quite a bit.

Copy edits

The first version of the sale letter was terrible. I knew that first drafts are rarely good, so I re-visited the letter several times in the weeks to come.

Each time, I would trim it down by half. Yeah... you can imagine the first version was really long and very rough. I'd go through the sentences one by one and meticulously cut anything that was unnecessary or did not add any value to my message.

Just like a film editor picks and chooses what to present to the audience, I edited my letter over and over.

This doesn't mean that I am at my final revision. I'm not even a copywriter... An experienced copywriter may laugh at my letter. But, I will keep revisiting the copy and try to improve it.

Most people don't realize how important copy is on their landing pages, the home page, product pages. It's crucial. But, sadly, a lot of people write it once and leave it at that.

I would recommend anyone reading this (assuming you already launched), to go back and look at every word you wrote. Cut out as much fluff as possible and keep only the bare necessities -- the simple, straight-to-the-point words that get to the core of your offer.

Writing in plain speak

The sales letter is conversational. While it follows a formula, my goal is to keep it very casual and simple. Here are some of the copywriting rules I observed:

  1. Short sentences.
  2. Ruthlessly eliminate any long words and complex sentences
  3. Make it super simple to read, under 6th-grade level
  4. No fluff words
  5. No difficult sentences
  6. No passive tone
  7. Focus on YOU, the audience while providing just enough background about myself so you know who is talking to you.

Ultimately, it is not about me, it's about you.

I used a tool called Hemmingway App to keep all of my writing super simple. See below:

enter image description here

To anchor the value, I seed the reader with the first giant cost of audit (for most bootstrappers at least) -- of $3k. This is how much an average audit cost if I provide it for you. There are companies that charge $10k, but the point is to show that this stuff sucks, and it's not cheap. BUT, a fix/bump in conversions could make a huge difference so a tiny fee for Swipe (in comparison) is worth it.

Price anchoring

This is a technique from the Swipe file called price anchoring. We are setting the reader to see the high figure first so that the next number feels tiny in comparison. Yes, it's a bit of a manipulative mind hack, but it's perfectly honest. We are not using any deception here. The audits really are at least $3k.

Price anchoring is incredibly powerful, and you can use it to increase your own revenue quite a bit with simple changes. I have outlined this technique in the file. Specifically when dealing with pricing tables.

Letter sign off

I sign off the sales letter with the exact value the reader is going to get if they purchase the product:

enter image description here

Make it personal

The last bit is to add personality -- to show that this is written by a human, not some unknown who knows who... I include my pic and title in a brief but courteous sign-off.

enter image description here

I want people to know that it is me talking to them directly. This is actually a bootstrapper's superpower -- and yet another strategy in the Swipe file ;)

Another powerful method is to include an "about" page with your story. But, I didn't have the time to craft one because I kept getting delayed with other things and I just wanted to get it out already.

Product Images

Next, I included product images with bullet points describing the VALUE provided, while briefly stating the features.

enter image description here

It is crucial that the page use REAL product photos, not illustrations or mockups. This is yet another strategy from the Swipe file. Illustrations do a poor job of communicating what people are buying. In most cases, you want to show the real product image, video, or video interaction.

Reasons to get product

It may seem obvious, but spelling out exactly why you should buy something is not a bad idea. You can use this section to explain the full value of the product, WHO it is for, and a compelling reason to buy NOW instead of later. For Swipe, it was a combination of showing value and making it clear that there is a lifetime guarantee.

enter image description here

If you ever create a "why you should buy this" section, try to include the following:

  1. What kind of pain is your product solving?
  2. What is the outcome of using your product? What does the customer achieve that was not possible before?
  3. Who is this for? Make it super clear who will see the most value from your product. In my case, it is SaaS companies.
  4. Any additional details about the product that do not require their own large section
  5. Any guarantees. Creating a crazy guarantee is a good way to answer some possible objections because.. "hey if I don't like this, I can return it". This is also a strategy in the Swipe file ;) Make crazy guarantees that you intend to honor!
  6. Any other objections that may come up in the mind of your customer.

More social proof (if you have it).

enter image description here

I got my testimonial from an early sale not part of the launch. This is why it's a good idea not to launch early if you do not have any social proof. Keep wrestling those beasts manually until you get a customer or two or three, and then bend over backward to satisfy them in hopes that they leave you a good review. If they are ecstatic about the product, you can and should ask for a review!

Here comes the money asking part...

Remember how we primed our reader with a large number? Heh, no pun intended.

Yeah.. so we're going to do this again because we are about to ask them to pull out their wallet! I mention the $3k audit fee as my price anchor. Again, no tricks (other than the psychological ones), just set up the next action.

enter image description here

Make it grand, make it scarce!

You go into the store and see 100 bars of your favorite ice cream.. how likely are you to run to the freezer? Nah, you'll do your other shopping first then maybe come back to it, unless you see some nice cookies instead.

We don't want that. We want our buyer to be hungry for that bar. So, we limit it. Imagine you only see 1 bar of your favorite ice cream left. Now, what are you going to do? You're going to grab it first, like... right now!

enter image description here

Lifetime Deal

You all know the benefits and downsides of lifetime deals -- cash upfront, no MRR. For info products, it is particularly hard to get a monthly fee unless you are selling a course that requires continuous access. I opted for a one-time fee due to subscription fatigue. Plus, I can use the cash to reinvest in the acquisition.

Pricing Tiers

I wanted to give early buyers some incentive for being early so I created 3 pricing tiers - $87, $157, and $237. The discount from the final tier is meant to entice people to be first. We are creating urgency by making something more scarce. Note: I added another price tier after the promo from 157 to 187. This just adds more scarcity but keeps the promise of raising the prices.

enter image description here

In hindsight, I kind of wish I tried more tiers with lesser intervals kinda like Steph Smith did with her book. I feel that more tiers might increase the incentive by lowering the number of available copies even further. Imagine if I said "10 at this price", instead of 100.

Make it scarce

Any course creator will tell you that open enrollment results in fewer sales than closed enrollment. This is because the course is available for a limited time and there is an urgency to sign up. The same is true of sales. Ecommerce does this all the time by showing only a handful of items remaining. And IT WORKS. It's psychological wizardry but it works. Yes, it's in the Swipe file in case you were wondering.

I limited Swipe to 100 per tier for the first 2 tiers. The last tier is the full price. This is to create some sense of scarcity/urgency. Again, I kind of wish I tested smaller tiers, but it is what it is!

Repeat most important points via a checklist

enter image description here

This is sort of like every other price table you see, I just wanted to repeat the most important points.

Progress Bar

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A progress bar is a good visual indicator to encourage people to take action. My coding skills are very limited so I opted for manual progress bar updates. I just set the length of the bar as a percentage of sales and adjusted it as sales came in. It wasn't 100% live, but close.

Show other grayed out tiers

I wanted people to have a visual reference as to what the price will change to. This way they know they are getting a deal because the price will go up.

Discount Bar

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Early on I decided that I would create a custom bar for each source of traffic to offer a discount code. I know there are options for bars, but I decided to just make my own. A bit of googling around and I found some code to set a bar based on a URL variable. Then I would just add custom URLs to each place I promote -- this way I know exactly where they came from. The code used from that source would also match in the name so I know if some strategy is effective or not.

enter image description here

Affiliate Program

Early on, I decided that I wanted to establish an affiliate program. I hesitated, but then a helpful person said I should do it, so I did. I created the Swipe affiliate page. Swipe pays out 50% of all sales and I thought since some of my customers are probably marketing people, they may be able to sell to their clients. With no overhead, my affiliate income is pure profit.

To make people aware of the program, I added a workflow email in Gumroad. This is the email that delivered the product links but also mentioned my affiliate setup. Sure enough, this led to 2 new deals. I now have 4 affiliates and one already made some money.

FB Pixel

I planted a Facebook pixel early on so I can eventually create lookalike audiences of people who were engaged with Swipe or purchased it. This is just a strategic long-term decision that I made very early on.

That's it for the page!

Initial Sales

The first 6-7 sales come just from building in the open. I shared Swipe initially here on IH and got a sale the same day. You can see me posting about it here, very excited ;)

I think the biggest reason building in the open is so effective, is not that it lets you gain a few initial sales, but it allows you to build a list (if you have email harvesting in place).

Since my info product did not take all that long to create, I did not have a mailing list. But, if I were any other indie hacker here with a product that's only in the idea phase or already being built, I'd definitely have a mailing list.

My tip on building in the open: Skip the "coming soon" page. Mockup an actual demo of what your product might look like to get people excited. Set up a simple email collection box and start talking about everything you are doing.

Post on Twitter, YouTube, IndieHackers, IndieLog, whatever... just keep posting every day everything you are doing. People will naturally get curious and check out your site, and join the list.

Me building in the open...

Even if you have zero plans to monetize this audience, you can ask them to help you promote your product on ProductHunt. This extra bit of support can be incredible and will make all the difference in the launch.

Pre-launch

Early Discount

About 7 hours before launch, I created a pre-launch discount of 40%. I announced it on Twitter, but to my surprise, nobody used it.

enter image description here

This could have something to do with my time zone (I'm in Japan), where everyone in PST and EST time zones may have been taking it easy in the evening. I really didn't give it much thought and that was a mistake on my part.

At this point, I had a sinking feeling that the launch will not go well. If nobody wanted the 40% OFF, why would anyone pay for this thing at all?!

Still, I thought since I made the announcement, I have to go through and there's not much to be done about it. A bit later I realized I shouldn't be too bummed out considering I've already had some early sales and knew the product was in high demand because people literally message me to do audits for them.

Messaged everyone I knew

This wasn't planned, but I think this one action made the entire difference in the launch. It was spontaneous, but the most important thing I did...

I randomly decided to DM everyone I've been speaking to on Twitter and let them know that I will be launching soon and asked for their support when the time comes. Of course, everyone said yes, they would have my back. โค๏ธ

These people are mostly indie hackers and friends I have made over time. I've chatted extensively with them prior to reaching out and we have good relationships.

I then recorded a video on IndieLog to let people know I'll be launching in 6 hours. No idea how many saw it, but I figured some exposure is better than none. A few positive comments from friends lifted my spirits.

A few of my connections reached out and made the launch even more successful.

Went through a checklist

Matt from Taskable recommended the PH launch checklist. I made sure to go through it and see if I got everything covered. This was helpful, highly recommend it!

Product Hunt Launch

I scheduled Swipe to go live at 12:01 AM, PST. PH resets at midnight so you want as much time as you can get.

In terms of the listing itself, I didn't do anything special, except added a video intro and the first comment.

Video Intro

I think indie videos are super powerful and are an underutilized tool. I get it... most of us are shy or introverts. But if you can overcome this, people will connect on a deeper level because they can see who they are buying from.

Try to be friendly and excited in your videos, show your own excitement for your product. When people see you are proud of what you are launching, they are more likely to cheer you on.

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First Comment on Product Hunt

The goal of the first comment, for me, is to set up the deal and nail the points why I think people should get Swipe. I also use it to communicate the discount code. Feel free to inspect it for yourself if you need some ideas.

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Launch Tweet

Before the product went live, I typed up my launch tweet, which was inspired by Jim Raptis. Jim launched his product Magic Pattern by announcing 2 free copies to everyone who likes and retweets. I thought this was a brilliant idea and set up something similar for myself.

enter image description here

When the tweet went live, I pinned it. At the end of the day, this tweet had 6,798 impressions, and 204 link clicks.

I also made this tweet into a live update thread. Throughout the launch, I kept updating the tweet. But before all of this, I tagged many of the people who have helped me along the way or inspired me to finish Swipe.

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The tagged tweets were not a tactical decision -- I simply wanted to thank all of these people, although I suspect some of this had an impact on people seeing the first tweet and possibly engaging with it.

Here is how the launch tweet performed, courtesy of ilo:
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Help from an indie hacker

Another indie hacker I chatted up recently and would consider a friend @jeffsvicarovich made a lot of good suggestions. He told me I should post to FB groups, StartupSchool. He also recommended I post to various groups here on IH. And I did!

Jeff was super cool and his valuable advice helped a ton! Jeff ended up following the launch, liking, tweeting, commenting, and generally being super supportive. It's incredible if you ever get a chance to meet people like him who will go out of their way to help you! Another reason to take networking seriously.

Here is the first post: "Swipe has launched on Product Hunt!" that I made in the PH group.

The 2nd post would come later after I gained some initial traction.

Facebook and Slack

I made a few posts in a few Facebook and Slack groups, but the engagement was very low. I'm talking a few comments. If you are part of any active groups, I'd definitely mention there, but for me, this was a non-starter. I did get a few helpful upvotes from one of the slack groups I'm in.

Staying Up / Monitoring Comments

Launching in the PST time zone meant I had to stay up at night. My launch started at 4PM my time. From 4PM to 4AM the next morning, I monitored people's comments and tried to reply to them as quickly as possible. I monitored PH, Twitter, FB groups, Slack groups. I also tried to reply to the two posts I made here, though they did not get too much action -- but I think generated a sale or two!

I think engaging with people is critical because it keeps giving you exposure as the algos prefer active posts. On PH, my product did not have more upvotes than some below me, but it had more engagement and I think this helped the ranking.

Kept Tweeting

Many of us know it's important to keep tweeting your live thread to keep gaining traction. I probably didn't do as good of a job as some. It's a bit hard to keep tweeting without feeling spammy, but there are ways to do it. Feel free to inspect my thread, or better yet -- inspect those of more successful launches.

Types of things I tweeted:

  1. Milestones when the product reached 1, 2, 3, 4, 5k
  2. Thanking people
  3. Highlighted other great products from PH that day
  4. Conversion rate stats since my product focuses on that

That's about it. In hindsight, I should have shared some more of the strategies from my product -- even the free ones I already openly gave in the sample file. Just discuss them in more detail. Had I done that, I may have had much higher engagement and ultimately a lot more revenue. But hey... life is full of lessons!

TLDR; Lessons Learned

  1. Have an audience. If don't have one, start building one today. Build in the open, update often, collect emails.
  2. If possible have an email list to notify.
  3. Reach out for launch help to everyone you consider a friend. You REALLY need the initial push on PH. Of course, your product will then need to stand on its own to keep going throughout the day.
  4. Reaching out is important because people can miss your tweets.
  5. Use a checklist from Taskable
  6. Post everywhere! Facebook, Slack, IH, whatever community you are a part of. I think the more exclusive the community (private), the more effective this will be. Open communities tend to be spammy and people ignore self-promotions.
  7. Engage all the comments. Yes, you may need to stay up, cancel your work engagements, not do any work.. whatever... you have to sacrifice everything else.
  8. Keep your live thread updated. Behind-the-scene stories, product wins, customer wins, whatever you can think of. Share value so people can like and retweet.
  9. Wait to launch until you have social proof -- this makes a difference.
  10. Discounts optional (especially for SaaS, as they can attract the wrong type of audience), but I think in my case it helped. I would definitely consider an annual prepaid with 30% OFF, or an early supporter Tier with significantly reduced pricing for an entire first year.
  11. Add urgency. Limits. Date expiration. Timers. Whatever makes sense for you.
  12. Be thankful - good advice for life not just for launch ;)
  13. A contest might help with Twitter impressions.
  14. People like lifetime deals
  15. Build in the open for early sales
  16. Try cold outreach by offering value - this works!
  17. Keep powering through until the end of the day. If you finish strong, you get featured in PH newsletter and get another round of exposure. Even in 6th place, I got ~$1k worth of sales. Imagine what it would be in 1st place with your own featured section!
  18. Higher priced products require less sales for the same amount of revenue as lower-priced products. Common sense, but something to think about if you are selling a $10/mo SaaS vs. $60/mo.

Mistakes

  1. Didn't have an email list specifically for the product
  2. Did not update my live thread as best as I could
  3. Was not prepared with a list of places to post. Jeff saved the day here!
  4. Was not part of any exclusive/private communities to help with the launch.

Other Tips

  1. Make sure your product landing page is in tip-top shape and has a clear value proposition.
  2. Have a good product, otherwise nothing else matters unless you are super connected.
  3. Join private groups early. Form connections.
  4. If you have a nice following, it'll be much easier to launch.
  5. Build an army to back you up. Or put them on alert if you already have a ton of supporters. Sometimes they can miss your tweets.
  6. Get some friends with large followings to go to war for you on launch day.
  7. Have fun. Stay positive, and excited about your launch. It's hard to get others excited if you are not beaming with energy.
  8. Don't have kids. Ok.. joking, but they'll make your launch day chaotic ;)
  9. A messed up launch is not the end of the world. You can re-do it. Or just not worry about it... As long as you keep working on your product, you'll be fine.
  10. Don't give up.
  11. Start connecting now, network with peers, and not just by spamming them with your stuff. My DMs are open ;)

What's next for me and for Swipe?

My initial goal was to sell 100 copies. I am very close to that. Just 21 left in the current tier. I will keep hustling until I get to 100 sales. I've got a cold outreach strategy that I want to continue exploring.

Since I planted an FB pixel early on, I will start creating lookalike audiences for people who bought Swipe. This should help with the ad conversions. I'm not sure if my sample size will be enough just yet, so I might broaden the audience to highly engaged people instead.

After Swipe reaches 100 sales, I will make the decision to focus on Swipe Ecommerce - my other product, or Swipe Growth (yet another product).

My ultimate goal is to have a suite of "Swipes" and a number of other products. I want to build out a product empire and work on a few central sources to promote them.

Speaking of central sources, Swipe will have a permanent home at Growth Insider under the Power-Ups sections. This will be my central focus aside from launching the other products.

One of my growth strategies is to do many mini-launches on PH (starting with Growth Insider next), which all link to the site/newsletter. The site will act as the main hub. All of the newsletter content will push people to the site.

I hope to broaden my reach with the newsletter (a tall order for now..) but that's the goal.

Long Term

Working on Swipe gave me a few micro-SaaS ideas. I even shared a few on my Startup Ideas podcast. Whether I pursue them or not is left to be determined. I like both the idea of a product empire and of the micro-SaaS. Coding is my biggest challenge so we'll see what happens. One thing is for sure, I need to act quickly.

Open

Swipe is now an open product. You can keep updated on the total sales by going here: https://www.swipe.page/open

Thank you!

The launch would not go as well as it has had it not been for everyone who helped me along the way. Thank you, thank you, thank you!! ๐Ÿ™๐Ÿ™‡๐Ÿ™๐Ÿ™‡

Some of the people who made the launch successful by liking / tweeting or purchasing swipe, I owe it all to them: @damon, @txu, David Miranda, @mister_bruce, @dagorenouf, Chris Lu, @sachaarbonel, Paul van Oijen, Darren Shaw, @dr, @notlhw, Rohan Gilkes, @Brauhaus, @muazzim, @kevinpeters_, @jeffsvicarovich, @storycreator, @nickverhaege, @andreboso, @MattHa, @dmraptis, @utsav, @Janel, @pauldmet, @sagunsh, @Ramy, @RikNieu, @bennoland, @jovian, @dannypostmaa, @mattcrail, @darrenrogan, Dev Basu, @v3nom, Daniel Eitam

Sorry if I missed anyone, probably just couldn't find your real name or username here.

What can I do for you?

If you guys have any questions, let me know and I'll do my best to answer, or DM me on twitter any time.

  1. 6

    Wow, I feel like you just gave away a bunch of your strategies for free in this post ๐Ÿ˜‚. Very detailed, thanks for sharing.

    1. 2

      I hope it helps! These are just a handful of basics from a list of 190+ now (I think). Thanks for your support Ben!

  2. 4

    This post is very usefull, thanks for sharing these advices and strategies ! Congrats on your product !

    1. 2

      My pleasure, Steph!

  3. 4

    Such a comprehensive write-up!

    Easy to follow strategies from zero to launch๐Ÿ™Œ

    1. 3

      Damon, you have no idea how big of a role you've played in this. Thank you! ๐Ÿ™๐Ÿ™‡

  4. 3

    Hi @genemachine I've bought the swipe list from Product Hunt and it really helps a lot. I'm walking through the checklist to improve my product www.pixela.xyz which I'm launching this Thursday Oct, 8th on Product Hunt.
    You mentioned that you were using FB pixel to create lookalike audiences. You can use pixela to attach your FB pixel to any link that you share (email, blogs, posts, etc)

    1. 2

      Thatโ€™s really cool! Thanks Juan! Iโ€™ll have to do the email part when I work on growthinsider - my other site.

  5. 3

    Bookmarked for the most thorough break down.

  6. 3

    This write up is glorious, thanks for sharing! Lots of great tips and lessons, truly awesome.

    1. 2

      ๐Ÿคฉ๐Ÿคฉ Thanks so much!

  7. 3

    Thanks so much for sharing your story. Look forward to how the Swipes develop!

    1. 2

      Thank you Wit, appreciate it! Yeah there is a lot of work ahead. I am trying to think about how to prioritize it all. On one hand, I want to keep going with Swipe Convert tons of partnership / advertising channel opportunities. But on the other hand, I feel like Swipe eCommerce can do well too!

      1. 2

        Nothing really preventing trying each of them out and see how it goes no?

        1. 2

          Nope, just limited time and kids haha.

  8. 3

    Wow, thank you Gene for sharing all of this!

    I'm still figuring out what it is that I want to build, but I know that eventually the time for me to launch something will come and this post will be the first thing I come back to.

    1. 3

      Thanks Siim!! Take your time and when you launch Iโ€™m sure youโ€™ll nail it! Iโ€™ll be happy to help in any way I can do dm me on Twitter โ€” even to discuss ideas :)

  9. 3

    I love the way you make it look very straightforward and simple. Feels like it can be replicated easily (but not without effort of course). Maybe that should be your next product: Swipe PHLaunch ๐Ÿคฉ.

    1. 3

      Haha, thanks for your kind words! I tell ya what, if I can get something to #1 spot twice, I may consider it ;)

  10. 3

    Awesome write-up, well done Gene! ๐Ÿ‘

    1. 2

      Thank you Rik, for everything! Your support was monumental in getting all of this to work!

  11. 3

    I forgot to mention that I was approached to buy upvotes on Product Hunt.. which was pretty funny. Of course, I rejected, but it made me wonder how many take up the offer...

    1. 3

      Great job with the launch!

      I think quite a bit of people do that! Was following your launch every couple of hours and noticed how at one point a new product "suddenly" appeared and got 200+ upvotes almost out of nowhere with no clear buildup. However, PH's algo manages to keep most cheaters away in my opinion.

      1. 3

        Yea I feel like most people are also decent and probably say no. The guy was really insistent but I kept rejecting politely. I know he probably has a family to feed and it might be a job for him so didn't want to be rude.

  12. 2

    wow.. lot of insightful strategies

    1. 2

      Glad you liked it!

  13. 2

    where is the link to purchase?

    1. 2

      Swipe.page
      Use โ€˜insider30โ€™ for 30% off. I think that code is still active

  14. 2

    Thanks for sharing, really nice set of tips

    1. 2

      Hey! Glad to be of some help ;) Cheers!

  15. 2

    Amazing post @genemachine! Swipe is a great product for all SaaS founders. Will definitely be mentioning in failory.com's blog in the future ;)

    1. 2

      Nico, that's awesome to hear! Thanks so much!

  16. 2

    This is golden! I'm preparing to launch Astrola and targeting SaaS businesses too. Thanks for the write up. Will give you a follow on Twitter :)

    1. 2

      Thanks Scott! Yeah reach out any time!

  17. 2

    Congrats on your sale & The case study was awesome & inspiring. Defiantly learnt so may new things. Thanks! @genemachine

    1. 3

      Thanks so much Saleheen! Glad the case study was helpful. Let me know if / when you launch something and need some backup or a 2nd pair of eyes on anything before you hit post.

      1. 2

        You are welcome. & I appreciate it I will definitely seek for your suggestions when I am ready to officially launch my product. Thanks!

  18. 2

    Wow Gene thanks for sharing this!

    1. 3

      Matt, thank you so much for being a part of the launch, and offering the checklist. I know it made a huge difference! Anyone reading this, have a checklist in place ;) Matt has a good one!

  19. 1

    Great read! I have found this story after someone commented a product in Product Hunt. I like reading stories like this and on top of that there is a lot to learn. Thank you for sharing all this.

  20. 1

    This comment was deleted 3 years ago.

    1. 2

      Really? Oh man, I'm flattered! I am also a designer, but a poor logo designer. This one I just made myself but didn't think it was particularly any good lol. But I am glad someone likes it!

      1. 2

        This comment was deleted 3 years ago.

        1. 2

          I must have lucked in haha. I assure you there was no checklist ;) Thank you for the compliments though!

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