How I built in public a tool to kickstart new conversations via Twitter DMs

Hey there 👋

I'm Luca, a software developer in love with indie hacking.

Today I’d like to tell you the story about the product I’ve been building in public for the last 6 months.

Its name is Hivoe — and it’s a productivity tool that solves the problem of kickstarting new conversations on Twitter via Direct Messages.

How everything started

I started being active on Twitter almost 1 year ago.
At that time, I built a product, I did a PH launch, and it got no traction.
That's where I realized I should have built an audience before.

As a web developer, I thought I could provide JavaScript & React visual tips, so I began to post constantly content like this:

However, I was still missing something.
Every big account on Twitter stressed the importance of Direct Messages to build genuine relationships.
But I didn’t know how to interact and I didn’t have enough time to dedicate (I was and I’m still on the side).

That's when I came up with the idea of an automated Welcome Message for my new followers.

Problems solved

• I wanted to make real connections and friends
• I wanted to spend time reaching out only to people willing to talk
• I wanted to know more about my audience (interests, preferred content, and so on)

Thanks to the Welcome Message DM sent to my new followers, I had the opportunity to start many meaningful conversations! 🙌

Most of the people actually replied, and some others just ignored it, but the overall results were very good.

Because of this, I decided to create a product in the Twitter DMs space.

Build in public

But this time, I wanted to proceed differently compared to my first product.
I started building in public Hivoe at the end of 2021, when I had almost 1k followers.

Building in public means…

…showing your progress

…publicly asking questions

…getting feedback from your audience

…celebrating the (even small) successes with the world

The results have been amazing!
While building in public and posting web development-related content, I was able to grow my following to almost ~3k followers! (250 are missing, to be honest 😅).

And these are the current stats of Hivoe:

• 👋 46,328 welcome messages sent
• ✉️ 2,597 scheduled direct messages
• 🔖 48 message templates saved
• 🏘 66 user groups created
• 👥 237 active users
• 🤝 12 paid users
• 💵 $40 MRR

Today, I launch on Product Hunt

Yes, it's happening. Right now.

It took a whole week to prepare for the PH launch, and I'm extremely excited about it! 🤩

If you have a minute, I really appreciate it if you can drop by and show your love! ❤️

I’d like to share Hivoe with the biggest community of product makers and see what will happen (I hope to boost the MRR a bit 😅)

To be continued

I enjoy sharing my story here on Indie Hackers!

If you like this post, please join me on Product Hunt, I am very grateful to have your support! 🙏🙏🙏

Here is the link.

https://www.producthunt.com/posts/hivoe

Thank you for reading! Until next time! 👊