MRR update: $22/month from Chrome extensions
Not where I want to be, but the machine is starting to work.
What changed this week:
- ZenRead v1.2.0 shipped — the #1 issue was silent trial expiration. Zero notifications = zero upgrades. Fixed with chrome.alarms (4 reminders) + post-trial popup.
- CookieJar hitting 2.1% free→paid conversion on paywall (96 shown → 2 paid)
- ReadMark at 5.3% (38 shown → 2 paid)
What's broken:
- Revenue pipeline stopped syncing April 14 — flying blind on actual May transactions
- ZenRead got 200 installs in 4 days, GA4 shows -57% WAU. Ghost installs from CWS algo.
30-day target: $40. Need 1-2 more paying users.
12-month target: $670/month (34x current). Ambitious but I have 17 extensions and finally understand the conversion math.
Building solo, no co-founder. Happy to compare notes with anyone in similar territory.
The useful signal here is that you are no longer guessing. You are starting to see the machine at the conversion level: installs, trial expiry, paywall views, paid conversions, reminders, and broken revenue tracking.
That is probably the real product-building lesson. With Chrome extensions, small UX leaks quietly kill revenue. A silent trial expiration is not just a bug, it is a missing conversion moment.
The bigger question I’d watch is whether ZenRead, CookieJar, ReadMark, and the other extensions stay as separate tiny products, or whether they eventually become one browser productivity/workflow company.
If they stay separate, the individual names are fine. But if you are building a system around browser actions, reading, saving, conversion moments, and lightweight productivity utilities, a cleaner umbrella brand like Xevoa .com would make the whole thing feel more durable than a collection of small extensions.
You already understand the conversion math now. The next leverage point may be making the product family easier to remember and trust as one coherent system.