BarfPlan
The only app you need to plan and track the BARF / RAW diet
Today, I made the full rollout of the app. It was available on Android and iOS but there was a single country where the app wasn't available... and surprisingly that was the biggest market in the world. The USA 🙀
Why? Because I believe you can do a good first impression only once and going to a new market is more than just adding translations. Sure, it helps but that's only the first step.
The app is "units heavy" and I didn't want to release it before I will support imperial units. After some research, I even decided to support a mix of units (a suggestion from a Redditor).
The cool thing is that I'm guessing what unit a user will need. But they still have the ability to change it.
Finally, nothing stops me from going global, and not worrying about US citizens hating the app because of the "incompatibility" with their local market.
The app is written in ReactNative and when it comes to functionality we were ready from day 1 to release it to both stores at the same time.
Unfortunately, my lack of knowledge about subscription payments for digital goods was revealed. I had to do a few things in Google Play and connect all the things.
BUT HERE WE ARE. Just about a week later after releasing iOS we released the app on Android [1].
Surprisingly (or maybe not?) Android users have more feedback than iOS but it's all very positive. Showing the new directions in app evolution.
Fortunately, all that feedback aligns 100% with what I already had on my roadmap 🎉
PS. There are a couple of subscriptions already. This surprises me because we offer 2 weeks trial! They don't have to upgrade yet 😍
[1] https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.getbarfplan
This is my first paid product. I mean, I am a front-end dev, working on products for the last 10+ years, people pay for what I did...
... BUT this is the first time someone paid for a thing that I've built from an empty page. I literally started with pen and paper.
What a feeling that is. They say the feeling of earning your first dollar on your product is amazing. And I can only confirm.
The nice man who bought it sent me an email also (I encourage people to do it in the follow-up email). He was wishing us a lot of success and told me it was something he really needed and he believes in this product.
He bought an annual subscription! Amazing 🎉
After months of working on the app and testing it every day we were finally ready to push it into the wild.
I must say, the last month (or two) were all around turning "our app" into a product and filling the gaps in missing features like "I forgot my password" or adding payment methods to AppStore and Google Play. Nothing sexy.
I missed adding new features and tweaking the interface at that time but there are certain things that you just need to do.
But here it is! We released it [1] and announced that to ~300 people on our FB fan page. We got a good few accounts created in the first few days.
THE BIGGEST COMPLAINT now - why it's not available on Android?! 🤖
Good problem to have... when you write in ReactNative 😉
PS. We are still under the radars. The app is multilingual but we only reached ~300 people. On purpose. We want to polish a few things before a full release.
Our dogs are on BARF / RAW diet. So they eat meat and supplements. Unfortunately, it's not easy to calculate everything on your own. Excel is your friend but it's just not the tool for the job.
My wife asked me if I could create an app for her, something she can just use out of her pocket to plan and track our dogs' nutrition. There are apps on the market but not very interactive. More like an information app about BARF.
Initially, she wanted something super hardcoded but I wasn't happy with that. I LOVE BUILDING PRODUCTS. So I said I can do it but only if she let me design it and code it with the potential to turn it into a product.
In the next months, we fell in love with the app. We can't imagine how we could use Excel before. There is no way back anymore.
By accident, we shared an idea in one of the BARF Facebook groups in Poland. My wife replied to a post with screenshots from my app and told people how we do it.
We've got dozens of leads that day and even invited a few folks into a testing group.
And that's just the beginning of the story...
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