GomScope
Supercharge your Bear notes
36 paying customers and 1,013 USD so far.
It's not subscription, so not recurring.
When I started this project, I never thought of this revenue. This project itself is a good one I can put my passion into, but also its income will be a good seed money for me to start other things.
For example there are good saas tools I can utilize but didn't use because of the cost. Now that I have a passive income, I can leverage it.
So far we've had 24 users who purchased the app. The total revenue is $671. It's been a good beta period. The users in the community slack have provided so much feedback and I iterated quickly. I feel confident that this can go public, so just sent an email to 222 people from the mailing list. We'll see how it goes π€
Getting closer to the official release. The alpha testers and beta users (who paid) are actively giving me feedback. I've made a lot of progress so far.
Having paid customers before official launching is so good in many ways. They proactively give feedback, I guess, because they paid and want the app to be better. It's good to know there are people buying it for the current price.
Initially I didn't think of code-signing this Mac app, meaning when user first installs it, they will see a popup like "this isn't verified. you really want to open it?" I didn't care much. I didn't want to spend about $100 just to get rid of it. Now that I already have $361, I could invest $100 to get rid of it and add the auto-update feature.
It's definitely good to earn some money before the official release π
I'm glad I made a decision a week ago to release the beta version in public. It got me 9 paid customers for total $249. It maybe not a lot of money but clearly shows there are some people willing to pay for what I do. It encourages me a lot. Some of them are actively giving me feedback which is insightful. I plan to release the stable version in two weeks.
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Congratulations!
Couldn't find which platforms your are targeting. Lots of work for the site should be done, too. I'm convinced you are on the right way! :)-
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Thanks for the advice :) It's a helper app for Bear which is Mac and iOS only. I should clearly say that in the website and I still need to make product detail page and etc. What else did you see that I should improve on the website?
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Congrats.
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Congrats man (β’Μα΄β’Μ)Ω
Wish your business continue growing -
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Congrats!
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Thanks π
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Good job! Get as much feedback from those early users as you can! Getting money before a stable release is great validation.
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Thank you :)
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After getting 10 alpha testers, I've been working on the app and released 4 versions to the testers.
Last week, someone reached out asking if the tester seat is available. I said sorry but would release it soon.
Today someone else reached out asking when it will be released. I said "It will be released in a month or two."
And I thought.
"The current version is not perfect but it's already usable. Why not release it now and lose a month or two?"
So I decided to release it as "beta" with reduced price. Once I really the official version, I will increase the price. Not sure how much yet.
So I sent a DM to the person to say it's available for purchase. And the first transaction is done! I've been working as software developer since 2011 but it is my first time every earning money outside company.
Now I'm going to send an email to the 220 subscribers that they can already purchase the beta version with the reduced price even though the app isn't perfectly polished yet.
I published the second alpha version last night. Now I check my previous milestone here in IndieHackers, it was only 4 days ago I released the first version.
I guess I'm in a very rapid iteration. This new version includes new features that both I and the community members wanted.
Although this testing community is going well in my opinion, I'm striving to find channels to acquire users once it launches. I posted about GomScope once in r/bearapp but they deleted my second post because they think it's spam-y.
Yesterday I released the very first alpha version to the 10 alpha testers. We have a dedicated Slack I've started a week or so ago. So far, 4 people have installed it, and I'm starting to get feedback. I really like the velocity so far.
I was thinking of improving the note viewer but according to the feedback, the next minor update is going to be all about graph view.
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Well done! Also love the attitude of prioritising features your users actually want, rather then just building what you think is best!
Just be careful you understand the 'job to be done' from the user. What is exactly they are trying to do with the graph view? I go more into that stuff here https://www.indiehackers.com/post/listening-to-your-users-is-essential-for-building-a-successful-product-heres-how-you-can-effectively-collect-and-analyse-user-feedback-a723c38208
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Wow, that post looks really nice. I'll give it a thorough read later tonight :)
I'll try my best to analyize their needs and implement what's best for them, not literally what they asked for.
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Congrats, man! This is a major achievement! Try to get as much quality feedback from those alpha users as you can. They will help lay the foundations of your product.
Also, I really like your landing page - really clear and simple. Curious how much you plan to charge for this once you release it?
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Hey thank you so much!
I'm going to create a pricing page with details including why I'm charging like that, but to give you a brief summary, it's going to be (not 100% sure yet, though) 28 USD, one-time payment.
I'm not maintaining any server for this app, so it doesn't make any sense to charge them monthly or annually. I will also make it clear that they're paying for what I've already done, not for what I will add in the future. I will continuously provide some updates, but don't guarantee that I can bring new huge functions. If I do it, then it must be v2 and will charge more for upgrade, IMO.
Does it make sense to you?
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GomScope has got 147 people waiting for the product on the mailing list and just got 10 alpha testers in a private Slack workspace after sending an email to the subscribers yesterday.
We will iterate the app based on their experiences and are planning to get beta testers in a month.
I had an idea to visualize the Bear notes as a graph to help people understand the connections between notes, which can lead to new discoveries of ideas.
I've made the first PoC and put it on r/bearapp.
https://www.reddit.com/r/bearapp/comments/jn7o27/thinking_of_generating_a_graph_out_of_my_bear/
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