Stashcook
Simple recipe management
The initial release of Stashcook Premium had one Premium feature, Family Share (share recipes, meals and shopping lists with family members). Although highly requested it is a feature that is specific and is only required once the app is full integrated into your meal planning process.
In the latest release, I added the Stashcook web browser. This is a far more generic feature that all users can benefit from. It simplifies the process of stashing recipes from within the app.
I also changed the onboarding to include the Stashcook web browser so the users are familiar with it before being asked to upgrade.
This has increased the conversion rate by over 200%.
Onwards and upwards!
I pushed out Stashcook's first newsletter to those who had signed up to the app. It detailed the official release of Stashcook Premium and how the new Premium features allow you to share your recipes, meal plans and shopping lists with your family/household.
STATS:
Open rate: 16.09%
Unsubscribers: 2.08%
Click rate: 1.48%
*taken after 3 days
This is the first time I have completed any real email marketing. I found that the click-through rate was pretty modest. I realised after sending that the Call To Action wasn't very strong and only directed the users to the app store via the generic "Download on the XXX Store" button.
In a perfect world, I would have wanted to add a button to open the app on the sign up to the Premium page. However, I hadn't set up the universal links to open the app. In hindsight I would:
- create a generic URL to open up a particular part of the app (premium page, recipe page or a meal plan week for example)
- add one very large and very bold button in the newsletter for "Go Premium now!"
This is the email: http://x9hs9.mjt.lu/nl2/x9hs9/xlhy.html?hl=en
Feedback welcome! Be kind, though. It's my first time! 😅
-------------SIDE NOTE------------
---Email campaign software---
It took me about 3 days to review the 10's of email campaign managers. Long story short I opted for MailJet. Mainly for its low price but also a lot of the expensive (£100+ to send to 10,000+ contacts) had features I didn't think I'd use, not to mention couldn't afford.
MailJet allows me to send 30,000 emails (no contact limits) for £6.95/month. The templating software is simple enough to use and supports MJML, which as a developer, is great!
After 8 months of working on Stashcook, I have released its first Premium version. Stashcook Premium offers users the ability to link their accounts with their family members to automatically sync recipes, meal plans and shopping lists.
After a soft launch of the Premium offering, the app has totalled $100 in monthly subscriptions across 40 subscribers. I opted for a Pay What You Want payment model in the early days in order to attract users to the Premium features. The modal has 3 options (£0.99 / £2.99 / £5.99 a month). The majority have opted for the lowest tier but the average payment is approx. $2.50.
I'm unsure of the long term viability of this payment model but I didn't want to exclude anyone from the Premium features while I try to work out the business/payment model that will allow Stashcook to become my full-time job.
The feedback on the product has been extremely positive and I'm excited to see what happens in the coming week as I start marketing the Premium version.
I'm always keen to hear feedback. If you try the app, let me know what you think.
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Great app!
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Thanks 😊. If you have any feedback or suggestions, just drop me a message.
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1
Hey Royston,
Some nice to have that my help improve the usability and some features that would be nice.
1- The ability to adjust the serving is such a neat feature. I notice that when I adjust the serving (i.e. 6 to 2) and then tab to the "methods" tab and then come back to the "ingredients" tab, I lose my set serving. It would be nice if the serving size stays to what I've selected.
2-On the Methods tab, it would be nice to bold the ingredients to make them stick out, which could make it easy for the user to scan through the instruction.
3-Is there anyway the user can dismiss the toaster link at the bottom if they are not trying to add a recipe into the app? Just a thought.
Overall, great app!
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Will do! My boyfriend and I started using your app during the pandemic. Your family plan is a game changer.
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1
Congrats on the milestone, Roy!
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whoot!
Stashcook has made it to version 1 and available on Android and iOS.
Over the past 7 months I have learnt a lot more that I thought I would. I've been making software for over a decade now and i'm still learning.
To celebrate version 1 I quit my job and I am now working full-time on Stashcook. I'm not sure where the revenue streams are for this venture yet. However, I'm looking to make this the best product it can be before worrying too much about money.
v1 has a running cost of £7.54/m per environment. Currently Stashcook running on to environments: Dev and Prod.
I have invested approximately £3,200 into the project so far. These costs come from developer licences and external designer costs.
I'd like to give a shout out to some of the amazing open source libraries I have used to create this app. These libraries are truly incredible.
- .Net Core (for back-end services)
- SpaCy (for the NLP of ingredients)
- Flutter (for the UI)
You can read more about why I made Stashcook in this short article.
https://medium.com/@roy.cockram/stashcook-so-i-made-my-girlfriend-an-app-e528631a400
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