
Ask HN: What am I doing wrong with this project? - stephanduq
Hello HN,<p>for the last two years I have been developing WellDressed, an app that can suggest outfits to wear based on how you look. http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.welldressed-app.com<p>And I have never been able to earn a single dollar with it. I&#x27;m now getting to a point where I&#x27;m going to have to quit. Because I can&#x27;t afford to keep the project live any longer. But before I do, I hope that I can receive some feedback that can explain why this project is so unsuccessful.<p>I started out with an affiliate system, I crawl a few stores and display their products in the app. Using twotap users can make an purchase at the affiliated shops, and I should be able to collect a commission. As styles are constantly changing, I also need to constantly update new styles. As a last ditch effort I tried to monetize new styles with an in-app purchase. But no success either.<p>I&#x27;ll give you some metrics, to give you an idea what is going on behind the scenes:
Total users: 5600.
Total activated users: 3700.
Monthly churn rate: 19%.
DAU&#x2F;MAU: 45&#x2F;700 (5.7%).
Average userlifetime: 145 days.<p>These users generate a total of: 
2800 monthly outfit requests.
15000 monthly impressions of the garments in the app.
600 monthly clicks for more information.
80 monthly clicks to visit a retailers website, or to go to a twotap checkout.<p>Total revenue: $0<p>The user numbers are quite low, as I haven&#x27;t really done any marketing yet. But I do feel that with the current numbers there should have been at least some form of revenue over the last few months. Without knowing if the app can make money, I&#x27;m also quite hesitant about putting it out there.<p>I would really appreciate it if some of you could share some thoughts on why its not working. Maybe I&#x27;m interpreting the metrics wrong and is the app doing horrible, maybe the UX just sucks, or maybe there just isn&#x27;t a market. At this point, I just don&#x27;t know and I lack the experience of a successful product to reference this app with.
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danieltillett
You have enough users to know if they will ever convert to sales and I think
you have your answer.

If I was to say why this approach didn't work it is that you are trying to
target a very unusual person - someone who cares enough about what they wear
to use an app to tell them what to wear, but also doesn't care enough about
what they wear so they are happy to wear what they are told what to wear
(sorry for the convoluted sentence).

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stephanduq
I completely understand your sentence, it makes me wonder if the design of the
app itself is convoluted as well. And perhaps should be either a wardrobe
manager, or a tinder of outfits. Instead of trying to be both, and some more.

And thank you for your reply!

~~~
danieltillett
Not a problem.

One suggestion I do have is maybe aim the app at women. Many girlfriends/wives
buy their boyfriends/husbands clothes, but they are often unsure what he will
like and often buy items of clothes that he doesn’t like (my wife does this
all the time to me). Your app might work really well to help women buy clothes
for men that they will actually like.

~~~
stephanduq
Thank you, right now I'm playing with the thought of giving it one last go (I
just got featured on Producthunt, so that kinda gives me a confidence boost).
And I'm playing with the idea of trimming the app down in features, focus on a
core user (women are a very good idea).

One more month...

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danieltillett
If you are serious about going down the route of targeting women then get in
contact with me as I may be able to help you make this happen.

~~~
stephanduq
Thank you for the generous offer, I definitely will!

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smt88
Have you asked your users?

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stephanduq
Yeah, I implemented a small feedback dialogue a few months back. About 79%
where positive about the entire app, but they just never got around to
purchasing anything through the app, or did so through a browser. They would
like to see some changes to the wardrobe section of the app.

The remaining 20% didn't like the slow speed the app used to operate on. And
it felt that when they used their own clothes, instead of the stores, they
never got results. Both of those issues have been fixed.

One of the bigger lessons I got, is that users used the app mostly for their
own clothes, and not to shop. And it seems to be used much more as an
inspirational source, instead of a shop. The problem is, that if the app would
provide the same value as a social media influencer, I can't afford to scale
it to a point where it could be profitable by working with brands. And I'm
also unsure if the current metrics are scaleable, and if growth is actually a
possibility at this point.

~~~
smt88
So you're saying that if you drove any sales, you lost the commission because
the user switched out of your app and onto the desktop?

~~~
stephanduq
Yeah. Or they remember the outfit combinations when they are shopping, and
look for something similar in the store. A rather large percentage of the
users I have asked prefers to shop in the stores because they can feel the
fabric and experience the fit.

I think there are two very different users (thanks to the post above that I
realised this):

\- The user has no clue, and wants to know what works well within his existing
wardrobe. Not really interested in shopping.

\- Knows what he wants, likes the app for the inspiration it gives. But also
likes the entire process of shopping.

