
Oh shit, my weekend project turned into an App Store Best New App (2018) - wallflower
https://tannerchristensen.com/blog/2018/12/30/oh-shit-my-weekend-project-turned-into-an-app-store-best-new-app
======
liquidise
> “Snaplight serves an extremely niche need: mine.”

There is a subtle brilliance in this sentence. With this recognition comes the
permission to not try adding a mountain of features and complicating matters.
Build something you will use. Solve a problem you have. Enjoy the process and
accept the vulnerability that comes with shipping something to the world.
Chances are good things will come of it.

~~~
lerxst00
I recently had a similar experience: I watch a lot of YouTube videos and I
like reading through the comments. Often, comments quote specific timestamps
from the video and I would find it a pain to keep scrolling between the
comment section at the bottom of the page and the video at the top and then
find the specific time in the video that the comment was talking about.

So, I created a Chrome extension that surfaces YouTube comments that have
timestamps right below the video, around the time that the comment contains.
And, then disappears it after a few seconds.

It was fun to make and in the end, it solved a very specific problem that I
was facing.

Link: [https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/youtube-timed-
comm...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/youtube-timed-
comments/mfmjnhncafdcdegeiamnjpnjgmmkkaal)

~~~
Crinus
I had a similar case... i want to be able to download interesting videos with
youtube-dl in case they or me go offline but i found having to copy the url,
open a command line, move the proper folder, etc, type youtube-dl and paste
the url be a bit cumbersome, so i wrote a Firefox extension to do all that for
me.

This is extremely specific (and i had to switch to Firefox Developer Edition
to do that since the mainline one doesn't allow unsigned extensions) but it
was helpful and i got to learn how to make extensions for personal use (though
the whole process to call an external program was a convoluted PITA involving
adding registry entries, writing Python scripts to parse JSON, etc... meh).

~~~
Adverblessly
For a similar usecase I settled on writing a bash script along the lines of

    
    
      PARAM=`xclip -o -selection clipboard`
      notify-send downloading $PARAM
      youtube-dl $PARAM
    

And setting a keyboard shortcut to invoke it, so downloading is just

    
    
      CTRL+L (select URL)
      CTRL+C (copy selection)
      CTRL+ALT+D (trigger download script)

~~~
jeegsy
Damn Son! I have had the same issue and your solution is so face palm simple!
Excellent.

------
mister_hn
> "All-in-all the project took me an hour to program"

Come on, it's more than that. Being compliant to Apple Developer Guidelines
takes some more time.

~~~
_-___________-_
That's a strange statement. It's a very simple app, which specific guidelines
do you think should have taken significant time for him to write code that
complies to?

In my experience the guidelines are mostly common sense once you get used to
the "Apple way", and are straightforward to comply with, especially if you're
already familiar with them (OP had submitted several apps before).

~~~
mister_hn
still, claiming to hacking a mobile app together in one hour is something
strange as well. Does the "hour of code" includes setting up project in the
IDE, setting a repo, testing it, making it AppStore-ready?

Options are:

a. you have already the code somewhere (own sources, StackOverflow, GitHub,
etc.) b. you are bluffing

~~~
fingerlocks
I could believe it if you counted only the time taken to type just literal
code. Probably discounted the time it would take to build the UI .xib, wire up
all the event-handler delegates, and set all your layout constraints for the
various screen sizes.

And doesn't this use the camera and/or photos API? Not hard, but somewhat time
consuming to set up your boilerplate for these. Also handling permissions
request, response, & error handling. Probably copy/pasted from another project
so it wouldn't count?

Yeah I'm skeptical, but also sounds like a fun challenge.

------
luke14free
Just to be clear: the app makes ~20 downloads per day (checked on App Annie
premium and Sensor Tower premium) except for the fact that you change the
price from paid to free multiple times, causing multiple spikes in downloads
generated by sites like [https://www.148apps.com/](https://www.148apps.com/)
and [https://appadvice.com/apps-gone-free](https://appadvice.com/apps-gone-
free) which basically list all apps that have become free from paid.

So claiming `about 10,000 downloads each week` is not very correct.

~~~
yoz-y
I assume that the author has better visibility to actual download numbers than
App Annie or Sensor Tower. I assume they just got the number from the App
Store connect.

That is, apple highlights are massively more impactful that any other venue.
My app had reviews in multiple publications and I average about 200 downloads
per week, at around 4500 impressions. It got featured once in some list (in
Thailand) and I got about 1 million impressions per day. Sadly, the app was
paid (and not translated) at the time so no sales.

10k downloads per week is legitimately impressive for this kind of app. Kudos

~~~
luke14free
I work on models like those of Sensor Tower and App Annie use to estimate
downloads. They are extremely precise, the cross-validated error is << 10% for
apps that are this small, and in the US (it increases with much bigger apps in
countries where little data is available).

~~~
mettamage
In general, could you tell a bit about how do app downloads get estimated? Now
that I'm thinking about it, I think the first way to do it is to correlate the
amount of comments in your particular app section to downloads numbers that
you do know and extrapolate that out, assuming that comments/downloads ratio
stay the same within a particular app category.

One could test this hypothesis out on different YouTube video categories for
which this obviously is known to give the assumption some quick strength or
falsification.

Anyways, this is the first time I'm thinking about this question at all. I'm
curious what you're allowed/able to tell us.

~~~
luke14free
There is a public ranking of apps ranked by downloads in the app store. If you
know how many downloads correspond to what position in the chart (e.g. number
100 makes ~1000 downloads), you can fit a log regression to determine the
number of downloads given the ranking in the category. I am oversimplifying
because you also need to take into account seasonality and time trends (e.g.
the app store is always expanding), but overall fits are very very precise
(unless you get near the top positions, which are those for which they have
more problems in estimating). Ah, and if you wonder where the data comes from,
App Annie and Sensor Tower get data for downloads to fit their models directly
from tens of thousands of developers that share it with them in exchange for
free analytics,

------
vinhboy
> All-in-all the project took me an hour to program

That's amazing. I don't think I've ever written anything usable in an hour.

~~~
scarejunba
He's working in a space he has mastery. Like, look at this legend with his
live note taking of Inkscape + Latex. I would have been like two orders of
magnitude slower [https://castel.dev/post/lecture-
notes-2/](https://castel.dev/post/lecture-notes-2/)

~~~
_cairn
Unrelated to op, never seen this link before, super cool thanks for sharing.

------
ladberg
> As of March 2017, two years after launching Snaplight, it’s still going
> strong with about 10,000 downloads each week.

Wow. I've been hearing for years that the gold rush of 99 cent apps on the App
Store was done for, but this kinda gives me hope. I might get around to
finally finishing any app I've worked on...

~~~
curiousigor
Snaplight is a free app though, so while the 10k number is high I think it
would be hardly reached if he had placed a 99 cent tag on it, given the niche.
Some people (me included) like to download and try new apps, only to remove
them after the utility hasn't proven valuable enough.

That shouldn't stop you from finishing your app though. Building and later
publishing an app to your audience can be an awesome experience. Go for it!

~~~
rkho
From the original screenshot in the post, it looks like it debuted at $0.99, I
wonder if there's a way to look up App Store price history

~~~
curiousigor
You're right, totally missed from the screenshot and based my comment on the
current App Store data.

I looked the app on Appannie (non paid account) and the pricing history is
quite interesting:

26 Mar 2017 - 0.99 to Free

29 Mar 2017 - Free to 0.99

19 Jul 2017 - 0.99 to 1.99

20 Jul 2017 - 1.99 to Free

02 Aug 2017 - Free to 0.99

04 Feb 2018 - 0.99 to Free

10 Feb 2018 - Free to 0.99

03 Mar 2018 - 0.99 to Free

27 Mar 2018 - Free to 0.99

04 Dec 2018 - 0.99 to Free

03 May 2019 - Free to 0.99

05 Sep 2019 - 0.99 to Free

From the above details, it was a paid app for most of it's time. I wonder why
the developer played with the pricing as much though?

~~~
tannerc
I just looked at the lifetime stats for the app and in total it only ever
generated ~$4,000 in profit.

I would often change the price to 1. See if I could squeeze a few more dollars
out of the work and 2. Generate more downloads.

A fun "trick" for getting more downloads is to temporarily make a paid app
free, as many, many people follow "Apps Gone Free" type of bots or directories
and if your app has any substantial numbers behind it more people tend to
notice when it switches to free.

------
z3t4
The year should say 2015. Would be nice to know some more stats, maybe a
downloads graph? When was is made free, and why?

------
dfrew
I had a similar itch and built a similar app, except snippets are captured as
searchable text and organised by books [1]. It was only ever my second app and
app building for me is as much about the journey as the destination so it took
me a lot longer than 1h/24h.

I agree with the premise of the article ie build small, monetize, learn.

Other lessons I've learned: Promotion is harder than building. It's pretty
hard to get more than a few downloads per day. Free or not, once it's out
there your users will make demands. I got emails from all over the world
requesting all sorts of new features. Simple is better. Almost all feedback I
got was that the app did one thing well (actually good enough). Try different
monetisation strategies.

[1] Key Passages [https://apps.apple.com/us/app/key-passages-study-
assistant/i...](https://apps.apple.com/us/app/key-passages-study-
assistant/id1442938779)

------
wodenokoto
While the article was last updated 2018, I think 2015 is more appropriate.

------
King-Aaron
There's a strange double-scrollbar in the #content div, that makes viewing on
a desktop a little awkward

(Chrome/ Win10)

~~~
Traubenfuchs
Which could be easily fixed by setting the body height from 100% to 100vh.

------
nirui
> I held my place in the book with one hand while thumbing through the app
> store on my phone in the other, unable to find an app that could accomplish
> what I was looking for. Then an idea suddenly struck me: I could easily
> create — or try to create — an app that allows me to highlight and share
> quotes from the books I’m reading.

This, my dear, is what an application should be created for -- To help resolve
real problems and improve lives.

"Best New App" is well desired.

------
rolltiide
Interesting how the current version only has 5 ratings, but the author at the
time says it received 10,000 per week. We would never know this and could
never be able to assign validation to this app from the metrics we see in
passing

I find that interesting

~~~
forkLding
I've had an app that kind of blew up and grew to thousands of users in several
weeks and then reach top 200 Lifestyle Apps on Appstore. It also had more than
100 ratings with an avg rating of 4.6. However I stopped updating a long time
ago and removed it from Appstore, I noticed basically that old ratings get
erased after version updates to the app which I guess make sense as it ensures
reviews are actually of the current version of the app so.I guess Snaplight
just died in popularity after several updates.

~~~
dmurray
This makes sense in a way, but also seems like it has bad incentives for
developers.

------
Double_a_92
I wonder how much the app name and icon contributed to the success. The name
is unique while still having the know "snap" as trigger in there, and the icon
is also quite neat and clean.

~~~
bemmu
The video was also very good, I imagine Apple wants to promote apps that have
nice intros.

------
LukeWalsh
Wow this is actually scratching an itch of mine now. I love the kindle feature
of saving / sharing quotes and have been wanting something for offline.
Awesome work Tanner!

------
bonoboTP
It makes me sad that features are now paid apps. Imagine if every tool in GIMP
was a separate app.

This app should be a feature of a default Paint-like app.

~~~
ineedasername
In some ways I think this is the environment Apple has cultivated (maybe not
deliberately) over the years. Basic features like cut & paste are left out,
and then announced in a later version to as though it's this great innovation.
Not that this particular app is such a basic feature, but illustrates the
reasons why there are so many single-function utility apps. And of course the
danger of them for their developers, if they rely on them for their
livelihood, is that Apple will at any moment swoop in and copy the most
popular ones. For the record, I'm not sure there's anything wrong with that on
its own, but there is when Apple doesn't let developers access iOS as deeply
as they do themselves.

------
0x0aff374668
I don't know what troubles me more:

1\. a clearly-expert developer bragging about 1 hour to write hit app then
telling everyone to basically live the dream chicken soup for the soul bs

2\. people who experience increased anxiety from said
wampeter/foma/granfalloon* because they haven't wildly succeeded

My brain to me: Welcome to 2019.

* See: Kurt Vonnegut

------
not_a_cop75
Sounds cool, but the scratch your itch advice isn't for everyone. Most
everything I would want as an app, maybe 1% of the population would every even
consider using, and that's assuming they knew about it.

~~~
ineedasername
Isn't that the point of the statement though? You do it for yourself, not
because anyone else at all might want to use it. Then if you toss it up on the
app store and anyone does actually use it, it's just a happy upside.

~~~
not_a_cop75
It would make more sense if the example were of an app no one ever knew about,
if that really was the case. His app provided more of a counterexample, if
what you're saying is true.

~~~
ineedasername
I took the fact that his app became popular as a happy accident. That he made
it mostly to satisfy himself, because he was, in his words, "scratching his
own itch". That it worked out on the app store was just a nice benefit, but
not really part of the motivation. Or such was my interpretation, maybe I have
it wrong.

~~~
tannerc
Exactly right.

------
Rerarom
What if you don't have any itch? Seriously.

~~~
rubbingalcohol
That's okay, and there's no shame in working a 9 to 5 job in that case. Not
everyone is cut out to (nor should) be an entrepreneur.

------
jnordwick
Hunblebrag much?

~~~
LukeWalsh
I don’t think this is a humblebrag. It’s a success story, and we should
celebrate those. There’s nothing wrong with being excited about something
turning into more of a success than expected, and there are a lot of general
values in the post that may be broadly encouraging to folks here.

