

Ask HN: I'm an unknown indie developer. How can I promote my web app? - cleer

I launched my first major web app, http://grapev.in, a few days ago.<p>Since then, I've been iterating on the app to improve the user experience. However, this is difficult with few users and consequentially little feedback. I published some info about the app to a few sources, including HN, but it's difficult to get a voice heard as a completely unknown developer.<p>I'd really like to generate awareness of the app so that I can get some feedback and understand how to improve it. It's not a business by any means, so I'm not financially incentivized. Just trying to make something good. How can I go about this?
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warwick
In a C4 talk a few years ago, Wil Shipley said that he's asked things like
"How can I launch my app to 10,000 people on day one?". The answer is "Well,
you can't."

If you haven't put the time into creating a reputation (either for yourself or
for your product) and getting people excited about your next release, you
aren't going to suddenly find yourself able to tap into a nonexistent
audience.

What you can do is grow your reputation by creating great products and growing
a community of people who are interested. Launch to a hundred people, and
don't be disappointed that you're not a hit by next Tuesday. Overnight success
stories are rare, and almost always backed by years of hard work. There's no
secret website that you have to submit to and people will suddenly start using
your product.

You'll gain users over time. At least in my experience, now is the best time
for iteration. You've only got a few users, and you can actually interact with
them as people, not just statistics.

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emerglide
Some ideas / thoughts:

On viewing your site, my first thought was why am I being prompted to log in?
I've just landed, the first thing I want to do is find my feet.

I suggest maybe put a recently submitted playlist to the right of the main
page. Then have a dialogue with a button with something like 'create playlist'
to left.

Allow people to create playlists anonymously if they want - then give them the
ability to share it. That might encourage some people to stay on your site and
generate content who otherwise may have left. I know you're aiming for social,
but how about the ability for people (logged in) to vote up / down playlists
being the more social aspect?

Having names / titles for playlists as well, that way someone is likely to
create more than one and give them proper labels that people can use in rating
them.

I'll be honest, I don't think I can picture myself using this app as is. If I
want to share a song with people I know I'll likely send a link in an IM or
put it in facebook.

As you're probably aware of, there are plenty of places which do the whole
music + social aspect already, so why should I use your service? How is it
different and more worthwhile than simply sharing links on facebook / twitter?
These are the kinds of important questions I'd ask myself.

I think your application does have potential though. I'd say worry less about
number of users or level feedback you have and more about the product you're
creating at this early stage. The important thing is to keep doing stuff -
keep adding features and refining it.

~~~
retroafroman
The login thing is also what made me immediately close the tab last time I
checked this website out. (He submitted it sometime earlier this week or
last.) I just wanted to take a stroll around the site, see what's up, get
carded at the door.

------
hendrik-xdest
I tried your app and liked it. But there is no way to get in contact with you
easily. Try to offer a simple contact form to send in feedback. And - I can't
believe I am saying that - make it visibly beta.

Because I would really like to use grapevin but have run into some technical
problems. First, if I add a track I do not get any feedback of it's addition
when using the latest non-beta Firefox. Secondly, if I click a song from the
"Edit Playlist" page it will always play the first one and not the one I
clicked. Before you do any extensions test your app extensivly. It will help
spread the word when more user are satisfied with the service.

The next step in my opinion would be to include more music sources, of course.
There is already a lot that is recognized. You might want to consider
displaying a different "Missing cover" grafic when the song is available from
Grooveshark, though. For example "Das Racist - You Oughta Know" does not show
a cover but has the song. While when putting in an unknown German band it
displayed the same icon. One always has to check his live page if a song can
be played or not.

In my opinion, if you get the feedback function up and do not have any
financial targets, it's best to let it grow on it's own.

------
Skywing
I actually like this site quite a bit. I use Grooveshark all the time and find
it difficult to "explore" new music on it. Perhaps if this site makes that
easier then I will use it often.

Also, perhaps some form auto complete suggestions as you type in a song name
to add to your playlist?

Right now, though, it doesn't really seem to offer anything that Grooveshark
itself doesn't.

~~~
heymatty
+1 on the auto complete. I don't know Grooveshark all that well. I'm still
unsure how to create my playlist... so I type the title of the song? How does
it work?

------
heymatty
I would go where Grooveshark users are. Find who they are and reach to them.
Use twitter search and other social monitoring tools to find them.
<http://lithium.com> has got a good social monitoring tool you can use free
for 14 days. Should be plenty of time for you to find enough of them.

Once you found them, ask them if they would part take into grapev.in mavens.
Tell them you are looking for feedback from heavy grooveshark users and in
return they will be the only ones with early access to some grapev.in
features.

Create them a special account, give them a place where they can connect to
each other. Make them super fans by iterating and get to market fit with them.

They will evangelize your product for you - sounds like a good starting point.

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trouble
Well, I'm not an expert or anything so don't take my comments toooo seriously;
but the first thing I noticed was that it doesn't look like there's anyway to
use your app without signing in via Facebook or Twitter. I'm not likely to do
that, especially for an unknown application. I understand it's a social app,
so there are good reasons to link it with FB and Twitter, but it would be nice
to bypass the signin part in order to see what it's like and whether I like it
before committing to a connection with FB/Twitter. Maybe I missed that option,
but if so, it wasn't an obvious one.

The point of my comment, I guess, is that if you want more feedback and
awareness, maybe you need to make it more accessible?

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veb
I really like this. I'm actually using it now. Could you not join Facebook
Groups and start 'talking' about your website? For example, join some music
lovin' group and mention it... or even get in touch with the owners/admins and
ask to "affiliate".

Those are just random thoughts, I'm in the same boat as you. :) Good luck!

EDIT: Signed up and everything, but I like to listen to other peoples
playlists, however if I'm signed in, I can't find any, because it redirects me
to /me and that feature is on the main page ...

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hardik988
Breaking off on a tangent here, but for some reason, I cannot get any of the
features on the website to work. The added songs don't play (No Song Found),
the change URL function breaks the site. When I click on the URL below Share
your Playlist, a new tab opens up with a new playlist URL. (I'm on Chrome
8/Ubuntu Maverick)

Design-wise, I would probably not black out the album cover to show the name
of the album/artist, but just make it transparent

~~~
cleer
I've stupidly been doing all my dev and testing in Chrome OS X. I tried out
Firefox OS X today and located several bugs that were preventing main
functionality from working; they're now fixed. Maybe that applies to cross-OS
Chrome somehow? (I got other reports about things being broken on Chrome
Windows.) If you get the time, I'd be thankful if you could try it out again
and let me know if anything's fixed. I haven't figured out the change
URL/share URL bugs yet, though.

------
cleer
Thanks, everyone, for the great, useful feedback. I'm taking all of it into
consideration. :) Much appreciated.

