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1) Hustle. Talk to people about your app. Tell everyone you know about it. Tell them to use it. If someone doesn't want to use your app, ask them why. If you ca

1) Hustle. Talk to people about your app. Tell everyone you know about it. Tell them to use it. If someone doesn't want to use your app, ask them why. If you can't find a dozen people who use your app, there's something wrong with your app and you need to go back to the drawing board. 2) Content. If your app is about fashion, make sure you have gorgeous fashion on your website. I see two half-assed selfies on your website. Get professional photos that make me think: YES I want to look like this. YES I want to look at photos of people like this. And don't fill your blog with SEO crap. If you can't write well, post pretty photos instead. 3) No ads. Ignore all advise about buying ads or hiring an SEO agency. Doing that stuff right is really hard, and if you can't do it yourself you won't be able to afford the people who can do it right. It's really easy to spend all your money on ineffective advertisement. You can advertise after you have some initial traction, but advertising wont help you get a broken product off the ground.

mstipetic 11y ago
Thanks for your feedback! The main problem with starting an app like this is that it basically doesn't work without having a substantial number of users. Even with a dozen people onboard, it will still feel very empty. We need a way to gain a larger following quickly to get the ball rolling, and for the user interaction with it to even make sense. As for the selfies on the website, we had the idea of using real photos that you might find on the app, instead of some obviously professionally made photos, but, yes, that might be the wrong approach. And yes, I really feel that the "No ads" is the way to gain a real following, and if the app is good, it will spread organically.
- dllthomas 11y ago
  "The main problem with starting an app like this is that it basically doesn't work without having a substantial number of users." I think the traditional advice is "fake it 'til you make it". Is your concern that you will have too many photos and not enough people rating? Rate them yourselves. Not enough photos for raters to feel engaged? Send every photo to everyone, tune it down when you can.
  - mstipetic 11y ago
    Yes, some of those tactics are being employed, however the number of users is so low it doesn't really matter. To get technical, since this is HN, the photo distribution part is done by a Lua script running inside of redis instance which does just that, distributing images based on current demand and skewed towards recent ones. But if the number of images is small, every image will try to be distributed.
- zensavona 11y ago
  Take a page from Reddit's book and fake it till you make it.
- jakobegger 11y ago
  I disagree. You can totally make this app work even if there are only a handful users. Just make sure there are some initial pictures to look at (take them yourself) and make sure that anyone who submits a photo gets replies quickly (by monitoring activity and immediately sending feedback yourself). Yes, at some point all the content should come from users; for now you'll have to provide some of it. Concerning the selfies on the website: I guess they should look like you'd find them on the app. But you can still pick properly lit shots where the model looks into the camera with a nicely decorated apartment in the background.
  - mstipetic 11y ago
    Yes, we could do more on the "hustle" and "fake it 'till you make it" part. We'll look into the website selfies to make them nicer, thanks!
- CodeWriter23 11y ago
  Have you and your friend considered bringing in another partner who understands fashion marketing and branding?
  - mstipetic 11y ago
    Yes, of course. We've been having trouble finding such person. We'd be happy to give a stake in the project to the person if he/she would see it through. If you know any people who would be open to that, please let us know

mstipetic 11y ago

Thanks for your feedback! The main problem with starting an app like this is that it basically doesn't work without having a substantial number of users. Even with a dozen people onboard, it will still feel very empty. We need a way to gain a larger following quickly to get the ball rolling, and for the user interaction with it to even make sense. As for the selfies on the website, we had the idea of using real photos that you might find on the app, instead of some obviously professionally made photos, but, yes, that might be the wrong approach. And yes, I really feel that the "No ads" is the way to gain a real following, and if the app is good, it will spread organically.

dllthomas 11y ago
"The main problem with starting an app like this is that it basically doesn't work without having a substantial number of users." I think the traditional advice is "fake it 'til you make it". Is your concern that you will have too many photos and not enough people rating? Rate them yourselves. Not enough photos for raters to feel engaged? Send every photo to everyone, tune it down when you can.
- mstipetic 11y ago
  Yes, some of those tactics are being employed, however the number of users is so low it doesn't really matter. To get technical, since this is HN, the photo distribution part is done by a Lua script running inside of redis instance which does just that, distributing images based on current demand and skewed towards recent ones. But if the number of images is small, every image will try to be distributed.
zensavona 11y ago
Take a page from Reddit's book and fake it till you make it.
jakobegger 11y ago
I disagree. You can totally make this app work even if there are only a handful users. Just make sure there are some initial pictures to look at (take them yourself) and make sure that anyone who submits a photo gets replies quickly (by monitoring activity and immediately sending feedback yourself). Yes, at some point all the content should come from users; for now you'll have to provide some of it. Concerning the selfies on the website: I guess they should look like you'd find them on the app. But you can still pick properly lit shots where the model looks into the camera with a nicely decorated apartment in the background.
- mstipetic 11y ago
  Yes, we could do more on the "hustle" and "fake it 'till you make it" part. We'll look into the website selfies to make them nicer, thanks!
CodeWriter23 11y ago
Have you and your friend considered bringing in another partner who understands fashion marketing and branding?
- mstipetic 11y ago
  Yes, of course. We've been having trouble finding such person. We'd be happy to give a stake in the project to the person if he/she would see it through. If you know any people who would be open to that, please let us know