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You've raised some really great points. And no, this is not raining on my parade, I think this feedback is more like fertilizer :). So, thanks. I guess since I

by hgezim 14y ago

You've raised some really great points. And no, this is not raining on my parade, I think this feedback is more like fertilizer :). So, thanks. I guess since I use it and know the URL quite well, I didn't prioritize creating an account too high, but you're absolutely right. Thanks so much for your thoughts. P.S.: Any thoughts on how I can monetize this? Would you pay for a monthly subscription if there was a mobile app and all the convenience factors you've mentioned?

johnmurch 14y ago
A few thoughts on making $$$. 1. SAAS - Set the bar low and features high -> $2/month gets you private lists, dedicated subdomain, etc. Make it so cheap that people just buy it/signup. Might want to focus on "prepay 6 months for $12" - so users don't feel locked in. etc. Have more features with the premium model like email notifications/alerts/bigger teams 2. Affiliate Ads - Focus on future partners/affiliates - think of your product as a gateway drug to a bigger platform for doing/development. Push affiliate products that are targeted towards developers as well as bigger products like asana or basecamp. Try other products that every person needs (dollarshaveclub/birchbox.com) 3. Kinda crazy but wonder if you could do something like http://www.launchbit.com http://www.launchbit.com - if users signup with email and leverage http://www.fullcontact.com/developer/ http://www.fullcontact.com/developer/ or https://www.rapleaf.com/ https://www.rapleaf.com/ you could break out users and serve up newsletters around productivity and do joint ventures with other companies to test drive their products. Since most likely your audiance will be startup/dev community. Anyway - just some thoughts
- hgezim 14y ago
  Very interesting ideas. I love it! I might try going after 1. at first and see where it goes. Anyone doing something similar and want to partner up with me? Maybe a complementary system, etc.
- johnmurch 14y ago
  I gotta throw out these 2 other ideas as they relate as I have some working code on a similar problem but focused around small groups and daily tasks. 1. Take a look at http://15five.com/ http://15five.com/ - Just 4 to 5 questions, 15mins - extremely valuable. The problem is status updates. A todo list can fit into this space nicely when you have many teams (e.g. enterprise) and all need a update/email for each weekly sprint. 2. Todo Tonight - Many developers/hackers/etc have day time jobs, but then spend another 3 to 5 hours each night hacking on something. To better focus on their time - rather than send crap to an email each day - why not have a task/todo that is nighly. Speeds up the process - focuses on a simpler achievable tasks (did you complete last night, add notes, urls,etc.) The idea is it's a holding place for "STUFF" it relates to what you are working on. Hit me up @johnmurch if you want to chat more
bpatrianakos 14y ago
johnmurch's comment has a lot of what I'd say. I'm not so sure about his #2 or 3 but his #1 was really good. I'd just price it super low and have the option to prepay for a year for a small discount. If I had built this, I wouldn't be having visions of raking in millions but you could realistically make a nice side income from it. If the price is like $4 a month or $20 for a year and you're basically just hosting a CRUD app that only stores text then it shouldn't be very expensive to run. Consider too that you built it just for fun. Put that all together and even if you charged $1 for life from every user you've made a profit. Maybe I'm wrong but that's how I think of my projects. It's like I was going to rent the servers and build something anyway so even if I make a single cent then I'm in the green. But to answer your question more directly, yes. If this were a beautiful site/mobile app that did this one thing really well I would pay. It would be really pretty to look at (like Cheddar is/was), would be super convenient (open a URL or tap a phone icon), and do one thing well (I managed different todo lists with others and I didn't have to fuck with settings or signing in more than once a month or click/tap through more than one screen to get what I wanted) so it would be worth the few bucks I'd probably spend on a coffee or something. A problem I see is getting groups to use it. Individuals all have their own preferred ways of todo-ing. A thought just came to me that if you made this awesome to work with alone then people would end up using it on their own and then they'd get together and use the group features later. Just a thought. Tie-ins with other products would be good too. I don't know if they're monetizable but they're certainly great for promotion. If you could build an API and hook your app up to someone else's and vice versa that could definitely be a value-add for a lot of people. Throw up a payment form with Stripe and just see if people will pay $1 for fully refundable 30-day trial and the promise of getting in on some future features of your choosing. That will tell you a lot about how interested people are and if its worth exploring monetization.

by hgezim 14y ago

johnmurch 14y ago

A few thoughts on making $$$. 1. SAAS - Set the bar low and features high -> $2/month gets you private lists, dedicated subdomain, etc. Make it so cheap that people just buy it/signup. Might want to focus on "prepay 6 months for $12" - so users don't feel locked in. etc. Have more features with the premium model like email notifications/alerts/bigger teams 2. Affiliate Ads - Focus on future partners/affiliates - think of your product as a gateway drug to a bigger platform for doing/development. Push affiliate products that are targeted towards developers as well as bigger products like asana or basecamp. Try other products that every person needs (dollarshaveclub/birchbox.com) 3. Kinda crazy but wonder if you could do something like http://www.launchbit.com http://www.launchbit.com - if users signup with email and leverage http://www.fullcontact.com/developer/ http://www.fullcontact.com/developer/ or https://www.rapleaf.com/ https://www.rapleaf.com/ you could break out users and serve up newsletters around productivity and do joint ventures with other companies to test drive their products. Since most likely your audiance will be startup/dev community. Anyway - just some thoughts

hgezim 14y ago
Very interesting ideas. I love it! I might try going after 1. at first and see where it goes. Anyone doing something similar and want to partner up with me? Maybe a complementary system, etc.
johnmurch 14y ago
I gotta throw out these 2 other ideas as they relate as I have some working code on a similar problem but focused around small groups and daily tasks. 1. Take a look at http://15five.com/ http://15five.com/ - Just 4 to 5 questions, 15mins - extremely valuable. The problem is status updates. A todo list can fit into this space nicely when you have many teams (e.g. enterprise) and all need a update/email for each weekly sprint. 2. Todo Tonight - Many developers/hackers/etc have day time jobs, but then spend another 3 to 5 hours each night hacking on something. To better focus on their time - rather than send crap to an email each day - why not have a task/todo that is nighly. Speeds up the process - focuses on a simpler achievable tasks (did you complete last night, add notes, urls,etc.) The idea is it's a holding place for "STUFF" it relates to what you are working on. Hit me up @johnmurch if you want to chat more

bpatrianakos 14y ago

johnmurch's comment has a lot of what I'd say. I'm not so sure about his #2 or 3 but his #1 was really good. I'd just price it super low and have the option to prepay for a year for a small discount. If I had built this, I wouldn't be having visions of raking in millions but you could realistically make a nice side income from it. If the price is like $4 a month or $20 for a year and you're basically just hosting a CRUD app that only stores text then it shouldn't be very expensive to run. Consider too that you built it just for fun. Put that all together and even if you charged $1 for life from every user you've made a profit. Maybe I'm wrong but that's how I think of my projects. It's like I was going to rent the servers and build something anyway so even if I make a single cent then I'm in the green. But to answer your question more directly, yes. If this were a beautiful site/mobile app that did this one thing really well I would pay. It would be really pretty to look at (like Cheddar is/was), would be super convenient (open a URL or tap a phone icon), and do one thing well (I managed different todo lists with others and I didn't have to fuck with settings or signing in more than once a month or click/tap through more than one screen to get what I wanted) so it would be worth the few bucks I'd probably spend on a coffee or something. A problem I see is getting groups to use it. Individuals all have their own preferred ways of todo-ing. A thought just came to me that if you made this awesome to work with alone then people would end up using it on their own and then they'd get together and use the group features later. Just a thought. Tie-ins with other products would be good too. I don't know if they're monetizable but they're certainly great for promotion. If you could build an API and hook your app up to someone else's and vice versa that could definitely be a value-add for a lot of people. Throw up a payment form with Stripe and just see if people will pay $1 for fully refundable 30-day trial and the promise of getting in on some future features of your choosing. That will tell you a lot about how interested people are and if its worth exploring monetization.