Getting our first thousand users in one day

[gk1]

8% conversion rate is pretty good for a PH/HN audience.

Three things I'm sure helped the signup rates, which others should copy:

- Low-friction registration using SSO.

- Glimpse of the product in the background.

- Let guests see and click on gated features. (Even if visitor clicks "Or try it instead" they still see "+ New Draft" button, which leads to the signup prompt again.)

I've tested these in other apps and found they significantly increase signups. The first because of low friction, the second because--I suspect--it shows the visitor what they're about to experience in just a few more clicks, and the third because it shows the guest what's possible and offers multiple chances to sign up.

Well done!

[freshbagels]

I'm curious as to what else you've found helps increase sign ups. Do you have the results published anywhere?

[notRobot]

Uh, what's PH?

[cambalache]

> sparking a controversial discussion in the comments.

I suppose that generates views but to me it seems a cynical abuse of the platform.

[philosopher1234]

He’s done it again!

[joegahona]

I don't believe "sparking" was the correct gerund for the OP to use, because indeed it sort of implies that it was intentional.

I'd word it simply:

- a spirited discussion

[gk1]

It's also not clear how much it helps. I believe HN penalizes overly controversial posts, and it uses quantity/frequency of comments as a signal of controversy.

[Mnlfrgr]

not his fault people seem to like a fight. It says more about human nature than it does about him.

[philshem]

Not related to your achievement, but...

If you want “users” - post a well-paid but fake job on Upwork and ask applicants to first check out your site/app.

I don’t suggest this but I’ve noticed it from a couple real jobs I’ve posted. Of course, these “users” will be beyond meaningless for any useful metric. I guess if your app/site was geared toward Upwork freelancers, it could work as a strategy.

[waynesonfire]

lol, nice

[alfonsodev]

Congrats to the Typefully team, I really like the idea, and I'll give a it try soon.

Also thanks for sharing the numbers, and the your insider thoughts.

For everyone else building a product, don't let this success stories discourage you from launching your product sooner, you are not expected to have 1000 user in a one day, launching is not what you want to celebrate, you need to launch as soon as possible, and celebrate product market fit if it ever happens, learning from your users is what can get you there, but you need to launch first!

[frankdilo]

Yeah definitely. Did many other launches where we had 1/100 of this reach. Just keep shipping.

[jamesmarkewen]

It's interesting to see the difference these days between PH numbers on launch day and after being featured in the newsletter.

I launched last week and got to the number 3 product of the day. Traffic stats similar to yours. Next day after the newsletter went out and it was a bit of a letdown. Not what I expected.

Would be interesting to see these numbers for you. Maybe PH isn't the launch pad it used to be

[waylandsmithers]

Thanks so much for being forthcoming about the donations you received, as well as your commitment to maintaining free features. I've been weighing a paid subscription against voluntary donation for my own bootstrapped product launch, and I seem to keep finding more evidence that the donation model probably isn't the way to sustainability.

[joshspankit]

I have not yet seen a business that can comfortably survive long term with the “make a single donation” model. Recurring donations are something that can work, however.

[DataCrayon]

We almost had a similar experience with our front-page HN post here https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25314170

Except we were not prepared for the traffic, and it took the site down for over 24 hours! Lesson learned...

[hinkley]

On my bucket list is using the "Referer" header to aggressively redirect traffic from hug-of-death websites toward cached pages.

It's been a long time since I've worked somewhere that would benefit from that trick, so I haven't had a chance to use it.

[GordonS]

That post got just over 100 points - very curious to know roughly what kind of traffic you say from it?

[aazaa]

> Yesterday we launched Typefully, a write-only interface for Twitter, after weeks of work and refinement. I told the whole story on Twitter @frankdilo.

The idea of a write-only interface is interesting in itself. I was expecting to see something about it on the Typefully page but didn't.

[waynesonfire]

this will blow your mind... write-once, modify three times.. and read only once on Mondays between 5:30 and 6:30.

[Aperocky]

chmod 222

[tubs]

One very slightly annoying thing is that the orange/red "over character limit" only appears after the pause/delay.

I don't know if you could signal that more immediately (inline perhaps, without updating the thing on the right)?

[desireco42]

Just because people signed up, it doesn't mean they will stick around. I would be curious how much will stick around.

[pc86]

Isn't that a different problem though? It's marketing to get them to sign up in the first place, it's product to get them to come back.

[joshspankit]

You mention a tip-jar “patron” strategy, and I took a second look having not noticed anything like that when you launched the actual product.

I still don‘t see anything.

Are you guys hiding a tip button somewhere in the interface after you sign in?

Are you asking for one-offs? Or recurring?

#alwayscurious

[ramkarthikk]

Congrats on launching the app! You have mentioned the earnings from a tip-jar system. I also noticed that Typefully links to Mailbrew. It will be interesting to see the traffic numbers to Mailbrew and how many of them ended up signing up/paying for Mailbrew.

[sam0x17]

Gotta love the whole "frontpage of HN 2.0: meta article about getting to the front page" approach many have found success with recently :D

Seriously though, love seeing the actual metrics on how this process went, thanks!

[xwdv]

Thanks for respecting dark mode in browsers that have it set. Sent a tip.

[CleanMirage]

Is this a sort of Twitter Reddit crossover ? I like the two the way they are. One for short form and the other for long form expression.

[the_arun]

To even go to Typefully.app, it is asking me to signin with Twitter. Is that how you are getting new users?

[dewey]

You can click "Or try it instead." under the Twitter sign in.

[waynesonfire]

get this spam off the front page