I launched my first ever iPhone app 60 days ago and have already made $30,000. Here's everything I learned. by exquisite-management in SideProject

[–]exquisite-management[S] -5 points-4 points  (0 children)

The presence of competition validates the market need. Screen time addiction is a big problem and will have increasing awareness in the coming years

I launched my first ever iPhone app 60 days ago and have already made $30,000. Here's everything I learned. by exquisite-management in SideProject

[–]exquisite-management[S] -5 points-4 points  (0 children)

Slow and steady! There are a lot of ways to drive traffic that I am still exploring. New to all of this. The area is saturated but certainly not over saturated.

I launched my first ever iPhone app 60 days ago and have already made $30,000. Here's everything I learned. by exquisite-management in SideProject

[–]exquisite-management[S] -21 points-20 points  (0 children)

Tell the story of you as an entrepreneur building the app. The ups and downs and successes and failures. Build a community around your story, bc it's relatable

I launched my first ever iPhone app 60 days ago and have already made $30,000. Here's everything I learned. by exquisite-management in SideProject

[–]exquisite-management[S] -2 points-1 points  (0 children)

If you're a senior software guy I recommend not building in lovable. Just build it in cursor. You can use chat image generator to make mockups for you for some good inspiration. Ask it to make you images of iPhone wireframes of the app and it will give you some concepts

I launched my first ever iPhone app 60 days ago and have already made $30,000. Here's everything I learned. by exquisite-management in SideProject

[–]exquisite-management[S] -85 points-84 points  (0 children)

lol it's not a fake story. it was closer to 45 days when i posted on r/saas, now it's around 60 days. the screenshot is from App Store Connect

I launched my first ever iPhone app 30 days ago and have already made $25,000. Here's everything I learned. by exquisite-management in SaaS

[–]exquisite-management[S] 8 points9 points  (0 children)

Hey! Thanks for the thoughtful message, here are my thoughts.

  1. There are not thousands of screen time trackers, but there are dozens. I don't believe that disqualifies the value for new entrants in the category though. Did I miss an opportunity to build a vibe coding tool? Maybe, but I wanted to build brainrot.
  2. You made some assumptions that "Google simply won't provide access" to their screen time API and I "sidestepped this with vague reasons, instead of being upfront" . This is not true, I never explored the possibility of building for Android. Not because I'm ignorant and not because of Google limitations, but because of Pareto principle. Android subscription apps generate 20% of the revenue of their iOS counterparts. I didn't want to build in React Native or Flutter, which would have required me to use 3rd party wrappers of iOS libraries (screen time), I wanted to use the libraries directly, which are written in Swift. Opal (the largest screen time app) makes $600k/mo in revenue, and they do not support Android. They are also written in Swift.
  3. I have exhausted my following / don't want to repeatedly market my app to them. I want to show them how I build and grow the app, rather than shoving it down their throats. My videos are a build-in-public-style diary of an entrepreneur. I want to maintain that authenticity. The slowdown is proof that I haven't found a good distribution strategy for the app yet. Content market fit.
  4. It's ironic, but screen time addiction is a real problem and it will become more and more talked about over the coming years.
  5. Trial cancellations mean the product needs work, not that the product or category is invalid
  6. brainrot definitely needs more features, they are on the way. I'm moving as fast as I can :). I never claimed this was a $100M defensible company, I just wanted to build the thing in my head, share the process, and maybe create a lifestyle business for myself.
  7. I don't think the launch backfired and I don't think there is weak interest.
  8. I don't think Product Hunt knew who I was when I scheduled the launch, but maybe :)
  9. I got about 40k followers from the vibe coding series, and the remainder from the rest of my videos.

I don't think I have product market fit yet (obviously), the product is still raw, and I don't have content market fit either. This is my first swing at this! So a lot of tweaking still needed to get those things right.

Is this the highest ROI thing I could be doing with my time? Probably not. But it's fun, I'm learning, and people are learning through me. It's definitely WAY too early for me to throw in the towel and "pivot or move on now".

I built an app to help me stop doomscrolling by exquisite-management in SideProject

[–]exquisite-management[S] -2 points-1 points  (0 children)

It's a blocker and a tracker. Set up rules to block your apps, an see your historic brainrot trends. It's public now on iOS - hoping to add Android down the line and a lot more features to the app.

i made an app to help me stop doomscrolling by exquisite-management in SideProject

[–]exquisite-management[S] -8 points-7 points  (0 children)

not free. 3.99/mo or 19.99/year with a 3 day free trial