blindautist
New member
1 year ago my friend and I wanted to build our own project from scratch. The freedom to build what we wanted and how we wanted really motivated us to take action.
Since we both work a fulltime 9-5 job, we wanted to actually spend some time on investigating different ideas and opportunities before pushing the start button. So the first 1,5 month we brainstormed on different ideas, but ended up with a design tool dedicated to YouTubers.
It took another few weeks until we landed on the name Tapely and bought the domain Tapely.io
We started designing the brand, a landingpage and started on the foundation of our idea. After 1,5 month we launched the MVP. We tried to find Users to test it, but it took some time. First we started with SEO the next couple of months and then we started testing Paid Ads. The Paid Ads was the ones that brought in some people who actually ended up trying the product.
We made the friction very small. All the Users had to do was to write their email and then we would redirect them to the app. That brought in Users and we had a conversion rate of approx. 9%, so we was pretty have with the validation. Especially considering how simple the first MVP was.
We had a dip in the motivation and took some time off enjoying vacation and the danish summer. We did manage to upgrade the product with different improvements and in the late summer we had almost finished implementing authentication.
OUR FIRST SALE! We tried another validation strategy and offered a lifetime deal to our now 60 early testers. We offered it for $49 and our expectations was not that we would sell anything yet, but we ended up selling one lifetime deal. Such a surreal feeling that something we started could bring value to a YouTuber and that the person would invest $49 of their hard-earned money.
The dedication and passion for the project is the most important thing. We had already used close to $1000 on Webflow, servers and trying out different paid ads platforms. For us it’s an investment in our own skills and knowledge, so that alone is worth it, but it’s also an investment in the foundation of what’s to come in 2024.
We did it! We launched with a fully fledged SaaS product that we build from scratch while working a 9 - 5. Such a great feeling and we have learned so much.
We have launched with 3 tiers
Hopefully this post can motivate others to work on their passion regardless of them working a job or not. It has taking us a year to get here, but through passion and regular meetings we managed to achieve this. The hard part is being patient, but it’s worth it.
First month
Since we both work a fulltime 9-5 job, we wanted to actually spend some time on investigating different ideas and opportunities before pushing the start button. So the first 1,5 month we brainstormed on different ideas, but ended up with a design tool dedicated to YouTubers.
It took another few weeks until we landed on the name Tapely and bought the domain Tapely.io
The next few months
We started designing the brand, a landingpage and started on the foundation of our idea. After 1,5 month we launched the MVP. We tried to find Users to test it, but it took some time. First we started with SEO the next couple of months and then we started testing Paid Ads. The Paid Ads was the ones that brought in some people who actually ended up trying the product.
We made the friction very small. All the Users had to do was to write their email and then we would redirect them to the app. That brought in Users and we had a conversion rate of approx. 9%, so we was pretty have with the validation. Especially considering how simple the first MVP was.
During summer
We had a dip in the motivation and took some time off enjoying vacation and the danish summer. We did manage to upgrade the product with different improvements and in the late summer we had almost finished implementing authentication.
The last 3 months of 2023 and our first sale
OUR FIRST SALE! We tried another validation strategy and offered a lifetime deal to our now 60 early testers. We offered it for $49 and our expectations was not that we would sell anything yet, but we ended up selling one lifetime deal. Such a surreal feeling that something we started could bring value to a YouTuber and that the person would invest $49 of their hard-earned money.
The dedication and passion for the project is the most important thing. We had already used close to $1000 on Webflow, servers and trying out different paid ads platforms. For us it’s an investment in our own skills and knowledge, so that alone is worth it, but it’s also an investment in the foundation of what’s to come in 2024.
We launched 25th of february
We did it! We launched with a fully fledged SaaS product that we build from scratch while working a 9 - 5. Such a great feeling and we have learned so much.
We have launched with 3 tiers
- Starter ($9)
- Grow ($19)
- Lifetime ($75)
Hopefully this post can motivate others to work on their passion regardless of them working a job or not. It has taking us a year to get here, but through passion and regular meetings we managed to achieve this. The hard part is being patient, but it’s worth it.
