The PH effect

“‘Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house
not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.”

It all really started like in 1822 Clement Clarke Moore poem, except what made me sprang from my bed on December 24th wasn’t a miniature sleigh and eight reindeer, with a little old driver so lively and quick. No, ‘twas a tweet from my friend Chris of AppRecap.net:

@cdf1982 I got an invite for PH recently, so I’ve added Tasktic for you! https://t.co/Scf9SX1nEw

— Christopher Hannah (@chrishannah) December 24, 2015

Quickly three emojis appeared in my mind (we all see emojis in our minds, right?): 🙀🎄🎁

And indeed for a task manager like Tasktic, launched just 43 days before, is there a better Christmas gift than being posted on Product Hunt?

Receiving so much exposure, to the right people, could really make the difference in an App Store that has probably already surpassed 1.6 million apps. On top of that, let’s admit it, that kind of validation also feels amazingly good, after 10 months of development without knowing if your product will actually be downloaded by someone who isn’t related to you.

Turns out, though, that there is an even better gift a developer can receive, and it takes the form of being actually featured among the top ten products of PH Tech page on Christmas day, scoring (at the time I’m writing this) over 110 upvotes… I still can’t believe Tasktic was on the home page of Product Hunt (and yet I have an embarrassing amount of screenshots to prove it 👻)!

Let's face it: when your task manager is up against The Donald, it's the real deal...

It is so rare that your expectations survive a meeting with reality, and yet here I am with some comforting data:

  • On the day of the feature, downloads increased 470% vs. the daily average, with the second highest number of installations since launch day (I must say that Tasktic already had a pretty good launch, thanks to the reviews on AppRecap.net and Macitynet.it and to some direct marketing I made in Slack channels and by email). The next day, downloads were still 293% higher than the **average and on December 27** (the last day I have iTunes Connect data for) they actually sky-rocketed to 539% of the pre-feature average. So, the third day after the feature Tasktic had the highest number of installations ever! I was expecting the effect of the feature of December 25th to slow down quickly and to return to my regular numbers very soon, and sure that’s going to happen 😞, but the “Product Hunt” effect is being much longer and stronger than I imagined. Yay!

  • The new users I’m acquiring are willing to pay 💰! The free version of Tasktic offers a pretty-complete feature set, but there’s also a Pro version (unlocked with a single, non recurring in-app purchase that costs just $4.99) that offers unlimited projects, tags, stats & achievements, export to file, etc. and, since appearing on Product Hunt, the conversion rate to Pro is almost double than the pre-feature average.

  • For the most loving users, there’s even a Pro Big Supporter version that costs $9.99 and actually offers the same feature-set of the “regular” Pro version (plus a special badge!). I chose to offer two price options because I believe people are willing to spend a little more to support the apps they love, and looks like I’m not wrong: since launch, over 30% of in-app purchases have been Pro Big Supporter. I can confirm the same ratio after the feature, which was a surprise to me: Hunters try a lot more apps than the average user, so I assumed they would have been a little more difficult to “upsell”. As a matter of fact, Hunters are people too 😸, and while they don’t spend their money like water, they’re pretty fair and don’t hesitate to show their love in a big way.

  • One thing I wasn’t expecting was the huge amount of traffic the PH feature brought to Tasktic’s website, compared to the daily average (which, honestly, has been pretty low after launch week). On the day of the feature, cdf1982.com had 1.800% more visits than the average, on Dec. 26 1.100% more and on Dec. 27 it bounced again to +1.466%.
    Usually, when I see an app on Product Hunt I visit its website and download it from there; turns out, I’m not the only one who prefers checking out the webpage before downloading it (or not).

  • Compared to the number of installations, I’ve had a pretty low feedback via email, and almost none on Twitter. Those who contacted me were amazing, though, so I made up quantity with quality, and in the process got some pretty good suggestions for future features too!

In the end, yes, I have a completely predictable conclusion: being feature on Product Hunt can generate an amazing amount of interest around your app.
What surprised me the most is how long the effect continues after the feature: according to RankUp, Tasktic right now (5.30 PM CET of December 28, 2015) is ranked in the top 200 free Productivity section (sic, not in the top grossing list 💸) of the App Stores of 30 countries, including UK, Germany, France, Spain, Mexico, Argentina and Brazil.

Now is up to me to continue improving Tasktic and build upon this amazing exposure. If you want to follow our next steps, pleasesubscribe to our RSS feed and follow Tasktic (or myself) on Twitter. And if I can do anything for you, please don’t hesitate to send an email, I always answer! Last but not least, if you haven’t tried Tasktic for iPhone or iPad yet, download it now for free!

Thank you Hunters, from myself and from the Tasktic Kittens, Amélie and Remy, who you can see expressing the usual feline Christmas spirit in the picture above!