ドミニク

Dominik Sobe

Lessons from a “failed” Product Hunt launch

June 22, 2022
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5 min
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Startup Lessons

HelpKit unfortunately "failed" on Product Hunt yesterday, not ranking top 5, despite having the best community support I could have asked for! Here are my thoughts on the launch, the good, the bad and top 5 lessons learned. Including stats, images and more.

 

First, let's start with the "bad" 👎

HelpKit didn't manage to get into the top 5, ending up just one spot behind at #6. Given the extra mid/longterm exposure a top 5 product gets, I am kind of displeased by that fact to be really honest with you.

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Now, let's move to the good parts 👍

I have easily the best friends in the entire maker community. I'm incredibly thankful for every comment, RT, cheer or upvote! Building in public is quite literally changing my life and I never thought I'll be able to make so many amazing connections with it.

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I had absolutely no idea that for seemingly a handful of people, I am considered to be a "big inspiration" to them. This truly warms my heart and extremely motivates me to push even more in the future.

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I also found out that my personal newsletter has close to 100 subscribers, so I really feel pressured to start writing more, which is a good sign!

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If you want to join the newsletter check the subscription box at the end of this post 📧

 

Traffic, Signups and Conversion

 

Let's move on to the most important part: Traffic, Signups and Conversion. Overall, I am quite happy with these results: 📊 1200 Unique Visitors 👥 25 Free Trial Signups 💰 1 Immediate Subscription Conversion (Pro Tier Annually → $720)

 
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The Launch Tweet

Lastly, let's take a look at the launch tweet stats. Shall we?

 
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In total we got…

👀 27.000 Impressions 🖱 300 Link Clicks 😺 ~130 New Followers Link to launch tweet 👇

 

Here are my top 5 lessons learned from this launch

→ Competition can be extremely high on your launch day. You never know. → The launch day is exhausting, no matter how you frame it. → There seems to be more voting/comment fraud going on than I thought.

 

→ A hunter is not necessary. → Try to not put too much weight on the result of your launch. There'll always be a net-positive. For me it was to see the countless customer comments and reading how happy they are with the product. These testimonials are super valuable.

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As you can see, there’s always something to win out of a launch, even when you don’t end up in the top 5. While I am certainly a bit disappointed (I want this badgeeeee 😉), I realized that it’s not so bad after-all.

 

Good luck with your next launch! Maybe the launch gods be with you.

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Hi ツ I am Dominik and here I document my journey and share my thoughts as a 27 year old founder. From Austria, living in Lisbon.