by BouncyMarshmallowRaise
Launched MVP, Zero Users After 3 Months
Followed all Lean principles, but no traction. Do I pivot, rebrand, or shut down? Honest advice needed.
GroovyRaccoon
Hit 200K users fast on my productivity tool, quit my job & now I’m stuck. How do I get back on track?
Hey folks, last year I launched a lightweight async tool to help remote teams sync up without the headache of Zoom fatigue. Unlike other tools that focus on heavy features, I focused on speed, simplicity, and accessibility - no learning curve, no downloads, just straight-to-the-point communication.
This was a problem I faced firsthand working remotely for an Israel-based startup. Meeting fatigue was real, and I knew there had to be a better way.
The response was incredible:
- 50K signups in 3 days after landing on the front page of Product Hunt.
- Teams loved the simplicity and started sharing it on Slack, which sparked a second wave of growth.
- We scaled to 200K total users, with 30K weekly actives at our peak. Retention was solid early on - 60% of signups returned weekly.
Building it felt magical, like everything was falling into place.
I quit my job, confident we could charge for premium features. That’s when reality hit:
- WAUs plummeted by 80%, dropping to 6K.
- Only ~500 teams converted to $6/month per user. SMBs loved the tool but hesitated to pay, while larger teams wanted enterprise-grade features I couldn’t deliver.
- Growth stalled - limiting the free tier killed word-of-mouth, and the buzz dried up.
It felt like overnight, we’d lost the magic. Watching users churn after they’d raved about the product was a gut punch.
Looking back, I underestimated how competitive the async space is. Giants like Loom and Slack dominate, and while I believed our lightweight, no-friction approach could carve out a niche, keeping users engaged and paying has been an uphill battle.
Now, I’m at a crossroads:
- Expand the free tier to reignite virality - but how do I sustain costs if this works?
- Niche down further - focus on solopreneurs or specific industries?
- Build integrations (Notion, ClickUp, etc.) and target power users on LinkedIn?
Here for any advice!
4mo ago
Talking product sense with Ridhi
9 min AI interview5 questions
SnoozyJellybean
Flipkart4mo
Sounds like you've built something great but doing poorly as far as GTM goes. High-level suggestions:
Only think of free users as success if you originally intended to get free users (for a specific reason.)
Customer obsessed: none of your options talk about your current paying customers. Speak to your paying customers to understand (1) why they are paying (2) why they would pay more. 1 will help you market your product and scale to new users who are similar to your core user set and 2 will help you define your future features.
The idea to build integrations is a good one generally for SaaS GTMs but the questions you should be asking is if your users use these complimentary tools or which are the popular complimentary tools related to your product.
Bottom-line I feel like you're a great product person who is now stuck at post-validation stage, asking the wrong questions. If I were you, I'd be on the lookout for a GTM Co-founder or mentor.
Feel free to DM
PeppyBanana
Freelancer4mo
🔥 man @side
DizzyLlama
Atlys4mo
@side , i have rarely seen a software engineer do a product talk with the jargons. Tell us a bit about this experience of yours...
JumpyWaffle
Grapevine4mo
Kudos! Getting to 200K isn’t easy man.
I don’t know how to solve the situation you’re in.
But a high level look tells me you need to double down on the market that is already paying for your product. As I do see 500 teams did convert to your product. Find a GTM pathway to 100X into that market/team type (if indeed that market is big enough)
ZippyMochi
Stealth4mo
Share your tool here man, you don't think your customers might be on grapevine? That should've been an obvious self promotion you missed.
500 teams converted is still a big number, you need to double down on keeping them happy.
Take a hard look at your expenses and income, cut any expenses that you can, go live with your parents if it helps.
-
Do not go back to promoting/building free tier unless you can afford it. The giants can afford to, hence they do. You need to get profitable enough first.
-
Explore your current users and their industries/domains, work on them to get word of mouth going for you.
-
@side is correct, integrations only matter if your current and prospective users need them. Don't add extra hassles and costs where you don't need to.
PeppyMarshmallow
Philips4mo
This is aboce GV’s paygrade, most here have just coded features given by PM’s on silver platter
SqueakyPickle
PhonePe4mo
If you have like 500 team with 5 people pm average, that's like 2500 people which amounts to $15000 per month. That's a great income to start with. What was your salary in the job?
BubblyBurrito
Swiggy4mo
We haven't counted the expenses here but yes, 15K a month aa revenue is extremely good. OP needs to double down on this.
DancingTaco
Quest Global4mo
What's product let us try
ZoomyBoba
Student4mo
You can do some more things
- Focus on business partnerships. Loom, slack, teams are running because of businesses. Contact businesses, do one to one.. Etc..
- Probably riase funds
- Send more on marketing. Try all kinds of marketing methods
SquishyNarwhal
Deloitte4mo
200k users is a great achievement. If I were you I would increase the time limit for free user so they grow habitual to the application. Once they are many of them won't mind paying you a subscription.
Other than that a difference of features between free and paid users can be a good attraction for new paying customers.
WigglyPenguin
Stealth4mo
why don't you use your productivity app to find the answer?
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