From 500 users in 5 months to 500 a day (now our extension #20 travel app on US app store)

When’s the time to quit on a project that doesn’t seem to be working? I definitely will not answer this question below, but I’ll share my personal experience that may inspire you to wait a few more days before making that final decision.

Shortly about the product: RatePunk is a browser extension that compares hotel prices live & for free. We’re an entirely self-funded startup, so the advertisement possibilities to gain installs are pretty limited. Here’s the website to take a closer look: https://www.ratepunk.com/

If we were already talking about quitting and moving on to the next project last month, today we hit 2000 installs. After working on it for around half a year & struggling to make it to 500 installs, we collected 1500 in less than two weeks after a breakthrough.

I shared a bit more about our techniques, problems & solutions in another article on Indie Hackers. Here’s the link for those interested in a more detailed background: https://www.indiehackers.com/post/the-hard-truth-of-scaling-a-free-browser-extension-to-500-users-self-funded-9575db0d12.

✔ Tracking the installs:

We had some struggles with the tracking system at the very beginning. First, it was complicated to install, so we used Chrome & Apple Store data. It was enough at that time but when the installs kept growing, we needed more detailed tracking (like data of extension opens/closes or user’s redirects). The more improved system allowed everyone from our team to check the numbers (using Google analytics) when only the developers had access to check Chrome/Apple store analytics before.

We started the day-by-day tracking in April. During the month, we achieved 142 installs (through all the browsers our extension is available on), meaning we had around 5 users/day on average. After some discussions, we decided that it was earned mainly by word of mouth: sharing RatePunk on our personal social networks & telling about it to everyone around us.

In May, the number of installs was 1347, and today (Jun 3rd), we overcame 2000. The last days were the most successful ones - only from May 29th to Jun 2nd (5 days!), 1135 installs came in.

As much as we’re happy & excited (really the best Friday), we’re questioning our moves and decisions even more. What was the problem in April? Which steps did we take that have had the most significant impact on this growth?

✔ STEP BY STEP what worked for us:

1. Indie Hackers article (May 12th).
Sharing our story gave the first push from like-minded people who’re interested not only in the value the product provides but also in the technical & behind the scenes part of it. We got a bunch of valuable tips from the community & the installs grew more than ever before the day after posting, but it was not the end.

2. Sharing the article (May 13-18).
The number kept growing after sharing the piece on different social media platforms (LinkedIn was super effective) & various Indie Hackers communities - it kept the two-digit number of installs daily. This article and its success showed us the direction we should be proceeding.

3. Posts in Facebook groups.
The most successful one was on May 19th. It was written on a Lithuanian travelers group and helped us reach our first three-digit number/day (128, if you’re curious). It gave us the main lesson: referring to Facebook communities & sharing the tip with them is one of the best ways to reach our target audience. One of the tips from Indie Hackers I mentioned was reaching out to travel agents as our product should be super relevant for them - that’s what we did. We started posting on more groups on Facebook. Although many of them name it as an advertisement & disapprove of posting any names, there are plenty of groups (at least covering the travels topic) where there’s no need to get an approval, and some of them accept it as a great money-saving hack (which is completely accurate!). We did not limit ourselves to the English-speaking audience, so a TIP: spread the word in as many languages as you manage to talk, or Google Translate can translate! For example, in our case, the Lithuanian & the Spanish-speaking audience was the most successful.

4. First paid collaboration (May 29th).
After searches that took 5 months (as I mentioned, our budget is minimal since we’re entirely self-funded), we had our first paid collaboration. The platform we picked was YouTube & travel vloggers were our primary focus. Here’s the result link (the pre-roll is where RatePunk is mentioned first 3 mins): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dn9Fuq0161Y. The video has reached more than 23k views, which are constantly growing. Although it brought us quite a big number of installs (like a 3-digit number), we’ll keep tracking it & only the future can tell if it paid off. However, from the current CPA, the result seems quite promising.

5. Share on influencer Instagram stories (May 31st).
This was a free collaboration with one of the best-known travel journalists in Lithuania (170k followers on IG). We could call it the most successful tactic so far, which resulted in skyrocketing install growth (more than 450 installs on that day). It proved that users find clear value in our product after it’s been shown step-by-step to them.

6. Getting featured in media coverage.
Reaching out to journalists & offering our pitches finally showed results: I was interviewed by one of the leading Lithuanian business newspapers & agreed on making another one focusing on leisure. I also got invited to talk on one of the tech podcasts. We tried to be featured on some travel & tech-related magazines/websites from the start, but it didn’t perform till now.

Our story on the biggest local newspapers:

7. Newsletters (the first one on May 15th).
We’ve been collecting users’ email addresses from the very beginning, and in May, we started sending out our newsletters. By now, we’ve sent 3, but it doesn’t seem to be working super efficiently, which is why we’re analyzing the stats & working on the content to understand the needs of our users better.

8. ADDITIONAL step. This one wasn't taken by us, but is a HUGE win: one of the TikTok influencers reviewed us as a travel hack and rated 9/10. We haven't contacted her before & just got a message where she shared the already uploaded video: https://vm.tiktok.com/ZMNJDDYra/?k=1. Sadly, we can not track installs from this, but we can review how many people landed on our website from TikTok (it increased after the mention).

This is how our growth looks after all of the steps mentioned above. The red arrow shows the very first breakthrough after the IH article (May 12th):

The growing numbers turned into something more - we got into Apple store’s TOP charts.

After being stuck from the very beginning, it finally looks like we’re heading in the right direction. Of course, maybe it’s just a temporary growth, and we’ll be back at being stuck in a week or two (I really hope we won’t), but that’s the way it is shortly - a rollercoaster. We were really mentioning closing this project because we thought it was just not performing, but the problem was we didn’t find the best ways to market it at that moment. If someone asked me what’s the best decision I’ve made in creating RatePunk, I’d definitely say not giving up and quitting when the going got tough.

All of these steps and the achievements they resulted in became the new motivation for our team. Since the higher the rollercoaster the more fun - we set our current KPI to 100k installs.

If you’re working on something you love and get the feeling of being stuck, it’s natural that the thought of killing it might cross your mind. But is it not too early? I guess it’s best to trust your gut on this one - mine certainly didn’t lie.

What are your experiences with this?