127 Comments

Got my first paying customer! 🥳

It took some time — 4 months basically. There are a bunch of things I'd change if I could start all over again! I went through self-sabotage, a false start, and almost quitting...

Here's the full story. 👇

The idea

I began my journey as a solo founder back in July 2022, after spending 6 months building in the web3 world. I had enough of the market going up & down: I wanted to start building something "real".

All these indie devs sharing their journey on twitter inspired me, so I decided to jump in. As I knew nothing about twitter, I bought some courses ( i.e Find your Following from Arvid Kahl) and started posting on my account.

One of the (many) tips in Arvid's course was:

"I retweet my own content 6-12h after it’s posted. That way, I reach stragglers and Twitter friends in other time zones."

I gave it a try and realized how powerful it was... 😲

Auto-Retweets

As I don't want to wake up at 3 am for a retweet, I searched for a tool to automate the process, but found nothing under $200 a year! I was onto something...

The false start

I started by building it for myself, so I was sure to have at least one happy user. 😜

As I posted about it on twitter, some friends asked me to share — so I shared as it was: buggy AF and with almost no features, just retweeting 12h after a tweet is posted. 100% free.

I was surprised to see that people liked it anyway! ❤️ I received a bunch of feedback and ideas for it, but then...

2 months and 100+ users later, we exceeded the twitter api monthly usage :

Auto-Retweets

It was down... 🥹

Self-sabotage

I took that as an opportunity and established an action plan:

Make it paid to reduce the number of users. (+ request elevated API access)
Add a "custom sequence" feature to let people choose when to retweet
"Clean feed" option, to delete all retweets 24h after

I gave myself 10 days to release that (as the api usage where reinitializing). It was very stressful... and when I released 10 days after I didn't have time to test it as I should have.

It was so buggy that after 2 days people weren't even able to log in. I was completely down... I was getting tons of DMS of people reporting bugs, and every time I tried to fix one in production, I created 2 new ones. So I started doubting myself and I gave up (almost).

The last chance

After 2 weeks of trying to forget about it, I (somehow) found the courage to dive back into the code. I completely changed the way authentication is handled — and managed to make it work!

Literally 2 days later I received a stripe notification:

First Customer

---

Currently, 30+ people signed up for a 14-day free trial, and I keep improving Sidebird!

Those $15 per quarter means a lot to me, after battling so hard to make the product work.

My next goal is to grow it to 10+ customers! ✨😇

To be continued...

Lilian ッ

, Founder of

Sidebird

on October 21, 2022

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3

Oh congratulations! I can imagine how amazing that must feel :))
Do you have a background in design or specific experience in it? Your UI looks outstanding.

ludwigsonneck

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a year ago
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  Eww thank you so much for your kind words! 🥰
  
  I'd say no lol. But I've worked on quite a lot of (failed) projects so I've been improving a lot on these skills.
  
  Glad you like it!
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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    Cool, interesting to hear. And I also like your quarterly pricing approach I realized now.
    
    I find a month can feel like asking for too little commitment, also in terms of communicating how much we believe in our product ourselves. But a year can be too much. And a quarter is a nice middle ground. I think I'm actually gonna give it a try myself :)
    
    ludwigsonneck
    
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    a year ago
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      Thanks! What's the product you're buiding? Don't hesitate to dm me on twitter: @_justlilian!
      
      The only thing I'm noticing with this quarterly pricing is that some people might not see the deal is that great, because they're used to monthly subscriptions.
      
      Lilian ッ
      
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      a year ago
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  Agree！ UI looks good
  
  Kuggaduke
  
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  a year ago
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UPDATE: Just got the second paying customer 🥳

Lilian ッ

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a year ago
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  This comment was deleted a year ago.
  
  icebob
  
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  a year ago
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Congrats! 🫶

malthart

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a year ago
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  thank you mate!
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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Congrats, it's an amazing feeling!

WelcomeImJd

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a year ago
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  I’ll never forget… Thanks! 🤩
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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I was about to ask you what's the difference between Sidebird and Hypefury for example, and I guess your service is much cheaper than the other one right?
Congrats, and good luck to get more costumers.

TarekNac

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a year ago
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  Sidebird is much more "micro" I'd say. It's a passive and cheap way to get extra traffic on your tweets without changing anything ;)
  
  Thanks mate! 🙌
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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Congrats man 🔥🔥

A small start of a big future

vikram_

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a year ago
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  Thanks, mate! Cheers to your startup succeess too 🥂
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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    Thanks, but I dont have any "success" yet ;-;
    
    vikram_
    
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    a year ago
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      Times will come if you keep at it. Without a doubt!
      
      Lilian ッ
      
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      a year ago
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Congrats on this milestone. I just signed up, excited to check this out.

ajpicard25

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a year ago
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  Awesome, thanks! What’s your Twitter @?
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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    It's @picacardanycard
    
    ajpicard25
    
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    a year ago
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Lets gooooo!!! Congrats!

ajpicard25

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a year ago
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  Thank you! 🤩
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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That is really cool, keep it going !

derich

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a year ago
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  I appreciate bro ;)
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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Love this story!

rgmvisser

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a year ago
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  Glad you liked it, mate!
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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Congrats！！！！

Kuggaduke

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a year ago
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  Thank you ;)
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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wow congrats!

dytra

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a year ago
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  Thanks!!
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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That's so awesome, Lilian, a huge congratulations!

And I love the way you found a niche in the market and started building, well done!

phillipstemann

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a year ago
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  Thank you, Phillip—glad to connect btw! 😇
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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What an awesome way to MVP.

matMoreTrail

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a year ago
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  Thanks! 😜
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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So valid for startups.

Leon_Ou

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a year ago
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  🔥😉
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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Hell yeah, friend!!

elsiealkurabi

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a year ago
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  🥳
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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Congratulations! Very well built website! Clean and elegant.

Tip: increase the size of the text in the images. I could barely see them!

JosephAttia

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a year ago
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  Yayy! Thanks for the tip—gonna fix that asap! 😇
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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Congratulations!

Also want to say, the name is perfect and your website looks super nice. Well done all around! 👏

Nixstrom

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a year ago
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  Thank you, mate! Bool looks rly cool too ;)
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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Congratulations

kochbi

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a year ago
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  thanks
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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Congratulations and thank you soo much for sharing your story - it actually inspired me to write up my story (which I didn't think was relevant because I've just made $15 from my new product).

Genny

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a year ago
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  Ohh, I'm so glad it inspired you! You should defo go on and write it—I followed you so I won't miss that 😁
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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Congrats bro 💓🚀

titi

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a year ago
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  My man 😇🏝
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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That's amazing! I just started using an OKR tool and added on there a goal to achieve at least 1 paying customer by year-end. I'm sure the feeling is amazing. Congratulations.

Mardo

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a year ago
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  What an awesome goal, I'm sure you're gonna make it! Cheers to that, mate 🥂
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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Awesome - thanks for sharing your journey...will also have to try the original retweet, like you mentioned, and see what that looks like.

"Sidebird" - as a name, for what it does...that's pretty good! 🦚

A lot of influencers are into the "circular viralocity" concept..where you note which of your social postings had the largest views, then post them again a few weeks or months later. Sort of like, watching reruns of a show you like. You know you've seen it before, but, you liked it the first time, so why not watch it again?

ExpansiveJohn

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a year ago
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  Thank you so much!!
  
  You're totally right. The other reason why it's not a problem (and even great) to repeat yourself online is that people are sometimes just not ready for your message...
  
  It's proven that people need to hear (or see) something seven times before they buy. They call that the marketing rule of 7.
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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Congrats🥳

OfficialKegan

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a year ago
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  Thanks a lot! 😇
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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congrats!

five9s

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a year ago
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  thanks 😜
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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Congrats!!! Love this 🙌. Keep it going!

jwalker

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a year ago
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  Thank you, I appreciate ;)
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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simple and clean web, nice job man

SparrowHack

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a year ago
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  thank you for your kind words! 😇
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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Congratulations and thanks for sharing your story. I’m taking a look at your product. I may be a customer as I start on my journey.

hey__marie__

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a year ago
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  Thanks Marie! Are you building an audience?
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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    You’re welcome. I’m trying to build my audience but not sure exactly how. I have a Twitter account with a VERY SMALL following. Twitter is where I wanted to document my journey. I also thought about documenting on YT.
    
    hey__marie__
    
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    a year ago
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      Can you send me a dm on twitter @_justlilian? I'd love to discuss a bit about that ;)
      
      Lilian ッ
      
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      a year ago
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Congrats \o/

sjozsef

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a year ago
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  Thanks 😊
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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Congrats bro :)
Your site is very pretty and clean, keep it simple like this to make sure users doesn’t face any Tribble. Now u need some marketing, to get some free traffic to your saas I suggest to post videos and pics about your service benefits like TikTok, pinterest and some articles and why not to make a YouTube video !

Ihab07dev

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a year ago
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  I appreciate the suggestions bro!
  
  I’m thinking about starting a kind of « buildinpublic » video series on twt / yt. What do you think?
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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    It’s great idea, but also checkout the method I explain previously and mostly it will be help to grow up your business.
    Hope the best for you.
    
    Ihab07dev
    
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    a year ago
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Congrats on your launch!
I used to run a similar service, known as Skedlo. It was offering tweets/thread scheduling as well, I eventually decided to stop the service at least for now, since I found extremely difficult to find clients.. also the competition was extremely high at least at that time, with other players in the game like Hypefury, Zlappo which were doing the same things.

Are you experiencing similar issues?

dev_bre

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a year ago
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  Ohh, interesting experience — thanks for sharing. How long have you been running Skedlo?
  
  Would you mind connecting on twitter? I’d have some ( a bunch of 🤣) questions to ask!
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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    I run Skedlo for almost a year, with almost 100 users on free plan. The issue I had was to deal with:
    
    Competition
    
    Find new clients
    
    Security
    
    Especially point 2 was really difficult. Which makes sense these kind of services requires the client to trust you, clients will basically give you the keys their accounts to a perfect stranger.
    
    There are also very serious security implications in how these kind of services work... If your service gets hacked, the attacker can start posting content on your user behalf... Pretty scarry if you think about it.
    
    dev_bre
    
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    a year ago
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      Hey man, founder of Zlappo here.
      
      I remember chatting with you in 2020 when you started Skedlo (which was just months after I launched Zlappo).
      
      No doubt Twitter SaaS is a hyper-competitive space, and I recalled clearly you described point #1 as "toxic."
      
      I faced exactly the same issues you faced, and believe it or not, there are even more competitors now than when you left, so it's even harder for Zlappo to stand out. Even Hypefury had to face stiff competition from Tweet Hunter, 2 teams going at it.
      
      Despite that, I think we've found our footing, and we're doing better than ever in 2022.
      
      Just happy to even still be in the game at this point.
      
      The key is to innovate somewhere where your competitors are unwilling or unable to copy you.
      
      I remember that you were starting an API product instead, I hope you're doing well with that!
      
      simplisticallysimple
      
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      a year ago
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        Hey, am glad things are going well for you.
        
        Yeah I heard about TweetHunter, and even if their presence makes competition more challenging, this also makes me thing that the Twitter/social automation market is not actually saturated as it seems.
        
        One part of me would always come back into the space, mainly because I love automation maybe with some AI concepts.
        
        I have been thinking about the angle I could be back in the market, still have to find it. I could just restart Skedlo at its original form, but I don't want to go on the same path I already have been.
        
        I could potentially scale it down a bit and see if I can grow the user base with that.
        
        dev_bre
        
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        a year ago
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      These 3 points are very interesting!
      
      I think for the security it’s always an issue on every service… I chose to work with firebase which should make it (theoretically) more secured than with a custom backend?! 🤷‍♂️
      
      Lilian ッ
      
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      a year ago
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    Sure.
    
    dev_bre
    
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    a year ago
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wow very promising product, and your landing page is another level up, very clean , neat and simple UI, congrats bro like to connect with you on twitter

sathithyayogi

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a year ago
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  Ohh, thank you for your kind words! 😯
  
  I’d love to. Let’s connect ;)
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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Congrats my friend

Victor🤙

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a year ago
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  Thanks Victor 🥰
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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Congrats!! Big milestone, awesome learnings. Keep it up!

ZachHack

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a year ago
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  Hey Zach, thanks a lot! 😁
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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Love this clean UI/UX. Interesting re-tweet strategy. Will this re-tweet annoy my existing followers? Since they may see the same content show up everyday?

skylinedev

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a year ago
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  Hey mate! 👋🏼
  
  In fact your followers aren’t always online, and are often missing 60% of your content…
  
  I’d suggest you to start with a 6h,12h retweet strategy—you can get a free 14-day trial with no cc required, and then analyse the results!
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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the stripe screenshot looks so symbolic... congrats!

mikha

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a year ago
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  It is! Thanks bro ;)
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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I started by building it for myself, so I was sure to have at least one happy user.

Great mindset! Well done 🙂

How did you start promoting Sidebird? Twitter DMs?

dambro

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a year ago
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  Thanks, I appreciate!
  
  I started by posting about it on my Twitter, nothing more haha
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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Still remember my first paying customer. Great feeling.

Congrats!

jarekrozanski

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a year ago
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  Thanks, Jarek! Glad to connect ;)
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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Congrats man, also been building/working in the web3 space and daydreaming about launching my own micro saas on the side

shan5742

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a year ago
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  Thanks mate! Did you do it?
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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    Nope, still nothing yet :(
    
    shan5742
    
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    a year ago
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      You should try, I'd be your first supporter!
      
      Lilian ッ
      
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      a year ago
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Congrats! In the same boat, so can relate to how big of a moment the first sale is.

jcliftonlee

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a year ago
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  Thanks! What’s your Twitter handle? I’d love to connect with people at the same stage 😉
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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Amazing! I couldn't relate more to this post.

I remember how good I felt when I got my first paying customer.

Keep up the great work dude! You're on your way to the second paying customer ;)

idanmasas

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a year ago
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  Eww, thank you mate! 🥰
  
  Hope I can get 10 customers quick so I can consider the idea as validated!
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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Congrats dude! So glad you continued past the 2-week craziness!

Curious why the per quarter pricing. As most will charge per month?

justindra

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a year ago
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  Hola Justin, 👋🏼
  
  That is a great question! I wanted to explore something unusual at this point.
  
  But I’m realizing that most people might not see the deal is that great, bc they are used to monthly plans…
  
  What do you think?
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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    Yea, I'm not too sure. I know that one of the companies I worked for, offered a quarterly price (5-10% discount), but also offered the monthly for those that are not yet sure and don't want to commit for a full quarter. In saying that the pricing was at $250 per month, so its a huge saving too to go quarterly.
    
    If it isn't a huge complication (with Stripe should be easy enough), it might be worth trialling both? And just see what people end up choosing?
    
    justindra
    
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    a year ago
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      Great insight, thanks!
      
      Then maybe I have to put a monthly plan on the side to make it clear enough?
      
      I think I’ll make some changes to the pricing next week. Will keep that in mind—thanks for helping ;)
      
      Lilian ッ
      
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      a year ago
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        Thats nice, having monthly plan help new user to try the paid version.
        
        sathithyayogi
        
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        a year ago
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        Thanks for the suggestion — I’m adding it asap!
        
        Lilian ッ
        
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        a year ago
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Nice, congrats! we're in the same niche :)

I'm not going to advertise on your topic, but on-topic your landing page looks nice and clean. Good luck!

alexmano

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a year ago
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  Hey Alex, looks like we are! Your project seems promising, I wish you luck too ;) 😇
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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You've got it dude! Keep it up!

And thanks for your continued help and support with www.survey101.io

Jakepryszlak

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a year ago
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  Yayy! Thanks mate.
  
  I'm on it too, small bets as they said... 😁
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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Simple product, very useful and really good UI, I'm sure you will get a lot of customers in no time!

fjdelarubia

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a year ago
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  Means the world—I truly appreciate 🥰
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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Huge congratulations! I reached the same milestone recently too and the feeling is incredible.

Your Landing page is super clean btw, it looks so nice :)

mgirkins

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a year ago
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  Thank you so much, Max — congratulations too! 😜
  
  Looks like we're at the same stage... Let's connect!
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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Awesome! A great start to a great journey :)

arvidkahl

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a year ago
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  Wow, thanks Arvid!
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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Inspiring story! Hope I also make money from my own startup someday :)

Indrajit

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a year ago
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congratulations!

Digitalpriyana

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a year ago
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Congrats!

olex_codis

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a year ago
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Congrats @_justlilian . We got 300+ customers in 1 day last year when we launched our product https://linkedcamp.com (LinkedIn Automation Tool). Try content marketing to get good results.

erichui

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a year ago
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  Hello, I'm interested in your service. Can you send me the pricing plan? Thanks so much
  [email protected]
  
  danhtp
  
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  a year ago
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    Which service do you want?
    
    erichui
    
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    a year ago
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  300+ paying customers in 1 day is HUGE 😳
  
  Is there anywhere I could read how you managed to do that?
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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Good job. Did you use any tool for retweeting?

icebob

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a year ago
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  Thanks. No, actually built it all by myself with the twitter api!
  
  Lilian ッ
  
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  a year ago
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0

What did you used that made the authentication flow not work?

Diogovski

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a year ago
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9xflix

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a year ago
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StevenL

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a year ago
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Neurone

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a year ago
1. 1
  
  Thank you!
  
  Lilian ッ
  
  ·
  a year ago
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This comment was deleted a year ago.

doanhuy

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a year ago