We found leaks š§
Launching Polar Habits, how it went, what we learnt, and how it shaped what's coming next.
Hey, friend! šš»
As promised, itās February 9th, and Iām here. Thanks for keeping me accountable! š
I want to tell you about launching Polar Habits, how it went, what we learnt, and how it shaped what we decided to work on next.
Launching the appā¦
I knew early on (back in July) that I wanted to launch Polar Habits on ProductHunt on January 1stāthe day of New Yearās resolutions. It just made perfect sense.
I had 6 months to build the app and prepare for the launch. I also teamed up with Jesse towards the end of October, which helped us move faster. But the closer we got to 2023, the more we realised we werenāt āready.ā š
We launched anywayā¦
It went amazingly well. We made it to #2 product of the day, getting 3k new signups within the first 3 days. Over a month later, we continue to get new people finding out about us through ProductHunt! šš»
The combination of our success on ProductHunt and Jesseās reach in the ADHD communityāfor whom our habit-building philosophy is a game changerāmade our user base grow much faster than Iād imagined.
On Monday, we crossed 5,000 registered users! š¤Æ
To me, thatās exciting but also super overwhelming. To put this in perspective, Course Creators Weekly, the newsletter that took me 17 months of effort, never made it to 1k subscribers!
Our big success also highlighted some big issues.
I donāt regret launching, though. Despite the overwhelm and the feeling that Polar Habits wasnāt yet ready for prime time, Iām glad we launched it. If we waited until it was āready,ā that day would never have come. More importantly, we wouldnāt know what to focus on next. šš
Finding leaksā¦
Weāve had over a hundred support messages from website visitors and users of the app since the launch, and there are a few questions/feature requests that have repeatedly come up:
Is there a mobile app? š±
Can I group/rearrange my habits? āļø
How can I set up reminders? ā°
Whatās your Privacy Policy? šļø
Is there a Dark Mode? š
OK, Iām joking about the last one, though having tried using the app before bed, I can totally empathise with the few people whoāve asked for Dark Mode! š
To me, only one of those requests stands out as critical.
Having a native mobile app would be nice, being able to organise habits without resorting to hacks (like numbering them) would be great for the user experience, a clear privacy policy is a non-negotiable thatāll help put our usersā minds at ease (not to mention cover our asses! š ), and dark mode would be a welcome addition for the night owlsā¦
But reminders? That, we should have launched with in the first placeā¦
For an app thatās helping people build momentum with their habits, one of our biggest challenges is helping people maintain momentum using Polar Habitsāthe appāitself. š¬
I built a basic dashboard that lets us see how many people actively use the app and how many habits were logged over a given period. This is how our numbers looked last week:
As a first-time SaaS founder, I donāt really know what āgoodā numbers are supposed to look like, but to me, seeing that only 13.37% of our āusersā used the apps last week doesnāt give me confidence that weāre doing a great job in terms of onboarding and retention. š¤Ø
Whatās more relevant is that despite the increase in our total number of users, our number of āactive usersā has been dropping week after week.
Iām fully aware that some drop in engagement is normal and expected, especially for a habit tracker launched on January 1st when peopleās motivations were through the roof. Once the excitement disappears, so do our users! š«„
But I also know that so far, weāve done virtually nothing to keep users engaged once their āNew Year, New Meā excitement wears off. Weāre relying on people to remember to track their habits.
Polar Habits is like a leaky bucket right now. šŖ£
There are 2 things I can think of that perhaps we shouldāve done already:
Daily reminder emails
Onboarding email series
Push notifications
I know, thatās 3 instead of 2. I just hadnāt thought of the third one before! š
Letās start with thatā¦
Push Notifications š¬
Itās not entirely true that I didnāt think of this, but I kept dismissing it because I thought push notifications were only for mobile appsāsomething we donāt have yet. But websites can send push notifications too! š¤¦š»āāļø
I almost never allow websites to send me push notifications, but that doesnāt mean it wouldnāt be a viable option for Polar Habits and our users.
Having done a little research, I think itās also possible for websites on Android devices to send push notifications without a native app. This isnāt possible on iOS, but itāll be worth looking into for Android alone. It could be more straightforward than I thinkāor the opposite! š
Thanks, Dylan (again,) for nudging me in this direction! šš»
Daily reminder emails ā°
We want to give our users the option to receive daily email reminders in case (and only if) they forget to log their habits.
Iāve been working on this for the past week or so. I thought it was going to be relatively straightforward, but oh man! š
Most of the complexity was around designing an efficient database structure (not my forte) and then time zones (aka the developerās nemesis.)
The good news is that the feature is now complete! š„³
Weāre rolling out soon:
Onboarding email series š§
We plan to set up an onboarding email series to familiarise our users with the product and how it can help them build long-term habits. šŖš½
I havenāt given much thought to what goes into the emails (Jesse will be taking care of this one,) but in terms of retention and engagement, there are 2 things I think the email series should aim to accomplish:
Get our users to add Polar Habits to their phoneās home screen
Encourage our users to enable daily reminder emails
My next commitmentā¦ š
As mentioned before, Iām not publishing The Bumpy Ride on a fixed schedule. I find that too overwhelming. Instead, I only make a commitment and set a deadline for my next post.
So, here goesā¦
Jesse and I want to start charging for Polar Habits as soon as possible. Thereāll always be a free plan, but the sooner we get money flowing in, the sooner we can turn this into a viable, sustainable business. š°
Knowing myself, though, Iāll probably want to patch every leak and fix every little detail before I have the āaudacityā to ask people for their money. This is obviously going to be a problemāit wonāt ever happen! š
So, Iām going to count on you to keep me accountable.
By the time I publish my next post, Iāll have added a paid plan to Polar Habits.
And it canāt be later than March 9th. šļø
Thanks for joining me on this ride! š
It means the world to me, so thank you! ā¤ļø
āMerott š¾