About four months ago, one of my coworkers was caught in a wave of layoffs. During a conversation, he shared his job search challenges and discussed automating various processes.
He pointed out that while numerous AI tools exist for different tasks, the sheer number can be overwhelming. A single, streamlined platform could save job seekers significant time. With this in mind, my coworker, despite having no development background, built an MVP (thanks to Cursor!).
The MVP, while not visually polished, was functional. It offered easy job tracking, job fit analysis, and interview recommendations. We onboarded a user to validate the idea, and the feedback was positive. This initial validation, though limited to one user, encouraged me to develop the project further, alongside my full-time job.
After working on this for a while, we reached a point where we felt comfortable releasing a public version.
Side note: AI tools helped us do 2-3x more work and save a lot of time.
January 2025, We discussed various rollout strategies, focusing on organic growth:
- No paid marketing until significant user validation.
- Leverage product directories.
- Target specific subreddits on Reddit.
- Avoid marketing to the wrong audience.
Our initial goal for the end of January was a modest four users. 😅
We started with alternativeto.net. Listing was quick, and we rapidly surpassed our initial goal of 4 users. We then shared the app on r/jobsearchhacks and we got a similarly positive response. Within a week or two, we had nearly 100 total users, and lots of errors and bugs to be fixed.
This made us shift our attention to user retention instead of focusing solely on acquiring new users. We wanted to ensure existing users found value in the platform and returned. Our approach included:
- Analyzing user pain points using PostHog.
- Reaching out to users
- Analyzing usage patterns.
- Fixing visual as well as functional bugs.
This helped us significantly improve the app and understand user priorities. Traffic primarily came from our Reddit post and alternativeto, initially bringing in five to seven new users daily, which later tapered off to one or two. At this moment we also got some random organic users from Google.
By the end of January, our metrics were:
- 175 total users
- 5 daily active users
- 30 weekly active users
Of the 175 total users, only 30-35 performed meaningful actions on the app.
At the beginning of February, we repeated our January strategy: did another reddit post, focused feedback gathering, usage analysis, and bug fixes. By early February, we had 5-7 daily active users, 30-35 weekly active users, and 200-225 total registered users.
We prioritized user engagement, diligently tracking errors, and personally contacting users after resolving their issues. At this point, we have started to notice the patterns and what users like using more in the app. This helped us focus on the things that matter most.
We tried to got our app listed on theresanaiforthat in January but apparently its not free and takes about 200$ to do so. However, their editorial team manually vetted us and listed us on their platform, which significantly boosted our reach, pushing us past 400 users in two days.
We got a lot of reach from this platform. We even got noticed by The AI Report, a newsletter with 400,000+ subscribers and they decided to feature our app in their trending tools section alongside news about Musk's SuperGrok launch. This brought in another 130-140 users in a single day, pushing us past 500 total users.
We even hit the free tier limits of some of our services that day! These are good problems to have. 😉
The response confirms the market demand for our solution, and the retention confirms that we are able to add value to users' job search. By continuing to deliver value, we're confident we can build something significant.
We are repeating the same strategy, trying to be close to our users and build on their feedback while getting the users organically.
Here are some of our learnings in these last 3 months (total) of developing this.
- Creating user value is greater than fancy features
- We can only unlock the full potential of our software if we see and use the app from our user's eyes - Direct feedback
- If it does not work in the beginning, It's not going to work in the future -- This is not the first app we are releasing, we have some failed ones too ;)
- Sharing the journey while building the app is as crucial as the launch.
- Launching slowly (one platform after another) gives you time to improve your app much more based on users that are currently using it.
Thanks for reading, The app we are talking about here is Eloovor. It's an AI career coach app that provides an end-to-end solution for your job search journey. It has
- One-click employer research
- Job tracking
- AI analysis on jobs - (Job fit, personalised resume/cover-letter, interview prep)
- Helps you improve your existing resume by providing suggestions
If you are interested, You can try it out at https://app.eloovor.com
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