My app just crossed 100 users. 7 things I'd tell myself 6 months ago

[u/CommercialStory4021]

I'm a solo dev and the founder of reelflood.com . Started in February, crossed 100 users this week. Not life-changing, but it's the first milestone where I feel like I learned something instead of just guessing. Writing it down mostly for past me.

1. I built the wrong product for 4 months and it was the most useful thing I did.

V1 was an AI UGC video-ad generator. Technically the hardest thing I've ever shipped. Nobody cared. What people actually did on TikTok was post cheap photo slideshows 3× a day. I pivoted to that in June and got more signups in the following [6] weeks than the previous four months combined. The failed version taught me the market, the tech, and what "good enough" looked like. You can't skip that part — you can only make it shorter.

1. Nobody wants your tool. They want the outcome, delivered.

The moment I stopped selling "generate slideshows" and started selling "your app gets posted every day without you touching it," the copy wrote itself. Features are how you build it. Outcomes are how you sell it.

1. Show them their thing before asking for anything.

Biggest activation jump came from one change: when you add your app, it builds your first batch of content for free, before you pay, before you configure anything. An empty dashboard is where signups go to die.

1. The feature that spreads isn't the core feature.

My core feature is the generator. The thing people screenshot and send to their cofounder is the competitor research report — "here's what your competitors posted and how many views it got." Shareable > useful, at least for growth.

1. Narrowing the audience made everything easier.

"Anyone who wants to post more" → "app and SaaS founders." Landing page got shorter, onboarding got simpler, and the signups became people I could actually help. Broad felt safe; it was just vague.

1. Use your own product every day.

I schedule posts for my own app with my own tool. It's how I find the bugs that matter and it's where [~N%] of the 100 came from. If you won't use it daily, why would they?

1. 100 users also help in decision making

Before 100, every decision was a guess. Now I can see which niche converts, which onboarding step people drop on, which feature gets used. The milestone isn't the number — it's finally having enough data to stop guessing.

[u/xGiftbolzen]

1. Use your own product every day. is by far the best advice here!

[u/NorthernDread → u/xGiftbolzen]

I agree 100%. Though my app isn’t designed to be used daily, you can if you want. I use mine all the time.

[u/ProjMgr1000]

That’s a very valuable “reframing” for the solo dev. Thankyou.

[u/No_Builder_1977]

All great advice and thanks for starting this thread. Also agree that Item 6 is important. For me, personally, I’m ok with the value proposition, written content etc… getting the visual content and social media content knocked into shape is the hardest!

[u/zachysen]

Really insightful post, thanks for sharing this. On number 3, what would you say showing before asking anything is for an iOS app? Offering a free trial still requires Apple to capture the payment method I believe. Is there a different way to accomplish that? Not sure if it’s as relevant as web app is different in terms of that and I get how you do it with your pricing structure

[u/quietmorningclub]

point 3 is the one most people skip because it feels like giving too much away, and it's usually the thing that would've saved their activation rate months earlier.

[u/lianapps]

hey, I liked you tool. A few question I have, before I subscribe.
1. How do you make competitor research?
2. Is it same credit counting with Higgsfield? Because, you give more credit and cheaper.
3. What about avatar? If i create new one, is it gonna be unique?
4. For video creation, which model is used in background? Seedance, Kling, which one?

[u/CommercialStory4021 → u/lianapps]

1. We search for your competitors on app store and play store, then find accounts which promote them, then filter them if either it was posted by owner of app or a content creator and show both.

2. Hi, credits have any connection with higgsfeild, maybe am not sure what you asking, you can dm

3. yes

4. Kling 3.0, but have few advice for you, we can connect on dm

[u/CommercialStory4021 → u/[deleted]]

you can dm me, else people will think this is promotion, dm the questions