KeepSafe lets you take control of who sees what on your phone. Privacy is our main feature so we're an inherently non-social service. 12 months ago, we started at 0, today we have more than a million daily active users.<p>This is how we did it:
* Start with something the user cares about.
Instead of solving a big thing like "Privacy", we decided to start close to a specific user problem: keeping pictures private on the phone. By reducing it, we quickly realized that this was a crowded space with tons of apps that simply hide pictures. Bad, because of competition but a good indicator for what users care about.<p>* Throw out features
The fewer things your app can do, the more you can focus on making the user flows for the remaining features simple and easy to understand.<p>* Focus on retention
Growth is nice but we want users to come back. We were slow to build new features but always fast to release bug fixes and improvements to the core experience. In our case it was improving the speed for adding pictures to KeepSafe and the user flows for doing it. If you continuously improve, your userbase will notice and keep using your app.<p>* Speak a language your users understand
We have a large userbase in the US and other English speaking countries. But we invested in translating the app from the get-go. The smartphone penetration in countries like South Korea is really high and we see lots of users from Europe too. It's easy and it's fast if you use services like MyGengo.<p>* Ask your users for their opinion
When someone started to be a frequent user we simply asked them to rate us in the Android market. It has helped our ranking.<p>What is your experience and insights on growing your app?<p>KeepSafe has a fun and ambitious roadmap. If you want to join a mobile startup and have huge impact, take a look http://www.getkeepsafe.com/about.php#jobs
Your site (<a href="http://www.getkeepsafe.com/" rel="nofollow">http://www.getkeepsafe.com/</a>) should link to download links so that I can download your app straight off the bat.
Thx for sharing, great numbers. Some questions:
- Via which channel did you communicate with your early users / get feedback?
- Did you collect your user's email addresses from the beginning, upon installing the app - or at a later time?
Being on the App store / Android market is a social/viral marketing tool.<p>Getting positive reviews and more downloads creates a viral effect as you get more prominence in the market.<p>But I'm just being pedantic. Congrats on the growth.
I noticed that the app is free. And the upgrade doesnt unlock any core functionality. Would love to know how well has the monetization strategy worked so far? And if you plan to change it?<p>congrats on the success.
Well, another reason why app name is important: Hide pictures with KeepSafe instead of KeepSafe.<p>Btw, why the name of the iOS app is "Hide Pictures and Photos with KeepSafe", but the Android version is just "Hide pictures with KeepSafe"?<p>In my iPhone, when I search "hide photo" I can't find your app, so the keyword "Photos" is therefore useless?
For completeness:<p>In Android if you prefix a directory name with a dot, its content will not appear on Galleries and other common apps (some will let you choose to do so in settings). You can also create a .nomedia empty file in a directory to hide it.
Hey Guys,
great work there. Congratulations! I noticed that your logo does not link to your index page / home. Might not be that important, but I spent at least 2-3 additional clicks while looking through your appealing web pages.
What about marketing? How did you get your users?<p>I mean I got that you have a great product and keep improving it and people will stay - but you have to get your users from somewhere.<p>Was it all just people who found the app organically in the app store? No PR or marketing of any kind?