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Aivars Meijers

I'll add social once I have users" is a trap

Published about 2 months ago • 1 min read

I'll add social once I have users" is a trap

The Part-time Solopreneur

Hey!

If you’ve ever told yourself, “I’ll add [feature] once I have more users”, read this.

I just spent months in that trap.

The feature I gated: social in MotoLog (my Strava-for-motorcycles app).

Friends, leaderboard, profile cards. I kept saying I’d build it once I had more users. Today I shipped it. And realized I had it completely backwards.

The trap:

“Social only matters once you have users.”

The reality:

Strava without social isn’t Strava — it’s a spreadsheet. The social layer IS the product. Without it, the first 100 users have nothing to stick around for.

The order should be:

  1. Ship the social/loop layer first
  2. Drive users into a product where retention is already engineered
  3. Not the other way around

3 signs you’re in the same trap:

  • You’re building a “logbook” version of your app, planning to add sharing later
  • Your roadmap has a feature labelled “wait for users first”
  • The first user of your app has nothing to do other than wait. This one is extreme, agree, but possible

If 2 out of 3 — ship the social/loop layer this week. Even if it’s ugly. Even if you have to two-phone-test it yourself in a parking lot (I did).

Here’s today’s video — Bangkok ride, the two-phone test, the lens story, the honest reckoning at the end:

video preview​

Next week I’m going the opposite direction — researched 53 app ideas backed by data, not vibes. The methodology that comes out of that is something I’ll be using for everything I build going forward. More on next Monday.

That's it for today. Keep shipping 🚀

Aivars

600 1st Ave, Ste 330 PMB 92768, Seattle, WA 98104-2246
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Aivars Meijers

Part-time Indie Solopreneur

I'm building a portfolio with mobile apps and helping others to earn the first $1'000 on AppStore. Join The Part-time Solopreneur for tips and resources to build, launch, grow, and monetise your indie App business.

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