DEV Community: Hugo Hamel

AppSumo Keyword Ranking Tool

Hugo Hamel — Mon, 02 May 2022 11:17:37 +0000

Few weeks ago, after having few sales from a financial spreadsheet I am selling on AppSumo, I started listing it on Etsy (thinking that it could give the same type of results).

It simply didn't...

They are both Marketplace and are both accepting digital download products, but Etsy is a complete different beast than AppSumo.

Them problem I faced on Etsy

Not having any results on Etsy, I started looking at different ways to change that.

After looking at similar top performing products, I came to realize few things. I needed to have an image that fits the vibe of the marketplace, a good title, good search keywords (called tags on Etsy).

That lead me to improve what is called Etsy SEO. I paid someone on Fiverr to help, search online how to do it, and tried a tool called eRank.

The problem I saw for myself on AppSumo

Suddenly, I realized that maybe my AppSumo listing wasn't performing as well as I wished for similar reasons.

Not knowing any tools for it, and having never seen one before, I thought of myself, let's build one.

The day after, I had a working prototype, 14 days after I had the first MVP (not mobile friendly yet).

Along the way, I discovered that AppSumo had some internal keywords (called tags too) for some of their products, and that this might help these products to be displayed in more cases as they have more searchable keywords.

Now, here I am, with a MVP that I need to validate.

The solution I built

The tool I built is mostly for mostly for sellers but it could be useful to buyers as there are some valuable information such as the amount of codes left and the number days the listing has been active

With this ranking tool I built, you can see:

how well your product is ranking on AppSumo for a specific keyword;
what page your product would be listed on;
what are the hidden keywords (tags) your product can be searched/found with.

Then, as you can see what are the other products that are listed above yours for a specific keyword, you can analyze their strategy with some data such as:

the categories they picked;
the hidden keywords AppSumo have assigned them (maybe you can contact the support to have these keywords assigned to your listing);
the pricing strategy they have choosen;
how long their listing have been active;
how many codes they have left.

The goal of this tool

The goal was to really help sellers get some insights on how well their listing is doing, as well as their competitors, to then give them comparable data so they can either review their listing to improve it, or contact the AppSumo team to have some improvement done to it.

The validation phase

Now that I have this keyword ranking tool built for AppSumo, I need to validate if it's worth continuing putting more effort into it.

This is why I am here... Trying to find people that had/have listing on AppSumo.

When was the last time that you wished you knew how well your AppSumo product was ranking?

Have you ever looked into how your listing could perform better within their search engine?

I'd really love to have your feedback and thoughts on it.

Access to the tool (it's FREE)

If you want to have access to the tool, let me know below, I'll message you directly with the link to it. I'm just trying to keep it low profile to stay under the radar of AppSumo while I validate it.

PS: My struggle

I've always been good at executing and building products, but never at validating them, which in most cases led them to be what I would consider a failure.

So, if you have any advice, I am all ears.

How do you track your finances?

Hugo Hamel — Thu, 07 Apr 2022 13:08:59 +0000

Recently attended a workshop, and I'm curious to know how you track your finances. Personally, I've built a custom spreadsheet, and I'm happy with that, but I'd love to see how other people are doing it.

Do you use a spreadsheet? Did you build it yourself? Did you buy one that was already done for you?
Do you use an accounting software (Quickbooks, Xero, Zoho, etc.)?
How do you like your current solution? Is it too complicated? Is it too overkill in terms of features for your needs?
What would make it better for you?

In the workshop, they recommended also using tracking tools like Mint to follow all your expenses, not just business, but also, personal.
I'd be curious to know how many other people track it all to the penny like this.

How many of you have invested in their self-development and done inner work?

Hugo Hamel — Wed, 06 Apr 2022 16:18:14 +0000

Before realizing on what I should focus on and what my purpose was, I was in the agency world, and close from the infoproduct world.

I came to realize that there's a lot of programs that exist for this audience (agencies and coaches with a course). Most of these programs are steps by steps on how to do X (often sales related) or on how to improve their mindset to scale their business.

When I switched to focusing more on my craft of being an "optimizer" (problem solver) by focusing on being more a maker, I noticed that there's not much of these type of programs.

I am still new to this new "indie" and "maker" world, so maybe I simply have not been exposed to it enough, but I am curious, how many of you have been doing some inner work?

And what have been your experience so far as a creator regarding your personal growth?

Why I decided that I must live my life on my terms.

Hugo Hamel — Tue, 05 Apr 2022 13:11:50 +0000

Yesterday, I was talking to my partner, and even though I had heard Alex Hormozi mention that "We're all going to die, it doesn't matter who we are", I had never had the "click" that I needed to have to feel it.

We're all going to die one day, and we don't know when that day will be.
I've spent my whole life trying to find my purpose, where I was simply disappointed most of the time, and I was always looking at other people and comparing myself.

But now, I can finally say that I am slowly feeling like I am finding it with more clarity.

For that reason, as scary as it might be, I decided that I needed to stop being scared of things that weren't going to help me achieve the goals that I have set for myself.

The one is to make sure that I always focus on doing something that I love.

The second one is to enjoy the process and the journey that comes with doing what I love.

Basically, I want to grow old doing what I love, not feeling that I am working.

More specially what that means is: building solutions that solve problems (help people) and improve how things are being done (innovate).

What's that one thing for you?