In 2021, I built my first mobile app during a high school vacation. It was terrible, basically a wrapper around a website for exam past questions. But it made okay money from ads, so I forgot about it for years.
Fast forward to September 2024: I rebuilt the entire app with React Native. Today, it has over 50,000 downloads across Ghana, Nigeria, and Sierra Leone. I've never spent a dollar on ads.
Here's exactly how it happened, the channels that worked, the timing that mattered, and the one thing my brother said that changed everything.
The App: Solving a Real Problem
BECE Past Questions helps students in Ghana prepare for the Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE).
The problem it solves is simple but real:
Students need past exam questions to practice
Physical past question books cost money
Those books are often outdated
Digital alternatives barely existed
I built an app that gives students free access to all BECE past questions, plus quizzes to help them prepare.
Key lesson: I found a niche problem and solved it. This matters more than most people realize.
I've built other apps since then. They all failed. Why? Competition was fierce, and competitors had marketing budgets. If you're a student or solo dev without ad spend, you'll sink in competitive markets.
But BECE exam prep? That was wide open.
The Failed First Version (2021-2024)
My first version was bad. Really bad.
It was a glorified webview, just a wrapper around a website. The UI was clunky. The experience was poor. Downloads were decent, but churn was terrible. People would download it, use it once, and never come back.
I made okay money from AdMob, so I left it alone and moved on to other projects.
For three years, that app just sat there, slowly accumulating bad reviews.
The Rebuild: September 2024
In September 2024, I decided to do a complete overhaul.
I rebuilt the app from scratch in React Native:
Proper offline support
Better UI/UX
Quiz features
Faster performance
Cleaner store listing
I updated the Play Store screenshots, rewrote the description, and relaunched.
Then I waited for users to pour in.
They didn't.
I got a bit discouraged. I'd just spent weeks rebuilding this app, and downloads were... the same.
That's when my brother said something that changed everything:
"Jonathan, no one knows about the app. How do you expect people to download it?"
He was right. I had built it. Now I needed to actually tell people it existed.
The Growth Strategy (That Wasn't Really a Strategy)
My brother started posting the app link in Facebook groups.
What he posted:
Simple message: "This app gives you access to all BECE past questions for free"
Link to the Play Store
Posted in student groups across Ghana
How often: Regularly, but not spammy enough to get flagged by Facebook.
Results: We started seeing downloads. Sometimes 100-200 per day. During exam season? 500+ downloads per day.
That was it. That was the entire "marketing strategy."
No paid ads. No influencer outreach. No TikTok videos. Just my brother dropping links in Facebook groups where students actually were.
What Actually Drove Growth: Four Things
1. Accidental ASO (App Store Optimization)
When I set up the store listing, I didn't know anything about ASO. I just named it "BECE Past Questions" and wrote a description focused on what students were searching for.
Turns out, that was perfect.
Today, I rank top 3 when you search "BECE" in the Play Store.
I didn't intentionally optimize for keywords. I just named the app what students would search for. That accidental SEO has been my biggest growth driver.
Lesson: Sometimes the best ASO is just being obvious. Name your app what people are searching for.
2. Word of Mouth (The Compounding Effect)
Students tell other students. Teachers recommend it. Parents share it.
I know this because:
Users tell me directly: "My friend told me about this app"
Teachers and parents call me to thank me (my number is in the app for support)
Reviews mention: "My teacher recommended this"
Word of mouth didn't happen overnight. It took time. But once it started, it compounded.
The 2025 spike (44,000+ downloads) wasn't because I suddenly started marketing. It was because enough people knew about the app that it spread organically.
3. Seasonal Timing (Exam Cycles)
My app follows a predictable pattern:
Month |
Installs |
Jan-Apr |
Growth begins |
May-Jun |
Peak season (7,500+ downloads/month) |
Jul-Aug |
Drop after exams |
Sep-Dec |
Low activity |
Example from 2025:
January: 2,857 downloads
May: 7,520 downloads (peak)
July: 2,019 downloads (post-exam drop)
This seasonal pattern is actually good. It means the product perfectly fits the exam cycle. Students need it when exams are approaching, not year-round.
Lesson: If your product is seasonal, lean into it. Don't fight the cycle, optimize for the peaks.
4. Community Building (The WhatsApp Groups)
After the 5th iteration of the app, I added a WhatsApp group link for students to study together.
I did this on a whim. I didn't expect much.
Today, there are 5 WhatsApp groups with ~5,000 students total (WhatsApp limits groups to 1,000 members).
What happens in these groups:
Students help each other with past questions
They ask questions about specific exams
I jump in occasionally to help
New users join the app because they're in the groups
The moderation problem: Managing 5,000 teenagers is... challenging.
So I built a WhatsApp bot that:
Removes inappropriate content
Steers conversations back to studying
Moderates automatically
These groups create a community around the app. They keep students engaged, help with retention, and generate word-of-mouth growth.
Lesson: Community isn't just for SaaS products. Even a mobile app can benefit from giving users a place to interact.
The Review Recovery Strategy
When I rebuilt the app, I had a problem: tons of bad reviews from the old version.
The old app was terrible, and users left 1-star reviews. Those reviews stuck around even after the rebuild.
How I fixed it:
1. Created a review funnel I showed the Play Store review dialog after users completed something rewarding, like finishing a quiz or completing a set of questions.
Psychology: People are more likely to leave positive reviews when they've just experienced success.
2. Responded to every bad review I replied to complaints, explained what I'd fixed, and asked users to reconsider their rating.
Some updated their reviews. Many didn't. But new positive reviews eventually outnumbered the old bad ones.
Result: Rating climbed from ~2.5 stars to 4.3 stars with hundreds of positive reviews.
Teachers and parents now call me to thank me. One parent told me the app helped their child pass BECE. That's worth more than any 5-star review.
The 2025 Breakout: 9× Growth
2024: ~5,000 downloads 2025: 44,000+ downloads
That's 9× growth in one year.
What changed?
The React Native rebuild (better product)
Improved Play Store listing (better screenshots, description)
Facebook group posts (initial traction)
Word of mouth compounding (organic growth)
WhatsApp community (retention and engagement)
But honestly? The biggest factor was timing + product-market fit.
Students needed this. It solved a real problem. And once enough people knew about it, it spread on its own.
Geographic Expansion (Without Trying)
I built this app for Ghana. That's where BECE exams happen.
But look at my user base now:
Country |
Share |
🇬🇭 Ghana |
~70% |
🇳🇬 Nigeria |
~25% |
🇸🇱 Sierra Leone |
~5% |
Nigeria is growing fast:
2022: ~2,167 downloads
2025: ~7,980 downloads
Nigeria has 10× Ghana's population and it’s already my second largest market at 25% of users.
Sierra Leone is small but consistent: 600+ downloads per month. For a country that size, that's significant.
Lesson: Build for one specific market, but don't geo-block. You might discover adjacent markets you didn't know existed.
What Didn't Work (And What I Never Tried)
What I didn't try:
Twitter/X posts
TikTok videos
Instagram ads
Influencer outreach
Reddit posts
Paid ads (Google, Facebook)
Why? Honestly, I just didn't think about it. My brother handled the Facebook groups, and that worked, so I never explored other channels.
What failed: I built a game app recently (Z Play - mini games). It's not doing well.
Why? The market is too competitive. Gaming apps have massive competition, and competitors have real marketing budgets. Without ads or a unique angle, you sink.
Lesson: Niche > competitive. A small, underserved market beats a huge, competitive one, especially if you have no budget.
What I'd Do Differently
1. Start the Facebook groups earlier
I wasted three years with a bad app sitting idle. If I'd rebuilt sooner and started promoting it earlier, I'd be at 100K+ downloads by now.
2. Respond to reviews faster
I eventually responded to bad reviews, but it took time. Responding immediately would've helped the rating recover faster.
3. Build the WhatsApp community from day one
The groups are now a core part of user retention. I should've added that feature in version 1.
4. Track metrics from the start
I didn't pay attention to where downloads were coming from until recently. If I'd tracked it earlier, I could've doubled down on what worked.
What's Next
For BECE Past Questions:
Keep improving based on user feedback
Update with new past questions every year
Maintain the WhatsApp community
New project: WASSCE Past Questions
I'm building a separate app for WASSCE (West African Senior School Certificate Examination).
The challenge: Collecting past questions for WASSCE is exponentially harder than BECE. There are more subjects and more years
Right now, I'm deep in the data collection phase. It's the most time-intensive part of apps like this.
I'll write about that experience in a future post, how I scrape, collect, and process exam questions at scale.
The Bottom Line
50,000 downloads. $0 spent on ads.
Here's what actually worked:
Solved a real, niche problem (free access to past questions)
Accidental ASO (named the app what students search for)
Facebook groups (thanks to my brother)
Word of mouth (compounded over time)
Seasonal timing (aligned with exam cycles)
Community building (WhatsApp groups kept users engaged)
What didn't matter:
Fancy marketing strategies
Social media presence
Paid ads
Influencers
Sometimes growth isn't about doing everything. It's about doing the one or two things that actually matter for your specific product and market.
For me, that was:
Building something students actually needed
Showing up where they already were (Facebook groups)
Letting word of mouth do the rest
If you're a student or solo dev without a marketing budget, find a niche problem, solve it well, and show up where your users are. The rest will follow.
Next up: How I'm collecting and processing WASSCE past questions at scale (and why it's 10× harder than BECE).
Written while debugging to: [Dunsin Oyekan – Nagode]
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