What am I trying to achieve with my Forebears genealogy app? That’s the question I was asked by a wise friend two-years ago. “Is it just something to talk about at dinner parties? Or am I trying to build a long-term business serving a global market of family historians?”
Good questions! The truth is somewhere between the two. For sure, it’s fun to surprise friends by showing them Forebears on the AppStore. When I charged a small amount for each download it was even more fun to buy a round of drinks with the revenue!
But the time’s come to raise my sights. I’ve had my head-down in the weeds (looking for bugs) and need to go to market. ‘Hello World’, as they say in computing!
So today’s new release of Forebears shifts the focus from programming languages to real human conversations. Earlier releases were about functionality; this one is about user-experience.
But that’s still talking about Forebears as an app rather than engaging with the people who might use it. The genealogy ‘ecosystem’ includes magazines and journals as well as family-history societies and professional associations. Most towns across the globe have groups with an interest in local history. These are all people who’d enjoy Forebears – if only they’d heard about it! And it’s FREE!!
So after nearly three years of development effort, the time has now come to step outside and begin the hard part: connecting with journalists, speaking at club events, engaging on social media. I need to leave the home-office and flex my marketing muscles.
That said, it’s incredibly exciting that with no marketing on my part, Forebears has still had 200 downloads in the last 5 weeks from 38 countries! Just imagine how many people would want it if they only knew it existed…
I hope you’ve enjoyed reading this latest episode in the Forebears app-development journey. If you’ve enjoyed it please share with your friends!
And get ready for the exponential sales chart showing how 200 downloads have grown to 200,000. Hopefully in the next post!
Opsisoft Apps 