Marketing with Integrity: A Solo Developer Plan

I'm not a marketing person or a salesman. I find it difficult enough floating my own ego boat, let alone trying to market something. Don't get me wrong, I'm not scared of marketing or riddled with anxiety over it. I just don't like it or enjoy it. Perhaps that's the introvert in me. I don't know. I've always preferred to be behind the scenes, lurking in the shadows rather than in the limelight.

I guess being solo I have no choice now. It's going to be a steep learning curve, that's for sure.

Starting from Zero

As I had no clue where to start, I opted to buy a reduced course on Udemy titled "The Complete App Marketing Course".

View the course on Udemy

It wasn't until I'd completed checkout and started the course that I realised it was published in 2017 and hadn't been updated. I'd already spent the money, and while I could probably have gotten a refund, I felt confident there was enough in there that I could take away. For the sake of £15, I kept it and watched all the videos.

Of course the course had issues. It was outdated, some resources didn't exist anymore, and many things had changed in the platforms the presenter was using. All in all, the course was easy to follow and understand, and I got a decent amount of information from it to make a start. But it wasn't enough. I needed to verify the information from the video was still accurate and relevant eight years later.

With assistance from my buddy Claude, I gave him the notes I had compiled from the course and explained my situation. I asked Claude to research:

• Simple yet effective marketing solutions and opportunities for solo developers
• Free and paid advertising for a tight to zero budget
• Best practices, dos and don'ts, what to do and when to do it
• The plan must market with integrity, meaning no fake reviews, no inflated numbers, and no misleading tactics

After a lot of back and forth (me asking questions, Claude finding answers and restructuring), we managed to come up with a plan. How good it is, I have no idea. Does it completely suck? Is it a good start? I guess we'll find out.

Here is the ten section marketing plan for January.

1. App Store Optimisation (ASO)

Until watching the video course, I had no idea that performance matters within the first 24 hours, first week, and first month. Such metrics can dictate visibility of your app. Ideally promotional points and launch plans should be in place before submitting to the App Store.

I walked in blind to this. Now I know for any future apps.

Localisation

One key takeaway for better app visibility was related to localisation. Both App Store localisation (title and descriptions) as well as possible in-app localisation. The main languages to consider for both are:

• Chinese (if the app doesn't use AI)
• Japanese
• Spanish
• Portuguese
• French
• German
• Italian
• Dutch
• Russian
• Korean
• Arabic

Adding App Store localisations for the above potentially ensures better presence and visibility in the App Store of countries that use these languages.

Visual Assets

These visuals relate to the app screenshots and preview videos you attach to the App Store listing. I don't know why anyone wouldn't bother with this, but I have already added these for all the apps I have on the App Store. That said, it's listed here as a reference:

• The App Store allows up to 10 screenshot images. Use all of them and add good looking screenshots with captions where relevant.
• The App Store allows up to 3 preview videos of 30 seconds each. Use all 3 if possible.

ASO Keywords

Interestingly, the top 5 apps that show up in search results of the App Store take up 72% of downloads. ASO dictates whether your app shows up based on search terms. Similar to website SEO, ASO is important with the key focus being on keywords entered in the App Store details section.

My takeaways from the video course and things I will be implementing:

• The App Store will generate all possible combinations based on given list of keywords
• Don't include plural words, the App Store will do this
• Don't add spaces between commas (takes up character count)
• Search the App Store to see what other suggestions and terms users are searching for
• Use Apple's own Search Ads to find used keywords
• Early game: use keywords not searched frequently but with a low difficulty rating
• Once you have downloads and reviews, start targeting better and more relevant keywords

2. In-App Review Prompt

Have you ever noticed how some apps periodically ask if you want to rate and review the app? It's not often I see this, but I have a few apps I use where I have seen it.

Implementing in-app review prompts seems fairly straightforward using SKStoreReviewController. Why bother? After installing and using an app, most users forget about rating and reviewing it, and often don't realise how integral it is to the development studio.

Apple states that the prompt can't be shown more than 3 times in a 365 day period, so users wouldn't be constantly bombarded every time they start the app. It's certainly worth adding, which I'll be doing following this process:

• Use SKStoreReviewController as required by Apple
• Capture the date on first app launch
• Trigger a review prompt every 125 days since first app launch (125 days ensures only ever 3 times in a 365 day period)
• Don't show anything if the user has already left a rating
• Never prompt during onboarding or critical tasks
• Add a manual "Rate App" button in Settings if no review left yet (doesn't count against the limit)

3. Launch Platforms

The two main platforms worth considering are Product Hunt and various app directories. I did look into Hacker News, but it required community interaction, and honestly I really don't have the time for it.

Product Hunt

Product Hunt has a domain rating of 91, which makes it valuable for backlinks alone. The original plan from the course involved building a teaser page, gathering followers, coordinating supporters, and timing the launch for maximum visibility on launch day.

After researching how the platform actually works in 2024, it turns out only about 10% of launches get "Featured" since their algorithm changed in January 2024. Chasing "Product of the Day" requires significant effort with uncertain returns.

The pragmatic approach would be to submit all apps to Product Hunt purely for the backlink, which would take around 30 to 60 minutes per app:

• Write a decent tagline (60 characters)
• Write a description (260 characters)
• Upload 2 or more screenshots (1270x760px)
• Link to the website
• Submit

No teaser pages, no launch day coordination, no staying online all day. The backlink gets indexed regardless of how the "launch" performs.

Directories

For directories, the main ones worth submitting to are AlternativeTo and SaaSHub. Both are free, provide backlinks, and submission is straightforward. Submit and forget.

4. macOS Specific Opportunities

After researching various options, only two made the cut for effort versus potential return.

9to5Mac runs an Indie App Spotlight feature. Just one email to their editorial team and hope for the best. Zero ongoing commitment.

Indie App Sales runs coordinated discount events twice yearly in March and September. Participating means discounting your app during the event window and getting included in their promotional push. Low effort, potentially good exposure if the timing works.

I did actually have other options on the plan like Indie App Santa and Setapp, but in the end they were removed:

• Indie App Santa is iOS focused and costs circa £300+ per submission
• Setapp requires SDK integration and ongoing maintenance. It's also more of a distribution and business model decision than a marketing activity.

5. Reddit Strategy

The key discovery here was r/macapps. Unlike most of Reddit where self-promotion gets you banned or downvoted, r/macapps explicitly welcomes developers posting about their own apps. No karma farming required, no pretending to be a regular community member first.

The approach is simple:

• Write an honest post about what you built, why you built it, and what makes it different
• Respond to comments

That's it. One genuine r/macapps post likely delivers more return than weeks of trying to game other communities.

Hacker News was originally in the plan but got removed entirely. HN rewards genuine long-term participation, and the community can smell promotional accounts. Forcing engagement in a community I don't have a lot of time to dedicate to, just to drop a link, goes against the whole "market with integrity" philosophy. If I'm not already an active HN participant, it's not worth pretending to be one.

6. Social Media

In general I find social media platforms to be time vampires, so I tend to stay away from them. While YouTube is a social platform and like many people I'm on the platform at some point every day, rarely do I like videos or add comments.

Sorry, yes. I am one of those. A lurker.

But I have to bite the bullet, so I will be promoting the apps on the following social platforms:

• Twitter/X
• Mastodon
• BlueSky
• Pinkary
• LinkedIn

Of course, if platform users comment on things or ask questions, I am happy to oblige and will always make an effort to engage. Just don't expect random "funny meme" posts. Promotion and update posts will be the main focus, with engagement where it's needed.

The ratio matters: mostly helpful and interesting content, occasionally promotional. Nobody follows an account that only posts "buy my app."

7. Content Marketing

This is essentially blogging, which I'm already doing. The "secret sauce" approach means writing about how things were built, technical challenges solved, and decisions made along the way. But I'm already doing this, albeit on this website rather than the app specific websites. I think from here on I will add a development log section on future projects.

Developers love reading about other developers' journeys. Blog posts also serve SEO purposes. User guides and FAQs can rank for problem-based searches, bringing in people who don't know your app exists but are searching for solutions to problems your app solves.

8. Cross-Promotion

The easiest marketing channel: promoting my own apps to people already using my other apps. This costs nothing and the audience already trusts me.

The implementation is straightforward:

• Add "Other Apps by Codel" sections to each app's website
• Mention other apps in relevant contexts
• Potentially add cross-promotion within the apps themselves (tastefully, not annoyingly)

9. Self-Published Specifics

This section only applies to Chronode, or future projects that can't be in the App Store, since it can't be sandboxed. Trust becomes the primary challenge as users are naturally more cautious about downloading apps outside the App Store.

Trust signals to implement (already done for Chronode):

• Code signed with Developer ID
• Notarised by Apple (with badge displayed on website)
• Clear developer identity
• Professional website with SSL
• Visible version history
• Clear refund policy

10. Marketing Calendar

Rather than an elaborate launch sequence, the calendar is split into one-time setup tasks and an ongoing rhythm.

One-Time Setup

• ASO keyword research
• Screenshot optimisation with captions
• Website and landing page (already done)
• Email capture setup
• Social media profile
• Review prompt implementation
• Cross-promotion links between apps
• Product Hunt submissions (backlink grab)
• Directory submissions
• r/macapps posts

Ongoing Rhythm

Wrapping Up

That wraps up the marketing plan and process for January, for each app and other future projects. What do you think? Too much? Too little? What can be improved? Any oversights? Drop a comment or message me directly. I'd be grateful for any feedback.