My little app is getting upvoted on a directory launch for no reason

My little app is getting upvoted on a directory launch for no reason

Apparently my iOS app Koko launched on a directory yesterday. I waited so long I completely forgot about it!

I was completely surprised to see that I'm in 3rd place out of 130 projects this week. I didn't post about it obviously, so perhaps this is a good sign that the app has legs.

For some reason I really want to win. Even if my app doesn't make a single dollar, at least I can say I placed first in a launch lol

If you would like to support this little chicken on his way to the top of the leaderboard, please check here!

u/parker_birdseye — 3 days ago

First 30 day web traffic. Transparency post

Hey guys,

I often get depressed by the viral posts of success like 5k MRR in just 30 days...

So I wanted to do a quick reality check for my homies not having so much success (me included). Here's a transparent view of the first 30 days of web traffic to my landing page. Nothing crazy, averages like 10 visitors a day.

I posted a little bit on Reddit, a little bit on X. Again, nothing crazy. Imo this is a benchmark of a very average performance for the first month.

My app is an iOS app so web traffic isn't my main focus, but it's still a goal for me to grow it organically.

Here's the website. I think it's solid, especially for a quick AI build with only a few revisions.

Best of luck to all my brothers and sisters still in the trenches. Don't get discouraged.

u/parker_birdseye — 4 days ago

1st time iOS dev. Can you give me your thoughts?

Hi, I've launched my app on the App Store recently and I'm experimenting with screenshots. It's a language practice app that lets you have full voice conversations with local AI so you practice speaking and listening. Since it's local, your voice and info never leave your device.

I'm new to iOS development so I was hoping for some feedback these screenshots. Any thoughts would be helpful!

u/parker_birdseye — 7 days ago
▲ 4 r/sideprojects+1 crossposts

1 Week on the App Store. I'm happy with these stats :)

Hey everyone!

I wanted to share my stats since publishing my app Koko which went live a week ago. Koko is a language practice app that runs fully on-device, meaning you can have conversations where your voice and info don't leave your phone, for privacy reasons.

1 week in with 35 downloads and a decent conversion rate I think. No sales yet but I made the free tier really generous with a lot of free conversation time before showing the paywall.

Yesterday I made the switch to show the paywall immediately after the onboarding and let the user start a trial immediately. Hopefully this converts into some sales!

Hope this realistic view of my app performance helps give some context!

u/parker_birdseye — 7 days ago

I'm so pumped that my app was approved! The feeling hasn't gone away for 24 hours lol

Hey guys,

Just sharing a small win! After a couple weeks of review, my app is finally live! Two weeks of review isn't long in hindsight but it felt like an eternity.

Anyways, I built Koko to help language learners practice speaking and listening while keeping everything fully local and private, so your voice and info don't leave your iPhone.

I'd love any feedback! Running the models locally is a little difficult and I don't have every physical iPhone obviously so it's hard for me to know how it's working on various devices. It should work for iPhone 14+ and Mac obviously.

Here's the app

u/parker_birdseye — 14 days ago
▲ 20 r/iosdev+3 crossposts

Holy F I made it through review! Koko is alive!

I'm pretty emotional right now haha. I've been checking App Store Connect for the last 2 weeks religiously, and today I was afk all day and didn't realize I was approved this morning!

Anyway, I built Koko, a fully offline conversation practice for language learners. You can listen and speak as much as you want, everything scaled to your level. Best of all your voice and info stays on your device.

Check it out if this is up your alley! https://apps.apple.com/us/app/koko-language-learning/id6794011726

u/parker_birdseye — 3 days ago
▲ 3 r/TestFlight+1 crossposts

Koko - conversation practice for language learners. Fully-local AI conversations so your voice + info stays on your iPhone.

Hey!

I built an app to practice speaking and listening a new language. I tried simply talking with ChatGPT but it wasn't good because it spoke at too advanced of a level and more importantly I didn't want OpenAI training on my voice and information.

Best features:

  • Fully local. AI models run directly on your device (STT + LLM + TTS). You can run the app in airplane mode.
  • Audio scales to your learning level. Beginners hear slow, easy words while advanced users hear complex words with faster speaking.
  • Quality-of-life features like quick translation, "check my response", "what should I respond", etc.

You can run it in TestFlight on iOS or Mac. Any feedback would be appreciated!

testflight.apple.com
u/parker_birdseye — 15 days ago

Test my app and I'll test yours!

Hey, my iOS app just got approved for beta testing in TestFlight. I'm looking for testers but I also want to provide value for others. So if you're interested in testing my app, I'll test yours as well!

My app Koko is a conversation practice app for language learners. It's fully-local, so your voice and info stay 100% on device. You can test on either iPhone or Mac. You'll need to tell me your email so I can add you to the list of testers.

And be sure to drop your app so I can test as well.

Cheers!

u/parker_birdseye — 23 days ago
▲ 3 r/iosdev

Question about Paywall requirements

Hi everyone,

My app is in review right now. I just got a rejection because the reviewer couldn't find my paywall. The issue is that I give the user a free hour of usage, and then the paywall shows.

Obviously the reviewer can't be expected to use my app for an hour. I detailed this in a comment but I'm wondering if this won't be allowed.

Does anyone have any experience with a paywall setup like this?

I also thought about just adding an "unlock" button in my app settings that shows the paywall (basically if the user wants to pay early) just to give the reviewer an easy access to the paywall. I would love to hear your thoughts. Thanks!

reddit.com
u/parker_birdseye — 23 days ago

Just picked up this guitar

Hey I just picked up this Jester guitar for $40 from Facebook marketplace. It feels great to me though I’m only used to the bottom of the line beginner acoustics. It says it’s made in Holland. Anyone know much about this brand and what it’s worth?

u/parker_birdseye — 1 month ago

I'm only using local AI from now on

I've noticed a major shift in users' mentalities (mine included) regarding AI. They don't want to talk to AI when their info and sometimes voice recordings are going to external servers, maybe used for training data or who knows what.

I used to think privacy-focused apps were a bit overkill but I've completely flip flopped. The future of apps will be privacy-first apps that use local AI if they need an AI component. This eliminates any worries of what the user is actually giving up for using the app.

Anyways, I've already started building along these lines. My iOS app Koko is under review and will hopefully be released soon. It's a language conversation practice app that uses 100% local AI so everything stays on your phone. It can run fully in airplane mode!

Interested in hearing what others think about this. And to be clear because I probably wasn't, I use Codex for dev and there's no way around that. I tried developing with local AI but it was too slow for dev. My post is talking about using AI on the consumer side.

reddit.com
u/parker_birdseye — 1 month ago
▲ 4 r/LocalLLM+1 crossposts

I built a fully local conversation practice app so you can learn a language without sending your sensitive info to the cloud!

I've started to sober up to the idea that we should not be sending our info and voice to these cloud models.

When practicing a language on some of the speaking apps, I sometimes think "I probably shouldn't be sharing my details with this random app".

So I built a conversation practice app so you can practice listening and speaking all damn day and your voice, recordings, info, EVERYTHING stays right on your device.

PSA: you have to download a pretty beefy model (Gemma 4 E2B) onto your phone but the tradeoff for privacy is worth it in my opinion.

If you're interested in trying it out, it should be live on the App Store very soon. You can join the waitlist here: https://www.getkoko.app

u/parker_birdseye — 1 month ago

Understanding why businesses rank better

Hey everyone,

I am knowledgable in local SEO (what makes your business rank better on Google/Maps). It's actually quite easy and straightforward to optimize your Google Business Profile + website if you follow the rules which will help you rank better.

I would love to use this knowledge to help your small business if you're not ranking as well as you would like. Let me know if you would like the (free) help! cheers

reddit.com
u/parker_birdseye — 2 months ago

A tool to compare your GBP against local competitors

Hi everyone, I recently created a tool to compare how your business profile compares to your local competitors. I posted it in r/localseo and people really liked it so I wanted to share here as well.

GBP Comparison Tool

It measures how complete your profile is, how active, and how strong your local reputation is based on total reviews, review recency, etc.

Note: I've fixed a lot of early bugs so if you've already tried it and had issues, it should work now! Hope this helps your business.

Note #2: Service area businesses may not work 100% of the time. Lmk if you run into issues.

reddit.com
u/parker_birdseye — 2 months ago
▲ 114 r/SaaS

It ain't much, but I'm happy with it

168 visitors to my site, 107 the day before. And virtually 0 every day before that.

I achieved this by creating a lead magnet. Highly recommend it as a form of marketing.

Best of luck fam

u/parker_birdseye — 2 months ago

A tool to compare your GMB profile against local competitors

Hi everyone, I created a free simple tool to compare how your business profile compares to your local competitors. It measures how complete your profile is, how active, and how strong your local reputation is based on total reviews, review velocity, review recency, etc.

GBP Comparison Tool

This is not a map pack ranking. Let me know if you find it useful! It should work for all kinds of businesses.

Similarly, I created a "sister" tool that lets you estimate the local competition for a service as if you're just planning to start the business. You input an address and service and it provides overall grades for the local competitors. This tool is hidden right now but let me know if you want to test it out.

reddit.com
u/parker_birdseye — 2 months ago

Here's a tool to compare your profile against other businesses in your area + category

Here's a simple tool to compare how your business profile compares to other local businesses in your category. It measures how complete your profile is, how active, and how strong your local reputation is based on total reviews, review velocity, review recency, etc.

This is not a map pack ranking. Let me know if you find it useful! It should work for all kinds of businesses.

GBP Comparison Tool

Example Rankings:

https://preview.redd.it/vw3z8sbj8f8h1.png?width=2622&format=png&auto=webp&s=cc89cb82b5edfa6f2d838bd96cc8d063900821a2

reddit.com
u/parker_birdseye — 2 months ago

Comparing GBP to competitors

Hi, I hope this is allowed here. (Please tell me if not)

I built a tool to help local businesses compare and rank their Google Business Profile against local competitors in their categories.

It measures how complete your profile is, how active, and how strong your local reputation is based on total reviews, review velocity, review recency, etc.

Hope this is helpful! GBP Comparison Tool

Example ranking:

https://preview.redd.it/pfz0b26x6c8h1.png?width=2622&format=png&auto=webp&s=a0fae422704e0193600b79c93a9d045b35f14264

reddit.com
u/parker_birdseye — 2 months ago

Here's a tool to compare your profile against other businesses in your area + category

Here's a simple tool to compare how your business profile compares to other local businesses in your category. It measures how complete your profile is, how active, and how strong your local reputation is based on total reviews, review velocity, review recency, etc.

This is not a map pack ranking. Let me know if you find it useful! It should work for all kinds of businesses.

GBP Comparison Tool

reddit.com
u/parker_birdseye — 2 months ago

Building for a small customer base was a great decision

Guys I'm on my 8th product and it's getting steady users, 10-15 a day. Some paid but mostly free trial users.

The difference between this product and my previous failed startups was that I am now building a tool for a small group of people (plumbers, electricians, other home service providers).

Previously I was building for everyone or at least a very large portion of the population.

When you build for a small group of people, it becomes very obvious for them to see the value in it.

Similarly, I started running ads that probably turn off 99.9% of people but the 0.1% of people that click through know exactly what they're getting. It keeps my ad spend low while funneling great prospective customers to my site.

In the off chance that you run a home service business, check it out! https://www.homeservicepro.site

reddit.com
u/parker_birdseye — 2 months ago