r/LaunchPanda

I'm the solo developer of WorkRush, a free Android typing survival game built for a real phone keyboard.

Office reports, meeting notes, and urgent requests keep piling up. Type each visible memo exactly to clear it before the workload overflows. During a run, support memos can add an AI assistant, shields, slowdown, automatic cleanup, and extra capacity. Later levels add disruption memos and boss instructions, so it becomes a survival run rather than a typing-practice app.

The game supports Korean and English. I'd especially like to hear whether the mobile typing pace feels fair after the first few levels.

Playable Link: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.memosurvival.app

Posting the actual data because I think it helps to have a reference point for what to expect early on. No idea if mine are above or below average. I've heard stories of people taking way longer to see any revenue, and also much faster success stories. So take it for what it is.

Quick context: I spent about the first 20 days building before it went into beta, so this is really off 40 days of actually being public. The app is a tool for indie builders who just shipped something and have no idea where to launch it. It's a roadmap of handpicked, vetted directories, so instead of guessing, you can just launch on the ones that actually send traffic and give you quality backlinks for SEO. It's honestly my own Excel spreadsheet turned into a product. It now tracks 245 directories and is updated over time through my own findings and community input.
 
Good to know, there is no subscription model, everything is just one time payment.

Anyway, this is where i stand now:

• 387 users (not all recurring of course)
• 27 paying customers: 12 only on Pro, plus 15 who bought the Auto-Launch (which also gives them Pro)
• 2 tools paying for a promotion spot
• Just under $1,400 in revenue at the time of writing (see here: https://trustmrr.com/startup/launch-panda )

What worked for me:
Mostly just posting on X and sharing the journey. There are a lot of builders on X, and solving a pain they have (that I also have myself) has led to steady growth. So maybe the takeaway is: solve a problem for indie builders, which usually means solving it for yourself, and distribution gets a lottttt easier.

Also be willing to adept. I started with just the roadmap, then added the Auto-Launch feature because people kept asking for it. This feature turned out by far the most profitable thing I've shipped.

Biggest lesson:
I’ve seen that demand really comes in waves. I had a burst of Auto-Launch sales in a small window (see previous link), and right then I discovered a bunch of problems in the backend, so I decided to dial promotion back down. I fixed most of it, but now I have to build the momentum back. Looking back, easing off was probably a mistake. Part of building is accepting that your tool will break constantly at the beginning, that's just the process, and maybe I should've pushed through and eaten the hours then instead of killing my own momentum.

Next milestone for me is hitting $10k in revenue. That would be amazing.

FIRST BACKLINKS EXCHANGE FOR BUILDERS INSIDE YOUR CODING AGENT

Asked yesterday how you're all getting backlinks. Here's my answer.

The trade always dies at placement. Both sides agree, then someone has to open an editor, find the right page, write the sentence, commit, deploy.

Your agent is already in the repo. Now it writes the link, in your own words.

builders/backlinks is live.

Free. Open source. My first open source project.

Would love feedback. DM me if you want to contribute.

Approving everyone in the morning.