In April of 2015, Wheeler submitted Dayo, but it did not make it out of the site's Upcoming feed, where all tech submissions generally land first. Related: You May Have an Awesome Product, But It Won't Mean Much Without a Marketing Planīen Wheeler is the CTO of a tech startup called Telepathy and is the maker of several apps including Dayo, a personalized weather app he hoped would gain some traction on Product Hunt. With this growth, the site has become a hotspot for entrepreneurs to test out their products, but the Product Hunt platform has also come under a bit of scrutiny regarding how users are given maker and hunter privileges, and what it takes for a company or product to land on the front page of Product Hunt. The site, which now has a staff of 23 people in 10 different time zones, has expanded beyond its initial focus of tech to include games, podcasts and books, along with an even stronger community. In the time since graduating from the accelerator in the summer of 2014, the small passion project has grown considerably. "I could see it turning into something bigger than just a small email list or a small community," Hoover says.Īnd it has. After receiving guidance from both (and others), he decided to apply to the Y Combinator program. In 2014, he began speaking with people like Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian and Garry Tan, then a partner at the prestigious startup accelerator Y Combinator, to figure out the next steps. With this progress, Hoover had his sights set on more. After the list continued to grow and receive positive feedback, in November of that year, Hoover turned the list into a website that functioned as a simple chronological feed. Eager to build something of his own, he started an email list and named it Product Hunt. He and his friends were constantly finding products and apps to send to each other, but he wished there could be one hub for everything new in technology. In 2013, Hoover was living in San Francisco and in between jobs. Related: Meerkat Was Just a Side Project.
This ecosystem is complex and will continue to grow, but it started with a simple idea. Using this model, Product Hunt has helped hundreds of products and services gain momentum, with some breakout stars including livestreaming app Meerkat and 2015 Best Nine, a tool that rounded up Instagram users' top nine photos of the year and included celeb fans Beyonce, Ellen DeGeneres and Taylor Swift. If not selected for the homepage, either by receiving enough upvotes from the community or being chosen by a hunter, the products go to the Upcoming Feed, an on-deck queue, where products may get lost in the shuffle. Approximately 50 to 90 posts, chosen by the hunters, make it to the homepage - the Holy Grail for startups, as this spot greatly increases the chances of getting noticed. On average, 200 to 300 items are posted to the site daily. The site's network is made up of users who upvote a product or service makers, who contributed in some way to the product at hand, like the founder of an app or the author of a book moderators, who verify makers and a group of "hunters," (also known as community members) who are handpicked and can post products, either theirs or someone else's. Founded by Ryan Hoover, the site's engaged and constructive community, curated offerings and voting system has made it a darling in the entrepreneur community. Breaking down the Product Hunt modelĪnd so do plenty of other people. "When you are an established business, 1,300 new users in a day is nothing, but when your product has never really gotten exposure, it feels like a lot," says Sednaoui, who continues to use Product Hunt today. Bloomberg Ryan Hunt, Founder, Product Huntīefore being featured on Product Hunt, MailCharts had only approximately 15 to 20 paying customers, but afterwards, it saw quite the jump. It was a smart move for the young company. He heard about a site called Product Hunt, a hub for tech fans and early adopters to share cool new products with one another, and decided to push MailCharts out to the engaged community. Back in 2013, when Carl Sednaoui launched MailCharts, a startup that specializes in tracking the impact of email-marketing campaigns for ecommerce businesses, he wanted to get a little feedback about his then side project.
There is nothing quite as scary and exciting as introducing your product to the world.