Weekly Indie Log #50
About decreasing churn rates, working remotely, and ongoing HabitKit development.
Already #50 of this weekly log in which I've been documenting my journey of building a sustainable indie app business. Building a successful indie app business is all about consistency, and I'm happy to see that I've been able to stick to this routine for over a year now. Summarizing my activities every week really helps me to stay on track and make sure that I'm always moving forward. Thanks for following along!
Let's start with a small milestone celebration: October was another month of an all-time low in terms of subscription churn. I dropped another percentage point and I'm getting closer and closer to a number that's regarded as "healthy" for a SaaS business. This is a huge deal for me because I've been struggling with this for a long time and the churn rate has been really high in the past. Maybe I'll share the exact numbers at the end of the year in a dedicated retrospective post.
I often get the question of how I managed to do that. The truth is that I don't really know. I just keep improving the app based on user feedback and try to make it as good as possible. I also try to release new updates as soon as possible, so users don't have to wait too long for new features. A happy user who feels heard and appreciated is more likely to stick with the app and not churn.
HabitKit Development
In a recent post on X, I shared a new experiment with my app HabitKit: adding a button on the dashboard to open the paywall. It's one of those ideas that seems obvious in retrospect, but I hadn't tried it until now. The goal is to make free users see the paywall more often, but I'm curious if it feels too intrusive.
Balancing user experience with monetization is always a tricky thing, and I'm curious to see how this change impacts free users. I'm a little bit worried about decreasing the user experience in terms of look and feel and I can already see some people sharing negative feedback. But with the New Year's season right around the corner, I'm sure it's a good idea to test this out.
I've been working non-stop on the next big update for HabitKit this week. Version 1.10 will include a couple of very exciting customization options for Pro users of the app. You'll be able to change the following settings for your dashboard:
Display Streaks: You can now display the streak and goals on your habits cards.
Display Labels: You can now display the month and weekday labels on your habits cards.
Display Categories: You can now display the category icons on your habits cards.
Sort Completed Habits: You can now sort the completed habits on your dashboard to the bottom of the list.
I also developed some small improvements to the app, all of them based on user feedback:
I changed the category filter so that it's a single selection toggle instead of a multi-selection toggle. A couple of users asked for that and it makes completely sense. This approach definitely provides a better user experience.
I adjusted the icon colors in the iOS widgets so that they match the colors of the icons in the app. There were some hard-to-see contrasts in the previous version.
I added a couple of new entries for the long-tap context menu. I hope to improve the discoverability of some less-used features, like archiving or sharing habits.
I also tried to create some new promotional content for this update. I used Figma and Shots to create four images that highlight the new customization options. I'm not a good designer, but I think it turned out pretty good.
Traveling and Working Remotely
This week has been a little bit special for me. It was the first time since I started my app business that I traveled and worked remotely at the same time. I spent the second half of the week in southern Germany. It was a weird experience to work on the app while traveling and I have to admit that I'm not a big fan of the "digital nomad" lifestyle. Because I also stayed in a smaller city, I couldn't find a good coworking space, so I had to spend most of my time working from the hotel. I guess working from home is still my favorite way to work and clearly separating work and vacation is really important for me.
That's it for this week, see you in the next one 👋