Projects Insight No 8. | June 2024
Released on Thursday July 11th in 2024 by Simon Braun (Opens in a new window)
Follow my journey as a digital creator: Learn more about my steady progress, the tools I use to work efficiently, my marketing methods, the business numbers and the sources of inspiration I find.
The Projects Insight Newsletter is free, enjoy reading!
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Disclaimer: * an asterisk is identifying an affiliate link
Look back – June
Last month was quite tough. Doing some travelling, as well as being sick for several days, made it difficult to move the needle. I also got an offer to take care of and to take over another macOS application. Not sure, if I should probably better focus on my existing apps. We will see.—Oh, and now there have been more than 100.000 downloads of all my apps. That’s nice, but hard to grasp.
I decided to remove several recurring sections of the newsletter. It should feel more focused now. I try to be mindful of your reading time.
TOTM – Tool of the month
(Opens in a new window)It was a more recent discovery for me. I have stumbled across Soulver many times, but this time I gave it a try and found so many great use cases for it. —It is a blast to write down numbers with text for context and do calculations like on a piece of paper, but of course Soulver is calculating for you and because of variables updating the numbers is fun. Believe me, you should try it out, too! It is also available for iPadOS and iOS, but currently I use it solely on my mac. (I know that Apple just announced some similar functionality for its Notes app, but believe me that Soulver is the way to go.)
Soulver 3 (Opens in a new window) | macOS (iOS/iPadOS) | Paid → Download (Opens in a new window)
Projects Overview
ACTIVE
(Opens in a new window)⬛️ Filmlog (Opens in a new window) – First-class private movie tracker
The best app for a personal overview of your seen and unseen movies and for looking up information on movies, actors and cast members.
📱 App | Since 2014 | iOS and iPadOS | Freemium
🔗 Website (Opens in a new window) | AppStore (Opens in a new window) | Testflight (Opens in a new window)
(Opens in a new window)🟩 Auricula (Opens in a new window) – Interval ear trainer
An interval ear trainer to practice your sense of hearing and to learn the skill to identify intervals.
📱App | Since 2015 | iOS, iPadOS and macOS | Freemium
🔗 Website (Opens in a new window) | AppStore (Opens in a new window) | Producthunt (Opens in a new window)
(Opens in a new window)🟥 Next Size (Opens in a new window) – Forecast for children clothing sizes
Children clothes size forecast. It's that easy: Next Size estimates the body height of your kids and tells you which clothing sizes will fit when.
📱App | Since 2024 | iOS, iPadOS and macOS | Freemium
🔗 Website (Opens in a new window) | AppStore (Opens in a new window)
(Opens in a new window)🟪 Projects Insight (Opens in a new window) – Follow my journey as a digital creator
Learn more about my steady progress, the tools I use to work efficiently, my marketing methods, the business numbers and the sources of inspiration I find.
✉️ Newsletter | Since 2023 | Free + optional patreons
🔗 Subscribe (Opens in a new window) | Posts (Opens in a new window) | Patreons (Opens in a new window)
PROTOTYPES
🌐 Puinte.org (Opens in a new window)
A community financed effort to create better software for the general public: privacy-friendly, open-source, fully reusable and financed in solidarity.
🌐 Infolge.org (Opens in a new window)
A comprehensive format for following current events, comparing points of view and forming a differentiated opinion
ARCHIVED
📱skunkit (Opens in a new window) (2012 – 2015)
The ethical messenger service: an iOS app
Updates
— No updates in June
Marketing
POSTS
— No posts in June
SEARCH ADS – June
I currently use Basic and Advanced Search Ads with mixed results for now and just getting into the many configuration options of the Advanced Search Ads.
Search Ads: Basic/Advanced
🟩 Auricula 10/72 Installs | CPT 0,20€/0.44€
🟥 Next Size 2/1 Installs | CPT 0.21€/0.41€
⬛️ Filmlog – Paused
I decided to pause Search Ads for Filmlog up to the next major release. The current version is not bad, but whenever I use the latest Testflight (Opens in a new window) version, I feel like I do not want to pay for ads for the current Filmlog app.
Publications, Appearances and Testimonials
— No Publications, Appearances and Testimonials in June
Did I miss something? Please let me know: feedback@simonbraun.eu (Opens in a new window)
Inspiration and Findings
Bookmarklets for testing your website (Opens in a new window) – Jeremy Keith
I think it is a great idea to check your and other websites regularly. Having bookmarklets for it, definitely helps.
Dynamic Type on the Web (Opens in a new window) – Craig Hockenberry (Opens in a new window)
Never thought about this as a possibility. But sure, great idea and great implementation—as always.
DEDICATED READER'S CHECKLIST
I have to thank you dear reader for your interest in my newsletter. If you are interested in supporting me further please check out the following list:
recommend this newsletter and my apps to your friends
download and test my apps
rate my apps and write reviews on the AppStore
follow me on any social network you like
upvote my apps on Product Hunt
Dedicated readers who would like to support the newsletter and take part in the monthly AMA meetings can become a patron here:
Statistics
OVERALL
Downloads – 100,537
🟩 Auricula 81,005
⬛️ Filmlog 19,270
🟥 Next Size 262
Social Media Followers
🙎🏽♂️ Personal Mastodon 109 @techumbely@indieweb.social (Opens in a new window)
🙎🏽♂️ Personal Instagram 70 @techumbely (Opens in a new window)
⬛️ Filmlog Mastodon 9 @filmlog@indieapps.space (Opens in a new window)
Product Hunt
🟩 Auricula 2 Upvotes
🟥 Next Size 2 Upvotes
JUNE
Downloads
🟩 Auricula 290
⬛️ Filmlog 200
🟥 Next Size 32
Sessions (opt-in)
⬛️ Filmlog 3,998
🟩 Auricula 576
🟥 Next Size 21
Crashes
🟥 Next Size 0
🟩 Auricula 11
⬛️ Filmlog 77
Newsletter Members
🟪 Newsletter Patreons 0
Sales (net revenue)
🟩 Auricula 53.74€
⬛️ Filmlog 33.15€
🟥 Next Size 4.51€
Earnings
Apps 91.04€
Expenses
I try to keep costs very low and looking out for growth enablers. Annually recurring costs are converted into monthly expenses. And labour hours are not taken into account as the projects are still a hobby.
MARKETING
Apple Search Ads 66.76€
HOSTING & INTERNET
Hosting 9.41€ – Legacy plan (112€ yearly)
Public work phone 10€ – fraenk (Opens in a new window)*
APPLICATIONS & SERVICES
Apple Developer Program 8.25€ monthly (99.00€ yearly)
GitTower license 5.85€ monthly (70.21€ yearly)
RevenueCat Free plan – used for ‘Next Size’
TelemetryDeck Free plan – 3,605/100,000 monthly signals
appfigures 20.97€ – Monitor (50% blackfriday discount for 12 months)
Mastodon Instance Support 1.19€ (via Patreon)
OTHER COSTS
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Margin
JUNE
Earnings 91.04€
Expenses -122.34€
Loss -31,30€
At the very end you will find, as always, a section of the tools and services that I use. Thank you for reading my newsletter!
Until next month and stay safe,
Simon
If you want to become a testimonial for the newsletter or if you have questions, suggestions or critique, please write me: feedback@simonbraun.eu (Opens in a new window)
Simon Braun – Website (Opens in a new window) / Mastodon (Opens in a new window)
Want to start your own Newsletter? I recommend to give Steady a try (Opens in a new window)!
Tools and Services
In this section you will get an overview of tools and services. I use them to develop and keep my projects up and running.
NEW
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DROPPED
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CURRENT LIST
Hosting and E-Mail hosting Mittwald (Opens in a new window)
Domains Domain Offensive (Opens in a new window)*
Bank N26 Business (Opens in a new window)* (Germany, free tier)
Mobile Operator fraenk (Opens in a new window)* (Germany)
IDE Xcode (Opens in a new window)
Git Github (Opens in a new window) and Git Tower (Opens in a new window)*
Texteditor Sublime Text (Opens in a new window)
SFTP Client FileZilla (Opens in a new window)
Local Webserver MAMP (Opens in a new window)/WorldWideWeb (Opens in a new window)
IAP Framework RevenueCat (Opens in a new window) – used for Next Size InApp purchases
Analytics TelemetryDeck (Opens in a new window)*
ASO appfigures (Opens in a new window)
Business Analytics Trendly (Opens in a new window) (iOS)
Browser & Bookmarks DuckDuckGo Browser (Opens in a new window)
Web Development Safari (Opens in a new window)
Calendar Fantastical (Opens in a new window)
Mail Apple Mail
Notes Standard Notes (Opens in a new window)
Todo Things (Opens in a new window)
Online Storage Tresorit (Opens in a new window)*
Documentation Notion (Opens in a new window)*
Calculator Soulver (Opens in a new window)
Diskmanagement DaisyDisk (Opens in a new window)*
Messenger Signal (Opens in a new window)
Passwordmanager Bitwarden (Opens in a new window)
Security Little Snitch (Opens in a new window)
Translation ICanLocalize (Opens in a new window)*, Deepl (Opens in a new window), dict.cc (Opens in a new window) (iOS)
Design Affinity Designer (Opens in a new window) (still use version 1), Sketch (Opens in a new window), Figma (Opens in a new window)*
Image Compression ImageOptim (Opens in a new window)
Music Doppler (Opens in a new window)
Podcasts Airshow (Opens in a new window)
News NetNewsWire (Opens in a new window) (iOS)
Mastodon Ivory (Opens in a new window) (iOS)
Visual Collection eagle (Opens in a new window)*
Newsletter and Membership Steady (Opens in a new window)*
Do you have a tool or service suggestion for me? Let me know: feedback@simonbraun.eu (Opens in a new window)
