How MakerBox generated $6000 in sales by launching on Product Hunt

A quick intro about Sveta

Sveta, the co-founder of MakerBox, launches one new product every month as a part of MakerBox marketing strategy. Her products have ranked Top 3 in Product Hunt multiple times and they’ve made $6,000 from Product Hunt launches.

Some of her products:

1. MakerBox Workbook
2. MakerBox Frameworks
3. MakerBox Tools
4. Sponsor This Newsletter

Let’s unlock all her launch strategies and secrets

Maker Interview

Hi Sveta, could you tell us a little bit about yourself and Why you started MakerBox?

After working for four years as a Project Manager at several companies, I finally got burnt out and wanted to try something new.

So Dan & I decided to build a side project while still working in our 9-5 Job thinking “ If we can earn $1 from MakerBox, let’s quit our job & make money online”

Makerbox Tools managed to generate the first dollar online. And that was the moment when we decided to pursue full-time building products.

Why did you choose Product Hunt as the main traffic channel for MakerBox? Why not SEO or Social Media?

The answer is quite obvious – quick results. With SEO and Social media, getting the first dollar can take between 3 to 6 months. Whereas with Product Hunt, you can get that in a month.

You launch one product a month on Product Hunt, how do you build and ship that fast? How do you create buzz for a launch?

I think there are 3 key points

1. We already have knowledge of the niche where we build products
2. Building products is our full-time activity. Before the launch, we work 10-12 hours daily.
3. We have a clear understanding of our target audience and their needs.
   
   

You got a hunter to hunt your products in the early days. How did having a hunter help your launch?

Having a Hunter helps a lot when you launch your first product. Especially if you don’t have any audience on Product Hunt.

How it helps:

1. Quick social proof and
2. The hunter’s audience will get a notification when you launch
   
   

When do you start planning for a product launch? and What is your launch strategy?

We start planning a month ahead of our product launch and finalise the launch day. To be honest, there’s no common launch strategy, since we always try something new.

Here is how our plan looks:

1. Validate the idea with a pre-launch
2. Open early bird sales
3. Create the content on Twitter around the launch and build the product
4. Giveaway of a free product part on Twitter
5. Prepare content for the launch (visuals, description, comments)
6. Launch!
   
   

What are your goals when launching on Product Hunt?

The target is always to get the #1 Product of the Day, since it’s hard to predict sales.

You mentioned that your Makerbox Workbook launch didn’t perform as expected. Did you find any reasons behind it?

The main mistake we did with that launch is we decided to launch on a competitive day (Thursday). Big companies that have a huge audience launch between Tuesday – Thursday.

What are your main traffic sources for a Product Hunt launch?

Our main traffic sources are:

1. Twitter
2. Email list
3. FB, Discord and Slack groups. (These are less efficient)
   
   

Do you offer any special discounts on launch day for PH members? Does it help increase your sales?

Yeah, we do give discounts on Product Hunt launch day. And we increase our prices after the launch.

Can you share the tool stack you use for the Product Hunt launch?

1. Figma – visuals
2. Notion – work organisation
3. Gumroad – To Sell Products
4. Canva – Gifs
5. Typedream / Webflow – landing pages
6. Tally forms – forms
   
   

You’re extremely active on product Hunt discussions. How has it helped with your PH launches?

It grows my Product Hunt audience (followers will get notified about all my launches). Also, I try to plug our products or articles into the discussions. This generates traffic for MakerBox.

Could you share how much sales, revenue & traffic you made from ProductHunt launches?

Yeah, We got 12.6K visitors for our website and we made $6,000 from Product Hunt during the last 7 months.

Could you share what are the mistakes one should avoid while launching on Product Hunt?

1. Not having enough audience to support the launch
2. No soft launch to the audience before the PH launch
3. Don’t have distractions on launch day
   
   

What are your future plans? What are the upcoming launches from Makerbox?

Good question! In January we’re planning to launch a course about positioning. Have a lot of plans, but need to decide on the sequence.

Thanks a lot, Sveta for sharing your Product Hunt strategies and secrets with us.

Follow Sveta on Twitter