Here are the hard-won lessons from the video “My App Failed - My Brutal 6 Months Building a Startup” by the YouTube channel Internet Made Coder.
TL;DR:
- The Core Mistake: They built a solution for a problem that was not painful enough. “Desktop clutter” is an annoyance, but it’s not a “hair on fire” problem that compels users to learn a complex new tool to solve it.
- The Polite Feedback Trap: They received positive feedback from friends and acquaintances, but it was mostly out of politeness. This led them into the “just one more feature” loop, making the product increasingly complex and difficult to use.
- Actions Speak Louder Than Words: Despite the positive verbal feedback, analytics data showed that users abandoned the app almost immediately. This was the clearest signal that the product had failed.
- 3 Rules for the Next Startup: 1) Only build in a space where you have an “unfair advantage.” 2) If you can’t launch it in one month, don’t build it. 3) Only solve a problem you personally and deeply understand.
6 Months, 70-Hour Weeks, $0 Revenue: A Startup Post-Mortem
Last year, the creator (a successful YouTuber) joined a tech startup as the Lead Software Engineer with two co-founders. They spent six months working 70-hour weeks, only to end up with zero revenue. This is their story of failure and its invaluable lessons.
1. The Idea: A Productivity App to Tame the Chaos
The initial idea seemed logical: solve the problem of “desktop clutter” that most people face. When working on multiple projects, our computers become a mess of tabs and applications.
Their product was a productivity tool that allowed users to create “boxes” for each project. When you opened a “box,” all the apps, files, and tabs related to that project would appear, and everything else would be closed.
2. The Downward Spiral: Two Fatal Mistakes
Mistake #1: Underestimating Complexity and Building for Too Long
They broke the cardinal rule of “ship fast.” The product was far more complex than they had anticipated, and it took them months to build a beta version. This time should have been spent getting market feedback.
Mistake #2: Falling into the “Polite Feedback” and “One More Feature” Trap
When the beta launched, the team’s morale was high because they received a lot of positive feedback. However, this was a trap.
Most of the testers were friends or acquaintances who tended to say nice things to be polite. They would often say things like, “This app is great! If it just had feature X, I would definitely use it.”
And that’s exactly what the team did. They jumped to build every requested feature, turning the app into a complex mess. They were stuck in the “just one more feature” loop without realizing they were heading in the wrong direction.
3. The Harsh Truth: Words vs. Actions
Although users said they liked the app, the analytics data told a completely different story: most people stopped using it after the first day.
At this point, they identified two core issues:
- The product was too complex: New users opened the app and had no idea what to do because there were too many things on the screen.
- The problem wasn’t painful enough: “Desktop clutter” is a real issue, but it’s a minor annoyance. It’s not a “hair on fire” problem that would motivate someone to spend time and effort learning a complicated tool to solve. People weren’t even willing to use the free version, let alone pay for it.
Ultimately, the team decided to shut down the project.
4. Three Golden Rules for the Next Startup
After this failure, the creator established three crucial rules he will apply to all future projects.
Rule 1: Only Build Where You Have an “Unfair Advantage”
Never build a productivity app again. It’s an incredibly crowded market because it’s the first idea most developers have. Instead, enter a niche market where you have unique experience or expertise that others don’t. That is your “unfair advantage.”
Rule 2: If You Can’t Launch in 1 Month, Don’t Build It
This project took far too long just to find out it was a bad idea. If they had chosen a simpler idea, they could have built an MVP, tested it, and “killed it” in just a few weeks before moving on to the next idea. The speed of iteration and failure is key.
Rule 3: Only Solve Problems You Deeply Understand
This ties directly into Rule #1. If you’ve never worked in a bank, you will never understand the truly painful problems of a banker. When you solve a problem you have personally experienced, you have a massive advantage because you genuinely understand it.