{
  "$type": "site.standard.document",
  "canonicalUrl": "https://build.ms/2024/9/10/indie-app-spotlight-plinky-feature/",
  "description": "Plinky was featured in Indie App Spotlight Issue 20, where we discussed the app's origin story, design philosophy, technical implementation, and the journey of building a successful indie app.",
  "path": "/2024/9/10/indie-app-spotlight-plinky-feature/",
  "publishedAt": "2024-09-10T12:00:00.000Z",
  "site": "at://did:plc:b6eke66r3vbmnegg73qgprl6/site.standard.publication/3mmypfmg4sx2d",
  "tags": [
    "iOS",
    "Plinky",
    "Design",
    "Swift",
    "Interview"
  ],
  "textContent": "I was honored to have Plinky featured in Indie App Spotlight Issue 20. In this in-depth interview, I shared the complete story behind Plinky - from its origins as a simple solution for sharing links with my wife to becoming a powerful, customizable link-saving app used by thousands.\n\nThis is an interview that I did with Indie App Spotlight, originally posted on their blog.\n\n<!--preview-snippet-->\n\nIssue 20 - Plinky\n\nHey everyone, In this issue we’re taking a look at Plinky created by Joe Fabisevich. Plinky is more than just a link-saving app; it also includes browser extensions and a lightweight macOS app. Its user interface (UI) stands out because it doesn't rely on standard iOS UI elements. I particularly appreciate the ability to set up folders for various needs. Joe is certainly not taking it easy; just two months after launch, he released version 2.0, which offers even more customization options.\n\nApp Spotlight\n\nApp Name : Plinky\n\nDeveloper : Joe Fabisevich - Threads\n\nWhat Is Plinky?\n\nPlinky is an app that makes it really easy to save links to enjoy later. With Plinky’s share extensions oniPhone and iPad, browser extensions forChrome,Safari, andFirefox, a little menu bar app calledPlinky Mini, and an open API, you can save links from anywhere with just one tap or click. When you’re ready to come back to your links, they’re all there in Plinky, complete with organizational tools like folders, tags, search, and more. There are plenty of apps that help you save links, but Plinky really shines in three ways. 1 - It’s quick and delightful to save a link in Plinky. I save a dozen links a day, and all of that time adds up. I made speed a priority in Plinky to save your links and get you back to what you were doing quickly. 2 - Plinky is incredibly customizable. After years of trying out every link-saving product, I was never able to find one that felt just right for me. I've gone to great lengths to make every aspect of Plinky customizable, so you can make it a home for your links. 3 - Plinky is highly extensible. There are some great read-it-later apps, but they’re not particularly good for the cute animal videos or funny tweets you want to show your partner. Some apps are great for archiving, but they’re not flexible enough to use as a todo list for your links. I focused on making Plinky work for all kinds of links, all kinds of workflows, and all kinds of people who want to save links for later.\n\nWhere did the idea for Plinky come from?\n\nWhen I first started dating my now wife Colleen, I would send her links I saw throughout the day. I have to emphasize, it was a lot of links. Working at Twitter meant I came across so many interesting articles, recipes, and funny videos. While she loved that I was thinking of her, she also found it pretty distracting when her phone buzzed with all the links I’d send.\n\nShe suggested saving the links for later so we could look at them together, at night once she was done working. I tried filling up the Notes app with links, but that quickly became a disorganized mess. I left dozens of browser tabs open, but I’d forget about them, only for more links to pile up. I tried adding links as todos in the Reminders app, but then I couldn’t actually use Reminders with the jumble of saved links. I just wanted one place that made it easy to find all my saved links, so one morning I woke up, told Colleen I had an idea for an app, and started working on Plinky.\n\nWithin two weeks, I had a working app for the two of us. Then I started showing it to people, and they said they really wanted an app to help them organize their links. As an avid fan of read-it-later and archiving apps, I knew that solutions existed, but those apps didn’t really resonate with the people I showed Plinky to, at least not in the same way my little app did.\n\nI like to think of Plinky as my love letter to links, and to Colleen. Now that we have a place to save the links we come across throughout the day, and we set aside time every night to share them, what we call plink time.\n\nWhat’s one stand out feature you’d like everyone to know about?\n\nPlinky has always made it quick and easy to save a link, a value that I don’t want to compromise on. It’s also important for me to allow Plinky to grow more powerful, to match the workflows that people need from their link saving app.\n\nPlinky 2.0 solves this design challenge with a feature called Save Screen Actions. As more people began using Plinky, I noticed they had many different needs and ideas for what they wanted to do when saving a link. Some people wanted to add their link to a folder, many people have a more tag-oriented workflow and wanted to add tags to their link without opening the app, and others wanted lesser-used options like archive or pin to still be available when they needed them.\n\nWhen you save a link using Plinky’s share extension, the link saves quickly and lets you get back to what you were doing. But if you want to edit the link in any way, you do that by pressing any of the actions, and the timer that would have dismissed Plinky’s Save Screen pauses. After that, you’re free to add your link to a folder, pin it, copy the link, or perform any of the other available actions, and dismiss whenever you want.\n\nThis is different from many other apps that treat the share extension either as a quick action or a full editing mode. I really wanted to bridge that divide and provide both. One of my favorite compliments about the feature so far was that “it’s something you have to try to get, but when you do it just makes sense”. In the spirit of showing rather than telling, I’ve got a little demo of how it works.\n\nHow do you promote Plinky?\n\nI’m actually planning to write a blog post about this, but I’d say the #1 piece of advice I have for building a good marketing strategy is to marry an amazing product marketer. I’m incredibly grateful to Colleen for helping build a full go-to-market strategy for Plinky — I wouldn’t have had nearly as successful a launch without that. If you’re already married or aren’t romantically interested in any product marketers, then here’s what I use as my outline for launching an app:\n\n   Conduct user research. This may sound scary or buttoned-up but really it’s just taking 30 minutes to talk to a user. This will not only help you understand your product, but it will help you understand the value people are getting from it, which is crucial for crafting a great marketing message.\n\n   Do competitor analysis. Download a bunch of apps in your space, sign up for their onboarding and marketing emails, then don’t touch anything to see how they try to reactivate you as a user. This will help you understand what features people are looking for, what your competitors offer, and where you have room to make your app stand out.\n\n   Create a cohesive brand. Those first two bullet points will help you craft a message to share with the world. The hardest part for me is sticking to the main selling points, because I get really excited and love to talk about everything my app can do in the nerdiest ways.\n\n   Collect emails early and often. This is highly underrated because no one really wants more email, but an email address is the one piece of connective glue we all have. In a world of scattered social networks and new apps popping up every week, email is the one place to reach people who have shown direct interest in hearing more about your product. Don't be a jerk and don't spam people with every little update, but reaching out occasionally to share the value you've added to your app is a great way to keep people in the loop about what you're building.\n\n   Tell Apple! Most people don’t know about appstore.com/promote, but you can literally tell Apple you want to be promoted. (This will be even easier in the fall, when Apple launches Nominations.) I can’t say for sure because when Apple chooses to feature your app can be a bit of a mystery, but I’m confident that filling out the promotional form played a part in Plinky being featured by Apple on the App Store within two months of launch.\n\nI did quite a few more things to launch Plinky, including leveraging my social media following, blogging, and PR, but I do need to save some tips for my own blog. 😉\n\nHow did you decide on the pricing?\n\nBefore shipping, I set aside time to do competitor analysis to make sure I understood the market I was entering. I’m really familiar with the product space — I’d probably tried more read-it-later or archiving apps than 99.9% of people on the planet before deciding to dedicate 2+ years of my life to building Plinky as an indie business.\n\nI settled on $3.99/month or $39.99/year for Plinky Pro for a few reasons:\n\n1.   The most expensive apps in this product category are about $60/year, and the cheapest decent quality apps are priced as low as a $10 one-time purchase. I’m building more than just an app — Plinky is a service with recurring costs, so I knew that a one-time purchase would be unsustainable and I’d have to go the subscription route. I didn’t yet feel I could match the $60/year apps feature for feature, but I knew from the beta that hundreds of people were using the app and finding it valuable.\n\n2.   You can always change your price! It’s really easy to get caught up in finding the perfect price, but the only way you can figure it out is by testing the supply/demand curve of different prices and seeing what resonates with consumers. I chose $39.99 as a price that sat in the middle to high end of the category's range, while still giving me flexibility to make adjustments up or down as needed.\n\n3.   Speaking of price adjustments, I knew from the start that I wanted to leave room to run sales. The sale price needs to be high enough to support the costs of running the business, yet still offer a good deal. The $39.99/year price point is a sweet spot where I can afford to mark down Plinky Pro by ~50%, and still provide a high-quality product at just $1.60/month. My hop",
  "title": "Indie App Spotlight - Plinky Feature"
}