Hi there,
I won Who Wants to Be a MillionARR.
On stage, in New York, in front of a room full of app people. At one point I was 800 points down š, which was slightly embarrassing, but luckily I made a comeback.
I nearly didnāt make it there at all. I got sick a few days before flying, and for a brief second I seriously considered not getting on the plane. Iām so glad I did, though, as I learned a lot and got to meet so many interesting people in the space.
Sadly, I am not a millionaire now. The prize was a very cool champion belt and $500.
And it wasnāt even the wildest thing that happened in New York. More on that below, along with the rest of October.
Whatās been happening with clients
A new way to find the right ones. One thing Iāve struggled with for a while is inbound leads.
Itās amazing when apps reach out. I never take that for granted. But Iām not always their best match, and I only want to take on projects where I know Iām the right fit and have the skills they actually need.
Finding that out 20 minutes into a call isnāt fair on anyone. And pre-qualifying questions only get you so farā¦
So this month I built a match checker: daphnetideman.com/bookacall. A few questions up front, and it points you to the option that fits where you are. Sometimes thatās a call with me. Sometimes itās something else, and thatās fine too.
About a dozen people have been through it so far. Hereās what Iāve learned:
More than half werenāt the kind of app I work with (so not wellness / productivity apps)
Of the ones that were, most asked for one of two things: āSomeone to own all of growthā or āmore users.ā Even apps doing Ā£500K+ a month.
Iāve already updated it based on this. I saw people trying different options after selecting āown all of growthā, so I gave them the option to say theyāre happy with product growth only:
I built it with Claude, and it logs every answer to a Google Sheet, which is how I can tell you any of the above.
The work itself. I rounded off an ongoing project and started a new one: an app within a larger company that helps parents support their kids with autism. Itās early days, but Iāve already identified a few key drop-off points and have been working out the roadmap.
On top of that, Iāve had one-off strategy sessions with earlier-stage startups, tackling retention strategy and how to identify the biggest growth lever.
What Iāve been presenting
A workshop at App Growth Annual (RAGA) in New York. The activation workshop, rebuilt after its first run in September. The biggest change was designing it for questions rather than exercises, because thatās where the room really comes alive.
It was incredible to have apps like Runna, Burner, Elevate, Dipsea and Fitbod choose to come to my workshop. It was a bucket list room. (It also clashed with a last-minute helicopter ride over New York. I chose my workshoppies over a helicopter.)
A panel for Experience Next Online ā26 with Talia Wolf, Luiza and Kelly, on optimizing for the wrong (measurable) things and where AI ends, and judgment begins. Itās out next month, so more on it then.
A few actionable tips from the session for using AI for user research:
Real user research is messy, so be careful of findings that look too clean.
Donāt give it your hypotheses upfront. It will just look for data that confirms them.
Ask it for exact quotes so you can double-check its findings and conclusions.
Ask it for evidence against its conclusions, so you see both sides.
What Iāve been writing
Two new articles went live this month:
Your appās growth has stalled: what now? (RevenueCat). Stalls are normal, and most of them come from your own decisions rather than the market. Thatās the good news, because it means theyāre fixable.
I share a four-step diagnosis: is it a real stall or just noise, is it within your control, where in the funnel (or the team) is it breaking, and then scale, fix or kill each hypothesis. One at a time.
5 Models for combining subscription apps with physical products (RevenueCat). Subscription apps can add physical goods in five ways: brand merch, companion goods, physical goods as the core offer, hardware with a subscription attached, and membership-native hardware.
But success depends on perceived fairness: what do they expect to pay for vs. get for free when they buy the physical product?
Next up, Iām working on articles about multi-step paywalls and what changes when you take payments on web instead of in the app.
What Iāve been up to with Women in Experimentation
Weāre starting workshops for the community. The focus is helping women who are between jobs or want to grow internally by learning and growing. Itāll be a mix of hard skills (experimentation programs, AI tools) with the ones nobody teaches you properly (interviewing, personal brand, negotiation).
The first sessions start in November, with Ioana Iordache penciled in for the week of 23 November. More details soon.
This monthās flip-flops
Taking every free call felt generous. It wasnāt. For a long time I said yes to an intro call with pretty much anyone who asked, including founders who hadnāt launched or werenāt making money yet. It felt like the kind thing to do.
But I spent most of those 30 minutes figuring out where they were, and by the time we got to anything useful, the call was over. Nobody got much out of it.
A pre-revenue founder needs a proper strategy session, where the whole time focuses on their problem rather than qualifying them. So thatās where I point them now. It feels less generous on paper. Itās far more useful in practice.
From game show champion to last place.
Before you think the MillionARR win went to my head: I also came dead last in a Growth&Company pub quiz this month. Clearly my trivia still needs work. (Ask me an app statistic, Iām your woman. Ask me what was the first item ever sold through a vending machine? Never in a million years would I have guessed holy water.)
Getting sick at the worst possible time.
Iām rarely sick, so of course it happened a few days before flying to New York. The flight wasnāt great, but I made it and gave the workshop.
It also put a spanner in my Hyrox training: a week of no workouts, and my first one back (a run club along Chelsea Piers) was rough. I know it wasnāt my fault, we all get sick from time to time, but given 12 days later I still donāt feel 100% itās made October a bit rough.
What Iāve been enjoying
New York. RevenueCatās New York App Week was wild, again:
Getting all glammed up for the Shippies, an award ceremony on the Intrepid next to fighter jets, with cast members from Cats performing at the end
Mark Rebillet screaming at a room full of app people to make more ARR. I was scared š
The Runna x RevenueCat run club along Chelsea Piers
Cinnamon roll pancakes (again) at Ellenās Stardust Diner, where the waiters sing their hearts out
Getting a ticket to see Tom Felton in Cursed Child at the box office, 15 minutes before it started
A Growth Gems event right after landing, and the Gapp (Women in Apps community) craft events
Most of all, the people. Some I got to see again, and some I met for the first time, like Alice Muir, who Iāve been collaborating with on a few projects this past year.
Investing in my own learning. I joined Ioana Iordacheās She Leads Accelerator on influence and executive presence for women adopting AI at work. Working for myself, nobody will sign me up for training, so I have to.
It felt like a great fit as I work more and more with scaleups rather than startups, where how you show up in the room matters as much as what you know. Weāve covered presence, positioning, and dealing with adversity.
Getting out of the house. Iāve been making a real effort to get out more. Between New York and coworking with Anna Tankel and Rosie, itās been great. I also organised an in-person āhow we use AI without the buzzā session for female growth and product leaders.
If you missed my newsletters this month
Looking ahead to November
Itās the final sprint of conference season before itās done for the year:
Business of Apps Berlin: running a workshop and having a pre-event dinner with app growth leaders that Alice, Ioana and I organized
Conversion Hotel in the Netherlands: hosting karaoke again (yes, really) and running a Women in Experimentation session
The Experience Next Online ā26 panel with Talia, Kelly and Luiza will be released
The first WiE workshops kick off
The final session of Ioanaās course excited though to keep implementing the learnings
And the one Iām most excited about: my sisterās 30th, which Iāve been very happily planning
If youāre in Berlin or at Conversion Hotel, come and say hi! Especially if itās at karaoke.
Till next time,
Daphne