Journy · B2C · trip planning service
Spend heavily on marketing and press coverage early on
Didn't work; founder calls it wasted money, no details given
Failedpr-launch
What they did
Spent a lot on marketing and PR, expecting a media article to make everything work. No specifics given on what was bought.
What happened
Founder says it just didn't work and is not a silver bullet; the promised explanation never comes.
- Effort
- 'So much money' (amount not stated)
“I burned so much money on marketing, PR that just didn't work for me. That's not a silver bullet. Everyone thinks like, "Ooh, if I just get this media company to write an article about me, everything's going to work." Not true”
Related topics
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More from this episode
- Journy: Charge $6 a day for trip planning aimed at tech-savvy millennialsToo cheap to live on or to trust; 80% of revenue came from boomers
- Journy: Pitch investors before you have a working growth engine180 rejections over about 6 months
- Journy: Pack nine investor meetings into two days in one citySeed round closed in 2 days with three term sheets
- Journy: Pivot to business customers, local trips and online experiences during COVIDNothing worked; couldn't raise more money either
- Journy: Use one buyer's offer to pull in rival bids, then return to your favoritePreferred buyer agreed to pay double its first offer
- Sell $19 PDF travel guides from a landing page before building the app$3,000 in sales in the first month
- The Evolved Founder: Post founder videos on Instagram about your journey and expertise20K+ followers from 26 posts; one video drove 500K views, 2,000+ sign-ups
- The Evolved Founder: Test two hooks as Instagram trial reels, then post the winner to your feedWinning hook hit ~50K views vs 500; ~3,000 new followers in a day
- The Evolved Founder: Have Claude interview you to write scripts, then film five videos at onceLets her post alongside a full-time job with no editor; no numbers
- Use round prices like $19.99 or $29.99, not $22.99Round prices won in a community member's A/B test; no numbers
- Label the paywall button 'Start free trial' on Android and 'Continue' on iPhoneBeat 'Subscribe' in a community member's A/B test; no numbers
- Offer phone cleaner apps as a weekly plan with a 3-day trialHost says weekly tends to win across cleaner apps he's worked with; no numbers
- Put the year, 'New' and a clean-up message on an Android cleaner iconHost says these icon tricks have worked before; no numbers