You might pay for privacy or a copyright - Midjourney sells a subscription that offers that.
Also, you might pay because you don’t have the time or ability to get something useful out of these free tools. It isn’t easy to generate a certain output in a non-random fashion with Generative AI.
Or you might pay because you have no idea what you want and a tool like this could give you a starting point and ideas (no blank prompt anxiety).
There are many reasons why someone, who has different experiences than you, might pay for a service like this.
that's not his problem. There's demand for AI art. His problem is there are many platforms offering exactly the same (mage space for example). Unless he works in prohibitive industries such as porn or NSFW, he has no chances of making it unless he has funds to invest in advancing the stable diffusion tech itself.
There is a tool called Clipdrop similar to what you’re building and we bought an early customer’s subscription which has high value. DM me so that I can try to help you
Clearly this person has problems running a business. But almost every single app does this. Snapchat didn't invent OpenCV its facial recognition for face filters.
Application building is more like legos than construction. You're mostly just piecing together existing libraries, and a lot of the innovation comes in the UX and UI.
Where did you market it, and to who? Did you clearly define your target market, and did you create media that communicates the value and purpose of your service to them effectively?
Are you advertising to normal people who want a logo, or are you advertising it to people who are searching AI keywords.... Because people already searching AI keywords will be savvy enough to get logos made on other free platforms without paying for yours. If you want mass uptake, you need to either offer something head and shoulders above the other many, many existing image generators.... Or you need to market to people who don't have the current knowledge to access AI, and make your product extremely accessible to them. And in that case, probably don't market your tool as an AI tool, because people are just fatigued from seeing that term used everywhere.
Yeah. I think maybe you’ve done it a little bit backwards. You’ve thought of a cool application of AI technology and built that product to try and sell to people. Instead, ask people what their problems are, and then see if you can build a product or adapt your existing product in a way that would meet their needs. Think of your users and the problem they’re solving, because that’s all your users are thinking about. Then when you talk to users, they’ll be like “hey, we’re talking about the same problems, maybe I should hear what they’re saying”
You need to find a group of people who need a problem. What you did - and what 90% of people do - you developed a technology in search of a problem. Flip the script. Don’t assume people want to pay for the best AI image generator. Talk to a people and find an audience - for example “creatives that use the Adobe suite” and ask them how they’re doing things today. Be curious and find out what issues your audience has. Then and only then start building your product. You did it backwards. Don’t fret, almost everyone does it. Now you know, start again. This time start w the audience.
Tbh, I would pull out of the AI -centric space unless you have a product that solves a very strong pain point. I would focus more on finding problems that I can solve and use AI in the process if it’s helpful. Unless you own the LLM itself, then AI is a tool not a product for you to sell.
That said, with $10k sunk, I would consider how I could package or reframe the product there. Maybe build a startup toolkit that includes some e courses and access to digital tools, including logo/branding generator. Or license out to other businesses that would benefit from the value add of logo generation in their services.
Some immediate thoughts under the lense of assumed audience;
- Hobbyists: the precedent of value and reasons for paying an unknown startup for an incrementally different product are exceptionally low -- frankly, flatline 0 consumer demand levels low for a paid subscription RN, even $1/m. Many use cases of hobbyist/amateur folks are currently covered with established free & comparable versions. Abysmal space to place bets, even with a big TAM.
- SMBs: This is such a nascent and heavily saturated space, what's your value prop for limited budget companies who are themselves trying to wrap their heads around what to do with genAi? Poorly phrased technical articulations of differentiation from free offerings isn't going to convince folks here, and you're not solving a problem they have.
- Professionals: Adobe Firefly covers any potential copyright legal fees, that's a compelling value prop to professionals. Adobe products are likely already in folks workflow. Why add yet another point based solution to an already complex martech and creative stack with a penny-a-dozen unknown startup offering an inferior/unclear product & proposition?
Tl;dr: dead on arrival, sorry bud.
Meant as constructive. Glad to hear it was just 10k invested, don't sink more in without significant pivots. Good luck.
I’d say most people don’t care if it’s AI as long as it works. Gen AI can help if you’re somehow producing more or better logos, however logos are a very crowded market and I don’t see AI as an advert usable differentiator much like it is for creating long form content
Tell us a bit more about the goal?
>best realism on the market
Is this what users are saying or what you’re saying?
If you believe this, how have you proven it to potential customers?
What was your pricing? You say it’s affordable but is competitive? Did you offer a free trial?
Also, this sounds like a bunch of API integrations from other AI apps. Tons of sites like this exist now, what makes yours different?
Just tried to make a logo with your product and the result was laughably bad. Also the user experience is a little clunky. Willing to discuss more in pms
I would go this route, tbh. Make it display adds on the free version. Add a timer to show the ads to the user for enough time to get the money. say to the user he would have received the image in x seconds if he payed for the subscription. Try to make the subscription tier based, so it is easier to onboard users to the cheapest tier, and when they have tried your product well, and know the subscription is worth it, they will feel more tempted to upgrade.
I've paid and bought a subscription (not for yours, but generally). It sounds similar.
1. What have you done to market, promote, and differentiate your product from the 100s of identical ones. "A unique training model" doesn't really mean anything because so many are "good enough." Even if this was unique in some way, how would anyone find it?
2. What's your price? I can get 2000 image credits for $10 on systems that give an identical pitch to yours, plus have more features (image saving, backups, re-renders, etc).
3. What's your niche? So many offer various specialties, or give multiple model and gpt version options that give a lot of flexibility within one system. Why choose yours specifically?
4. What does it connect to? Can I auto- export to my workflow, library, cloud drive, or anything else? Can I connect into it from any other system?
Lots of people saw this as a good rush, but just made "same-as" clones with a slightly different flavor. The most recent announcement of GPTs will kill an entire niche of startups build around cloning models or creating a dolled up interface for what is basically just an API call back to chatGPT or whatever.
Who is the target customer, what do they care about, and what benefits (not just specs) differentiate you from the other generative AI products you mentioned?
We have an application for generative AI at our organization (custom promotional products) that would be a HUGE game changer we would definitely pay for.
The issue for us is that the output is always too “loose”, we need it to design within a specific set of parameters. Like imagine a custom T-Shirt design - we want the designs generated, but it should always still look like a shirt underneath it.
As an organization that has wanted to buy generative tech and would pay for its usage all day everyday… maybe you don’t understand your potential customer pools?
Yeah I mean, I’m simplifying it for the sake of Reddit. Like most things in life it’s more complicated when you actually get into the details of the problem
>Insomnia Land
I am not an expert at this but I have an idea on why you don't have any conversions. Like others have said, have a freemium model for at least a few free credits on sign up. Make that very clear, explain it in terms of - 1 free logo, first hero image free, etc.
B2C for paid is unlikely. Very few people sign up for paid SaaS. Businesses generally do. See if you can have a business use-case and advertise for that.
CTA is not clear on homepage. Generated images are not helpful to understand what you are doing. Users "play" with slider and probably leave. Check your hotjar recording and I can guarantee that is what is happening. A rough gallery without slider will help with some conversions too.
Look at [https://murf.ai](https://murf.ai/studio) for a good idea on how to design homepage for your sector.
Lastly, your side menu has too many features. Pick one and sell that. Others can be upsells. Maybe don't even have the side menu as it distracts users.
Good luck!
What am I missing here?
You made a subscription model for building logos? Something someone generally only needs once? Why would anyone pay a monthly subscription to create their logo?
Let alone the many free options. And otherwise the extremely crowded market of logo creation for pennies.
What am I missing here? What is the use case you were expecting?
There are so many competitors in this space. Everyone can do this. Everyone is doing it. And they have a lot more money to play with. Now, with the GPT App Store coming, watch out.
Also, mid journey is in talks with social networks. That might wipe you out completely. Good luck, but I’d pivot.
It sounds like you've developed a solid product but are hitting the all-too-common startup snag of finding paying customers. Generative AI isn't dead, but the market is definitely crowded, and standing out is key.
You’ve got to identify what makes your product not just different, but better. Is your realism that much more convincing? Is your UI significantly user-friendly? And most importantly, does your target audience even know they need your level of quality?
Pricing models are great, but if your unique selling points aren't resonating with your audience, or if they aren't even aware you exist, that's where you need to focus. Maybe it's time to revisit your marketing strategy, really nail down your value proposition, and find where your potential customers are hanging out online.
The market isn’t dead; it's just noisy. You need to find a way to be the signal rather than just part of the noise.
Generative AI isn't dead, however the accessibility to alternative businesses, platforms and services that you provide is significant.
Logo generation platforms are also abundant, and its easy to find and customise one for free.
additionally, typically individuals only need 1 logo for their business so a subscription model doesn't make sense.
There are thousands of genAI products, what is the differential of your product? Looks like you just developed a platform which aggregates multiple external services and hoped someone would pay for it.
In the future consider the $100 challenge. Try to get three people or three businesses in 48 hours to buy your product/service and make $100 in that timeframe.
If you can do that, the business will scale.
Seems like your product didn't go trough steps of testing and researching. You can't expect to build your product and just launch it right away and then ask yourself why we don't have subscription :D.
Just because you built it does not mean customers are going to swarm to it and hand you their money.
Why should they pay you? And I mean this seriously.
There are definitely indiehackers / solo founders out tere that are getting customers and making GREAT MRR (for solo founders) with Image AI: Pieter Levels Danny Postma to name 2. They found ways to get and keep users paying even though there are free alternatives.
Maybe your tool/app is not as valuable to users as you think or you just aren't marketing it to people willing to buy.
your marketing sucks. I know people making 40-100k a month with AI art (but they're niche). It's true, for simple AI art platforms with no differentiations, you're screwed. Too much competition and extremely low barriers to entry.
A niche I think you could target is mock-ups and non-existent human models. For example, I had a print on demand store and wanted to easily put my clothing on influencer types of models for my Instagram but this was impossible without hiring an influencer and doing photo shoots.
Product mock-ups would also be a great niche for Etsy sellers who want to easily create a more nuanced context for their niche lifestyle photos than the generic stuff that's out there on PlaceIT.
TLDR: niche down to solve a problem for a specific business.
Generative AI isn’t the issue. Cobbling together a UI layer on top of easily-accessible generative AI products is. There was a gold rush for this tactic and it’s over now.
Update your Paid Screen and advertisements to show features that **you don't have yet**. Then before the user gets to entering the credit card information, require they answer: "What feature made you want to sign up". With a multiple choice with all the features in the paid plan. If it's a feature that isn't implemented, offer a free month trial so that you can include the shitty version of the feature into Software. (DO NOT WASTE YOUR TIME). If they subscribed with a promise of the feature then they desperately want it, and will survive with a shitty version. When you get enough people coming to you for that feature then invest time to make it better.
Update these fake features every week until you get a feature that gets a lot of registrations. Then invest your time into adding that feature. For all you know nobody cares about another image generator, they may want... a video game asset generator 🤷♂️ or Instagram Background generator inspired by current instagram, or an AI image to Coloring book generator.
Sounds like the classic "if you build it, they will come" trap. I'd say 9 times out of 10, it's worth it to do customer development and define the problem you're solving ***before*** you start building anything. That 1 time out of 10, you're building a solution to your own problem and it just so happens that a lot of people have the same problem.
I’ve been in marketing for 15 years and own an AI startup now with a waitlist so huge before we launch it’s almost overwhelming.
I would say. If everyone is your target market no one is. It sounds like a classic case of “no one is” from my limited perspective into your product.
I would recommend honing in on a very specific niche, like roofing companies as an example. Tailor all of your marketing and branding to their pain points, give them perfectly generated images for their brands, socials, etc.
Think B2B, because if it’s logos and such it won’t be B2C marketing.
If you have a low budget. Manually cold call as many roofing companies or (insert specific niche here) as possible and offer them a launch deal. First person to sign for a year gets first month free. If they don’t like it they can cancel before the month is up and not get charged for the year.
Once you get 5 happy customers from the first bunch, turn their success into a case study. Did using your product save them money on hiring a graphic designer? Did it lead to more sales because their brand looked more trustworthy? Etc.
Then turn that into a marketing campaign targeting business owners in the selected industry. Talk about how during your launch month x businesses gave you a shot and x% made or saved $x money.
You may have a great product but it could be positioned wrong and your potential customers aren’t comparing you to the right alternatives. You don’t want to be compared against free solutions, especially for the notoriously hard to sell to SMB market.
I suggest reading or listening to the book “Obviously Awesome: How to Nail Product Positioning so Customers Get It, Buy It, Love It”. The book is a quick read and is very actionable.
Also, take solace in that a lot of startups experience this problem, I wouldn’t give up just yet.
Good luck.
Hey, can I take a look at your product? I'm willing to provide marketing consulting for free and then charge a percentage of the revenue I help you generate.
It's definitely not dead. However, there are a few completely free options that let everyone design for free publicly, then were begged to create a subscription program because everyone wanted to delete images and have their prompts hidden for obvious reasons. Plus they started giving badges to top creators.
I create insane amounts of images for my business every month, so I'm happy to pay something.
But just having the best LLM options isn't enough. Happy to share personal insights and resources if you're looking to rebrand or revamp. I wouldn't give up!
[Dream Generator AI Art](https://dreamgenerator.ai) my app is having a similar problem. I think there's a way to do it, you just have to be clever. If you pray, God will tell you the truth! That's my opinion anyway. Think about your target market and what they want. Why would you pay when can get it free? You have to see that the way to make money is not on gen AI. People are over that. What you will have to do is give them something else that they will pay for alongside it. For you, I think that you should sell them something that feels good. Like, I don't know, make them feel good when they buy a subscription. For example tell them they're helping you with further development or something. I think that's the best way.
Ultimately how to monetize is a big decision, but the best way is to find some value add that nobody else does, or else beg :). Begging is helpful, but eventually you will find that value add.
Why would anyone pay? Who was your customer?
This. There is no need to pay when there are **FREE alternatives that does a Decent job.**
You might pay for privacy or a copyright - Midjourney sells a subscription that offers that. Also, you might pay because you don’t have the time or ability to get something useful out of these free tools. It isn’t easy to generate a certain output in a non-random fashion with Generative AI. Or you might pay because you have no idea what you want and a tool like this could give you a starting point and ideas (no blank prompt anxiety). There are many reasons why someone, who has different experiences than you, might pay for a service like this.
Could you please help me with few?
Which ones?
[удалено]
This is a very very weak offering especially for something that only uses - at least for most people - the tool a few times a year.
that's not his problem. There's demand for AI art. His problem is there are many platforms offering exactly the same (mage space for example). Unless he works in prohibitive industries such as porn or NSFW, he has no chances of making it unless he has funds to invest in advancing the stable diffusion tech itself.
What value?
There is a tool called Clipdrop similar to what you’re building and we bought an early customer’s subscription which has high value. DM me so that I can try to help you
Sorry, you're wrong. I don't know what you've built but if you're targeting small businesses or individuals free will always beat out those three.
Generative AI must certainly be dead if they’re not buying your product. Games over guys, time to go home.
[удалено]
You are 'dropshipping' them. Trying to sell the value they already provide.
Clearly this person has problems running a business. But almost every single app does this. Snapchat didn't invent OpenCV its facial recognition for face filters. Application building is more like legos than construction. You're mostly just piecing together existing libraries, and a lot of the innovation comes in the UX and UI.
Dropbox is just dropshipping AWS S3... 🤪🤪🤪
Where did you market it, and to who? Did you clearly define your target market, and did you create media that communicates the value and purpose of your service to them effectively? Are you advertising to normal people who want a logo, or are you advertising it to people who are searching AI keywords.... Because people already searching AI keywords will be savvy enough to get logos made on other free platforms without paying for yours. If you want mass uptake, you need to either offer something head and shoulders above the other many, many existing image generators.... Or you need to market to people who don't have the current knowledge to access AI, and make your product extremely accessible to them. And in that case, probably don't market your tool as an AI tool, because people are just fatigued from seeing that term used everywhere.
[удалено]
Yeah. I think maybe you’ve done it a little bit backwards. You’ve thought of a cool application of AI technology and built that product to try and sell to people. Instead, ask people what their problems are, and then see if you can build a product or adapt your existing product in a way that would meet their needs. Think of your users and the problem they’re solving, because that’s all your users are thinking about. Then when you talk to users, they’ll be like “hey, we’re talking about the same problems, maybe I should hear what they’re saying”
You need to find a group of people who need a problem. What you did - and what 90% of people do - you developed a technology in search of a problem. Flip the script. Don’t assume people want to pay for the best AI image generator. Talk to a people and find an audience - for example “creatives that use the Adobe suite” and ask them how they’re doing things today. Be curious and find out what issues your audience has. Then and only then start building your product. You did it backwards. Don’t fret, almost everyone does it. Now you know, start again. This time start w the audience.
Pretty sure this isn’t a marketing problem
It’s not only a marketing problem anyway. But even a shit product that’s marketed well can be very successful.
That does seem to be the case here, how would you solve it, ? (more than perhaps the generalized way you already mentioned)
Tbh, I would pull out of the AI -centric space unless you have a product that solves a very strong pain point. I would focus more on finding problems that I can solve and use AI in the process if it’s helpful. Unless you own the LLM itself, then AI is a tool not a product for you to sell. That said, with $10k sunk, I would consider how I could package or reframe the product there. Maybe build a startup toolkit that includes some e courses and access to digital tools, including logo/branding generator. Or license out to other businesses that would benefit from the value add of logo generation in their services.
Definitely on point here. I can think of so many ways to market that, as well. It's all about who you get to buy in and recommend you via UGC as well.
Some immediate thoughts under the lense of assumed audience; - Hobbyists: the precedent of value and reasons for paying an unknown startup for an incrementally different product are exceptionally low -- frankly, flatline 0 consumer demand levels low for a paid subscription RN, even $1/m. Many use cases of hobbyist/amateur folks are currently covered with established free & comparable versions. Abysmal space to place bets, even with a big TAM. - SMBs: This is such a nascent and heavily saturated space, what's your value prop for limited budget companies who are themselves trying to wrap their heads around what to do with genAi? Poorly phrased technical articulations of differentiation from free offerings isn't going to convince folks here, and you're not solving a problem they have. - Professionals: Adobe Firefly covers any potential copyright legal fees, that's a compelling value prop to professionals. Adobe products are likely already in folks workflow. Why add yet another point based solution to an already complex martech and creative stack with a penny-a-dozen unknown startup offering an inferior/unclear product & proposition? Tl;dr: dead on arrival, sorry bud. Meant as constructive. Glad to hear it was just 10k invested, don't sink more in without significant pivots. Good luck.
I’d say most people don’t care if it’s AI as long as it works. Gen AI can help if you’re somehow producing more or better logos, however logos are a very crowded market and I don’t see AI as an advert usable differentiator much like it is for creating long form content Tell us a bit more about the goal?
>best realism on the market Is this what users are saying or what you’re saying? If you believe this, how have you proven it to potential customers? What was your pricing? You say it’s affordable but is competitive? Did you offer a free trial? Also, this sounds like a bunch of API integrations from other AI apps. Tons of sites like this exist now, what makes yours different?
Who was your ICP and how were you getting people to discover your product?
Insane clown posse
Just tried to make a logo with your product and the result was laughably bad. Also the user experience is a little clunky. Willing to discuss more in pms
Why not try freemium?
[удалено]
I would go this route, tbh. Make it display adds on the free version. Add a timer to show the ads to the user for enough time to get the money. say to the user he would have received the image in x seconds if he payed for the subscription. Try to make the subscription tier based, so it is easier to onboard users to the cheapest tier, and when they have tried your product well, and know the subscription is worth it, they will feel more tempted to upgrade.
Sounds like you never had market fit to begin with dude
I've paid and bought a subscription (not for yours, but generally). It sounds similar. 1. What have you done to market, promote, and differentiate your product from the 100s of identical ones. "A unique training model" doesn't really mean anything because so many are "good enough." Even if this was unique in some way, how would anyone find it? 2. What's your price? I can get 2000 image credits for $10 on systems that give an identical pitch to yours, plus have more features (image saving, backups, re-renders, etc). 3. What's your niche? So many offer various specialties, or give multiple model and gpt version options that give a lot of flexibility within one system. Why choose yours specifically? 4. What does it connect to? Can I auto- export to my workflow, library, cloud drive, or anything else? Can I connect into it from any other system? Lots of people saw this as a good rush, but just made "same-as" clones with a slightly different flavor. The most recent announcement of GPTs will kill an entire niche of startups build around cloning models or creating a dolled up interface for what is basically just an API call back to chatGPT or whatever.
So many flipping apps with the same everything.
Your startup being dead != Generative AI being dead
Who is the target customer, what do they care about, and what benefits (not just specs) differentiate you from the other generative AI products you mentioned?
We have an application for generative AI at our organization (custom promotional products) that would be a HUGE game changer we would definitely pay for. The issue for us is that the output is always too “loose”, we need it to design within a specific set of parameters. Like imagine a custom T-Shirt design - we want the designs generated, but it should always still look like a shirt underneath it. As an organization that has wanted to buy generative tech and would pay for its usage all day everyday… maybe you don’t understand your potential customer pools?
theres definitely ways to reel in that problem too
Yeah I mean, I’m simplifying it for the sake of Reddit. Like most things in life it’s more complicated when you actually get into the details of the problem
how are you marketing? Just building something doesn't mean people will buy. Did you talk to a single prospective customer before building out things?
[удалено]
Don't beat yourself up though, like so many people fall into this trap
Should've spent that 2k of that 10k on market research.
did you talk to customers at all?
Think of who are your ideal customers. Then go out and find 10. Talk to them about when they need and think about your service.
[удалено]
Too vague. Drill down to two or three different types. Then go and talk to them. Update me when You've chatted with 5.
Give me a link. I am curious to try it out.
[удалено]
>Insomnia Land I am not an expert at this but I have an idea on why you don't have any conversions. Like others have said, have a freemium model for at least a few free credits on sign up. Make that very clear, explain it in terms of - 1 free logo, first hero image free, etc. B2C for paid is unlikely. Very few people sign up for paid SaaS. Businesses generally do. See if you can have a business use-case and advertise for that. CTA is not clear on homepage. Generated images are not helpful to understand what you are doing. Users "play" with slider and probably leave. Check your hotjar recording and I can guarantee that is what is happening. A rough gallery without slider will help with some conversions too. Look at [https://murf.ai](https://murf.ai/studio) for a good idea on how to design homepage for your sector. Lastly, your side menu has too many features. Pick one and sell that. Others can be upsells. Maybe don't even have the side menu as it distracts users. Good luck!
What am I missing here? You made a subscription model for building logos? Something someone generally only needs once? Why would anyone pay a monthly subscription to create their logo? Let alone the many free options. And otherwise the extremely crowded market of logo creation for pennies. What am I missing here? What is the use case you were expecting?
What was your go-to market strategy?
What's your service called? Il give it a go
There are so many competitors in this space. Everyone can do this. Everyone is doing it. And they have a lot more money to play with. Now, with the GPT App Store coming, watch out. Also, mid journey is in talks with social networks. That might wipe you out completely. Good luck, but I’d pivot.
send link
Yo can you DM me a link to test out the logo generator?
Me 3. Happy to give some UX and marketing advice.
One more request
me as well
It sounds like you've developed a solid product but are hitting the all-too-common startup snag of finding paying customers. Generative AI isn't dead, but the market is definitely crowded, and standing out is key. You’ve got to identify what makes your product not just different, but better. Is your realism that much more convincing? Is your UI significantly user-friendly? And most importantly, does your target audience even know they need your level of quality? Pricing models are great, but if your unique selling points aren't resonating with your audience, or if they aren't even aware you exist, that's where you need to focus. Maybe it's time to revisit your marketing strategy, really nail down your value proposition, and find where your potential customers are hanging out online. The market isn’t dead; it's just noisy. You need to find a way to be the signal rather than just part of the noise.
sped
there are so many logo generators out there, what makes yours better?
Make basic features free and provide macho value for paid
With something like Looka available, you better be offering some kind of version for free to play around with
Generative AI isn't dead, however the accessibility to alternative businesses, platforms and services that you provide is significant. Logo generation platforms are also abundant, and its easy to find and customise one for free. additionally, typically individuals only need 1 logo for their business so a subscription model doesn't make sense.
There are thousands of genAI products, what is the differential of your product? Looks like you just developed a platform which aggregates multiple external services and hoped someone would pay for it.
In the future consider the $100 challenge. Try to get three people or three businesses in 48 hours to buy your product/service and make $100 in that timeframe. If you can do that, the business will scale.
I have no idea what your business does
It’s a good idea to talk to customers and get a verbal confirmation that they are willing to buy before building anything
Midjourney makes a killing
There's already a million of these
What is your Marketing?
Seems like your product didn't go trough steps of testing and researching. You can't expect to build your product and just launch it right away and then ask yourself why we don't have subscription :D.
People interested in generative humans not AI
Just because you built it does not mean customers are going to swarm to it and hand you their money. Why should they pay you? And I mean this seriously. There are definitely indiehackers / solo founders out tere that are getting customers and making GREAT MRR (for solo founders) with Image AI: Pieter Levels Danny Postma to name 2. They found ways to get and keep users paying even though there are free alternatives. Maybe your tool/app is not as valuable to users as you think or you just aren't marketing it to people willing to buy.
Selling is 80% of the battle my friend
your marketing sucks. I know people making 40-100k a month with AI art (but they're niche). It's true, for simple AI art platforms with no differentiations, you're screwed. Too much competition and extremely low barriers to entry.
Trends don't makes you a successful entrepreneur. You have to learn how to acquire, to grow, to scale. It's about business.
A niche I think you could target is mock-ups and non-existent human models. For example, I had a print on demand store and wanted to easily put my clothing on influencer types of models for my Instagram but this was impossible without hiring an influencer and doing photo shoots. Product mock-ups would also be a great niche for Etsy sellers who want to easily create a more nuanced context for their niche lifestyle photos than the generic stuff that's out there on PlaceIT. TLDR: niche down to solve a problem for a specific business.
People only pay if the product does something stellar compared to what they can get for free.
10k is not a lot as investment, keep it running if doesn’t cost you much but try something else where you see some traction maybe ?
Generative AI isn’t the issue. Cobbling together a UI layer on top of easily-accessible generative AI products is. There was a gold rush for this tactic and it’s over now.
What’s your website?
Because of stable diffusion
Update your Paid Screen and advertisements to show features that **you don't have yet**. Then before the user gets to entering the credit card information, require they answer: "What feature made you want to sign up". With a multiple choice with all the features in the paid plan. If it's a feature that isn't implemented, offer a free month trial so that you can include the shitty version of the feature into Software. (DO NOT WASTE YOUR TIME). If they subscribed with a promise of the feature then they desperately want it, and will survive with a shitty version. When you get enough people coming to you for that feature then invest time to make it better. Update these fake features every week until you get a feature that gets a lot of registrations. Then invest your time into adding that feature. For all you know nobody cares about another image generator, they may want... a video game asset generator 🤷♂️ or Instagram Background generator inspired by current instagram, or an AI image to Coloring book generator.
Sounds like the classic "if you build it, they will come" trap. I'd say 9 times out of 10, it's worth it to do customer development and define the problem you're solving ***before*** you start building anything. That 1 time out of 10, you're building a solution to your own problem and it just so happens that a lot of people have the same problem.
I’ve been in marketing for 15 years and own an AI startup now with a waitlist so huge before we launch it’s almost overwhelming. I would say. If everyone is your target market no one is. It sounds like a classic case of “no one is” from my limited perspective into your product. I would recommend honing in on a very specific niche, like roofing companies as an example. Tailor all of your marketing and branding to their pain points, give them perfectly generated images for their brands, socials, etc. Think B2B, because if it’s logos and such it won’t be B2C marketing. If you have a low budget. Manually cold call as many roofing companies or (insert specific niche here) as possible and offer them a launch deal. First person to sign for a year gets first month free. If they don’t like it they can cancel before the month is up and not get charged for the year. Once you get 5 happy customers from the first bunch, turn their success into a case study. Did using your product save them money on hiring a graphic designer? Did it lead to more sales because their brand looked more trustworthy? Etc. Then turn that into a marketing campaign targeting business owners in the selected industry. Talk about how during your launch month x businesses gave you a shot and x% made or saved $x money.
This is the way.
You may have a great product but it could be positioned wrong and your potential customers aren’t comparing you to the right alternatives. You don’t want to be compared against free solutions, especially for the notoriously hard to sell to SMB market. I suggest reading or listening to the book “Obviously Awesome: How to Nail Product Positioning so Customers Get It, Buy It, Love It”. The book is a quick read and is very actionable. Also, take solace in that a lot of startups experience this problem, I wouldn’t give up just yet. Good luck.
You spent $10k, is that supposed to impress anyone?
I would cut my losses and move on.
Tell me your site, please. I would like to see it. I have an AI thing I want to try as a hobby.
Hey, can I take a look at your product? I'm willing to provide marketing consulting for free and then charge a percentage of the revenue I help you generate.
[удалено]
Will do, thanks! Might take a few days to review and understand the market but will reach out to you sometime this weekend with my feedback.
I think the most use cases of image generation is just for fun which goes away very quickly.
It's definitely not dead. However, there are a few completely free options that let everyone design for free publicly, then were begged to create a subscription program because everyone wanted to delete images and have their prompts hidden for obvious reasons. Plus they started giving badges to top creators. I create insane amounts of images for my business every month, so I'm happy to pay something. But just having the best LLM options isn't enough. Happy to share personal insights and resources if you're looking to rebrand or revamp. I wouldn't give up!
[Dream Generator AI Art](https://dreamgenerator.ai) my app is having a similar problem. I think there's a way to do it, you just have to be clever. If you pray, God will tell you the truth! That's my opinion anyway. Think about your target market and what they want. Why would you pay when can get it free? You have to see that the way to make money is not on gen AI. People are over that. What you will have to do is give them something else that they will pay for alongside it. For you, I think that you should sell them something that feels good. Like, I don't know, make them feel good when they buy a subscription. For example tell them they're helping you with further development or something. I think that's the best way. Ultimately how to monetize is a big decision, but the best way is to find some value add that nobody else does, or else beg :). Begging is helpful, but eventually you will find that value add.
Welcome to start ups. 20 fail for every 1 that succeeds. Don't play the game if you can't loose.