we're cooking

It's been a while since we posted an update on our journey, but it's for good reasons! We've been extremely busy laying the groundwork for a foundation that will endure for years to come. So, let's dive into a recap of what we've been cooking up.

Note: A lot has happened since our last update, so this post is kinda juicy!

Silicon Valley (Tinc Accelerator Program)

At the end of September, we were thrilled to be accepted into Tinc, a hybrid accelerator program tailored for Nordic companies. We were one of only eight companies selected for this opportunity.

Honestly, Jonathan and I didn't expect too much at first. We were really busy with building and fundraising, we also knew joining this program meant we had to put our plans on hold, and we weren't sure if it would really help us at our current stage.

However, we couldn't have been more mistaken.

The program consisted of four weeks of intensive virtual workshops and personalized coaching sessions with mentors from diverse backgrounds and expertise, culminating in a week-long trip to Silicon Valley.

It was an incredible experience. We met so many great founders, mentors, and companies. We learned a lot about working with data, how we should improve our pitch, and how to tell our story. The program also sparked so many new ideas for our product.

When we left Silicon Valley, we felt really inspired and it made us aim for even bigger goals than before!

With this in mind, we extend our heartfelt gratitude to Åse, Nellie, and everyone behind Tinc, our amazing cohort, and all the incredible mentors. Thank you so much for this transformative journey!

Fundraising

Before we started the Tinc program, we went to TechBBQ, a big tech conference in Copenhagen. We had just begun our pre-seed funding round, aiming to raise 500,000 Euros, and we were looking to connect with people outside the Nordic region.

This conference was really helpful. Over two days, we had more than 20 meetings with different VCs and investors. It turns out, a lot of them find Duoo really interesting!

So far, we've got some soft commitments from investors. We're hoping to finish this funding round by January, or maybe even earlier.

Right now, we're still looking for angel investors and others to help us complete this round. If you're an investor and want to know more about Duoo and our plans to make a big impact in the gaming world, please get in touch with my co-founder and CEO, Jonathan (jonathan@duoo.gg).

The duo becomes Trio

Jonathan and I have been a team since 2016, learning a great deal along the way, particularly from our past mistakes.

A significant error we made in 2017, when founding Altpocket, was failing to prepare for rapid growth. To put it briefly, our development wasn't scalable, and we had no backup.

However, our approach this time around is markedly different. We've implemented various strategies to efficiently manage an influx of new users, and we've even expanded our tech team!

Starting from the middle of January, Jonathan Edwardsson will be joining us full-time as tech lead and co-founder!

I'm genuinely excited about this addition. Jonathan is not only familiar with our tech stack, but he also brings in expertise that fills gaps in our technical capabilities, so we're super stoked to have him onboard!

We'll also be having a rap battle between Jonathan & Jonathan on who gets the jonathan@duoo.gg email.

Tracking

Improving our data tracking and analytics has always been a goal for us. In the past, we relied mainly on Google Analytics and client-side tracking.

However, this approach has its challenges, especially since our primary users are tech-savvy and often use ad blockers, making tracking difficult.

The only viable solution seemed to be setting up server-side tracking, but that's a big project, especially when you're also focused on creating a great product with a limited team.

However, we've always excelled at building products that impress and appeal to users. This made me think:

If we're doing this well without working with metrics and tracking, how much better could we do with it?

So, I decided to invest time in setting up proper tracking. Thanks to tools like Segment and Mixpanel, we now have a robust tracking setup for Duoo.

Just two weeks after implementing this new system, we started seeing areas for improvement, particularly in our new user funnels.

Now, several weeks later, the impact of these improvements is evident:

Onboarding Completion Rate - Increased from 70% to 82%
Duo Posts Created - Increased 20% to 59% 😮
Duo Requests Sent - Increased 13% to 31%

While these results are promising, there's still room for growth. I'm hopeful that by the next update, we'll have even higher conversion rates in our funnels.

Currently, our focus is on the following KPIs

• Conversion rates / Funnels
• Weekly Active Users (WAU)

The Product, KPIs and moving forward

Last week, Duoo hit a significant milestone: we surpassed 10,000 registered users. That's a big achievement for us, so good job us!

And while this proves that we're building something gamers want, we're not too excited over this number and we're not really focused on it either, we want to make sure we're building a great product that users not only love but also comes back to, which is why WAU is our current north star metric.

At the moment we're kinda suffering from the Tinder Paradox. We see that users are making connections and playing games together – over 4,000 matches and 20,000 games played to be exact. However, once users find their ideal match, there's little reason for them to return to Duoo unless they want to find someone new.

With this in mind, I'm setting two main goals for our product updates:

1. Improve the user experience so more users find value (Funnels)
2. Develop features that encourage duos to stay engaged (Stickiness / Retention / WAU).

These two areas will be my focus in the coming weeks. I'm hoping to report some significant improvements in our product and metrics in the next update.

On top of that, we've also set an internal goal to reach by the end of December:

1. Double the number of registered users
2. Triple our WAU

But for now, it's time to get back to work. Thanks for tuning in, and I look forward to sharing more in our next update!