Building and promoting Chrome extensions
A candid chat with Uladzimir Yankovich, founder of Manganum
Welcome to a special edition where we're shaking things up with a new format — interviewing startup founders! Today's guest is Uladzimir Yankovich, the brains behind Manganum, a popular browser extension with over 300,000 active users (myself included). Before Manganum, Uladzimir was CPO of Alitools.io and Product Manager of Yandex Browser. We're both part of the close-knit startup community in Minsk, Belarus, and have known each other for a long time. The kicker? I'm conducting this interview from sunny Florida, while Uladzimir is currently in Poland.
Being a Chrome extension builder myself, my original goal was to trick Uladzimir into sharing some of his best practices for Chrome extension promotion. However, it turned out into a much deeper candid chat.
We delve deep into Manganum's journey, its growth strategies, and the ups and downs of running a startup focused on browser extensions. Uladzimir shares his insights on the future of browser extensions. We also discuss the challenges of securing venture capital for a niche market and what's on the horizon for Manganum.
I hope you will enjoy it!
Intro
Being a popular extension is like being a popular gopher: you are popular, but unfortunately, only among gophers
AV: "Wow, Manganum became an extension of the month on dev.to! That's huge, especially with giants like Scribe and Magical in the mix. How does it feel to be recognized like that? Can you share a bit about what went into achieving this milestone?"
UY: "Actually, it doesn't mean much. Being a popular extension is like being a popular gopher: you are popular, but unfortunately, only among gophers. Yes, of course, we all know Grammarly, Honey, and... and that's it - exceptions that prove the rule. When we think of popular websites or apps, we can easily name dozens of products, but the situation is different for extensions."
AV: "What do you think about ChatGPT, and the popularity of Chrome extensions like Merlin or Monica?"
UY: "I think they are excellent products, and I'm not surprised by their emergence and popularity. The magic of LLM is best noticeable when we load them with a lot of context, and browser extensions have always excelled at this task. However, I believe the future of these products is not so clear-cut. My prediction is that within the next 6-12 months, we will see Google introducing native integrations of generative functions in Chrome. They will be native and free for users. I don't think Monica, Merlin, and other players will withstand the competition. Of course, this won't kill their business, but they will have to become more niche solutions for professional users."
About Manganum and its Journey
release -> send to 10 close friends on Telegram -> release -> send to 30 friends -> release -> Facebook post -> release -> launch on Product Hunt -> first 700 installations.
AV: "How did Manganum start? What motivated you to build it? Tell the story of the company."
UY: "Manganum was born in January 2021. I didn't want to spend the whole day taking care of my daughter, and I didn't want to go to work, so I decided to start a startup. At the same time, I had a lot of experience related to desktop browsers and browser extensions, which I could only realize in my own business. After several days of brainstorming with myself, I came up with Manganum - an extension that improves not just a specific website, but the browser itself."
AV: "Can you talk a little bit about your team?"
UY: "We have a very small team. We started with three people: a part-time engineer, a part-time designer, and myself. In the second year of the company's life, we were joined by a support manager and a product manager (who is now my partner)."
AV: "How did you get people to notice Manganum at first?"
UY: "The beginning of our story was quite ordinary: release -> send to 10 close friends on Telegram -> release -> send to 30 friends -> release -> Facebook post -> release -> launch on Product Hunt -> first 700 installations."
Growth Strategies and Partnerships
Currently, we receive about 500 organic installations per day. Number two is advertising in other extensions, some of which are our own
AV: "Suggest any tricks to get Manganum seen more on the Chrome Web Store?"
UY: "In the Chrome Web Store, like in other app stores, there are some ASO (App Store Optimization) practices: get the Featured badge. It's not an indicator of the best products, like in Google Play, but rather a sign that your product is 'not bad'. Beautiful graphics: icon, promo images, screenshots. Texts focused on 2-5 keywords. Add a large number of reviews. This works. The catch is that the Chrome Web Store is not focused on new products. So, I would recommend doing ASO after reaching the 10,000 Weekly Active Users mark."
AV: "Any one thing that significantly improved Manganum's growth?"
UY: "Actually, I don't think we have cracked it yet. It's just that others are doing even worse 😂. Our number one growth channel is organic. We have many integrations with big products, which means many juicy keywords. Currently, we receive about 500 organic installations per day. Number two is advertising in other extensions, some of which are our own (such as Button for Google Calendar or FasterWeb). Unfortunately, both of these channels are barely scalable, and all the others have not yielded good results yet. So, although I'm proud of our current results, I can't say that we have cracked growth."
AV: "Do you have any successful campaigns or partnerships?"
UY: "It seems there is nothing more to add to the previous answer. I can only say that our attempts to establish partnerships with projects much larger than us in size have not been successful. Technical integrations, yes, but only if the technical possibility already exists. Marketing partnerships or requests for exclusive technical integrations currently do not excite large partners - we are too small."
Utilizing Social Media and Feedback
With the growth of our audience over the past year, our backlog includes more items authored by our users rather than by us.
AV: "How do you use things like Facebook, Twitter, or YouTube to get Manganum out there?"
UY: "Honestly, almost not at all. And I think that's a mistake and our growth point. Yes, I have a Twitter account with 220 followers, and we have bought a couple of integrations on YouTube - but that's why I said 'almost'. I believe that by working systematically with these channels, we can reach a much larger audience."
AV: "What do people tell you about Manganum? How do you process feedback?"
UY: "We receive feedback from several channels: support service, reviews on the Chrome Store, PMF (Product Market Fit) and NPS (Net Promoter Score) surveys, our Discord community. Zarina, our support manager, is in charge of processing the feedback flow. There's no magic, we just try to respond quickly and honestly. I'm sure that these efforts pay off. With the growth of our audience over the past year, our backlog includes more items authored by our users rather than by us."
AV: "How do you know if what you're doing to promote Manganum is working?"
UY: "We are so small that we don't need highly accurate radars. If something works, it is immediately visible, like organics or advertising in other extensions. Unfortunately, almost nothing works 😂."
Growth Tracking and Challenges
AV: "What tools do you use to track Manganum growth?"
UY: "Google Analytics for the website and Chrome Store. Amplitude for the extension. Of course, Amplitude is great, but it costs as much as an airplane wing. I don't know if we can afford it after the end of the startup plan."
AV: "Can you share challenges you have faced to get Manganum where it is?"
UY: "I'm not sure. They were definitely there, but I probably just forgot. It's easier for me to talk about the challenges that are not solved at the moment: relationships with institutional VCs. I would say that they generally don't understand and love browser extensions: no market, no references. Yes, there is YC - the leader in the number of deals in extensions, but their main focus is B2B, and we are slightly off that mark.
Of course, if you grow like Clubhouse, it doesn't matter if you have references, a market, or what platform you build your business on. But so far, we haven't been able to have successful conversations with institutional VCs.
But, despite this, I am confident that if you build a product that brings real value to users, sooner or later you will find your market and your investor. We will too."
AV: "What's coming up that you can't wait for people to see?"
UY: "Integration with Gmail. Right now, we are preparing for the release of an Inbox application, where our users will be able to see their unread emails from the past month without opening the Gmail tab. I won't claim that it's a game-changer, but I'm sure it will be valuable for many of our users. We are doing this now only because gaining access to the Gmail API requires passing a paid security audit, which we couldn't afford before."
Inspiration, Company Culture
AV: "Where do you get inspiration for new marketing ideas?"
UY: "The best thing that works is communication with users. If you know them well, understand them, speak their language, know their favorite websites, forums, and chats, then you will never run out of ideas."
AV: "Can you talk about the culture at Manganum, and how it influenced its success?"
UY: "All small teams have a culture, but it is not verbalized. We are no exception. If you think about it, what might set us apart from other teams is probably a high level of openness and honesty internally, a positive attitude in any situation, attention to detail (interface details, edge cases, element states, animations - we are real maniacs, although not world-class professionals)."
AV: "What is your favorite feature of Manganum?"
UY: "The pause button in our life timer on the new tab 😂."
Wrapping Up
Do it only if you love this platform and can't help but do it. Otherwise, it's better to find application for your talents in B2B SaaS or the mobile app market.
AV: "Do you have any words of wisdom for anyone who wants to build their own Chrome Extension?"
UY: "Do it only if you love this platform and can't help but do it. Otherwise, it's better to find application for your talents in B2B SaaS or the mobile app market."
AV: "Do you need any help? Are you hiring? How can readers help you grow Manganum? Here is an opportunity to ask for something that you need! Don’t be shy!"
UY: "We are always open to any dialogues about partnerships. In addition, we are actively looking for a talented marketer. We are also interested in VCs who are interested in B2C productivity tools and extensions for purchase (from 5k to 50k USD)."
AV: "So, what did you think of our chat today? Anything else you'd like to share?"
UY: "I enjoyed it. I rarely talk to anyone about extensions other than my team and a few colleagues. I hope you found it interesting, and it will be valuable for someone."
AV: "And the last question. Where can people find you on the Internet? Twitter? LinkedIn?"
UY: "https://www.linkedin.com/in/yankovichv/, https://twitter.com/Yankovich_ 👋."