Krane

"An iOS app that scans business cards and exports contacts to CSV, built to eliminate the hassle of manually sorting through cards after networking events."
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Maker: h317
no rev. info provided

Marketing Channels

Primary

Word of mouth

The app spread organically from the creator to friends, then to friends of friends, and eventually to strangers

Ongoing

Apple App Store

Listed on the Apple App Store, providing organic discovery through search

Secondary

Hacker News

Creator shared the app on HN as part of the projects showcase

Growth Levers

  • Target networking event organizers and professional communities (BNI, Meetup groups, conferences) for distribution partnerships
  • Add CRM integration features (Salesforce, HubSpot, Google Contacts) to increase stickiness beyond CSV export
  • Study historical predecessors like sbook to learn from prior innovations in contact management
  • Create Android version to double the addressable market
  • Optimize App Store listing with keywords around business card scanning and networking

First Customer Strategy

The creator built the app to solve their own pain point of managing business cards after networking events. It started as a personal tool, spread to friends and friends of friends, and then other people started using it organically — a classic concentric-circles growth pattern.

Pricing Insight

No pricing details shared in the thread. As an App Store listing, it likely uses a freemium or one-time purchase model.

New Market Opportunities

  • Advanced contact management / relationship building tools Commenter referenced Simson Garfinkel's sbook (https://simson.net/ref/sbook5/) as a historical predecessor that was 'way ahead of the whole AI thing,' suggesting there is precedent and demand for intelligent contact management beyond simple scanning

Key Takeaways

  • • Solving your own pain point is the most reliable path to building something others also need
  • • Concentric-circles growth (self -> friends -> friends of friends -> strangers) is a strong organic validation pattern
  • • Business card scanning is a recurring problem with a long history of solutions, suggesting persistent demand
  • • Learning from historical predecessors in the same space (like sbook) can reveal feature opportunities and differentiation strategies
  • • Simple utility apps that do one thing well (scan -> export CSV) can gain traction through reliability and ease of use

Sentiment Analysis

1 Neu

Notable Quotes

"Have you ever looked at previous apps in that space? Esp. Simson Garfinkel's sbook? — WillAdams"

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