The Story
Leandro built Sync to Sheets, a Google Sheets add-on that syncs Notion databases to Sheets. He built it in just 2 weeks, and after 4 years, it makes $9K/month with 70K+ users.
As Leandro explains: "My name is Leandro and I built an app that does only one thing and makes $9K per month. Sync to Sheets is an add-on that runs on the sidebar of Google Sheets and allows users to sync their Notion databases to Sheets. I built it in two weeks and it has been around for four years now."
The Origin Story
"Four years ago I was building an integration between Google Sheets and another service. I was working with the Sheets API. So I gained a lot of knowledge about it. And at that time Notion released their official Notion API."
"There was a gap between what users needed and what's available in Notion. So I said okay I need to validate if there's going to be a need for that kind of integration to sync Google Sheets with Notion."
Reddit Validation
"I went to Reddit, I checked the subreddit of Notion and searched for keywords like sheets, Google Sheets, Excel, CSV, all related keywords to what I was trying to build and validate."
"I found a lot of people trying to export the information from Notion into Sheets to work with the data. I was confident to build an MVP in two weeks. So I just built MVP and started to find users and beta testers."
Finding Plugin Ideas with Zapier
"I believe Zapier is a good place to go and find those kind of opportunities. If you go to Zapier and you check for example the most common zaps, you will see that pair of two applications - for example QuickBooks and Sheets."
"There's a lot of companies and small businesses using QuickBooks for accounting and they need to move that information to check the invoices, the payment orders and everything and work with that data."
"Doing that in Zapier is kind of messy. You need to create different zaps for updates, for creates, deletes, and everything. So, if you're able to build that in just one piece of software that does everything, you're going to be solving a huge pain point for customers."
Background
"I first studied electronics engineering. College made me literally hate electronics. So I said, 'Okay, I need to learn by myself.' I chose JavaScript because in JavaScript you can build mobile apps, web apps and everything."
"I did freelancing for 8 years. It's kind of hard. You have an entrepreneur spirit. You want to make the decisions and sometimes you're not in charge."
"I was kind of tired of that kind of work. I wanted to create my own schedule for the day, just be able to build things, be with a computer, and solve problems."
"It was during COVID that I decided to take that step. I quit everything. No more clients, no more anything. And just decided to build my own thing."
Building the MVP
"The add-on is built using Apps Script. Apps Script is a language from Google services that allows you to extend Google Docs, Sheets, Slides and all Google services."
"It took me two weeks. No AI, just Stack Overflow, Google and searching for everything there."
"First, I need to be able to transfer the information from one place to the other. No formatting, no anything. I just wanted the data to be there in Sheets."
"Then I started to think about the user experience and what users could want the data to look like. I realized they could want the data to look similar to how it looks in Notion. So that's when I added conditional formatting, data validation for selects, for dropdowns and everything."
Growth Strategy
Marketplace Distribution
"The first source of installs was of course the marketplace. That was super important."
SEO
"I realized I needed to do SEO stuff. I started to think about what kind of blog posts I could write that users can find interesting and related to Notion and Google Sheets. That's right now one of our main traffic channels."
Reddit Tracking
"I use Reddit a lot. I have a service called F5 bot that is free that lets you track different keywords on Reddit. I set up some keyword tracking related to CSV, Sheets in that subreddit and every time I get an email with a notification that a new post or comment was added, I just go there and reply."
"Of course you need to try to be not spammy and really give value to the users and if your product can be a solution for their problems, then you recommend your product. You say you are the founder."
Product Hunt & Hacker News
"I also did a launch on Product Hunt a year and a half after launching the product for the first time. That's also was a really nice source of traffic, not paying customers, but yes, traffic and visibility."
"I also posted on Hacker News. I got to the front page. The spike you get in traffic is amazing. But again, it doesn't translate into paying customers. It's just visibility, backlinks that improve domain rating."
Business Numbers
- •$9K MRR
- •70K+ users
- •450+ paying customers
- •5K visitors/month
- •~$120K lifetime revenue
- •90% profit margins
Tech Stack
- •Apps Script (Google's language)
- •VS Code (editor)
- •Google Cloud and Firebase (infrastructure)
- •SendGrid (emails)
- •Mixpanel (analytics)
- •Paddle (payments - Stripe not available in Argentina)
- •Tidio (customer support chat)
Key Lessons
"It was crazy to realize how small changes affect the business. Moving a button, changing a text or just moving things around in the UI can have such a profound impact."
Removing the Free Plan
"At the beginning, we had a free plan. I realized that a lot of users were just using the free plan and that was enough for them. They didn't need to pay."
"I made a decision to remove the free plan. It was risky. There were a lot of people angry about that. But basically in that moment we went from $5K to $8K in a few months. Just a small decision that makes a huge difference to the business."
Advice for Beginners
"It's super important to at least find your first user that is willing to pay for your application. What happened to me with some other products is that you build it for free first, you have a lot of usage and as soon as you start charging, then they don't use the application anymore."
"Charging from the beginning, I think, is super important. Do not waste time building something that no one is going to be willing to pay for."
Resources
- •Sync to Sheets: Google Workspace Marketplace
- •Follow Leandro on Twitter