Turning Curiosity into Revenue

How I accidentally stumbled upon the idea for SOAPNoteAI

Last week, SOAPNoteAI surpassed $4,000 in revenue, attracting over 1,500 users and saving them thousands of minutes in the process. It was not long ago that I earned my first dollar online. So, how did I reach this point?

The Idea

Back in May, I found myself enthusiastically discussing GPT-4 with everyone, including my wife, who is a Physical Therapist running her own clinic. She had already been utilizing ChatGPT for tasks like drafting emails and creating business-related letters. However, she was struggling to keep up with completing her patient visit notes. One day, she experimented with ChatGPT to generate specific SOAP Note template for her documentation. SOAP stands for Subjective, Objective, Assessment and Plan and a SOAP Note is a structured method for documenting a patient's visit for records and insurance purposes. To her amazement, ChatGPT produced a useful SOAP Note example. But there were limitations – for instance, she couldn’t consistently get ChatGPT to create a specific format each time, and editing the output to her needs was a cumbersome process. When she shared these challenges with me, I saw an opportunity for a solution. I suggested developing an app tailored to her needs, simplifying the generation of progress note templates. This was the genesis of SOAPNoteAI.com.

Bringing Idea to Life

Although we had a great idea, we were uncertain if it would appeal to a broader audience of Physical Therapists. We weren’t sure if there was a significant market for such a solution. However, I knew I had at least one customer - my wife. In the spirit of placing a ‘'small bet’' (i.e. executing in a constrained environment), I set a goal to develop a minimal viable product (MVP) with just the essential features, allocating two weeks for this task. SOAPNoteAI was a departure from my previous projects, as it required user authentication and an interactive user interface. This complexity extended the development time to four weeks instead of the planned two, during which I constantly sought and incorporated feedback from my wife.

The Launch

Upon making SOAPNoteAI publicly available, we tapped into my wife's professional network, inviting physical therapists to try out the app. The responses we received were varied. While some therapists found it appealing, they were unable to use it since they were mandated to use their hospital's or clinic’s specific software systems. Others expressed reservations about integrating AI into their professional routines. In summary, the launch was somewhat underwhelming, and we did not have any paid customers for the next 3 weeks.

Reaching Out and First Customer

Although we initially relied on our immediate network for feedback on the app, we hadn’t conducted any specific outreach or market research to gauge demand for our solution. During my research on Reddit, I discovered numerous discussions (e.g. r/physicaltherapy) about the use of AI in documentation, mirroring my wife's experiments with ChatGPT. I actively participated in these discussions and seized the opportunity to invite participants to try SOAPNoteAI for free. It was through these engaging conversations on Reddit that SOAPNoteAI attracted its first paying customer. In fact, the Reddit recap feature had this to say about my Reddit activity in 2023.

Growth

Following our initial traction from Reddit users, SOAPNoteAI's growth was primarily driven by organic traffic from Google. Effective search engine optimization (SEO) strategies propelled our website to rank highly for specific keywords such as “AI SOAP notes” and “SOAP note AI”. This visibility has led to over 1,500 registered users trying out SOAPNoteAI. In response to growing demand, we expanded our features to support the generation of templates for a variety of fields including Occupational Therapy, Speech-Language Pathology, Chiropractic, Mental Health Counseling, Nursing, Podiatry, Veterinary Medicine, Massage Therapy, and Acupuncture.

Learnings

Here are some key insights from our journey with SOAPNoteAI:

1. Be Open to Unexpected Ideas: Often, great ideas can emerge spontaneously - we just need to be receptive and willing to experiment. In our case, had my wife not experimented with ChatGPT, the concept of SOAPNoteAI might never have materialized.

2. Time-Bound Your Initial Product Development: Given that we hadn't validated the market demand for our solution, it was crucial to limit the amount of time and resources invested in building the initial version. This approach helps in managing risks and keeping potential downsides in check.

3. Persistence Beyond a Modest Launch: A lackluster launch doesn't spell the end. Growth often occurs over time as you refine your product based on user feedback. Remember, if you hit the ball out of the park on Day 1, you were late in launching your product.

What’s Next?

My focus will remain on enhancing SOAPNoteAI, continuously striving to offer an improved experience for our customers. Several immediate improvements are already in sight. For instance, I plan to introduce a system to capture customer feedback directly within the app, providing valuable insights for further development. Additionally, I aim to launch an email marketing campaign targeting users who might not be aware of SOAPNoteAI's latest features and capabilities. Overall, I will keep experimenting and let my curiosity guide me.

Thank you Chris Wong, Louie Bacaj and Rahul Prabhakar for the feedback and for motivating me to overcome procrastination and publish this.

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Kunal