Ask HN: Review my startup, LitLift.com

25 points by dottertrotter 15 years ago | 18 comments

A few weeks ago I launched my side project; a novel writing application I call http://LitLift.com

So far over 370 users have registered to use the software, most of which are participating in NaNoWrimo. The response has been incredibly positive. The enjoy the simple user interface and the ability to create their ideas in any particular order.

Already I have managed to make the site profitable through a pair of partnerships that will be kicking off soon.

I know the design needs work, but I'm a programmer.

Any feedback on usability, interface and site structure are more than welcome.

Thanks.

yesimahuman 15 years ago |

Initial login impressions:

First of all, log me in right away when I sign up. I was confused that I just got redirected back and didn't notice the green text telling me it worked.

I like that you don't ask me too much information. However, I personally prefer to use my email to log in. That has the added benefit of you only having to ask me two things at signup time: my email, and a password (no password confirm). If I forget my password, I just reset it later with my email.

I would definitely highlight that litlift.com is a tool to help you write a book, but not where you actually go to write a book. I was confused for a bit what the "description" was under my new book, I thought that's where you expected me to type my novel (in hindsight, this was dumb of me).

It's very cool though. I think if I were to write a novel, this type of approach would fit my engineering brain better.

andrewljohnson 15 years ago |

You know, I've always wanted to write a book, and I have dozens of pages of writing for different stories. So, when I saw your post on HN, I was stoked. Unfortunately, you did it all wrong. I say this in hopes that you will redo it, because I want your product.

Here's the problem - your software is supposed to help me write a novel, but it actually just hinders me. Your text editor functionality is non-existent, you have no integration with my usual tools, and your website doesn't suggest to me how to actually get a novel written.

So, go back and revisit your idea. If you are trying to help me write a novel, it's not going to be by providing some archaic text boxes on the internet.

Here's some things that would help me write a novel:

* give me points or prestige for finishing parts - gamify it

* help me to get feedback on my writing - socialize it

* provide me with tools that I can use - integrate with Word or Google Docs - I'm not typing into your system

I'm not sure you really understand how a novel is written. Have you used your system to write one?

idiotb 15 years ago |

http://jasonlbaptiste.com/startups/how-to-succeed-like-apple... hey you can go through this article, I personally use it as my management guideline.

aik 15 years ago | |

Cool thanks for sharing. The one that sticks out for me and the one that's so easy to get wrong is the comment on benefits before features:

> Apple puts benefits before features and technical specs. They emphasize the benefit of a technology. Battery life in terms of work hours, storage in terms of music hours/total photos, etc. Talk to your customers in terms of benefits. Things like security, the ability to hold more stuff, work longer, and work faster are things they understand. GHZ, MPs, GBs, and 48X are just confusing.

idiotb 15 years ago | | |

Great! it helped you... You can also go through his other Articles they are very helpful.

Dysiode 15 years ago |

Fantastic! I actually made something with the same exact intent (except that it was more geared toward sharing your ideas with friends) but not being a writer myself it never really made it that far usability wise (although, it did have a name generator ;).

I watched the screencast and it looks actually useful! However, navigation looked a little clumsy, and having signed up and played around some, that's proven to be true. For example, in the chapter list there's no direct way to get back to the book except via the book menu. Also in navigation: having to click "Show" is unintuitive to me. I naturally want to click anywhere in the row.

As for features: I wish it were possible to interlink the various bits of the book together with each other. For example, going back to your screencast, being able to go beyond just saying "This is Sherlock's house." and linking Sherlock and the setting together. Perhaps more useful would be tying everything together in chapters (Sherlock and Watson and Arbitrary Character do something at Sherlock's house in chapter 3!).

Those are my main thoughts. I'll have my 5 users check it out and see what they have to say about it since they've actually used my site fairly extensively (over 200 characters amongst them). They're used to everything being public (I know how terrible that is, but they like reading each other's stuff), but they should still have some decent feedback :)

jeromec 15 years ago |

Very nice. This combines two of my interests, book writing and tech startups. :)

First impressions: the homepage looks good, nice and neat, but doesn't communicate "what's in it for me" to the user easy/fast enough. You have a great video demo, but I didn't even notice it was there until after I read comments here. Just do a screen capture of the page with the video, crop the video image, and stick that on the home page as a link to the video. Pictures are so much more engaging for visitors than just text.

Next, the FAQ and video demo, etc. should exist on the same site design as the homepage. I can understand this is an early release, and the crowd here at HN is familiar with Posterous, but anyone from the outside would think "huh?" when jumping to a different looking page. It doesn't look as professional.

The actual product looks very cool, simple and effective, as it should be. I especially like the character name generator. :) I think the site should also be clear about how the author's work is safe. As a dabbling author I will certainly bookmark this site! A feature request would be to see an overview of everything created -- characters, scenes, etc. -- on the same page to provide a good mental outline of the book for the author.

mr_b 15 years ago |

Click-able: http://LitLift.com

justlearning 15 years ago |

haven't logged in. few things that didn't make me login: no screenshots/preview. Although there is a demo video, I won't be able to watch this at work.

No Privacy policy listed - how safe is my data? how secure is my data?

Also, you could connect using facebook and twitter, but you have your blog link just beside - confusing me that you could connect thru posterous (send emails?)

ps: could you tell us what stack/framework are you using? Is it on a VPS or shared host?

dottertrotter 15 years ago | |

I built it RoR on the heroku system.

As for the privacy policy, I've been meaning to put that together. On the site, nothing is shared. Your information is entirely private.

Understandable about the posterous link. It's just a link to my blog.

Thanks for the feedback.

bryanh 15 years ago |

Rather impressive, and congrats on the partnerships!

I would really try to showcase the features through a user narrative (this is a novel writing app after all!) and lots of screenshots of novels in progress with the app.

Also, photos of the people in the testimonials lend credibility. Faces sell after all...

Naomi 15 years ago |

I signed up and I love it. It seems to be geared towards fiction though. Is there a way to use it to help organize ideological themes and subtopics, so you could switch them around and put them in different orders? Maybe a place to set down main ideas so they could be elaborated on at a later time?

dottertrotter 15 years ago | |

for the main ideas, I just use a new book. As for subtopics and switching them around, I would use the chapters section, which is completely sortable.

devmonk 15 years ago |

Good idea! If it helps, I liked this site- maybe it might give you some ideas for things you could add:

http://www.peacecorpswriters.org/pages/depts/resources/resou...

andrewljohnson 15 years ago |

Clickable: http://www.LitLift.com

pratikjhaveri 15 years ago |

Good idea and could be really useful to the folks that Amazon is trying to recruit to write their new "Kindle Singles" product. Perhaps you should approach them and offer the tool to folks that sign up with them.

lfx 15 years ago |

Hi, is any possibility to export book? O do I need to copy/paste all chapters?

Maybe in the future you are planing to let users to publish them work on line?

P.S. I watched video, but did not create account.

araneae 15 years ago |

Meh, the design is fine to me. But then, I am also design-challenged.

So far... I love it! This might actually tempt me to try to write a book.