Rebranding!

[rnystrom]

In case you haven't looked into it, the app name "Freetime" ranks really poorly on the App Store. So bad, that if you just search the word "freetime", this app wont show up on the list before your fingers get tired from scrolling down...

I wanted to try and update my keywords to improve ranking, but my keywords:

github, open, source, notification, manager, git, pull, request, issue

were basically useless.

Seriously, who is going to search "pull request"?

One of the core principles about marketing an app is that you have a unique and meaningful name. The name "freetime" is absolutely garbage, even if I have an attachment to it.

Do open source in your "free time". Get it?

So I went back to the drawing board and did a lot of brainstorming, trying to find a name that would:

• Convey something about the app's focus
• Be playful
• Unique (almost no apps that show up when searching just the name)
• Have an available .com domain
  • Appending "app" or "-app" (see freetime-app.com) is ok
• Have an available twitter handle
  • Only appending "app" is ok for me

For a few nights I mulled over some options...

I used a few techniques to mine inspiration:

• Scanned the GitHub topic on ProductHunt and just took notes on unique names or keywords
• Searched the App Store for things like "GitHub", "Mail", "Inbox", "Notify" and collected some unique words
• Even searched Dribbble for the same words

I came up with a few leads that I liked:

• "Tree", "branch" and "twig" (playing on git branch)
• Something + "Box" since this is basically a mail/inbox-style app

You have no idea how disappointed I was after finding there are no App Store results for "gitbox" to discover that Gitbox is a successful Mac app... 😭

I also started circling the concept of "chirp" (derived from "notify"). That lead me to birds. What about "Git"+bird-something? I explored this a little and landed on this trifecta:

• There are 0 results when searching "githawk" on the App Store. ✔️ uniqueness
• The Twitter handle @githawk is available. Nabbed.
• The fucking domain githawk.com is available for only $10/y!! 😱

So without further adieu, Freetime will now be called GitHawk! 🎉

I'll need to figure out what to do with the repo name. The Xcode project is going to keep the name Freetime in-memoriam.

---

Issues will have to do until I get a blog setup. Jekyll + GH pages?

[BasThomas]

What about a hawk-insprired App Icon?!

[rnystrom]

@BasThomas way ahead of ya! Should have something that sticks this weekend.

[Iron-Ham]

Page 2, center left is 🔥

[weyert]

Which brand of notebook is that? I am getting the feeling it's not Moleskine as I always thought their dots are bigger but it might be seeing things. I would say it would be a Leuchtturm1917 but probably not :)

[rnystrom]

@weyert yup! Leuchttturm1917. I've used these notebooks for years, I love them.

[MosheBerman]

The "hawk & git-branch" icon is amazing. (The one next to it looks great too, and reminds me of the golden snitch from Harry Potter.)

[rnystrom]

Ahhh, ok I'm leaning hard on that one. Going to start whipping it together this weekend, hopefully submit something.

Closing this out since we have a blog now!

http://blog.githawk.com/2017/08/16/Rebranding.html

Btw, I strongly encourage others to write stuff if they want, doesn't just have to be my voice. Could be anything:

• IGListKit + swift
• "Building in the open" ideology
• Best practices
• GitHub API/graphql
• Dependencies (apollo gql is cool)

Just write and submit a PR ✍️

This app is the community's!

[MosheBerman]

I took a stab at modifying the icon PSD, using this noun. I added to the original PSD and can open a PR if you'd like. (GH won't let me attach the psd here.)

[rnystrom]

That's awesome!!