SPECIAL EPISODE: Why Products Grow (Part 2)

I hosted part two of our growth panel with Aaron Edwards of DocsBot and Derek Ashauer of Conversion Bridge and Sunshine Photo Cart. We stayed grounded in themes from our Product Growth Survey.

A line we kept coming back to is demand. Getting traffic alone does not get you there. Aaron talked industry pages and high-intent searches. Derek talked writing for niche problems fewer people have, then showing up on social and Reddit so the work is not a lonely SEO article.

What is getting harder

Classic search and wp.org referrals are less of a free ride than they used to be. Aaron's churn review had a sharp number: mentions of customers building their own alternative, often with AI or vibe coding, jumped from about 1.6% to about 13% of churn reasons, even while overall churn improved. Derek noted that small utility plugins are the easiest things for people to recreate.

Where we land

Growth here looks like demand creation and product depth. Waiting for directory traffic to return is a thin plan.