Indie iOS stack
Pre-launch & waitlist app stack
The build-demand-first stack for the weeks before your iOS app hits the App Store.
Before an app exists, the work is demand and positioning: a landing page that converts, an audience you can email on launch day, keyword research that decides what you build metadata around, and store assets that earn the tap. This stack is about arriving on launch day with an audience instead of hoping for one.
It is intentionally light and cheap, because the pre-launch phase should not carry a SaaS bill. You graduate to a runtime stack — subscriptions, backend, analytics — the moment the app ships.
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The stack
What we’d run, and why
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Framer
Framer gets a polished, fast landing page and waitlist form live in an afternoon, with no CMS to maintain while the product is still moving.
Alternatives
beehiiv
beehiiv captures signups and keeps your launch audience warm with updates, on a free tier that is plenty before you have a product to sell.
Alternatives
Appfigures
Appfigures shows the keywords and competitors in your category early, so you can shape the product and its metadata around real search demand.
Screenshots Pro
Screenshots Pro turns your designs into App Store-ready screenshot sets, which are the single biggest lever on store conversion before anyone reads a word.
Alternatives
TelemetryDeck
Drop TelemetryDeck into your TestFlight build so you have baseline usage signals from day one of launch, with no consent banner to slow onboarding.
Alternatives
Compatibility notes
How these tools fit together
Feed Appfigures keyword research into your Framer copy
Use the terms Appfigures surfaces as the headline and subtitle language on your Framer page, so the same keywords you target in App Store metadata also earn you organic search and match visitor intent.
Connect the Framer form to beehiiv
Wire your Framer waitlist form straight into a beehiiv audience so every signup lands in the list you will email on launch day — no manual CSV shuffling between tools.
Design Screenshots Pro sets around your researched keywords
Let the value props you validated in Appfigures drive the captions in your Screenshots Pro sets, so your store listing tells one coherent story from keyword to screenshot to landing page.
Instrument TestFlight before public launch
Add TelemetryDeck to the TestFlight build so you enter launch day already knowing your baseline activation, rather than flying blind through the most important week.
When to upgrade
Once you ship, move to a runtime stack — the subscription consumer or content-and-community stacks are the usual next step.
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