Is a store listing enough to launch a product?

No. A store is a shelf: a very large one with good lighting, which puts your product in front of people searching for something with a similar name. It won't walk a single person over to it and explain why it's good, and it won't tell you who those people were.

The recipe extension

I built a browser extension that saved recipes from any cooking site, stripped out the life story above the ingredients, and let you tag them. It took 3 weeks. My plan for getting it to people was the store: a good listing with the right words would bring people in on its own.

Installs started within a week. Every one felt like a small miracle. Then I read which searches had found the listing. Most were for something else: a recipe site's own app, a meal planner, a printer-friendly view. People arrived because my listing contained a word they'd typed, tried it, and left.

In 5 months the only evidence of a real customer was one 3-star review that said "does what it says".

Findable isn't found

I mistook being findable for being found. They're different jobs. The store did the first. The second was mine, and I skipped it, because it involved talking to people and the store didn't.

My sister cooks more than I do. So does a man I played 5-a-side with for years, who sends me photographs of his bread. Either would have tried it, told me what was wrong with it and told 5 other people. I never asked them.

Use the shelf, but don't stop there

Put it in the store, because a shelf is free. But treat the store as the place where people who already know your name find the thing, never as the way they learn your name. Before launch, send it yourself to 10 people who have the problem, with one question.

Nobody Bought It has the extension's autopsy. The rules page has the rule it left.