I'd like to grow it. A similar startup, Toucan, built a simpler tool (single word, contextless translations) that gained traction and was acquired by Babbel. I'm not quite sure what they did that I'm missing.

I've run Reddit post ads. They get positive comments and feedback and lots of people trying the free trial, but very few convert, unlike the people from HN. I wasted my product hunt launch, which did well, because there wasn't a trial at the time.

Now I have a product with a small group of very positive power users, but I don't really see a path to growing it. I'm quite close to just putting it on the backburner and working on something else, but it seems a shame because there is a group of people - tech savvy language learners - who really like it, but I have no way of reaching them.

I'm 19, so I'm not in a position to spend much money without knowing that it has good returns. I've already wasted quite a lot of money on ads.

I'd really appreciate advice!