🚀 3 Tools To Scale and Grow Your Side Projects
Tags: webdev, tooling, sql, sideprojects
Published: 2020-11-05 00:42:10

My favorite part about side projects comes after the initial build is complete and I can focus on scaling. At this point, it's valuable to consider tools that can help you focus on the main goal: Talking to and acquiring users in a data-driven manner. I've been through this process a few times now and wanted to take a minute to share my go-to tools:

### 🛠 [Arctype](http://arctype.com/)

Arctype is an easy to use SQL client. It looks and feels like a modern spreadsheet, making it one of the most user-friendly SQL clients on the market. Some of my favorite features overall includes:

- **Managing queries:** I use it to query specific segments of users and have most of my queries for these segments saved. That way, I don't have to re-write long queries every time I wish to investigate my data.
- **Collaboration:** Arctype is designed to be a better alternative for teams. You can give team members different levels of access, share queries, and dashboards. 
- **Creating super simple dashboards (see below):** I love tracking metrics from day 0 on my side projects. Understanding total users, increase, churn and more is super helpful. Arctype lets you build these dashboard easily through SQL queries.
![ezgif-3-a939f4dbebc4 (1)](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/i/xdemettdpkgszuwhwrkw.gif)
- Best part? It's free!


### 📈 [Waitlist](http://getwaitlist.com/)
Waitlist is a tool to increase sign-ups via gamified referrals. With their [no-code integrations](https://gist.github.com/Ryan-Ouyang/3727a28efe47c0a984b8de111aadffe4), it takes less than 5 minutes to set up a waitlist on your webpage. I specifically use it for:

- **User research:** If users are willing to share your product with other users, that's already a positive sign. Reaching out to these users to understand their expectations and use cases can provide valuable information.
- **Rewards:** During its earliest days, Dropbox grew through its referral program. The vast majority of Dropbox users had free accounts with limited storage space. However, every user was given more free space for any additional users they sign up. Specifying rewards for users for successful referrals can further boost your growth.
- **Demand:** An important tool for marketing your product is showing excitement and traction. If you can begin markeitng your product and its demand already before launch, you can set yourself up for an incredible launch day.
![Screen Shot 2020-11-03 at 14.41.26](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/i/zqsvgfnh10drrsae2qwe.png)
_Full disclosure: I'm working on this product, so feel free to lmk if you have any questions!_ :)

### 🔍 [Sentry](https://sentry.io/)
Sentry is a monitoring platform that helps with discovering, triaging and prioritizing errors in real time. I didn't use Sentry until recently and previously relied on checking logs inside my EC2 instance (I know, super cumbersome). Sentry was a total gamechanger and here are my reasons why:

- **Stack traces:** A stack track shows the stack of functions at the time an uncaught exception is thrown. That way, you can trace your error, with return values and data throughout the process.

![Untitled](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/i/5oshjzfy1t35f5ma897e.png) 

- **Showcasing specific events:** With Sentry, you can investigate specific events and the logs associated with them.
- **Collaboration:** I no longer send screenshots, explanations and snippets of errors to collaborators, but rather send a link or assign errors accordingly.

![Untitled (1)](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/i/rvqssjbxtu4xhiojttp0.png)
 


Please let me know if you have any questions about these tools (I'm, naturally, an active and satsfied user of them all). Happy to help in any way I can 🤓