DraftStocks
A weekly stock-picking game
Introduction
Over the past few months, I built and tested an app, Draftstocks, that lets you pick stocks and compete against others for the chance to win $25.
Signup here: Link
This new app offers users an exciting and competitive way for individuals to pick stocks and see how their selections compare against others. It was created to allow users to compete in weekly contests against friends and other users to determine who has the best stock picks for the week. Users pick three stocks from a provided list and submit their choices before the deadline, with daily results posted and the contest ending on Friday.
The app was built out of a love for building things, a desire to create a platform for picking stocks and competing against others, and a platform to experiment on, with one example being testing different ad marketplaces.
Overview of the Game
Draftstocks is a weekly contest where you can compete against friends and others to see who can choose the best stocks. Think about it like Fantasy Football…
Here's how you play:
Pick three stocks from the list of stocks provided.
Submit your picks before the deadline, Sunday at 11:00 PM EST.
Results will be posted daily by 8:00 PM EST.
The contest ends on Friday at 4:00 PM EST.
At the end of each week, the winner will receive $25!
Why was it built?
The short answer is: I like building things. I also liked playing DraftKings, and wanted to create a similar platform for picking stocks and competing against others since I thought it could make for a fun little game.
Beyond that, it has also allowed me to experiment with different tools and technologies that I hadn't had a chance to use before. This included working with tools like Sendgrid, Google Auth, Ad campaigns, and much more.
Past Couple Months
Over the past couple of months, I’ve worked to make the platform a little prettier – still not great but have a look at the before and after – objectively better.
Before
After
Also, these past couple contests have made me realize how much I’ve loved participating in the competition myself. I even won the latest weeks competition! However, winning came with a bit of unexpected blowback, as friends and fellow players accused me of rigging the contest. Shouts of “Fraud” came quickly Friday night when the competition completed. Of course, this was not the case - just a testament to the game’s competitive nature.
Another fun surprise during this time was the text message trash talk that has occurred between players. While this has been an entertaining way to keep the competition lively, it would be awesome to integrate this type of banter directly onto the site. Stay tuned for more updates on this front!
Current Limitations and Future Development
Probably the biggest limiting factor is my time! Another is the number of stocks available on the platform, which is currently limited to 200 due to the cost of the API used to gather stock data. Additionally, updates to the platform are currently only pushed through at 7:30 PM due to API limitations that allow for only 5 requests per minute.
Over time I’d love to get live pricing up and running on the platform so that the contest can update during the day and results sent out at market close. This will allow players to more accurately track their progress and more quickly talk trash.
Other ideas:
A "trash talk board" per contest, which would allow players to engage in friendly banter and keep the competition lively.
Custom contests to allow more picks, longer duration and invite only contests
More ways for users to build portfolios based on a theme or factor.
There are many other potential developments in the pipeline!
Future Posts and Fun Asides: Ads
One area of interest for me has always been the ad market and how it works. Recently, I attempted to launch ad campaigns on both Reddit and Twitter, but were unfortunately rejected by both platforms. I am going to be honest, the crypto spam feel might’ve been the reason for the rejection, but I will let you be the judge.
Currently working on a new, less aggressive, fewer emoji filled ad to resolve this!
Despite these setbacks, it was still interesting to use the tools of launching the campaigns to be and it reaffirmed how complex and competitive the ad market can be. For example, at a cost of $75 a day, Reddit estimates the ad would only receive between 30-70 clicks through to the site - not even signups! This highlights how much user acquisition costs are and why keeping users is critical.
Even though the ad campaign is not currently going smoothly, the experimentation alone is worth it. These types of experiments are part of what makes building Draftstocks so fun.
In future posts, I want to share more about their experiences and lessons learned in building and running a platform like this and how much even the simplest apps can costs (e.g., ~$40 a month on AWS right now).
Conclusions
I hope you've enjoyed learning more about DraftStocks. It’s been a lot of fun to build. Feel free to signup and join the latest contest as the app evolves.
And subscribe to the blog!