Feedback is Lifeblood for Fina
Building a brand-new product from scratch is hard — especially when you’re unsure if there’s market fit.
The harsh reality? Most of the time, people simply don’t care.
Leap of Faith
Today’s world is flooded with products. In tech, creating something new isn’t as hard as it once was — thanks to no-code tools and AI, it’s easier than ever to spin up a prototype and test an idea quickly.
But a prototype isn’t a real product. Idea validation can sometimes give you a clear yes or no — but more often, it gives you something murky: “maybe.”
So what do you do when the answer isn’t clear?
This is where building a product requires a leap of faith. You have to believe in your vision enough to commit — fully — without knowing how it will all unfold. You’re investing months, sometimes years, into shaping something that doesn’t fully exist yet, based only on conviction.
And that journey can take 8–12 months, 2–3 years, or even longer.
Will you regret if all ends up as a baby nobody loves?
Our Product Is Like a Baby — But Not Quite
As a founder, few things are more joyful than hearing people share feedback about our product.
People often say, “Your product is like your baby.” I see the similarities — and the differences.
Like raising a child, we pour our days and nights into building and nurturing our product, watching it grow from something fragile into something that can stand, walk, and eventually run.
So on the relationship side, it is pretty similar.
Talking about feedback, it is hard to accept criticism to our baby, we tends to believe he is perfect even though we know it is not true.
But unlike with a baby, we welcome all kinds of feedback on our product — even the tough ones. While negative feedback can sting, it often sparks new ideas and helps us improve, as long as it’s constructive.
See the key difference? We can modify and evolve our product in response to feedback. Our baby, on the other hand, he can grow by itself.
Where to Play
Choosing where to play is like picking a spot to dig for gold — you won’t find diamonds in a field of sand.
The other day, I replied to a fellow founder in the personal finance space with this reflection: “Personal finance is a tough category — low price point, low willingness to pay, fragile due to reliance on data aggregators, and high user churn because switching is easy.”
I actually really meant it with my own experience on Fina for the last 2 years in building and growing it:
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Low Price Point: consumer product is mostly free, having consumers pay for a service for $10/month is already a high bar. That’s why a consumer product needs a massive scale to be successful.
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Low Pay Intention: unlike business world, consumers are used to free service and product. It is actually rare for most individuals to pay for a service if they do not see instant value to them.
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Fragile Quality: this is the nature of personal finance domain, with open banking is still evolving, nothing is solid enough for the ideal readability it should have. Everything seems loosely contracted.
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High User Churn: most products look like the same, some has a better user interface than another, or a few more functions. Users can easily tell you “I found an alternative” at any moment, and simply just left.
So, from business stand point, isn’t this a disaster to stick with?
It is not completely hopeless, personal finance has its positive sides that attract many founders to try —
“Every Person Cares About Money”
It sounds like there is a massive market there, so the question comes down to a few questions you have to ask if you are founder:
- Uniqueness: Are you building a unique product that can differentiate from the rest?
- Value: Does it bring users instant value?
- Scale: Does your product have potential to dominate the market?
Do not jump to build another personal finance product if you do not have good answers to these questions that convince yourself.
Fina Money
I went through the analysis before starting Fina Money, here are my answers:
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Uniqueness Fina is the only modular finance tracker, it’s super unique as a combination of simplicity and versatility. People can easily resonate the difference when referred as “Notion for Finance”.
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Value Fina deliver instant value through personalized experience that ensure every user get what they want from their finance data. Through templates and AI, Fina helps its users on top of their finances.
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Scale Fina relies on its flexibility power to empower people to share and communicate through templates, documents and community. I believe this is the way make it work for everyone regardless where they from.
That’s why I started Fina Money — with the leap of faith.
If you are a founder ready to start something new, I hope the sharing my thought/analysis process helps you gain more confidence in your adventure.
User Feedback
User feedback is like daily nourishment — it fuels the founder’s journey in building a product.
When that feedback stops, it’s like running on empty — a dangerous place to be.
This past week, I received two pieces of truly meaningful feedback, and I’d love to share them with you — so you can feel what I felt when I read them.
by Davide Tonietto
To make my feedback even more relevant, I’d like to share a bit of my background. I’m from southern Brazil, a software engineer focused on back-end development, and ever since I was young, I’ve always managed my personal finances with great care and attention to detail.
I can confidently say I’ve tested over 100 financial management tools — from the most well-known to the lesser-known ones, including several open-source solutions.
Many times, I used tools that I liked, but they never fully met all my needs. This led me to keep searching for alternatives, even while using something that partially worked. A recent example was the combination of Ledger CLI with Paisa, an open-source interface that offered some flexibility. Still, I felt that something was missing.
Then I discovered Fina. And I can say, with confidence, that it’s the best financial management tool I’ve ever used — by far. I know you’re still at the beginning of your journey, but what you’ve built so far is impressive.
What I love most about Fina is the combination of simplicity and versatility — bringing together the ease of spreadsheets with the power and flexibility of dashboards that are accessible to anyone.
I’ve always kept my financial history in spreadsheets, so the natural integration that Fina provides is what made me adopt it as my definitive tool.
Since then, I haven’t felt the need to look for any other solution. It was the first time I truly felt like I had found the perfect fit.
Today, I have an incredibly detailed view of my spending and a clear understanding of where my money goes. As a power user and enthusiast of this topic, I can confidently say that Fina has a brilliant future ahead.
Congratulations on the excellent work — and keep evolving this amazing product.
by Amina Moreau
I was looking for a Mint replacement and found Fina through an app comparison spreadsheet on Reddit that someone made.
I initially signed up for a Monarch Money trial. Once I discovered that they didn’t convert CAD values to USD equivalent, I canceled my subscription immediately.
How is one supposed to do any sort of budgeting or tracking when some accounts are 30% off? Seems so basic.
Anyway, I tried Fina and you got my business because you have this. Then I discovered how modular it is (I use and love Notion) and was hooked.
Admittedly, my first instinct was to feel a bit intimidated that I wouldn’t have the time/energy for the learning curve but it was quite simple to grasp.
Thanks for reading, have a great one!
This post is also published on Medium.