In your next launch, you can highlight up to 3 products that were indispensable in building your product, along with a note explaining why you love them. They'll also be notified that you gave them a Shoutout, in case they'd like to support your launch.
I love the special moment when I discover a new product that makes me feel like, WOW, this was built just for me. You know it when it happens because it makes your work and/or life exponentially more enjoyable — and it’s even more delightful when they continue to solve new problems that you didn’t even realize you had!
I often show my love and obsession for these products by doing things like sending fanmail full of emojis and gratitude, volunteering my time as a beta tester, sharing lots of live feedback etc. (Maybe some of this sounds familiar to others as well. <3)
Sometimes, a shoutout on social media, especially for those without a huge reach, can feel like such a fleeting moment that can be easily forgotten, overlooked or lost in a sea of competing posts for virality.
This is why I am pumped for Shoutouts to be our first segue into creating a space on Product Hunt for makers to publicly share this love (and healthy obsession!) with products in a way that is meaningful, will persist and create more value over time for both the products giving and receiving the shoutout.
Try it out, support your fave products and makers and share your feedback with us! We’re just getting started and look forward to exploring how Shoutouts can continue to help us create the kind, uplifting community Product Hunt is known for.
Love for lovely software.
As I sit here and think back to my early engineering days, tools of the time float across my mind. JQuery. Pre-es6 javascript (when I actually had to understand prototypical inheritance). Early versions of Node.js (when JavaScript on the server seemed laughable).
I then jolt back to reality. I gaze deeply and lovingly at my VS Code editor with so many nifty extensions, such wonderful linters, and the always-willing-to-help copilot. I look around at the TypeScript types saving me from a myriad of runtime errors in production.
As programmers, our function today is not so different than 15 years ago (we haven’t been replaced by AI just yet). But our tools do feel different. Shoutouts are a way for us to show off the tools that turned a day-long task into one hour, allowed us to build, scale, and grow our businesses in a way we could never imagine, or simply made us smile.
Think of Shoutouts as a way to show love for lovely software. Or as a way to pay it forward. And surely somebody will crack a smile when they use your product and a Shoutout will come your way.
There’s something magical that happens around product market fit. When a product has won the battle over incumbents by being 10x better, but is still far from the scale where platform decay starts to take hold. Products like Arc, Linear, Vercel - they inspire *love*.
And yet there isn’t currently a way to show real love on Product Hunt. An upvote is an upvote like any other. A comment can spark a conversation, but it’s still one comment in a sea of many.
This is one reason why, on a philosophical level, I’m intrigued by the idea of Shoutouts. They're a scarce resource (only 3 per launch), and so they can highlight the love and gratitude that early stage builders feel towards the tools that have made their life better, and their work better.
My ask: Be authentic! Shout out the products that you truly loved using to build yours.
We've given early access to a few products to test - and they're launching today! Check out Vapi, Kitemaker, Velt, and Dub.co
I'd love to hear all your thoughts, questions, feedback, and suggestions!
It's amazing to see makers supporting each other like this and it can. I think it would be awesome if you could include a small testimonial from the makers about why they love each tool. It could help others understand why these tools are so great.
Love the concept - I think it will be great for discovering new products over time. Honored that Stashpad Docs played a role in launching Shoutouts
Big congrats team. Looks great. Would be great if you could add premium subscription with verification and private messages 🦄❤️
Great feature!
However, could PH consider providing more support for solo makers?
I have noticed that the top 5 are mostly team products, and there seems to be a lot of vote manipulation.
Really excited to have been a part of building this! The products and tools we use to build are so important so I think it's awesome that we can shine a spotlight on them.
Love this idea and wish we had it for our launch two weeks ago! Perfect feature for the PH community, can't wait to use it.
Super proud of the team for working so fast and passionately to get Shoutouts launched! Like many new features, Shoutouts is an "aha" moment.
No product stands alone. We're all building an ecosystem that we progress with together...
👉 Many of you want to support fellow makers during launch — especially the ones making killer products that made crafting your product possible.
👉Makers behind those products love to see their product in your stack. It helps them continue to share their story.
👉 Users and product enthusiasts like myself always want to see what the best of the best are using.
The PH content team is excited use your Shoutouts to help elevate great product stories so this is just the start!
Hi Rajiv,
The concept of Shoutouts really strikes a chord. It's a thoughtful way to acknowledge the tools that empower creators. I can see how this could build a stronger sense of community and appreciation among makers. It's refreshing to have a feature that encourages genuine recognition rather than just transactional interactions.
I'm curious, have you seen any unique or surprising ways products have been using their Shoutouts? It must be exciting to see this feature come to life with the early access launches!
hey Rajiv. Love the idea as it helps to show the ethos of how each new product is built on the shoulders of other giants. And how interconnected the product world is :)
Two quick suggestions:
1/ the shoutout section def feels too big right now. And instantly can take the user from the current page (before they get a chance to see the full launch info). Can you either make it smaller or move it to the bottom of the page where there are stats and rankings etc?
2/ in the messaging, can you make sure that people don’t insert super broad tools like “Google Chrome” or “AWS” so it defeats the shoutout purpose (because practically any new app is built w those)
