Most people see the milestones — $1M, $2M, $3M ARR — but rarely the moments when everything nearly fell apart.
This is the Publer story!
It’s not a success story. It’s one of survival, persistence, and the decisions that kept Publer alive when it made no sense to continue.
The Road That Led to Publer
Publer didn’t start with market research, a roadmap, or a fixed vision. I didn’t even know I wanted to write code until I was 19 and took “Introduction to Programming” as an elective while majoring in Advertising (I didn’t know what I wanted to be when I grew up).
After switching majors to Computer Science and falling in love with building software, I started experimenting with Facebook apps, considering how popular Facebook was in the late 2000s.
By the time I graduated from The University of Texas at Austin, I had built two Facebook apps just for fun, one of which was even profitable.
But like many young graduates, I pursued the usual route and started working full-time for Onit, a small startup in Houston at the time, while maintaining my apps on the side.
My brother had just opened a small travel agency and asked me for a tool to schedule his Facebook agency posts.
That’s how Publer (short for Publisher) was born!
The first MVP, built over the Thanksgiving weekend of 2012 using PHP, MySQL, HTML, CSS, and a bit of jQuery, had a simple “Login with Facebook” screen.
And it offered only one thing: scheduling text posts for Facebook, and you couldn’t even see what you had planned. You had to “trust” the system.
But I envisioned it as powerful and fast as a superhero!
Six months after I added a paid plan, the first customer arrived. I barely marketed Publer, but it got traction, probably thanks to my other apps.
I worked on adding new features as soon as I got home from work, including weekends and holidays. I would go to bed at 2-3 AM, sleep for a few hours, and force myself to work through a lot of coffee.
The First Collapse: Health
After two years of that pace, my body broke: heartburn, insomnia, anxiety, and high blood pressure. I had to choose: keep the job and quit the side projects, or risk everything.
I kept the job, quit coffee, Publer, and the other apps. My health improved, but my happiness didn’t, and not because of living without coffee.
I really missed Publer, and being a little superstitious, I started looking for a sign to get back to it.
When I turned 25, a professor‘s birthday wish on LinkedIn, probably semi-automated, reminded me of the spark I had felt in his entrepreneurship class.
That was the sign I’d been waiting for, so I bought a one-way ticket home to Albania.
A few months later, with roughly $60,000 saved, mostly from my apps, I moved back in with my parents to focus on the only idea that truly mattered: Publer!
Hitting Reset in Albania
With time on my side, I gave Publer a proper website and a simple blog.
A little rushed at the time, I built the ambassador program, an affiliate program that ironically remains one of our main organic growth channels to date.
By spying on what my competitors were missing, I developed some of Publer’s most notable features: bulk scheduling, CSV import, auto-scheduling, watermarking, and signatures.
After two years of rebuilding, the Publer dashboard looked much cleaner and more professional.
With hundreds of paying customers, Publer was generating between $2,500 and $3,500 per month, while I barely had any living expenses.
My dad, watching me work from every possible spot, got a good deal on a small office.
The office nudged me to expand and thus hire more developers.
I decided to rewrite Publer from scratch using newer technologies: Ruby on Rails, React, and MongoDB/PostgreSQL. Painful in the short term, but necessary in the long term. My existing code was the pure definition of spaghetti code, unmaintainable.
Despite the planned setback, Publer continued to grow.
And then everything fell apart at once.
The Lowest Point
One day, on my way to lunch, I saw police officers outside my father’s currency exchange store.
A major fraud had taken place – a devastating financial loss.
But life had other plans. After a difficult period, my father was diagnosed with a serious illness.
Around the same time, Cambridge Analytica was exposed, and as a precaution, Facebook began manually re-reviewing all third-party apps. Our group-posting feature was suspended for 6 months, resulting in us losing half of our paying customers while competitors continued operating normally.
Within weeks, I was facing both a personal crisis and a collapsing business.
I didn’t tell the team about what was happening at home or the company’s financial struggles. It was heartbreaking because they had done incredible work. In months, they rebuilt everything I had created over the years.
We launched a modern dashboard, added LinkedIn and Twitter integrations, and kept pushing forward.
But the lost customers never returned, even after Facebook reinstated group posting.
One by one, I lost the entire team and was back to being alone.
Meanwhile, I was doing everything I could to cover my father’s medical expenses and outstanding debts.
I tried raising funds and awareness for Publer through competitions and pitch events, but every single one ended with rejection.
I was close to giving up, seeking comfort from strangers on the internet, and looking for jobs or ways to move back to the U.S.
But then I thought of my father.
Here was a man who had lost nearly everything, yet still found the strength to fight, go to work every day, smile at customers, and enjoy life to the fullest. Even in his hardest moments, he would ask me, “How are you? How’s Publer?”
That’s when I realized I had no reason to complain, so I got back to work, day and night.
No one was going to save Publer but me.
From Technical Founder to Business Builder
This time, I stopped thinking like a technical founder and started acting like a business one.
Marketing-wise:
- I put infrastructure in place to keep users informed with in-app notifications and email
- I offered discounts to customers who left us a review online (note this one down)
- I put my insecurities aside and started building my personal brand, at least on LinkedIn
Product-wise:
- I shipped analytics
- Introduced the first version of workspaces
- Launched post-customization when posting to multiple social networks
- Implemented mentions
- Integrated with Google Business
- Added post-recycling
After every new feature, I got in front of the camera and became “the video guy” on LinkedIn.
Strangers mocked me. Friends teased my accent. But it worked. People were finally noticing!
As soon as I saw growth, I took a €50,000 loan to hire again, even though my family was still deep in debt.
The AppSumo Breakthrough
On my second hiring attempt, thanks to a LinkedIn video that went viral, I finally expanded beyond technical roles and, from that point on, committed to becoming a better leader.
Since 2020, I’ve shared Publer’s finances with the team every month. Good or bad, they deserve to know. We conduct quarterly performance reviews, with raises awarded when deserved. If company-wide goals are met, 20% of quarterly profits are distributed as bonuses.
We also switched from unrealistic yearly roadmaps to quarterly planning. Shorter goals, faster wins.
In February 2020, AppSumo reached out for a partnership!
For context: it’s a marketplace where SaaS startups offer lifetime deals to reach new users
Funny enough, I’d emailed them a year earlier and got ignored. What changed their mind were our Capterra reviews — the same reviews I started incentivizing.
Through AppSumo, we offered our highest-tier plan for a one-time $39 payment (we kept a small percentage). On paper, it looked like a bad deal. In reality, it was our turning point.
We ran the campaign for three months. People fell in love with the product and our support so much that I agreed to another limited lifetime deal for Black Friday the same year.
Combined profit: $250,000!
As I'm about to announce a major milestone for Publer today, here's our turning point and my all-time favorite video from 2020.#publer #appsumo #throwback pic.twitter.com/LYAMLSZFuY
— Ervin Kalemi (@ervinkalemi) October 2, 2023
But the real win was brand awareness. For the first time, people outside our bubble were talking about Publer.
I reinvested everything back into the product, even though I was still in debt and still paying myself the bare minimum.
With the new hires, we gave Publer a brand identity, launched a new website, blog, help center, and a feedback portal to prioritize features.
We redesigned the dashboard, integrated with Instagram, Pinterest, YouTube, WordPress, and Telegram, launched the calendar view, the media library, and a link-in-bio feature.
To make Publer more accessible, we also released browser extensions for Chrome, Firefox, Safari, and Edge, as well as mobile apps for Android and iOS.
With the product stronger, we updated pricing, but only for new customers. Our #1 policy is never to charge existing customers more or give them less than what they signed up for.
I did make one mistake. I diversified too soon.
While Publer was still maturing, I led two full-time devs to build Kibo, a unified inbox as a separate product.
After a year of juggling both, neither Publer nor Kibo was where I wanted to be. I pulled the plug on Kibo and refocused entirely on Publer.
We reached breakeven in August 2021, and by the end of 2022, we were on track to reach $1M in ARR.
Personally, I was finally debt-free and earning a fair salary for the first time in seven years. Business looked bright again.
And then …
The Elon Musk X API Saga
Elon Musk bought Twitter and rebranded it to X, but that’s just the tip of the iceberg.
In April 2023, we were told we’d need to pay $42,000/month for API access. I could have dropped X like many competitors did. But then we’d never become a true leader in social media management.
At the time, roughly $20,000/month of our revenue came from customers using X. Between saving $20K and losing another $22K, I chose the latter.
Meanwhile, I had just hired more people across every department and invested in larger offices. We’d grown past 20 people, and to improve management, I added hierarchies, department heads, and even hired an external assistant.
Without noticing, we had gone corporate. Things moved slowly and expensively. We were also paying for ads, SEO content, and influencer marketing, all at once.
In 2023, we only shipped a basic AI assistant, added the client role and internal notes, integrated TikTok and Mastodon, and made a few minor improvements.
Dark Mode was the main highlight. Nice to have, but not exactly a game-changer.
Publer Dark Mode is now officially LIVE! 🌙
— Publer (@publer) November 23, 2023
Thank you for your valuable feedback during the Beta phase, which helped us refine it to perfection. 💚
With its sleek & stylish interface, Dark Mode is set to become your go-to choice for late-night scheduling sessions. pic.twitter.com/BugUbrwaDj
Love him or hate him, Elon and his API pricing brought me back to earth. Our finances were fragile. We needed revenue growth, fast.
And I learned the hard way that more people don’t always mean more work done. I had to undo everything. I let go of many people, removed hierarchies, and stopped all paid marketing.
Despite $1.5M in revenue in 2023, we ended the year with a $140K loss.
Reset and Acceleration
The hard calls paid off in 2024. The balance sheet improved, and the product velocity returned.
We upgraded analytics, launched hashtag and competitor analysis, integrated with Threads and Bluesky (bringing us to 13 platforms), unified Calendar + Posts, and introduced the Explore tab.
Groove to the beat of your socials with Publer Analytics 🎶 🪩
— Publer (@publer) February 28, 2024
The new metrics will show you what's hot and what's not, guiding you to the right strategy moves. 🕺
Discover more at: https://t.co/0Nnlqvx77Y pic.twitter.com/s6fPv2YO8M
The mobile app finally caught up with the web and began generating direct revenue via in-app purchases.
Ready to experience Publer App in a whole new light? Or should we say 𝙙𝙖𝙧𝙠𝙣𝙚𝙨𝙨? 🌌
— Publer (@publer) March 13, 2024
Introducing Dark Mode for mobile – perfect for those late-night sessions.🌙
Flip the switch to transform your mobile view into a sleek, eye-friendly interface. pic.twitter.com/9caS10qxgJ
With more stability, I cautiously diversified again. We started building Linkie, a standalone platform that will eventually replace Publer’s current link-in-bio feature.
Marketing-wise, I finally acquired the publer.com domain after 12 years on hold.
Negotiations, prices, tips, and everything in between!
— Ervin Kalemi (@ervinkalemi) January 29, 2024
Learn the backstory of acquiring the .com domain after 12 years 👇🏻 https://t.co/xGfKvt5BNJ pic.twitter.com/dYLZiPfaz5
To inaugurate the new domain, I asked the team to revamp and launch a new website, this time, independent of developers and with more landing pages. Thank you, Framer!
To fully onboard new customers, we set up automated email flows. And after years of manually changing emails, disabling 2FA, or applying discounts, I built integrations so any support agent could handle those customer requests directly. Thank you, Crisp!
With 24/5 customer support coverage, I had more time to focus on churn and growth.
We were holding on to data from nearly 4,000 paused subscriptions and, to make matters worse, we made it unnecessarily complicated for users to cancel by requiring them to provide feedback.
Our new motto: Easy come. Easy go. Easy rejoin.
Instead of hiding upgrades under “Settings → Billing,” I brought upgrade prompts right where customers needed them.
Programmatic SEO was our biggest marketing bet. In the last quarter of 2024, we focused solely on building free, functional social media tools.
These simple-looking tools drove millions of visitors and app installs for a fraction of the cost of traditional marketing.
By the end of the year, we generated $2M in sales, up ~40% YoY, and returned to profitability!
2025 and What’s Next
This year, beyond new integrations and post options like social media polls or Facebook text posts with backgrounds, we started expanding into new markets.
Besides English, Publer now speaks German, Italian, Spanish, French, and very recently Albanian.
If you haven’t figured it out by now from all the teasers… Publer is now multilingual! 🌍
— Publer (@publer) July 3, 2025
You can now switch your language in the settings, on both web and mobile.
Choose from 𝗘𝗻𝗴𝗹𝗶𝘀𝗵, 𝗜𝘁𝗮𝗹𝗶𝗮𝗻, 𝗙𝗿𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗵, 𝗚𝗲𝗿𝗺𝗮𝗻, or 𝗦𝗽𝗮𝗻𝗶𝘀𝗵 and manage your social… pic.twitter.com/hd3iNEQI66
We’re opening up automation for marketers, both inside Publer through post presets and performance-based post actions, and beyond through custom integrations.
With the Publer API, anyone with technical expertise can now build powerful workflows on top of Publer.
We’re also integrating with Zapier, n8n, Make, Pabbly, and more for true no-code automation.
Publer’s AI assistant now adapts to your tone of voice and learns from your post performance over time.
Meanwhile, Linkie has evolved beautifully. It’s almost ready to integrate with Publer and even with other social media tools that offer APIs.
You can still grab a lifetime deal at linkie.bio before the end of the year. Soon, you’ll be able to manage multiple Linkie pages from one account.
2025 isn’t over yet, but at this pace, we should surpass $3M ARR!
Unless, you know… things were looking really bright, and then…
Q&A
Abdul Mejid & Emanuel Zhupa: If you were starting Publer today from scratch, what would you do differently?
A: I would build in public since day one, and not just on LinkedIn.
Panajot Baka: Very curious to see Publer’s first MVP and what you learned from it that guided you in building future features?
A: What people loved the most about Publer in the early days was the composer. It was straight to the point. Despite all the new features added throughout the years, we have always strived to keep the composer as simple as possible.
Danny Hile: How do you know when you have the right product and should keep investing time and energy, vs when you need to divert your time and energy into something new?
A: A lot of intuition and a few paying customers are always a good combo to know if you have the right product. As long as you have one paying customer who has been with you for more than a month and whom you do not personally know, keep going.
Besnik Ligaçi: How long did you go without revenue, and how did you cover your expenses?
A: It took me months, probably years, without revenue. I was either working a full-time job and building apps on the side, or living with my parents until I was 33*.
Gerion Treska: How did you manage to overcome the darkest thoughts when you were going through the toughest moments with Publer?
A: Already covered this part, but also worth adding:
Emanuel Zhupa & joana_b_creative: Can you please talk about hiring and how you got good at spotting genuine hard-working people?
A: Intuition never fails. All the bad few hires I’ve had were because I didn’t listen to my inner voice. I also put a lot of emphasis on side projects. They’re a great indicator of someone who works hard and thinks outside the box.
Emanuel Zhupa: How do you negotiate salaries?
A: For salaries, I conduct market research and then set a range above market for every role I hire. The range is obviously included in the job application. The interview then helps me determine what part of the range to offer to the candidate.
Performance evaluations are done every 3 months, and if I’m satisfied, the base salary is increased by 5%. This way, an outstanding employee will have an annual salary increase of more than 20%.
Panajot Baka: What KPIs did you set up and track?
A: Two are the main metrics I keep track of.
- Monthly cash flow: Revenue, expenses, and profit
- Weekly customer flow: How many paying customers did we have the previous week? How many did we lose? How many have a failed or paused subscription? How many are actively paying?
Maruf Billah: What was the biggest mindset shift that helped you scale Publer to this level?
A: The X API fee made me hungrier than ever.
joana_b_creative: Can you please be brutally honest with the habits & lifestyle changes you applied during these years that most people avoid?
A: Some ugly truths.
- There’s no such thing as work-life balance. Every day is a working day. Every holiday is a regular day. Every hour is a business hour.
- There’s no such thing as passive income. You stop, you die.
- You need to have incredible self-control not to go on a spending spree as soon as you see a lot of money in the bank.
My golden formula: 6% of the next ARR target, as long as it’s over $50K.
Andrea Bosoni: Are you going to focus more on marketing and being the face of the brand now?
A: I love marketing, but not as much as I love building. While I will continue to be in charge —prioritizing what we build, considering new features, sharing updates, and overseeing day-to-day operations — I will no longer write code for Publer.
Instead, I want to focus on finally launching and building Kibo to eventually solve two main pain points we have at Publer:
- Monitoring social channels for new comments, mentions, messages, and reviews, and responding to them (this is also a pain on the personal level)
- Understanding where the customers are coming from
I believe a customer journey, from acquisition to support to sales, should be part of the same CRM.
Imagine a platform that shows you why customers chose you and lets you reach out to them with product updates or support answers, regardless of the communication channel they use.
But for Kibo, I want to do it differently. I want to embrace AI at every step of the business, not just the coding.
I believe that in 5 years, the most successful tech startups will look like this:
And my ultimate goal is to build a company with small teams, each running a different product.
But before I jump into the next adventure, I want to take a short break from 13 years of non-stop work.
Make sure to follow the rest of the team at publer.com/about ↗
Without them, none of these would have been possible.
Thank you for reading, and see you soon!
EK
Ervin Kalemi
