Calendar As Simple As The Name Suggests: What’s So Special About It Sachin Giri, who has been uploading informative videos on the ‘Nepal Revives’ YouTube channel since 2018, is a fan of simple yet meaningful design. He follows this philosophy, especially in his videos. While working as a content creator for the past six years, Sachin was not very fond of the trend of adding other features to the Nepali calendar app and making it a ‘super app’. While he did not disagree with the concept of a super app, he felt that the calendar app should be purely a calendar.
Sachin conveyed this idea to his friend Swadesh Nepal. Swadesh was running a company called ‘Black Tech Pvt. Ltd.’ During the conversation, Sachin took charge of uploading the content, while Swadesh took charge of app development.
After planning to build the app, Sachin began market analysis. He wanted to understand whether others wanted a pure calendar app like he wanted. During the study, he found that users were annoyed by unnecessary ads and features in calendar-related apps. He recalls, “Users were not having a good experience using the calendar app due to too many pop-up notifications and ads. So, it felt very important to create an app with a simple interface.”
Thus, after Swadesh started the app development work, Sachin set about gathering the necessary materials and data for it. Since he was deeply interested in astrology, he also dreamed of making a good calendar app. To realize that, he showed Swadesh the facts he found from his studies, which Swadesh also liked very much. Thus, after months of hard work, they released the app named ‘Simple Calendar’ on Google Play Store and Apple App Store on 27 September 2024.
What are the features of Simple Calendar?
Click here to download this app. After downloading the app, the calendar opens directly; creating an account is not easy. However, Sachin and Swadesh plan to add more useful features based on their data once more users join. But for now, they plan to continue it as it is.
The calendar appears in an attractive font on the app’s homepage. The app’s theme also changes according to the theme of your mobile. There is a search bar in the middle, where you can easily find the festival or date you are looking for by clicking on it. On the right side of it, you can choose the options of BS and CE. Initially, BS is selected. If you want the CE calendar, you can select that option.
Then the calendar appears below. To know the date of each day, tap on the date given there. For example, if you tap on today’s date, you can see information such as Shubh Sait, Diwas, Lavadi Bela, Panchang etc.
Below that, today’s date appears. A little below that, options like Holidays, Date Change, Radio and Muhurta are available. And below that, information about festivals and special days coming in that month is given. You can see a list of all festivals and days by tapping on the option called ‘View All’.
There are three dots at the end of the bar on the right. Tapping on them opens the app settings. There you can activate the option of sticky date notifications. After activating this, you will get today’s information in your mobile notifications. You can also choose the theme, language and start page from the settings. Apart from this, you can get more information about the app, send suggestions and review the app.
Most calendar-related apps tend to include news. However, Sachin does not want to include news in his app. He says, “More research needs to be done on how useful the news feature is. Our initial research has shown that many users have nothing to do with news.”
What are the options for earning and the way forward?
Advertising is considered the main source of income in the calendar app. But Sachin and Swadesh are challenging this established belief and operating their app. Instead of advertising, they are looking for different ways to earn money. Sachin says, “We always provide basic features for free, but we bring premium features. Although those features are not for everyone, some users will find them indispensable. We plan to bring features related to astrology in particular.”
Their strategy is to develop widgets, improve existing features, add horoscope-related features, upgrade the iOS version, and improve date notifications. “Why don’t we do it in two or three years, instead of putting ads in the app? We need revenue to sustain it, but we depend on different modalities of revenue,” he says firmly.