The fourth edition of a poetry collection: how a Nigerian small workshop gets 150 new-app installs a day

Installed 2,885 times in a month, no paid acquisition, no reviews, no press. It hit #93 on the Nigeria Education Top Free chart. The app itself isn't new. What's worth watching is the company behind it: 8 years old with about 50 apps, splitting the same book by "script × translation language" into several versions, each one capturing a search term. Below: what it is, where the installs come from, what you can take from it, and why going head-on isn't recommended.

One line in the reviews: "the rest of the translation still needed"

On 2026 Aug 28, under an app called Diwani on Google Play, a user named Ola Oluwa wrote: "So happy the translation was added, but we're still waiting for the rest of the translation." 28 people marked it helpful. On Sep 10, another user, Muhammad Sani Ibrahim, was more direct: "We love this update… but we'd be happier if everything were translated." On Sep 7, someone asked for a toggle to turn translation on or off.

This Diwani app was made 2019 years ago by Baye Niasse from Senegal. It has around 947k installs and 9.6K reviews and is the leader of this small category. It publishes the Diwan, the devotional poetry of Sheikh Ibrahim Niass (spelled Inyass in Hausa). Niass was the leader of the Tijaniyya Sufi order in West Africa, and his branch has millions of followers in northern Nigeria. The poems are recited in full at gatherings and at the Maulud. A full Diwan audio recording on YouTube has 314k views.

On 3 Oct, a Nigerian company called Sagware International published Diwani Warash (Ajimi). The store page says the same thing in four languages: "The Diwan in handwritten Warsh script, with Hausa, English and French translations and audio recitation." The same day, several of its other older Diwani apps were updated too.

What it is

Opening it shows a beige-and-green reader. The home title is the Arabic "Nine Collections of Poems," with Niass's name below. Then a row of "Fassara" (translation) toggles: Arabic, Hausa, English, French. Hausa also lets you choose "Boko (ABC)" (Hausa in Latin script) or Ajami (Hausa in Arabic script). Each collection has a card reading "28 wakoki · 392 baitoci": 28 poems, 392 stanzas. Inside, one stanza per line, the handwritten Arabic original on top and the translation below, a play button on each stanza, and full playback with speed control at the bottom. (Play store screenshot, 11-06)

The key is the font. The Arabic original uses the Warsh handwritten script that West Africans know from the Islamiyya schools, the letterforms in manuscripts. Generic Islamic apps from the Middle East usually don't offer it. Sagware markets every product on this point.

It's free with in-app purchases, listed at $0.99–6.99 for one item. What exactly is sold (unlocking translations? audio?) can't be seen from outside.

Where the volume comes from

In the first 11 days it got over thirty installs a day, then settled into a steady 100–155 per day. It's a flat line, not a burst. It charted only in Nigeria: Education Top Free #10-30 #198,11-05 #93,11-06 #115. The Nigeria Education chart has a low bar, and a hundred-plus installs a day gets you into the top 100. There isn't a single rating or review, which is normal for this audience.

No sign of paid acquisition was found. TikTok searches for "sagware" and "diwani warash" turn up no promo videos, and there's nothing on X or in the media. A curve this flat, in one country, with in-app purchases starting at one dollar, also doesn't look like ad spend (inference).

The installs most likely come from two places:

First, the store search is saturated by them. Sagware's Google Play developer page lists about 50 apps, nearly every commonly used classic of the Tijaniyya and Maliki schools (Risala, Al-Akhdari, Iziyya, Dalailul Khairat, Hisnul Muslim…), each in three or four versions: Warash Ajami, Hausa Boko translation, Arabic original, English. Search "Warash," "Fassarar Hausa," or "Inyass" and a string of their apps comes up. The Diwani alone has at least four: the old Diwani Warash Fassar Ajmi, Diwani Shk. Inyass na Warash, the Arabic translation Diwani Inyass, plus this one that puts "translation boko" right in the package name.

Second, old users cross-promote. Its flagship Al-Qur'an Warsh na Sherif Bala has about 568k installs, another Al-Qur'an Warsh about 379k, and the 9 apps with visible data total about 1.6M installs. People who read the Qur'an in Warsh script are exactly the people who look for Niass's poetry. The description ends with "more apps at sagwarestore.com."

It also launches new apps through big Hausa-language news pages on Facebook. On 8 May, the Hausa page Rariya posted a launch video for another Sagware app (Smart Azkar) with 6.8K views, ending "Don Allah ayi sharing" (please share). I couldn't find whether this app got the same treatment, or whether the +10-21 spike on 351 came from a similar post.

How it compares to the leader: where it's behind, where it's ahead

(Install counts: Google Play, 11-06)

This app's selling point is three things together: the Warsh handwritten original, Hausa translation in two scripts, and audio for every stanza. But that edge is thin. The leader is already adding English and French translations, and the "full translation" users are asking for will eventually arrive. The leader adds 6,194 a week; this app adds 1,085, about a sixth of that. What gets it over a hundred installs a day is Sagware's storefront and search position, not the app itself.

What you can learn from this store

• Split one book into several SKUs. For content that is fixed and has loose copyright (religious classics, study guides, legal texts, old books), split it into packs by "script × translation language × audio or not," and name each pack after a term locals actually search for. One pack captures one long-tail term, and dozens of packs can saturate the search results for a small language.
• Build versions by watching the leader's reviews. Users in the leader's comments asked for "the full translation" and "a toggle for translation," and a month later Sagware shipped a version with three-language translation and switching. The content assets already exist, so adding a version takes a few weeks.
• In small-language markets, the launch channel is big local Facebook pages. Not Product Hunt, not X. A Hausa news page plus a line saying "please share."

If it were you

One-line verdict: the business is real, but the moat is the storefront and search position built over 8 years, not the product. Going head-on against one Diwan won't get you numbers like theirs.

• Who it suits: Developers who know a small language's religious or education circles, who have content (or can legally get translations and recordings), and who are willing to build a developer account slowly. For example, someone who knows Wolof, Fulfulde or Swahili, or who knows the local scholarly circles of Indonesia or Bangladesh.
• Who it doesn't suit: People who want to make money from one app. Nigerian Play users have very low willingness to pay, and a one-dollar in-app purchase can't support any ad spend. This category earns its money as a sum across dozens of apps, each of which is small.
• How to do it: Don't build Niass's Diwan. In Hausa there's already a leader, Sagware, and copycats like sulaiman 3131 making the same thing. Pick a language and classic that haven't been saturated this way. First, search on Play in the local language for a dozen commonly used classic titles and see which terms have the fewest, oldest results and the most reviews asking for "translation," "audio" or "local script." Build that one. Launch a book with two versions first (local-script original, and local-language translation + audio), prove it works, then expand.
• How to get users: Store search is the main channel, so the title and package name must contain the term locals search for. At launch, post once on a local-language Facebook news page or religious-topic page. After that, every new app promotes your other apps in its description and inside the app.
• When to move: No need to rush. This demand is steady year-round, and the window won't suddenly close. But once one company has saturated a language, latecomers struggle to get into the search results, so the earlier you claim a language you've chosen, the better.
• Signs you've read it wrong: You've built your first app on a term, the store page uses the right keywords, and a month later it still gets fewer than 20 organic installs a day. That means the people in that circle don't look for books on Play, or another company already holds it. Switch languages. Another signal is Sagware itself: if its several Diwani versions are still stuck at a few thousand installs two or three months later, its storefront cross-promotion can only reach so far, and that's the ceiling of this approach for a single book.