3 Tactics Successful Indie Hackers Used for Promoting Their Businesses on Reddit
You know those dreams where you are standing in front of a large crowd and you suddenly realize you're fully naked?
That’s what posting on Reddit can feel like.
Here are 3 tactics to promote your business on Reddit without getting ripped apart 💔
1. Find the right subreddit and post the right content
Reddit has been the main source to grow Eric Lam's newsletter, Exploding Ideas. He reported getting 6,500 subscribers only from Reddit one year ago, and must have increased since then.
Eric's experience shows how important is to share the right content in the right subreddit.
For example, he posted an analysis he did of a big AI achievement in the Artificial Intelligence subreddit. He received 146 upvotes and 89 comments for this post.
But not every post was a hit. When he shared his newsletter success story in the Product Management subreddit, it was a total flop. He got exactly 0 upvotes and disapproving comments like "cringe" or "this isn't r/entrepreneur."
2. Don't be spammy
Marc Lou managed to get 2.4k upvotes and over 2,000 visitors to his site from just one post in 12 hours. How? He shared a story about selling his boilerplate, ShipFast, without any promotional links in the post itself. Instead, he added links in the comments or his profile when it made sense.
Compare that to another post he made titled "I made a starter to ship startups in days, not weeks," where he included a product link at the end. That post got removed by moderators and received "thoughtful" comments such as "Imagine buying for code lol" and "Shilling 👎."
3. Be helpful
Joseph Lee, who founded the demo-making SaaS Supademo, saw his ARR users double in just 30 days by consistently posting on Reddit and IndieHackers.
He targeted the SaaS subreddit, where he knew his audience will hang out. He offered something something his potential customers really valued: free interactive product demos. His post got over 11,000 views in 24 hours, which got him several new users and paying customers.
Have your tried promoting your product or service on Reddit?
How was your experience like?
I'm doing the same. I write about my process of building a startup and post it weekly on SubReddit. Something like "I quit my high-paid job to start a startup: Week 1/2/3..." I write what I accomplish, wins and fails, and updates on my progress.
I introduce my product at the end of the post or in the comment section. If people are interested, they would text me for more. It's a win-win.
That's awesome! It looks like it's working great for you. Can you share the link?
Reddit is so peculiar and has a picky audience. However if you hit it right, indeed you get a massive value out of it. My mental model goes with posting helpful things or asking questions. I'm not trying to promote anything there - I know it will fail. I think if you're genuine and helpful in your intent, you will get some engagement there.
Yeah that's how I usually interact as well. Have you included your link in your profile/bio?
Yes, I've added a couple of links to my profile
Reddit is surely a great place, same with hacker news
having your nose in code for weeks and then doing a completely different marketing activity is very difficult, the best is to alternate the two activities.
I found that I work better with themed days: writing day, marketing day, building day, etc.
It's hard for me to switch modes within the same day. I haven't tried doing that for weeks though.
How can one balance sharing personal stories and adding value without coming across as self-promotional, particularly in communities that are sensitive to marketing efforts?
I think it depends on the subreddit. For example, r/entrepreneur loves success stories. But if you go to a technical community like r/python I don't think they would love that as much. Maybe you could adapt the post to share the learning and talk about the technical side of your project there instead.
What I find useful is going to the subreddits where you think your audience hangs out, sorty by top (all time, past year) and look at what the most upvoted posts have in common to get a sense of what the community likes.
The coding hustle and marketing brain freeze :P
For real. I need to have separate days for making and promoting. Can make the switch in a single day.
Reddit is a world of its own.
Every subreddit is a universe.
Lots of subreddits have explicit no self promotion policy - here is a list of the ones that do allow for self promotion;
https://launchpointzero.com/launchsites/recommended?token=reddit
This is helpful! thanks
Reddit is so peculiar and has a picky audience. However if you hit it right, indeed you get a massive value out of it. My mental model goes with posting helpful things or asking questions. I'm not trying to promote anything there - I know it will fail. I think if you're genuine and helpful in your intent, you will get some engagement there.
Seriously? Just copy-pasting my comment? What kind of a bot does this lol
I am sorry, need to do this to be able to publish
there are better ways to gain karma my friend