Day 7 update: Reddit shadow banned me, Stripe had a regional outage, I built 3 free tools, and I still think this is going to work
Quick honest update on the 50 users in 25 days sprint.
The week did not go as planned.
Reddit has been the main blocker. Two posts auto-removed by Reddit's sitewide spam filter in different subs on the same day, then a shadow removal that's been active for nearly a week — my comments show up to me but nobody else can see them. I've tried everything: different VPNs, DNS changes, spacing out posts, stripping out all promotional content. The account is just in a trust deficit that needs time to clear, not tactics to fix.
On top of that, Stripe's dashboard was inaccessible from my location in Tanzania for most of one day due to a regional routing issue, which blocked a critical fix to the payment flow. That cost about 8 hours of the sprint right there.
What actually got done despite all of it:
A full Playwright end-to-end test suite caught and fixed 6 critical bugs before any real users hit them — wrong Stripe secret key, missing webhook endpoints, a price mismatch between landing page and checkout, and stale compiled files shadowing the real source code. None of those would have been fun to discover after paying users hit them.
Then today I shipped three free tools at helios.today/tools:
A freelance invoice template that adapts to UK, US, AU, and CA (correct tax label and currency per country)
A freelance rate calculator — input your country, niche, experience, and income target, get your recommended hourly and day rate compared to market median
A proposal template by niche — web design, development, copywriting, consulting, marketing, video
No signup required to use any of them. These will start pulling in organic search traffic over the next few weeks and feed the waitlist permanently without needing any platform to cooperate.
Where things stand: 0 paying users, 8 days left in June, Reddit still cooling down. Shifting focus to IH more seriously and letting the tools do the slow-burn work in the background.
If you know any freelancers who'd want to try Helios — web designers, developers, copywriters, consultants running solo — I'd genuinely appreciate an intro. helios.today, free plan available, founding member deal at £29/mo locked forever for the first 200 users.
Curious whether anyone else has dealt with Reddit shadow removal recovering — how long did it actually take for your account to clear?
Day 7 and already hit the Reddit wall — that's the channel being unforgiving, not necessarily your product.
Two separate problems people mix up:
For (2): pick 2 subs where buyers actually complain (search pain phrases, not your product name), reply helpfully on a few threads before linking anything. I built a small daily digest for that after doing outreach for my own products — happy to point at a few thread types that worked if you share what you're selling.
This is exactly what I've been getting wrong-trying to fix account trust with more post instead of just letting it age. I'm building for solo freelances (web designers, developers, copywriters running solo and ect). Would love to see which threads types worked if you're open to sharing.
For solo freelancers (designers/devs/copywriters), the threads that actually convert look like this:
High intent (reply-worthy):
Low intent (skip):
Account trust: you're right — let it age, comment helpfully on others' posts for 2–3 weeks before linking anything.
If you want, send me what you're building + 2–3 subs you're watching — I'll pull 5–10 real threads from the last few days where solo freelancers are describing a problem you solve, with a non-spammy reply draft for each. Free, just testing if it's useful.
This is gold, thank you. Building Helios — an all-in-one OS for solo freelancers (leads, proposals, contracts, invoices, time tracking). Watching r/smallbusiness, r/Entrepreneur, r/digitalnomad. Would genuinely love those thread examples if you're offering.
Done — here's your Helios digest (5 threads from r/smallbusiness, r/Solopreneur + the subs you mentioned):
https://threadscout-theta.vercel.app/feed/ee677816-42e0-428a-ba43-911caa26d181
Each one is scored 1–10 with a reason + a draft reply meant to be helpful first (not a pitch). Given your account situation, I'd treat these as "where to show up" — reply in your own voice, no links until you've got some genuine comment history in the sub.
Аre any of these actually worth your time? If 2–3+ feel right, the daily version is $39/mo, more posts every day — but only if it's useful. If not, tell me what's off (wrong subs, wrong pain, drafts too salesy) and I'll adjust.
Perfect — Helios is a clear fit for those subs. On it today.
I'll pull recent threads where solo freelancers describe lead/proposal/invoice pain (not "check my tool" posts) and send you a feed link with scored threads + non-spammy reply drafts for each.
Give me some time. If anything else you want filtered (e.g. web designers vs developers), say now — otherwise I'll run it for general solo freelancers.
These are exactly the right threads — appreciate the quality. Quick ask: any chance of a short free trial given I'm pre-revenue right now? Happy to give detailed feedback on what's working and what isn't as a trade-off. If not, totally understand.
Fair on pre-revenue — the feed I sent is already the free sample (5 threads + drafts).
If 2+ feel worth replying to, I can do a founder intro: $19 for the first month, then $39/mo if you're still using it.
What would also help me, its if you pick 1–2 threads you'd actually reply to, and tell me which ones are wrong (sub / pain / draft tone). That tells me whether to tune Helios keywords before you pay anything.
Honest answer — I'm pre-revenue, literally £0 in the business right now. I'll go through the feed and give you proper feedback on the threads either way, but I can't pay the $19 yet. If you're open to a free trial until I close my first user, I'd make it worth your while — happy to give a proper testimonial and shout you out to the IH audience (the sprint post has 1,200+ views). Totally understand if not.
Totally get £0 — been there. The 5-thread feed I already sent is the free sample; I'm not going to run daily for free until first customer on your side, because that's the paid part of the product.
What would actually help me right now (and counts more than a shoutout): the specific feedback you offered — which 1–2 threads you'd actually reply to, which are wrong (sub / pain / draft tone). That tells me if Helios keywords are tuned right.
If you're up for it: a short honest line in this thread or your sprint post about whether the sample saved you hunt time — not a salesy plug, just "tried X, threads were useful / weren't." That's real value back.
When Helios closes its first paying user, the $19 founder intro still stands. Ping me then — happy to turn on daily. Until then, the sample link is yours to work manually.
Went through the feed properly. Honest take:
Pain targeting is good — 'tool fatigue' and 'manage clients day-to-day' are exactly the threads I'd want to be in. Draft tone is solid too, not salesy.
The issue is the sub. All four threads are r/smallbusiness, which is the exact sub my account got shadow-removed on. Replies there are currently invisible to everyone but me.
If the feed could pull from r/Entrepreneur, r/freelance (carefully), or r/digitalnomad instead, that'd be the fix. The keyword tuning is working — it's the sub selection that needs adjusting for my situation.