Forget the Millions. Focus on Your First 10 Users.

This is where I'm at with math4fun.io. Getting first 10 users. I'm doing a lot on SEO and I'm sending cold emails to public elementary schools. When I will get first customer, I will post a longer post here on indie hackers.

I just launched a subtitle translation tool called Huake AI. It supports 40+ languages, automatically aligns timelines, and allows online editing. Currently, we have 50+ users, but the cold start phase has been quite challenging. Your article gave me hope, and I plan to have conversations with all 50+ registered users.

This hit hard — especially the part about making 100 people love you instead of chasing a million. It’s easy to forget how powerful that focus can be when everyone’s talking about growth. Love the 1 × 1,000,000 mindset — it really captures how real traction starts. Also checked out Pretty Prompt — super clean concept, especially how you position prompt crafting as a skill worth mastering.”

Great insights and yes, as they always say, the beginnings are the hardest. Good luck!

Being lazy next level. I need this for GitHub Co-Pilot to better instruct my AI Agent..

Love this. I'm actually at that stage right now - chasing my first 10 users for My Morning Brief, a small AI tool that turns your inbox and calendar into a personalized podcast each morning.

What I'm obsessing over isn't scale at all - it’s just finding a handful of busy people who will actually listen to it daily and tell me if it really saves them time.

Curious - for you, was there one thing you did differently that tipped people from "sounds cool" to "I'll actually use it every day"?

Really solid mindset, turning 10 users into raving fans is everything.

Just signed up for Pretty Prompt to check it out (clean design!). Noticed there's no welcome email after signup, that's likely causing a leak where interested users never get guided to their first moment of value.

That first 48 hour sequence is what turns casual signups into the obsessed fans you're talking about. The founders getting this right use a simple 3 email welcome flow to guide users to that moment where the product really clicks for them.

+1 to “1 × 1,000,000.” I’m testing a tiny ranking snapshots project (Rankiwiki — reference only: rankiwiki.com). Three of my first 10 came from hands-on setups. Curious: what did you obsess over first—activation or retention?

Totalmente cierto 🙌. En mi proyecto de apoyo en crisis emocionales, me concentro en los primeros usuarios que realmente lo necesitan. Cada interacción me enseña algo nuevo sobre cómo mejorar la plataforma antes de escalar. Es increíble cómo 10 usuarios bien atendidos pueden marcar la diferencia y definir todo el producto 🚀. ¿Alguien más aplica este enfoque en su startup?

Really love this perspective! Focusing on those first few real users helps you understand what actually works and what doesn’t. It’s all about building genuine value before scaling 🚀👏

Cross promotions with related businesses will help you get those first 10 users easily. All you need are good strategy, like minded related field entrepreneurs who are also interested in cross promotion. Unfortinately most wouldnt try and so never reply. You need tobdedicate some time to find the right business partners.

Love this mindset, Ilai. It’s easy to get distracted by big numbers, but this really brings it back to what matters: creating something 10 people genuinely love. That’s where honest feedback and traction start. I’m in the early stages of building my own app, and your “1 × 1,000,000” framing hit hard. A super-motivating reminder to focus small and build deep. Thanks for sharing this!

I'm coming to the end of day one..I have zero sign-ups and I'm still waiting on my chosen email provider to authentic my account!

I'm aiming for 1k sign-ups and giving myself a year to achieve this...if they come sooner then great but if they don't come by then, then it's safe to say it's a rubbish idea and to not invest anymore time or effort into it.

I don't want quantity, I need quality. I don't want a pay to win, I need an organic win.

Here's to my first ten sign ups!

@Ilaiszp I like your product...I'm wondering if something like this could be used in Cursor or Co-pilot or similar?

Thanks for your post 👍🏻👍🏻

You are right, Getting 10 users is really hard! I am building creatiz, to help creators and founders to make their content creation journey easy and faster. Two challenges, I am facing right now is solid team and first 10 users.

Love this mindset. I’m currently in that exact phase — building Kaelis, an AI ops copilot for teams, and my full focus is on getting the first 5–10 teams to genuinely love the product.
No ads, no hype — just real conversations, shipping weekly, and learning fast.
This post was a great reminder to stay obsessed with the few who care deeply before thinking about scale 🙌

Great insights — especially about focusing on retention early. Thanks for sharing this!

Completely agree. Getting those first 10 users is where the real learning happens — every conversation teaches you something about what actually matters. Once you make a few people truly love your product, scaling becomes so much clearer

It's so hard to get even one user.
it's only now that I realize that finding users is harder than creating a project.
I created a 100% free CV creation project just with my phone and NOTHING no user and no Feedback.

Nice take I feel the same way. People love to brag about getting millions of views, but honestly, most of those are empty. Folks just swing by, take a quick look, and bounce. The real growth isn’t there. What really matters is locking in your first ten true users. If they genuinely see the value, they’ll spread the word for you, dive deeper into your product, and even give solid feedback. That’s the kind of growth that actually sticks.

That’s awesome! I’m a hands-on maker and I always like connecting with people who are turning ideas into real products.

I love how Flovia focuses on helping people actually finish tasks instead of just planning endlessly. For anyone interested, click the post to check out how AI and science are making productivity smarter and more effective.

I just opened my Fiverr gig for my Systeme io / ClickFunnels funnel service — I’m offering 50% off my first few clients to collect reviews. How to reach me +18582509952

Hi [Ilai Szpiezak],

I really enjoyed your recent post about focusing on the first 10 users rather than chasing millions. That mindset is powerful — and I think Pretty Prompt has the potential to build a strong base of loyal fans.
From what I see, your current traction seems driven mainly by community sharing and word of mouth. That’s excellent for early validation, but to scale towards your first 1,000 true fans, you’ll need:
High-quality backlinks from relevant AI/tech websites to boost credibility.
Guest posts and mentions in niche blogs to attract early adopters.
This is exactly what off-page SEO does: it grows visibility, builds trust, and drives targeted users to your product — not just traffic, but the right kind of traffic.
I’d be happy to share a custom backlink plan tailored for Pretty Prompt that shows how you can move from the first 10 to your first 1,000 real users.
Would you like me to send it over?

Best regards,
[Asifa Iqbal]