I was targeting the wrong users for 3 weeks. Here's what I found out.
I launched a simple CRM for "solo salespeople" on IH a few weeks ago and got great feedback.
But I made a mistake: I didn't know exactly who my user was.
"Solo salespeople" is too broad. Founders track sales. Agencies track clients. Developers track consulting leads. None of them have the same pain.
Then I started doing LinkedIn outreach and something became obvious.
The people who actually need this aren't "solo salespeople."
They're independent insurance agents, 1099 commission reps, and freelance sales consultants — people who:
Work 100% on commission
Have no company CRM
Are managing 30–50 active prospects at any time
Lose deals not to competitors, but to forgetting to follow up
That specificity changed everything about how I talk about the product.
What CloserKit does (for that specific person):
- Kanban pipeline — see every prospect at a glance
- Follow-up reminders — email at 9am on the day you set, in their timezone
- Weighted pipeline value — know what's actually likely to close this month
- Won/Lost tracking with reason logging
- Full mobile support
Free plan (10 deals) + Pro at $9/month.
👉 closerkit.app
My ask to IH:
Do you know anyone who fits this profile? Independent insurance agent, real estate agent, 1099 sales rep, freelance consultant managing their own pipeline?
I'm not asking for a ProductHunt upvote. I'm asking for two things:
- An intro — if you know someone who sells independently, send them my way. That's worth more than 1,000 impressions right now.
- A share — if you have salespeople in your network (LinkedIn, Twitter, anywhere), a quick mention would mean a lot.
Happy to return the favor — feedback on your product, intros, whatever I can do. 🙏
This narrowing point is important.
I am seeing something similar in a WhatsApp outreach test.
When the target was too broad, replies happened but payment intent stayed weak.
The sharper version is not "businesses need follow-up."
It is closer to:
quote-heavy local businesses that lose warm leads after site visit or quotation because nobody owns the next follow-up date.
The pain gets clearer only when the buyer, workflow, and lost-money moment are specific.
That's a sharp distinction — "nobody owns the next follow-up date" is exactly the failure mode CloserKit targets. The buyer/workflow/lost-money specificity is something I'm still sharpening. Right now I'm seeing the strongest signal from solo insurance agents and independent sales reps where the follow-up gap is personal, not a team process problem. That's where the pain gets specific enough to convert.
That makes sense.
Solo agents/reps probably feel the leak more directly because there is no team/process to hide behind. If they miss the follow-up, they personally lose the commission.
That may be the difference I’m seeing with local businesses: the pain exists, but ownership is fuzzier. Owner, assistant, sales person, WhatsApp responder — everyone touches it, so nobody fully owns it.
The sharper buyer might be the person who owns both the lead and the revenue.
Are your users already tracking follow-ups somewhere, or is it mostly memory/WhatsApp?
Mostly memory and spreadsheets from what I'm seeing. A few mention WhatsApp reminders they set for themselves. That's actually the gap CloserKit sits in — they know they need to follow up, they just don't have a dedicated place where the next action lives. It falls through because there's no single owner of that next date.
That “where the next action lives” line is the key.
I’m seeing the same thing in a messier local-business version. They often agree the follow-up is manual, but the problem gets weak when nobody clearly owns the next date.
Solo reps are cleaner because the owner of the lead, follow-up, and revenue is the same person.
That makes me think the offer should probably be sold to whoever personally loses money when follow-up slips, not just “the business.”
What usually makes your users realize spreadsheets/reminders are not enough?
Usually the moment they lose a deal because they genuinely forgot — not because the lead went cold, but because the spreadsheet row just sat there with no nudge. That's when "I should track this better" turns into "I need something that reminds me, not something I have to remember to check." The pain isn't the tool gap, it's the missed commission.
That distinction helps a lot.
A spreadsheet is passive. A reminder system is active.
In my local-business test, I think “tracker” may be the weaker framing. The stronger outcome is: no quote/site-visit lead gets forgotten after the first conversation.
For solo reps, the missed commission is obvious. For local businesses, I probably need to make the missed-money moment clearer before pitching anything.
Do your users respond better when you frame it as “missed commission” or “never forget the next follow-up”?
"Never forget the next follow-up" lands better in the headline — it's the hook that gets the click. But "missed commission" is what closes them once they're reading. The pain has to feel personal and financial, not just organizational. So I lead with the behavior, then let them connect it to the money themselves.
That’s useful framing.
So the hook should describe the behavior they recognize:
“never forget the next follow-up.”
Then the sales conversation connects it to the financial consequence:
missed commission, lost quote, dead warm lead.
I think I was trying to lead with the system too early.
For my local test, the better order may be:
That’s probably cleaner than pitching “CRM” or “tracker” upfront.
That order makes sense — behavior, then risk, then solution. Reorganizing my own copy the same way. Appreciate you working through this out loud, it's genuinely sharpening my thinking too.
Tracking email open rate separately from app open rate is a lightweight way to tell the difference between "the reminder reached them" and "they acted on it." The gap between those two is where you will see the real attrition signal — users who open the email but do not visit the pipeline. That is the pattern that predicts churn before they even stop opening reminders.
Glad the framing was useful. Email open without pipeline visit is a lightweight signal that punches above its weight. most teams overcomplicate churn prediction when a single behavior like this tells you more than a dashboard of lagging metrics. Would be interested to hear what you find once you have a week of data.
That gap is exactly what I need to start measuring. Email open without pipeline visit is a much earlier churn signal than unsubscribe — by the time they stop opening, the habit is already gone. Going to add email open rate tracking separately from app session tracking. That's a concrete thing I can build this week. Thanks for the framing.
The "wrong users for 3 weeks" lesson is brutal but common — usually means the channel was right but the conversation filter was wrong (or vice versa).
What helped me: stop broadcasting and start replying where people already post the exact pain phrase. Reddit is good for this if your buyers are there — search by problem language, not product category. Took me a while to realize the hour/day goes into finding threads, not writing replies.
What signal told you they were the wrong users — zero replies, wrong questions, or wrong budget?
Zero replies was the main signal — not even "not interested," just silence. The conversation filter is probably part of it too: I was talking to builders who liked the idea but weren't the people actually losing deals. Shifting to find people already posting the pain phrase is exactly what I need to do more of. Reddit search by problem language, not product category — that's a reframe I'm going to use.
Glad the reframe landed — silence as signal is underrated.
Are you actively hunting threads on Reddit for Dealpad right now, or still shifting channels? If Reddit's live for you, happy to pull a small sample list (scored + draft replies) so you can see problem-language search in practice.
Not actively hunting Reddit yet — still shifting channels and figuring out where the real buyers are. That sample list would actually be really useful to see problem-language search in practice. If you're up for it, I'd love to see what that looks like for CloserKit's use case.
Makes sense to figure out where buyers actually are before hunting Reddit.
If CloserKit's buyers post anywhere publicly, happy to pull a small sample (scored threads, you write replies yourself). Send a one-liner on what CloserKit does + 2–3 places you think they hang out — I'll tell you honestly if Reddit's even worth it for that ICP.
CloserKit is a lightweight CRM for independent sales reps — pipeline tracking + follow-up reminders, nothing else. Places I think they hang out: r/sales, r/InsuranceAgent, r/realestate (the agent side). Would genuinely appreciate your honest take on whether Reddit is even worth it for this ICP before I invest time there.
Honest take before you invest time: Reddit can work for CloserKit but it's noisy. r/sales and r/InsuranceAgent have reps venting about follow-up chaos and pipeline mess — that's your pain phrase hunt. r/realestate is trickier (lots of consumer/homebuyer posts, not agent-tool buyers).
Worth trying if you search problem language ("forget to follow up", "pipeline in spreadsheet", "CRM too heavy") not "CRM for sales."
If you want, I can pull a small scored sample from those 3 subs so you can see if signal is real before you commit — free, ~24h. Yes/no?
Yes — that would actually be really useful before I commit time there.
Especially curious about r/InsuranceAgent. My gut says that's the tightest fit for CloserKit (high follow-up volume, solo agents, not a lot of CRM love in that space). r/realestate I'm already skeptical of for the reason you mentioned — mostly consumer-side noise.
If the scored sample shows real pain language around follow-up chaos or "pipeline in a spreadsheet" type stuff, that's the signal I need. Appreciate you offering this.
Hey Dealpad!
Any traction from the threads you replied to? Even one real conversation would help us both know if this is worth running daily.
$19/mo founder rate still stands if you want to try with refund option. If not yet, just say the word — no hard feelings.
No real conversations yet from the threads — replies are slow on Reddit. Still think the signal is there, just takes more reps. On the $19 offer — I'll take you up on it. The refund option makes it a no-brainer to test properly.
How'd the InsuranceAgent replies go? any real conversations from the threads?
No rush either way — just checking in after your test week.
Still early — replied in a few threads but no real conversations yet. The pain language matched but getting actual replies from Reddit is slower than expected. Still think r/InsuranceAgent is the right bet, just takes more reps. Will update when something moves.
Glad the InsuranceAgent hits landed, sounds like the filter is working.
What you saw is a one-time sample (9 threads from one pull). Paid is the daily version:
$39/mo on the site — less than an hour of hunting per week if it saves you that.
Since you already validated the sample, I can do a founder intro at $19/mo for CloserKit while I'm still tuning the product. If it's not working for you, i will refund the money
Appreciate the founder rate — $19 makes sense given I already saw the signal work. Let me get through a few more reply threads this week and see if it converts to actual conversations. If it does, I'll be back for the paid version. The refund offer helps too.
CloserKit sample is live:
https://threadscout-theta.vercel.app/feed/65ccbf20-090d-4690-bce9-0b7f056526c0
9 scored threads (heavy r/InsuranceAgent + r/sales). Skip the new-agent ones if they're not your ICP — focus on email chaos / pipeline / follow-up posts.
Which 2–3 would you actually reply in? That feedback is more useful than "looks cool."
r/InsuranceAgent threads — the follow-up chaos and spreadsheet pipeline posts are direct hits. r/sales selectively, only when someone's venting about losing track of deals specifically.
On it — scored sample for CloserKit in ~24h.
I'll weight r/InsuranceAgent + r/sales heavily (follow-up chaos, pipeline in spreadsheet, CRM too heavy). Light pass on r/realestate given your skepticism — only if clear agent-side pain.
Feed link here when ready. Work 2–3 by hand and tell me if the pain language is real or noise — that's the signal you need.
Went through them — r/InsuranceAgent pain language is real. "Forget to follow up" and "pipeline in spreadsheet" showed up exactly as you predicted. r/sales was more mixed. r/realestate mostly consumer noise, skipping for now.
Hi, Dealpad! last check before the weekend — are you still planning to try the $19 founder rate this week, or should i close the slot?
if the reply→conversation test didn't land, that's useful signal too. if you want to start, the link is still open: https://buy.stripe.com/4gM5kCfNDdo16N6fJBa7C04
let me know so i can close my iteration.
No rush on the $19 link — wanted to check if it opened Ok on your side or if you had a question before trying it.
Either way, happy to keep the founder rate open this week.
Glad the signal still feels worth it even when replies are slow — that's usually the right read.
Here's the $19/mo intro (daily digest + draft replies, cancel anytime):
https://buy.stripe.com/4gM5kCfNDdo16N6fJBa7C04
Once you're in, I'll turn on daily runs for Dealpad. For the first week, tell me honestly which threads you'd actually reply to vs skip — that feedback matters more than a testimonial. The Refund politic is actual for the first month.
The niche narrowing is smart, and the line about losing deals to forgotten follow-ups instead of competitors is the real pain. One thing worth testing early: do these reps want a tool they check daily as a workflow anchor, or something they mostly open when a deal moves stages? Follow-up reminders only work if the CRM is part of their morning routine, not a record they check when they remember. Have you seen a pattern in how often your early users actually open the pipeline view?
Honest answer: I don't have clean data on this yet. My early users are small enough that I can't see a real pattern. But your question cuts to the core issue — if it's a record they open when they remember, it's already failed. The 9 AM email reminder is supposed to pull them back in daily without requiring them to open the app. Whether that's actually working or whether they're ignoring the email is something I need to track better. Good question to pressure-test early.
Honest answers before perfect data are worth more than any analysis. The 9am reminder as a habit anchor is the right bet — if that email open rate holds, you'll know the workflow is becoming part of their morning before you see it in product analytics. Worth tracking which users open it vs which let it sit. That single behavior probably predicts retention better than any other metric at this stage.
That's the metric I need to start tracking — open rate as a leading indicator of retention, not just a vanity number. If someone opens the 9 AM reminder consistently, they're building the habit. If they stop opening it, the deal is probably already going cold whether they know it or not. Going to add that to the tracking list. Appreciate the framing.
The lesson becomes reusable when you define both the positive signal and the disqualifier. A narrow ICP should include the triggering event, current workaround, decision owner, and reason the prospect must act now.