I'm a 3rd year CS student who built a Chrome extension in a week — here's what I learned trying to get my first real users
A few weeks ago I was complaining about rewriting the same
prompts every time I opened Claude. My friend told me to just
save them in Notion. I did. Then I'd forget to open Notion.
Then I'd rewrite the prompt anyway.
So I built something about it.
PromptVault is a Chrome extension + web app that saves your
prompts and injects them directly into Claude or ChatGPT with
one click. You click a prompt, it appears in the text box.
No copy pasting, no tab switching.
I'm not a seasoned developer. I'm a 3rd year CS student who
used Claude Code to help build it. But I made every architecture
decision, debugged every broken injection, and shipped something
that actually works.
Here's what the last week looked like trying to get users:
- Reddit kept removing my posts for being a new account
- Twitter got zero traction because I have zero followers
- ChatGPT subreddit blocked me for low comment karma
- Indie Hackers told me to contribute before posting (hence this post)
Honestly it's been humbling. Building the thing was the easy part.
What I have so far:
- Working Chrome extension with prompt injection on Claude and ChatGPT
- Clean web app with search, categories, favorites, templates
- Open source on GitHub
- Zero users outside of myself
I'm not trying to sell anything. I genuinely want to know —
for those of you who got your first 10 users, what actually worked?
Reddit? Direct outreach? Just tweeting into the void until something hit?
GitHub: https://github.com/siddharthrajendran2-cmd/promptvault
Any feedback on the product itself is also welcome.
What would make you actually install this?
Lots of X replies, lots of honest comments and genuine engagement
Getting hit by spam filters on Reddit and Twitter when you're just starting out is the absolute worst. Since algorithms hate new accounts, dropping links doesn't work. Instead of public posting, try direct outreach. Look for people complaining about managing prompts on Twitter or Reddit, and slide into their DMs. Don't pitch it like a marketer—just say, "Hey, had the exact same issue so I built this tiny extension for myself, want to try it?" That’s usually how you get your first 5–10 users who will actually talk to you.
Reddit blocking new accounts while simultaneously requiring you to post to build karma is genuinely one of the more absurd loops out there.
Have you tried direct outreach to prolific Claude/ChatGPT users on Twitter or YouTube? People who post prompt tutorials publicly are basically your target user with an audience attached.
I'd be careful with one thing.
The challenge may not be finding the first 10 users.
The harder decision is determining what reaching those 10 users is actually supposed to prove.
That sounds subtle, but it can lead founders down very different paths.
I wouldn't make that call casually this early.