Indie Hackers, I’d love your advice on launching a SaaS.
I’m getting ready to launch my SaaS product soon, and I’m currently thinking a lot about the first 100 users.
The product is built, the core features are ready, and now comes the part I find more challenging: getting the right people to actually discover it, try it, and eventually become paying customers.
For those of you who have launched SaaS products before, I’d love to learn from your experience.
𝙒𝙝𝙖𝙩 𝙢𝙖𝙧𝙠𝙚𝙩𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙘𝙝𝙖𝙣𝙣𝙚𝙡𝙨 𝙬𝙤𝙧𝙠𝙚𝙙 𝙗𝙚𝙨𝙩 𝙛𝙤𝙧 𝙮𝙤𝙪 𝙙𝙪𝙧𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙛𝙞𝙧𝙨𝙩 𝙛𝙚𝙬 𝙬𝙚𝙚𝙠𝙨?
Did you focus on building an audience before launch, cold outreach, communities like Indie Hackers and Reddit, Product Hunt, content/SEO, paid ads, partnerships, or something completely different?
More importantly, what would you do differently if you were launching your SaaS again from zero?
I’m especially interested in strategies that worked for getting the 𝘧𝘪𝘳𝘴𝘵 10, 50, 𝘢𝘯𝘥 100 𝘶𝘴𝘦𝘳𝘴, rather than advice that only makes sense once you already have an audience.
Would really appreciate hearing your experiences, including the things that failed.
Thanks in advance. I’m here to learn from people who have actually been through it.
The first 10 and first 100 users feel like completely different problems. I’d probably focus less on finding the “best channel” and more on figuring out which small group responds strongly enough to keep coming back. That signal seems much more useful early on than raw signup numbers.
From what I'm learning as a first-time founder — the first 10 users don't come from channels, they come from conversations. Find where your exact customer already talks, be genuinely helpful there, and offer something free first. Channels only work after you understand why people say yes.