Looking to help find your first customers for free
I've always been the guys who builds stuff. Turns out, history has proven that the things that I build are "cool", but not really that useful.
So I'm taking a bit of a side quest this year and working strengthen my customer discovery skills. I want to get better at finding and talking to strangers, learning about what their painpoints are, and delivering them value in a way that doesn't come off as spammy, but genuinely helpful instead.
This is what leads me to this group.
I want to work with you to find you people who are close to the problem your app is solving. These could be potential customers, but maybe more importantly I think they will be data points that help you make decisions around messaging and features, to help cut wasted time as you build your app.
If that sounds interesting, DM me at [email protected] - Please describe what you're building and the problem it solves, and we'll take it from there!
Why this works differently?
→ McKinsey/BCG-grade strategic depth (real frames, not growth hacks)
→ At a scale a tier-1 firm can't deliver (they don't do $0 MRR, nor can they really scale)
→ Priced on performance (no retainer, no hourly, no $250k upfront)
I review your business in 7 days. If it grows, I get paid. If it doesn't, I don't.
Skin in the game. cofounder dot ink
Hey Robert, thanks for non-ai generated post) Getting SIGNUPS (read Attention) is not the same as getting PAYING CLIENTS! Difference is having or not having Product Market Fit (PMF) Your skills at Customer Discovery are exatly what is needed for PMF. Yet what you exactly you ask could be significantly improved if top tier business consulting frameworks from McKinsey / BCG are used to help you auto create business unit strategy and run business segmentation, customer discovery, moat xray and growth opportunities with specialized ai and use insights genreated for hypothesis testing. This is what we do at CoFounder dot ink Would love to find ways to work together. Send me any project you want your ai McKinsey team to work on, and I will send you results in 4 hours)
I’m working on this problem right now.
My product is Vynly co, a beta feed for AI-generated images, so the obvious users are AI artists and visual creators.
The hard part is approaching them without sounding like “please join my platform.” I’m trying to do it more like customer discovery: comment on their work first, ask what’s broken about current platforms, then only mention Vynly if it fits.
Curious if you’ve seen a better approach for creator/community products where the user already has many places to post.
Efficient customer discovery is key! BCG/McKinsey drill it deeply with pain, fears, motivations, whitespace, consumer compromise, and even evolution of consumer preferences over time, to unlock breakthrough strategies. if you want i can run it for vynly? discovery is not the only thing MBB methodlogy does, but it could be very useful for your product market fit discovery
sure
Robert, I appreciate the offer.
I have a live product (MindCalm) and I'm happy to collaborate.
Even though you're offering this for free to learn, I believe in fair exchange. If you help me find first users, I'll make sure you're compensated — either with a commission or a one-time payment.
Let me know if that works for you.
I'll DM you the details.
Lol, did you email me twice with 2 different products? :P will be writing back shortly! am a bit backed up on emails. Hope I can help
Haha, guilty as charged 😄
Yes — one for MindCalm (stress reduction app) and one for a potential collaboration.
No rush at all. Take your time.
Looking forward to hearing from you when you're caught up
Can I get an amen?!!? Close colleagues and I have repeatedly built the coolest most unmarketable things. I know better now, but this should be a prerequisite before the first line of code.
unmarketable))) or not solving problems users are so sick off they want to pay anyone to just get rid of it )
Interested in connecting? would be cool to learn what your journey was and how you approach things now. If you are - feel free to email me at my email address in the post!
This is a smart approach — learning customer discovery by actually doing it.
I'm building TempQR, a tool for freelancers to share client work without worrying about old links staying active. 12,000+ links created so far, but I'm still looking for early users to test and give feedback.
If you're interested, I'd love to collaborate. Happy to share more.
I'll DM you
like 12,000 SEO links? why not try to do 120 real conversations first? thats 100x less output and prob 1000x more impact)
This sounds really interesting—especially the focus on real conversations and avoiding the usual “build in the dark” trap.
Just sent you an email with some details about what I’m building. Looking forward to connecting 👍
Love the initiative! Just dropped you an email from Nexore. I think what I’m building fits perfectly with your goal of turning 'cool' projects into 'useful' ones. Looking forward to connecting!
useful wont do! it needs to be so good that if you take it away from customers, they block your fricking office in protest!
awesome! i don't think I received your email. can you try one more time? look forward to hearing from you.
Thank you, Robert.
I've just resent the email.
I've sent an email. Thanks for the offer, very interesting :)
LinkedIn add convert very poorly in my experience...lots of clicks little signup
same - really any ads feel like a waste of money so early on. shoot me an email using the address above & happy to chat through this more with you!
google been so good at extracting ad dollars from big business, and making their ROI negative over soo long, that its naive to think that they dont just abuse startups that dont even know whom they are selling too, or what Unique Selling Proposition and OFFER they use to drive channel traffic in the first place. use ads when your product market fit been validted!
Start with LinkedIn, and you can try running ads too. It helps...
Hey Robert, this is exactly what I need right now.
I built a WhatsApp ordering bot for small
businesses. Customers browse a catalog, add
to cart and place orders automatically via
WhatsApp. AI handles receipts, tracking and
customer profiles.
The problem it solves is real — small business
owners manually handle every WhatsApp order
and constantly miss messages, lose track of
orders and have no receipts system.
I know who needs it but getting in front of
them without coming across as spammy has been
the challenge
Would love your help with customer discovery.
so are you post product market fit already and tyring to scale what already works? or need help with consumer discovery?
This isn’t a spam problem.
It’s what happens when there’s no structured follow-up loop behind the first touch — every message becomes a one-off instead of a process.
That’s why it feels random.
seems like you've got some good insights here @astrawysocka. open to chatting for 30? maybe we can brainstorm further.
Happy to — but before that, curious:
what part feels most inconsistent for you right now — getting responses or turning them into actual orders?
Just sent you an email dude
Useful insight. The community always benefits from honest founder experiences. What's your focus for the next 30 days?
This is a valuable skill to build. A lot of founders are good at making things, but much fewer are good at getting close to the problem early enough to avoid building in the dark. I like that you’re focusing on discovery, messaging, and real conversations instead of just more output. That can save people a huge amount of wasted time.
100% but even pre-pmf needs to be well structured for a meaningful result
agreed! I think people avoid it because it less fun / less instant / awkward / etc.
This is really cool of you to offer. I am building a custom procurement platform for mid-market companies and struggling to get conversations started with Controllers and VPs of Finance through cold outreach alone. Just sent you an email. Would love to connect.
This is a great Initiave Robert. I've just sent you an email.
Ive built vetted a few months ago
And now handoffhq a few days ago - an AI invoice chaser with a unique no-API approach.
0 traction after months of marketing Vetted Coaching Platform. What would you do differently for this launch?
Kind regards
Glen
send me DM, i can run Mcksinesy level review and help you uncover the reasons it didnt work, starting with consumer discovery
Currently building operator23 ! Describe your workflow in plain English and run it across your tools without building or configuring anything. Operator23 executes it with clear steps, shows what happens, and lets you review before actions run, so you can trust automation from day one.
Is this interesting?
Its interesting! I think it makes sense. How many customers do you currently have? I'm mainly working with people who have 0 to a small handful (maybe 1 or 2) customers. If so, feel free to reach out via email! my address is in the post above.
Hi Robert. My name is Robert also, and I'm in the same boat as you. Interested in teaming up and working together to find these customers?
Yes, please email me! my email address is in the post
Robert
Customer discovery doesn’t break at the interview.
It breaks right after — when there’s no system forcing a next action, so every conversation resets to zero.
That’s why most teams “learn a lot” but never convert it into traction.
What followup action items might you recommend from your experience? any particular ones that have worked? and in what scenarios?
Most teams don’t need more actions — they need one clear next step that’s impossible to ignore.
The exact step depends on where things stall.
Is it after the first convo or later in the process?
well thats easy said than done, especailly if one has not business strategy in the firstplace.
This is a great initiative — most builders (myself included earlier) default to building before deeply understanding behavior.
One thing I’ve been realizing: people are often aware of their problems (like overspending or unused subscriptions), but they don’t act because the friction to change is higher than the perceived loss.
So the challenge isn’t just identifying pain — it’s understanding why that pain doesn’t convert into action.
Curious — when you talk to users, do you focus more on:
their stated problems
or the gaps between what they say vs what they actually do?
👉 Focus on the gap between what users say and what they actually do.
Stated problems = awareness.
Behavior gaps = where money and PMF live.
How to handle it:
Start with the problem
“What’s your biggest issue?”
Then go straight to behavior
“When did you last try to fix it?”
“What did you actually do?”
“What stopped you?”
Find the friction
→ that’s your product opportunity
Rule:
Problem → Attempt → Failure → Friction
That last part is everything.
"gaps between what they say vs what they actually do" sometimes - usually I look for people who are already trying to solve their problem.
If you’re trying to find first customers, the hardest part is getting unbiased messaging that actually resonates with strangers (not friends who are being nice). I’ve been using tractionway.com to test headlines/value props with verified humans and get honest feedback back in ~4 hours, and it also captures warm leads from respondents who are interested. The 7‑day free trial gives 5 responses, which is usually enough to sanity-check the angle before you start outreach.
you want to sanity check more than headlines and USPs) best to start with your life purpose, then who is your Ideal customer profiles, understand the market landscape, competition, market and see if you even want to compete there in the first place. finding business opportunities that fits with who you are, is not so easy
Hey @cgurani happy to help you find a few beta users for tractionway for free - I speak to people facing the problem you're solving every day. email me at the address in my post and lets set up a time to chat?