Six bans and two dead products before I figured out Reddit. Now that system makes $5.4K/month

Six attempts, zero traction

I'm Arthur. I'm building MediaFast, a Reddit growth roadmap that helps you avoid the ban cycle.

I built two products before MediaFast. Both failed. Not because they were bad. Because I couldn't figure out distribution.

The first one was an online library tool. Three months building. Tried Reddit marketing. Banned twice. Got one user who never came back.

The second one hurt more. React and Next.js animations that developers kept asking for in threads. I knew people wanted it. Built it anyway.

Made one sale. Then got banned trying to promote it.

That's when I stopped blaming the products and started blaming myself. The issue wasn't what I built. It was that nobody could see it.

The ban cycle that cost me everything
I tried Reddit six more times after that.

Account one: commented on 8 posts in one afternoon trying to be helpful. Banned in 3 days.

Account two: built karma for two weeks first. Posted once about my product. Banned in a week.

Account three: only commented, never mentioned my product. After a month I casually answered "I built something for this" with a link. Gone.

Account four: hired someone on Upwork to post for me. Different IP, older account. Banned faster than I was.

Account five: spent a full month building to 500 karma. Posted in a "what are you working on" thread. Shadowbanned. Took me three days to realize nobody could see my posts.

Account six: my breaking point. Four months gone. My product dying while I played Reddit roulette.

Then I did something desperate. I signed up with my dad's email.
Tracking patterns in a messy spreadsheet

I didn't think the email would save me. But I was out of options.
This time I started tracking everything in Google Sheets. Which subreddit. What I posted. How fast. Time of day. Account age. Karma level. What got removed.

What survived.

After two months, patterns showed up.
Subreddits under 100k members were more forgiving. Posting 2pm to 5pm ET got less mod attention. Accounts under 30 days died no matter what. Commenting 3+ times in an hour triggered spam filters even if you were being helpful.

I rebuilt my entire approach.

Waited 45 days before posting anything product related. Only commented twice per day max. Focused on 5 small subreddits instead of chasing r/Entrepreneur. Changed my writing tone to match each subreddit.
It worked.

Not the email. The system I'd been tracking.

Turning pain into MediaFast

I spent two more months obsessing over what actually worked. Which subreddits allowed what. When mods were active. What tone survived. What pacing kept you safe.

Then I thought: how many other builders are losing their products to this exact cycle right now?

So I built https://mediafa.st

It does what my messy spreadsheet did:

-Finds subreddits that won't instant ban you
-Analyzes what content actually works in each one
-Builds a 30 day roadmap of what to post, where, when
-Tells you when to comment vs when to post
-Includes pacing that keeps you off mod radar

I launched it in February 10th 2025 thinking maybe 10 people would use it.
The revenue climb

Month 1: $360 (almost quit, felt like proof nobody wanted this)
Month 2: $760 (word of mouth on X started working)
Month 3: $1,200 (realized churn was almost zero, people were getting results)
Month 4: $1,800
Month 5: $1,700 (one annual customer churned, hurt to see it dip)
Month 6: $2,300
Month 7-9: $2,700 to $3,000 (thought this was the ceiling)
Month 10 (December): $5,000 (something clicked, more builders struggling, SEO kicking in)
Month 11 (January 2025): $5,400

Mostly builders from X who were stuck in the same ban hell I was.

What actually works on Reddit

Here's the system I reverse engineered from 6 bans and 6 months of tracking:
Subreddit size doesn't matter, mod tolerance does

r/Entrepreneur has millions of members and bans 90% of product posts. r/SideProject has 100k and lets almost anything through if you match the vibe.
MediaFast shows you which subreddits in your niche actually allow product mentions based on what survived, not what the rules say.

Every subreddit has a different tone

You can't copy paste everywhere. r/SaaS wants different language than r/startups. Some want stories. Some want questions. Some only respond to comments in other people's threads.

Pacing is everything
Reddit doesn't punish you for one post. It punishes you for posting too much too fast.

Post Monday. Comment Tuesday and Wednesday. Rest Thursday. Post Friday in a different subreddit.

This pattern keeps you invisible to the spam detection bots.
Comments build trust faster than posts

Sometimes the best move isn't posting at all. It's commenting with helpful answers, then mentioning your product naturally days later.
New accounts need time

If your account is under 30 days old, you're under a microscope. Build karma slowly first. MediaFast includes account age requirements for each strategy.
Current growth strategy

I'm not chasing growth hacks. Just consistent execution.
I share my journey on X. Builders find MediaFast through my posts about Reddit struggles.

I post on Reddit sometimes using the exact system MediaFast recommends.
I'm focusing on SEO. "How to grow on Reddit without getting banned" is bringing steady organic traffic.

My conversion is simple: people try the 7 day free trial, see the subreddit analysis and roadmap, about 25% convert to paid at $29/month.

Build distribution from day one
If I could tell my past self one thing: focus on distribution before building.

My first two products failed because nobody knew they existed. I spent months building in a cave, then tried to figure out marketing after.

With MediaFast, I shared the pain while I was still in it. That built the audience before the product even existed.

What's next?

Next milestone: $10K MRR.

Not because I need it. Because I want to prove this model works long term. That you can build a sustainable business solving one specific painful problem.
I'm improving the core features. Better subreddit matching. Deeper content analysis. More accurate pacing recommendations.

But mainly I'm just helping people avoid the 4 months of hell I went through.
https://mediafa.st

I lost two products to Reddit bans. This is what I wish I had back then.

You can follow along on X where I share revenue, mistakes, and what's working.