DemandThread

I stopped trying to sell a $99 report before anyone had experienced the product.

DemandThread now has a free feed: follow two subreddits and get two evidence-backed opportunities per day with the original threads attached.

I invited 20 previously contacted founders. Current result:

- 3 real registrations

- 1 activated feed

- 0 written feedback

So the problem is not pricing yet. It is getting founders to the first useful result.

I am looking for five founders willing to test one very specific flow:

1. Create a free account.

2. Choose two communities relevant to your market.

3. Inspect the first results.

4. Tell me which result was useful or confusing, and why.

No card, no sales call:

https://demandthread.com/sign-up?callbackUrl=%2Fdashboard

I launched DemandThread this week. It is not another SaaS subscription yet. I sell a $99 done-for-you market research report: repeated pain points from Reddit, source quotes, buyer context, failed workarounds, offer angles, and a 7-day validation plan.

I spent the first week doing manual founder outreach instead of buying ads.

The numbers:

- 31 personalized email attempts

- 1 real founder reply

- 0 sales

- several stale-address or receiving-server failures

- 2 useful public Indie Hackers replies published today

What did not work:

1. “Reddit demand signals for your product” was too abstract. The one founder who replied asked what they could actually do with the report. That exposed the positioning problem immediately.

2. “I need distribution” is not enough buying intent. Founders with a live product and a specific conversion or retention problem are much better prospects than people asking for generic growth help.

3. More volume does not fix a weak first message. A small batch of researched emails still fails if the recipient has to imagine the deliverable and outcome.

What improved:

- Lead with three market-specific pain clusters, not a generic research promise.

- Offer three concrete source threads and buyer wording before asking for a paid report.

- Target founders who have already published real numbers: zero customers, zero signups, failed renewals, or ad spend without revenue.

- Leave useful public analysis first. A relevant comment is a better introduction than another cold pitch.

What I am testing next:

I am considering narrowing DemandThread to one vertical until the first three sales, probably SaaS onboarding, retention, or failed-payment problems. The horizontal “research any market” offer may be making the service harder to understand.

If you were buying a $99 research report, what proof would you need before paying: a sample report, three source threads for your own market, a guarantee, or a narrower specialist positioning?

Sample report: https://demandthread.com/sample-report