The hardest part of building a SaaS isn't creating the product—it's getting people to use it.
Many founders spend months adding features, redesigning pages, and perfecting their product, only to realize that nobody knows it exists.
If I were starting from zero today, I'd focus on:
✅ Talking to potential users every day
✅ Sharing helpful content related to the problem my SaaS solves
✅ Answering questions in communities where my target customers spend time
✅ Collecting feedback from every new user
✅ Improving the product based on real customer needs
✅ Staying consistent, even when growth feels slow
The first 100 customers usually don't come from a single viral post. They come from hundreds of small actions repeated consistently.
For founders who have already crossed the 100-customer milestone:
What was the channel that brought you the most customers?
I'd love to hear your experience. 👇
Top comments (2)
The channel that surprised me most was partnering with people who already had my target audience's trust.
I tried cold outreach, content marketing, and community posts early on. Outreach got single-digit reply rates. Content took months to rank. Community posts worked, but one at a time.
What actually moved the needle was finding a handful of people (consultants, newsletter writers, small tool creators) who already talked to my exact customers daily. Not influencers with massive followings. People with 200-500 person audiences who were deeply trusted in a narrow niche.
The pitch was simple: I'll give you a generous cut of revenue for every customer you send my way, and you never have to do a sales call. Just mention the tool when someone asks about the problem it solves. Three of those relationships brought more signups in a month than six weeks of my own outreach combined.
The counterintuitive part: the smaller the partner's audience, the higher the conversion rate. A consultant who personally recommends your tool to 10 clients will convert 3-4 of them. A newsletter with 10,000 subscribers will convert maybe 5.
So my short answer: referral partnerships with people already in the room your customers are in. Not scalable at first, but each one compounds.
@mihirkanzariya
That's a great insight. I think many founders underestimate the value of trusted niche partnerships. A small audience that trusts the recommendation can often outperform a much larger audience with lower engagement. Thanks for sharing your experience.