Directory index · Guide · 50 stories
How 50 startups got their first users
We read 50 founders' own accounts of how they got their first users, customers or sales: blog posts, interviews, podcasts and forum threads. Each story below says what they did, the numbers they reported, a short quote and where to read the whole thing. The numbers are the founders' own; we haven't checked them.
Where the first users came from
32 of the 50 credit more than one channel. The most common were communities, social media, and word of mouth. Counting every channel each story credits:
| Channel | Stories |
|---|---|
| Communities | 16 (32%) |
| Social media | 13 (26%) |
| Word of mouth | 13 (26%) |
| Launch platforms | 12 (24%) |
| Cold outreach | 10 (20%) |
| A waitlist | 8 (16%) |
| Content marketing | 6 (12%) |
| Partnerships | 6 (12%) |
| Paid ads | 5 (10%) |
| Press | 5 (10%) |
| Something else | 5 (10%) |
| App Store search | 3 (6%) |
| SEO | 1 (2%) |
12 stories credit a launch platform, most often Hacker News (7) and Product Hunt (4). The results range widely, from thousands of users to a lot of visits and no customers. Their numbers are in the stories below.
We also collected 53 founders' reports of what a single launch brought them: visits, signups, customers and what they paid. They're on each platform's page: BetaList (20), Product Hunt (19), Hacker News (10), Peerlist (3), Fazier (2), There's An AI For That (2), Uneed (2), Dev Hunt (1), PeerPush (1), Launching Next (1), AlternativeTo (1).
None of the 50 credits a directory for its first users. Directories are better for links than for first users: how to raise your DR without wasting links.