Finding your first customer.
My takeaways on how two Indie Hackers found their first customers.
Every first-customer story is unique — with some core overlapping themes. I asked Indie Hackers how they found their first customers to see what I can take-away and learn. These two are the best answers I received.
@linstobias from splitbee.io
He messaged companies where he knew someone and asked if they need an analytics & A/B tool. He quickly found his first lead. They scheduled a call and after a 10-minute demo, they were blown away and wanted to move forward.
The company used the free plan for a month until everything was setup. He got great feedback and feature requests that could be implemented immediately. After a one month free trial, the company subscribed because everything they were missing had been added to Splitbee.
My takeaways:
- Ask people what they want or need and then tell them about your product — they can’t use your product if they don’t know about it.
- As with everything — first impressions matter. Once people know about your product they have to be blown away.
- Listen to your users. Get feedback & iterate.
@Deepak910k from habitate.io
He found his customer even before he built the product. By talking to a group of people about a problem he was trying to solve, he got his first group of potential users.
They wanted the product right away and was ready to start as soon as he had the first version of the product.
He kept them in the loop of what’s happening and as soon as he had something (which was still buggy) showed it to them and one of them decided to buy.
My takeaways:
- Talk to people. Brainstorm. Ideas need to move through people to evolve.
- Keep potential users in the loop. Eventually, it will be their feedback that makes the product great.
- Just ship.
Cheers,
Hessel from Fifty
Find me on Twitter & Indie Hackers
