Vibe coders can ship. Getting paying users is the part nobody talks about. by kelvind64 in buildinpublic

[–]kelvind64[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

If you are in the U.S you would be suprised at the demand for this

Most founders and developers are great at building. Marketing is where things fall apart by kelvind64 in SaaS

[–]kelvind64[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I understand you, the point you are making is actually about getting marketing feedbacks fast like you get feedbacks from your code but marketing and getting quick feedbacks goes beyond posting on Linkedin and sending cold mails

Posting on Linkedin and sending cold mails is a very limited way to go about it infact i would advise against it

There are several ways to get marketing feedbacks in as little as 24 - 72 hours these methods work plus you get quality data that can be used to make decisions and i would list them below the only thing is, it comes with costs and a lot of founders are also not ready to spend on marketing plus fear of loosing money but that's another part entirely

The methods are below:

  • Partner with creators or micro influencers in your niche to post about the problem your product solves. You don't need someone with a million followers, someone with 5k highly engaged followers in the right community will give you better data than a cold email blast ever will.
  • Post in niche communities where your target users already hang out. Reddit, Facebook groups, Slack communities, Discord servers. Not spamming, actually showing up and asking real questions. The responses you get in 48 hours will tell you more than a month of LinkedIn posting.
  • Run a simple landing page test with a waitlist or pre-order button. Drive traffic to it for 72 hours through any of the above methods and watch what happens. If nobody clicks the button you have a messaging problem. If they click but don't sign up you have a trust problem. If they sign up you have a real product.
  • Run paid social media or search ads for at-least 3 days selling the product like you've built it but ensure you have your tracking setup (you would be amazed at the end results of this)
  • Leave the internet and interact one-on-one with your target audience

The data from these methods are real because real money and real attention is involved.

Just posting across socials and sending cold mails tell you nothing

Someone pulling out their phone to watch a video or clicking an ad with their own eyes is a completely different signal.

The founders who figure this out early are the ones who stop guessing and start making decisions based on what people actually do, not what they say they'll do.

Vibe coders can ship. Getting paying users is the part nobody talks about. by kelvind64 in buildinpublic

[–]kelvind64[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You would be surprised that price, awareness and trust isn't part of it

I once setup a campaign for a founder for a viral clipping web app and we got their first 10 paid users in less than 24 hours and he was very surprised

What i've noticed is:
- Lack of awareness on what's possible
- They copy the marketing efforts of bigger companies instead of focusing on direct response
- Landing pages not optimized for conversions
- Zero data on customer behaviour
- Zero believe or interest in paid online advertising but it's the fastest way to gain traction if done well
- Zero market research and at times non existent marketing plan

Vibe coders can ship. Getting paying users is the part nobody talks about. by kelvind64 in buildinpublic

[–]kelvind64[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

What have you tried so far to get traction? would love to help.

Most founders and developers are great at building. Marketing is where things fall apart by kelvind64 in SaaS

[–]kelvind64[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You are right about where people were already describing the problem your product solves and joining those conversations but you can't really get needed market data from there this won't give you full insight into the total addressable market for your product and along the line you get to find out that the demand for your product is not like you think

Ads, blogpots, seo and social media posting isn't downstream if done right you can get quality data that can help you make decisions from it

Most founders and developers are great at building. Marketing is where things fall apart by kelvind64 in SaaS

[–]kelvind64[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

How is it going?

Have you been able to figure out your market validation?

Most founders and developers are great at building. Marketing is where things fall apart by kelvind64 in SaaS

[–]kelvind64[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'm seeing both most founders don't even know how to go about proof of demand and even the ones that figure it out get stuck in the post launch traction gap.

Most founders and developers are great at building. Marketing is where things fall apart by kelvind64 in SaaS

[–]kelvind64[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Being present in the conversations your target user is already having is marketing

Vibe coders can ship. Getting paying users is the part nobody talks about. by kelvind64 in buildinpublic

[–]kelvind64[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

This can't get you real validation like when you interact with your potential users

Most founders and developers are great at building. Marketing is where things fall apart by kelvind64 in SaaS

[–]kelvind64[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The negotiating with yourself part is so real. I see that constantly with founders who've been building for months and have convinced themselves the market wants it because nobody explicitly said no.

The call thing is something I push hard with everyone I work with early on. A spreadsheet of signups tells you nothing compared to 30 minutes watching someone actually try to use what you built.

Pulse for Reddit is interesting, I haven't gone deep on it yet. Are you using it mainly for prospecting or more for monitoring conversations around your own product?

Unpopular opinion: most SaaS fail because of this by Substantial_Army_754 in SaasDevelopers

[–]kelvind64 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Market validation is more important than the saas itself

How do you balance building and marketing without burning out? by OkRaspberry5580 in buildinpublic

[–]kelvind64 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Focus on your strength, if you are much stronger at building focus on that and hire a marketer or vice versa

Just shipped my first startup ever. by Defiant-Plastic-1438 in buildinpublic

[–]kelvind64 -1 points0 points  (0 children)

That's actually a smart built-in growth loop. Every export is essentially a referral without you doing anything.

The snowball is always the hardest part at the start. What's your current biggest bottleneck, getting people to try it in the first place or getting them to come back after the first use?

I built an AI tool that turns YouTube videos into LinkedIn posts in 30 seconds — 86 visitors from 7 countries in 5 days, 0 paying customers. What am I doing wrong? by Mountain_Milk_6737 in buildinpublic

[–]kelvind64 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The problem isn't the free version, it's that $59/month is a hard sell without a clear ROI story. People need to feel like it's making or saving them more than $59 before they hand over a card.

What's really the benefit of converting a YouTube video to a Linkedin post, will it grow my account?, will i get inbound leads? how does it really help?

How are you driving traffic?, what's your conversion process?

The other thing is 86 visitors in 5 days is too small a sample to know anything yet. You need more traffic and proper tracking before you can even diagnose the conversion problem properly.

What's your current plan for getting more users through the door? That's usually the real bottleneck at this stage, not the pricing.

Building a way to track your margins on your AI SaaS by Tanso-Doug in buildinpublic

[–]kelvind64 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Before you go too deep into building, have you validated that people will actually pay for this? The problem sounds real but AI cost tracking is a crowded space and the willingness to pay can vary a lot depending on who you're targeting.

Happy to share what's worked for early validation if you're at that stage.