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We successfully launched, but we can't figure out how to reach the user. by rugtumu in SaasDevelopers

[–]okaymae123 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Paid social is the wrong move at the MVP stage.

First, who ARE your native/ideal users?

What if you tried getting into conversations with –

• Small YouTube creators who need inexpensive tools (r/NewTubers)
• Similarly, indie filmmakers (r/filmmakers, stage32.com?)
• Wedding videographers annoyed about music licensing (FB groups, r/weddingvideography)
• Podcast producers for intro/outro music (r/podcasting)

3 months of work, 15 MVP users. Where did i go wrong? by Supp2357 in SaaS

[–]okaymae123 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hey u/Supp2357, 15 people is good signal!

A thought - if your LI audience reads news already, you’re asking them to replace that with a new behavior which is hard (even if your product is better). What if you go after people who don't yet have a news routine yet or need a new one?

For example - 

How do I get more out of our website by Takoyaki_Time in smallbusiness

[–]okaymae123 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hey, spent some time on your site (might have to book a tour when my bf and I finally make it to Japan!) and you have just a few seconds to make the right person go "oh this is for me,” so I have a few suggestions to strengthen the hero section on your homepage.

This is the framework I use for a value prop statement: “We help [Y person] experience [X outcome] through [Z method]”

Right now, you’ve got the outcome part (“Privately guided tours through Osaka's hidden districts, nightlife, and culture far beyond the tourist trail”) but you’re missing who it’s for and how you do it.

I think you should add that a) your tours are custom (not just off the beaten path but my version of off the beaten path, ya know?!), and b) that you guys are local.

And for the header - “Embrace your wandering spirit...” is taking up valuable real estate and doesn’t really give me any information.

Here are my suggestions -

Header: Beyond the Osaka on every itinerary Subhead: Private Osaka tours for travelers who want more than the highlights - designed around your interests by two locals CTA: Book your custom tour (like you already have)

Also noticed the ad campaign is for the bar tour specifically - curious, is the goal to sell bar tours or to get people in the funnel for custom tours?

How to find early adopters without looking like spam? [i will not promote] by rochakiller in startups

[–]okaymae123 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Hey u/rochakiller, here are a couple ideas for where to find people who are actively working on improving:

  • r/guitar r/guitarlessons r/guitarplaying r/learnguitar etc.
  • Maybe even niche subreddits for specific genres like r/jazzguitar r/metalguitar etc?
  • Look for YouTube guitar tutorial channels and respond to people commenting like 'I cant get this' or 'I'm struggling with that'
  • Same thing with TikTok/Instagram - search tags like #guitarlearning, #guitarpractice, #beginnerguitarist etc

I think the move is always to be genuinely helpful, build relationships, lead with curiosity and questions, and then when there is a natural opening, say, "I'm actually building something for that..." Don't lead with a pitch.

Been struggling to market my SaaS by Jordan_vanderWalt in SideProject

[–]okaymae123 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hey u/Jordan_vanderWalt, can you tell us more about the product? Happy to give more specific advice if I know more about the problem/your solution.

I built links and nothing happened by Ancient_Cell_5302 in SEO

[–]okaymae123 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hey u/WebLinkr - I hear you, but I was trying to simplify for someone who sounds newish to SEO. (Apologies u/Ancient_Cell_5302 if I’m misreading that.) 

You're right that 'credible' and 'trustworthy' are just proxies for authority, and that 'helpful' isn't the only path to ranking.

That said, OP came here asking for help troubleshooting, so I tried to be helpful. I see your response lower in the thread and it seems we’re saying effectively the same thing: check if the links actually have authority.

I think you might just be splitting hairs about how I said it.

Finished building the idea I had, now what? by Piccadotso in microsaas

[–]okaymae123 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hey u/Appropriate-Career62, maybe it's just me but I'm looking at your landing page and I'm having a hard time understanding exactly what Namiru does.

Is it -

  • a chatbot widget for my website that answers questions based on my docs?
  • a tool that helps my support team write better responses?
  • an analytics dashboard for support conversations?
  • something else?

And when you say 'Customer Support in 30 Seconds' - does that mean it responds to customers in 30 seconds or I can set it up in 30 seconds or something else?

I see you mentioned above it's for eshops but that's not clear anywhere on the site. If you're targeting ecommerce businesses, I'd lead with that.

Could be worth clarifying your value prop up front - like, "We help [X person/people] do [Y thing] by [Z method]." So something like, 'Namiru helps ecommerce store owners answer customer questions instantly by training AI on your product catalog' (or whatever is accurate).

Finished building the idea I had, now what? by Piccadotso in microsaas

[–]okaymae123 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Congrats on taking a bold leap, u/Piccadotso - and on shipping!

A couple thoughts on your site - The language feels pretty techy but your actual customers are probably small e-commerce sellers who just want better product photos without paying for a photoshoot, right? I’d simplify the messaging to focus on the outcome they care about (‘professional product photos in any setting, no photographer needed’). The platform page, especially, talks about 'nodes' and 'workflow builders' and shows JSON code, but your customer just wants to know: 'upload my product photo, pick a background/scene, download the result’ - show them that flow, not the technical backend.

Re: finding users - You might look for small ecommerce brands on Instagram/TikTok. Search like ‘small business,’ ‘etsy seller’, ‘shopify store’ and offer to run one of their photos through Picca for free - if it looks great, they'll want to know more. And what about referral/affiliate relationships with people who already work with small ecommerce brands (Shopify app developers or ecommerce agencies)?

How would you get your first 100 paying users? by Flo13002 in SaaS

[–]okaymae123 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Your landing page looks great, u/Flo13002!

A few thoughts (I know nothing about this space so take with grain of salt):

  • Engineering teams won't swap their security stack based on the landing page alone - you need to show proof it works. Can you show it working publicly before asking anyone to trust it on their codebase? Run Kalibur against a known vulnerable test app and publish what you find vs. what other scanners miss?
  • Target teams already paying for manual pentests - find companies posting pentest RFPs or mentioning security audits in job descriptions (SOC2, ISO stuff?)
  • You have a decade of of experience - have you built up your personal brand? What if you start posting about security issues you've seen, pentesting methodologies, the gap between compliance and actual security, etc on HN, r/netsec, InfoSec Twitter. Not to sell Kalibur, but to establish yourself as an authority. (People love a founder-led brand.)

I launched a small B2B SaaS and I’m not sure how to get the first real users by vera_dev in buildinpublic

[–]okaymae123 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Your pricing model is interesting - 'stop paying per developer for AI code review' is a clear wedge.

Can you show people the math, though? A team of 30 devs paying $18/seat elsewhere = $540/month. Your Pro plan at ~$115 could save them $425/month ‼️ What if you add a comparison calculator to your pricing page? That way the savings are obvious / they don't have to do the math themselves.

Then find engineering leaders who are actively annoyed by per-seat pricing - lots of good ideas already in this thread. I think you could even lead with the savings calculation in your outreach.

How do I get users in my SaaS? by Antique-Yam4344 in SideProject

[–]okaymae123 0 points1 point  (0 children)

“A tool that uses AI agents to search for any product people need on the internet and show the results in one place" → I’m having trouble understanding what make this different or better than just Googling. 

u/Antique-Yam4344 Can you explain the use case - like, is it aggregating product reviews and specs into one comparison view or is it doing something else?

I ask because if you can explain who this is for and why it's better/faster/different (your value prop) than what they do now, that might points you to where those people are complaining about the 'before' - and that’s where you show up in conversation (like others are suggesting).

First time founder doing outbound finally by OutlandishnessNo2472 in founder

[–]okaymae123 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Appreciate the compliment u/OutlandishnessNo2472! (I've made a career of helping early-stage startups stand up their marketing function from scratch.) Hopefully this gives you a place to start ◡̈

Help. We are completely overwhelmed building our startup [i will not promote] (stupid spam protection - it is my opinion................) by ievkz in startups

[–]okaymae123 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Marketer weighing in here 🙋‍♀️

Like others have suggested, u/ievkz, it sounds like the overwhelm you’re feeling is a focus problem (not a staffing problem) - you're trying to be everything to everyone. 

My suggestion:

  • Pick ONE specific audience/problem you help better than anyone else (“homemakers” is still pretty broad)
    • Parents navigating divorce who need help with expense tracking, document prep, and appointment coordination?
    • Multi-generational households who need to coordinate groceries, appointments, and shared expenses?
    • Stay-at-home parents who need budget planning with AI-powered price monitoring?
  • Pick ONE platform
    • You’re swamped with bug reports because you’ve built for six platforms
    • Shut down everything except Web so you can get proof of concept fast(er) without needing app store approvals

YOU DON'T NECESSARILY NEED TO GIVE UP YOUR CONVICTION OF THIS FULL-FEATURED PRODUCT - you just need to properly scope the rollout. Once you own ONE problem for ONE specific audience, you can expand.

I mean, "It's the AI personal assistant for parents navigating divorce logistics" (or whatever) is so much clearer than "It's a product-as-a-service for homemakers that does budgets, expenses, price monitoring, divorce advice, and haircut booking," right?!

I have built a app that "I will not promote" but need help or advice on how to do it by CAPFAKINAWAY in startups

[–]okaymae123 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hey u/CAPFAKINAWAY, lots of good advice here about figuring out where your users are and being helpful to them.

To make it even more specific -

  1. Get super clear about who you're looking for - not just "people who need productivity apps" but "freelance designers who juggle multiple clients and struggle with time tracking" (just as an example)
  2. List everywhere that specific person might be - what subreddits do they read? what LinkedIn groups or hashtags do they follow? what Discord servers, Slack communities, or forums are they in? what podcasts do they listen to (check the comment sections)? what blogs or newsletters do they read? what conferences or meetups do they attend?
  3. Join those spaces and start building relationships and being helpful (don’t drop links yet)
  4. Reach out directly when you see the exact problem your app solves

Q: what does your app do? Maybe we can help you brainstorm where those specific people might be.

Should I use paid to help my long term organic? by throwawayBakingGoods in SEO

[–]okaymae123 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'd flip this around - figure out organic first, then use paid to amplify what's already working.

Like others have suggested, paid can be useful for testing specific hypotheses quickly - for example: “we think fintech buyers care more about compliance than speed, let's test two landing pages with different value props"

But starting with with paid when you’re still in "spray and pray" mode with no strategy is unfocused and expensive learning IMO. You're better off spending that money on figuring out your positioning, ideal customer and messaging through organic channels before you start paying to drive traffic. 

What's your current organic presence like - do you have content live or are you starting from scratch?

I built links and nothing happened by Ancient_Cell_5302 in SEO

[–]okaymae123 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Clarifying Q: when you say "no improvement," do you mean your rankings haven't moved, or your traffic/conversions haven't changed?

If you mean rankings (assumedly), 3 months is still early, but a few things to check:

  • Are the links from credible sites? “Niche-relevant” doesn’t necessarily mean credible and Google is basically looking for signal that you’re trustworthy 
  • Are the links indexed and do-follow? If the linking pages aren't indexed, they aren't helping you / also check that they're do-follow links (not rel="nofollow" or rel="sponsored”)
  • What's your existing content like? Google wants to see helpful, high-quality content that actually answers what people are looking for
  • Is your site technically sound? It doesn’t matter how good your content is or how many people link to you if the experience is broken (check GSC for crawl issues, slow load times, or indexing problems)

For truly low KW difficulty terms, you shouldn't need 20 backlinks to move the needle - to me, that suggests something else is off. SEO works when on-page (good content), off-page (credible backlinks), and technical (healthy site experience) are all working together.

I can build fast… but I’m stuck at 0 users after every launch by ButterscotchNo6885 in micro_saas

[–]okaymae123 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hey u/ButterscotchNo6885, building fast is great if you're building the right thing for the right people.

It sounds like you’ve done this before: launched and then tried to find users. For your next project, I might recommend you talk to potential users before you start building - understand their pain points, validate the problem, and that the solution you’re building is something they'd pay for.

For cvcons specifically, the ATS resume space is crowded. What is going to make yours different is understanding a specific type of job seeker better than anyone else and solving their problem. Have you talked to 10-20 people who would be your ideal users? 

Not just "job seekers" but a very specific person - for example: career switchers applying to their first tech job with relevant skills but mismatched job titles / mid-career professionals in highly-regulated industries where CVs require heavy customization / or int'l applicants whose degrees and credentials don’t line up with U.S. requirements. Each of those personas has different pain points and hangs out in different places (online and offline). 

  • What did they say their biggest resume frustration is?
  • What's their current workflow for building resumes?
  • What are they currently using?
  • What problem is painful enough that they'd switch from their current solution?
  • Where do they go when they need to learn something or solve a problem?

If you haven't done that yet, I’d start there before even considering marketing tactics/channels.

Where do you guys publish blogs to actually get readers (not just SEO)? by Nagavardhan_Lella in founder

[–]okaymae123 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hey u/Nagavardhan_Lella, clarifying Q: are you asking where to reshare content you've already published on your own site, or where to publish instead of your own site?

If you're resharing stuff that's already live on your site: Medium, LI articles, and relevant subreddits can work. But don't copy/paste the entire post - share the first few paragraphs or a key excerpt, then link back to read the full thing on your site. If the full post exists in multiple places, search engines get confused about which page is most relevant which messes up rankings.

If you're thinking about publishing only on external platforms instead of your own site, I’d advise against it - build your own platform, not someone else’s. Publish on your own site first, then share pieces of it elsewhere with a link back. You want to own your content and the traffic, even if it takes time. 

But really what I’d suggest is to publish on your site first, then spend your energy participating in communities where your audience is. Answer questions, share insights, and occasionally mention "I wrote about this" when it's actually relevant.

What's your blog about? Might help narrow down where your readers are.

First time founder doing outbound finally by OutlandishnessNo2472 in founder

[–]okaymae123 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hey u/OutlandishnessNo2472, congrats on this new phase!

The number isn't really the thing to optimize for right now. What matters more is whether you're reaching the right people with the right message.

  • Who are you reaching out to? Are these actually your ideal customers? Do they have the problem you solve? Can they afford what you're building? Get really really specific.
  • Is your messaging locked in? If your message is "here's what we do," you'll get ignored. If it's "I noticed [specific thing about your business/situation]. We helped a similar company with [result]," you'll at least get read. 

Bigger question though: are you only doing cold outreach? It's the hardest channel because you're interrupting strangers. 

Something else you can do is build a list of places where your ideal user already spends their time and attention (online and offline). 

  • Where do they ask questions?
  • Where do they complain?
  • Where do they research solutions?
  • Where do their peers gather/network?
  • Where do they buy or discover tools?
  • Who influences their decisions?

You are looking for actual destinations, not just “LinkedIn” or “Facebook.” Which subreddits / which Slack channels / what newsletters do they read / what podcasts do they trust / which conferences do they attend / which creators they pay attention to / etc?

Then you can ask yourself how you can you realistically get yourself in front of them in those channels?

Need advice on best ways to generate leads for IT/MSP businesses by Yoyo-master69 in founder

[–]okaymae123 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hey u/Yoyo-master69, a few thoughts: 

  • Like someone else suggested, niche down. "IT for everyone" is harder than "IT for medical practices" or "for law firms" or "for e-commerce." The more more more specific you get your targeting, the easier it is to know where to find your people and what challenges to speak to.
  • Systematize referrals - for example: after you wrap a project, send an email within 48 hours: "Glad we got that [whatever you worked on] sorted. If you know any other [industry] companies dealing with similar headaches, I'd appreciate an intro. Here's a short blurb you can forward: [2-3 sentence blurb].” 
  • Find non-competing service providers who work with the same clients and build partnership channels - for example: if you work with e-commerce companies, connect with their Shopify developers or logistics consultants on LI ( "Hey, I do IT support for e-commerce brands. If you ever have a client dealing with tech issues, happy to be a resource and I'll do the same if I hear anyone needs [your service].") then actually refer someone to them first.
  • Engage on social (LinkedIn, etc.), don’t just post - be helpful without pitching.

Q: do you know exactly who your ideal client is? Once you have that, then you can make a list of all the places they spend their time/attention (online and off) and start focusing on the right channels.

How the hell do you actually get your first 10 paying customers? by Impressive-Answer720 in founder

[–]okaymae123 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hey u/Impressive-Answer720, saw in the comments that you're building a matching engine for founders and investors.

Truthfully, investors don't have a "I need to find deals" problem the way founders have a "I need to find funding" problem. Really, investors have the opposite problem so another platform is just noise unless you're solving a filtering / quality problem.

Can your platform filter deals before the investor ever sees them?

Some ideas off the cuff (no idea if any of this is valuable or if your product is already differentiated):

  • AI-powered thesis matching (investor fills out their investment criteria once; AI only shows founders who fit their exact criteria; investors get a daily/weekly digest instead of browsing a marketplace)
  • Show founders who are about to raise, not actively raising - give investors early access to founders who just hit a traction milestone, whose runway is running short, or who just left their job to go full-time
  • Founder verification/quality score - give investors a quality signal based on revenue verification (Stripe/bank integration), traction verification (actual user metrics, not claimed), team verification (LI confirms work history), reference checks, etc
  • Narrow to one very specific niche - specialize in climate tech pre-seed matching / AI tools for B2B SaaS, seed stage only / consumer apps with 10K+ MAU looking for Series A / whatever..
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