How to Get Your First 100 Users
Your first 100 users usually come from work that does not scale: personal outreach, helpful answers in the communities your ideal customers already use, and onboarding each user yourself. Paid ads rarely work at this stage because you do not yet know which message converts.
By Javier Alonso, Founder & CEO. Updated .
Step by step
List where your ICP already gathers
Write down five specific places: named communities, forums, newsletters, events or search queries. Your ICP should make this list easy. If it does not, narrow the ICP.
Collect the phrases customers use
Read threads, reviews and interview notes and note how people describe the problem. Use their words in your posts and messages.
Be useful before you link
Answer questions, share a checklist or teardown, and help people solve the problem. Mention your product only when it genuinely completes the next step. Communities reward help and punish promotion.
Reach out one to one
Send short personal messages to people who match the ICP, referencing something specific about them. See cold email for startups.
Onboard every user yourself
Offer a short call, set things up with them and ask what they expected. Early users who get personal help activate more often and tell you what to fix.
Ask for one introduction
Once a user gets value, ask who else has the same problem. Referrals from happy users are the cheapest growth you will ever have.
Why unscalable work comes first
Paul Graham's essay "Do Things That Don't Scale" describes how many successful companies recruited their first users by hand. Manual work teaches you which message, channel and onboarding step actually work. Once you know that, you can automate and pay for it. Doing it in the opposite order spends money to learn slowly.
What to track
Use a tracked link for each channel and measure more than visits:
- Replies and conversations started
- Signups from people who match the ICP
- Activation: users who reach the core outcome
- Users active again a week later
- Referrals
Review the numbers weekly and put more time into the channel with the best activation, not the most clicks.
For SaaS products
For software, the same approach applies, with two additions. Offer a personal setup call for every early account, because activation is where most SaaS users drop off. And watch for the moment users first get value, then shorten the path to it. Your first 10 paying customers will teach you more than your first 1,000 free signups.
Example
A founder building a client portal for wedding photographers spends three weeks answering questions in two photographer communities and a popular forum. She shares a free contract checklist, messages 60 photographers whose posts mention client admin, and sets up every new account on a 15-minute call. Week by week she reaches 14, then 37, then 61 and then 102 users. Most come from the forum and from referrals, so she drops the other channels and doubles down there.
For your role
- Builders
- If you are still exploring an idea, these same steps double as validation: the people who respond are your earliest evidence.
Primary sources
- Do Things That Don't Scale — Paul Graham
Common questions
- How do startups get their first 100 users?
- Mostly through manual work: personal outreach, helpful participation in niche communities, hands-on onboarding and referrals, rather than paid ads.
- Should I run ads to get early users?
- Usually not first. Ads cost money before you know which message converts. Manual channels teach you that, and then ads become more efficient.
- Where do SaaS startups find their first users?
- In the communities, searches and networks where their ideal customers already ask about the problem, plus direct outreach and launch platforms once the message is clear.
- Should I launch on Product Hunt to get first users?
- Only if your audience is there and you have prepared. Many startups get more from niche communities first. See the Product Hunt launch guide.
Put it into practice
GTM Strategist recommends channels and messaging for reaching your first customers.