What’s the point of “build in public” if nobody’s watching?
by•
Everywhere I look, people say “build in public” to grow your product and audience. Sounds great… except when you’re starting from zero and literally nobody cares yet.
From what I’ve figured out, it’s less about getting likes right now and more about leaving a trail, progress updates, decisions you’ve made, even mistakes. Most of it will get ignored in the moment, but it builds a record that people can stumble on later.
Also, “public” doesn’t have to mean blasting it to Twitter. It could be small niche communities, Reddit threads like this, or a tiny newsletter.
Basically, don’t measure it by immediate engagement. Think of it as planting seeds for your future self.
Anyone here actually started with no audience and made “build in public” work? What did you do?
272 views
Replies
Super Intern
Build in public without audience is similar to building in private, so just keep building as long as privacy is not concerned. It may gain momentum gradually if you keep delivering good quality content. Choose the right channel if you have specific audience. That's the main job for PMF.
Exactly this — “build in public” isn’t about instant applause, it’s about building an archive that future followers, customers, and partners can binge later. At Growstack, we’ve seen founders go from crickets to traction simply because their early posts became a trust-building backlog when people finally discovered them.