Where did your first 10 users actually come from?
I'm Shun, the maker of Ownfeed.
We launched here today, and I want to use this thread to learn from you, not to pitch.
Here's the pattern I kept running into with my own projects: I
'd build something, post the launch, and nobody would come. The only thing that reliably worked was finding people who were already describing my problem on Reddit or X, and replying to them in my own words. Not a DM, not a pitch. Just an honest answer with "I built something for this" at the end.
That's why Ownfeed is a feed instead of an alert inbox or an auto-reply bot. You paste your URL, it reads Reddit, X, Bluesky and Hacker News, and keeps only the posts where your product actually helps. You still write every reply yourself.
What I'd love to hear from other makers:
1. Where did your first 10 users actually come from? Not where you tried, but where they came from.
2. If you reply to strangers' posts, what makes a reply land instead of getting ignored or removed?
3. Is there a community (a subreddit, a Discord, a forum) that was unexpectedly good for you?
I'll share what I see in our own data as it comes in, and I'll answer every reply here.
Replies
Congratulations on the launch Shun Really solid approach. with spam bots ruining standard outreach keeping the human touch is key.
one on one DMs with first 10 users on X and niche founders Slack groups. no hype just manual outreach.
how to make repliies hit the mark: Solve 90% of their problem in the comment itself. People trust it if it is very helpful without the click. Also, a quick full disclosure I built this helps.
Surprising community: private slack groups for indie hackers - way better engagement than public subreddits.
Supporting Ownfeed today
@nabeel_cheema070795 Thank you!
"Solve 90% of the problem in the comment itself" is the bar I'm holding myself to — Ownfeed only finds the thread, the reply still has to earn it. Agreed on the disclosure too.
The private Slack groups point is new to me. Any you'd recommend for indie hackers?
@shun_build Thanks, Shunsuke exactly the tools should expose the opportunity but the human touch closes it.
for slack communities here are a few good ones for indie hackers & founders:
Indie Hackers Micro SaaS Slack good for early validation and real feedback.
mind the Product good if you want to read about product led growth.
Demand Curve high Signal Growth & Marketing Talk
Wip.co cool maker community about shipping daily.
The trick with Slack is to get into sub channels like feedback or showcase where founders are asking for tool recommendations. Hope you have a great launch
@nabeel_cheema070795
This is gold, thank you. All four are new to me — I've been living in Reddit and HN and hadn't looked at Slack communities at all.
The "feedback / showcase sub-channel" tip is exactly the kind of thing I wouldn't have figured out on my own.
Bookmarked all four. Appreciate you taking the time on launch day.
Does Ownfeed show how fresh a post is? A reply on a day-old thread feels late, so I'd want to catch the new ones first...
@oliver_graf1 Thanks for the question! Yes — every post shows its age (3h, 2d…). What it can't do yet is sort or filter by it; the feed is ranked by relevance today. "Newest first" and a "last 24h" filter are coming, for exactly the reason you describe.
We haven't launched yet, so no first ten to report. What's worked best so far for getting noticed is close to what you describe: replying to people every day, long before asking for anything. Curious, how many of your first ten came from a single reply?
@farzam_habibi Thanks Farzam! Honestly, none of them came from one big reply — it was more like one person at a time, and most of them from a thread I'd replied to days or weeks earlier. The daily habit mattered far more than any single comment. Sounds like you're already doing the right thing — good luck with the launch!
Fair point! I've found the daily habit is the bit that compounds, a useful reply can turn into a conversation days later. Did any one community keep producing once the launch attention faded?
@matheus_paranhos1 Yes, but not the big ones. r/SaaS and r/startups spiked with the launch and went quiet. The ones that kept producing were smaller, problem-shaped subs like r/SideProject and r/smallbusiness. Someone posts "I'm stuck with X" there every day, so there's always a fresh thread to actually help in.
Bonus: Reddit threads stay searchable for months, so a reply from week 3 still sends people over in week 10. X replies die in a day.
Which one stayed warm for you after Toone's launch?
I don't have 10 yet. Everyone on Top10Q so far is someone I already talk to, and the one who stayed is the person who told me yesterday's tasks were still on today's list. No community sent them.
@mostafahosseini That's a real answer, and I think it's the most common one nobody says out loud: the first users are people you already talk to, and the one who stays is the one who complained.
Same here, honestly. The user who found my launch-day bug is the one I now hear from most. A bug report might be the strongest retention signal there is.
@shun_build Same — I'll take the complainer over a silent signup. That person caught the midnight reset bug and is still the only one I talk to about Top10Q every week. Bug reports beat vanity metrics for me right now.
On the reply part I would give one step they can actually try before mentioning a tool
And skip the link if they already solved the problem
A relevant thread is not always someone looking to buy
With Beat AI, we haven’t verified new first uploads from our recent posts. I’m now asking for one task—enter a photo—and tracking that separately from views. Did your successful replies ask for a specific task, or just invite people to explore?