guide
How to get your first 100 users
The first hundred users are the hardest, and they are almost never found through paid ads. They come from showing up in the handful of places where people are already looking for something like what you built. This guide covers the tactics that work, in the order that costs the least effort.
Start where people already look
Most makers start by announcing a product to their own small audience, which produces a handful of polite replies and no growth. The better first move is to put the product where strangers are actively hunting for tools: launch boards, niche directories, and the ShowBuild board itself.
These platforms work because they already have the intent you are missing. Someone browsing a directory for developer tools is not being interrupted by your product; they are looking for it.
Write the listing like a search result
A listing that reads like marketing copy converts badly. A listing that reads like the search result someone was hoping to find converts well. Name the job the product does, say who it is for, and lead with the concrete outcome rather than the technology.
Weak: “An AI-powered productivity platform for modern teams.” Strong: “Turns your meeting notes into a task list your team will actually read.” The second one tells a stranger whether they need it in one pass.
Go narrow, then widen
One community that genuinely cares will beat five that shrug. Pick the single place where your ideal user spends time, participate for a couple of weeks before you mention your product at all, and only then share it. You will get fewer visitors but a much higher share of them will stay.
Once a narrow channel works, repeat the same pitch in the next community rather than rewriting it. The message that converted in one place usually converts in a similar one.
Turn the first ten users into a loop
The first ten users matter less for revenue than for what they tell you. Ask each of them two questions: what were you doing before you found this, and what nearly stopped you signing up? The answers usually point at the one screen that is losing everyone else.
Comments and questions on your listing are a free version of the same feedback. On ShowBuild they are public, so they also serve as the kind of visible activity that makes a listing look alive to the next visitor.
Give the links time to work
A listing, a do-follow backlink, and a page on a working board keep earning after launch day. Unlike a single social post that disappears in an afternoon, they stay indexed and keep sending the occasional visitor. Treat each listing as a small, permanent shop window rather than a one-off announcement.