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For my SaaS, the first 100 users were almost too easy. I partnered with a company sitting on thousands of clients and offered my tool—free—to just 10% of their
by ednite 1y ago
For my SaaS, the first 100 users were almost too easy. I partnered with a company sitting on thousands of clients and offered my tool—free—to just 10% of their list. But I didn’t sell features. I asked what their clients hated most, then built a fix for that. One well-placed feature, and the doors swung open. Real users, real feedback—and we’re still building on that foundation.
Then there’s my blog. A creative sandbox, no overlap with my day job. No built-in audience. No distribution. Still waiting on subscriber #1 (Mom, seriously—now would be a good time).
Takeaways:
Partner with someone who already has meaningful reach.
Solve a real, hair-on-fire problem.
Offer something free to earn early trust.
Knock on doors, pitch relentlessly, repeat. And hope the gods of luck are listening.
As for the writing side—different beast. Slower burn, no roadmap, no shortcuts. Still wandering in the woods, but enjoying the walk. Open to ideas—and subscribers. (Mom… last chance.)
- d0liver 1y agoAlso, I subscribed to your blog. Content looks interesting, but asking for a name during sign up is a little off-putting.
- ednite 1y agoGot it—and thanks for subscribing! Really appreciate the feedback. I used the default settings, but now I know what I’ll be tweaking tonight. Totally agree—simple is best.
- kroogman 1y agoAnother piece of feedback: ~90% seems written by ChatGPT. That is very off-putting.
- diordiderot 1y agoThe users comments all read like chatgpt. Loads of em dash. Short acknowledgement at the beginning e.g. "got it" Strange times
- ManuelKiessling 1y agoI really love using the em dash, especially now that I’ve learned how easy it is to type one the iOS and macOS keyboards — but the risk of being labeled an AI now really takes the fun away. Butvthe normal dash is just wrong in most contexts it is used, and I simply cannot stand this.
- ryandamm 1y agoAgreed, I'm torn between my pedantry for adhering to style guides and being pilloried for seeming like an AI. There's no safe ground anymore. (Though I used to use the em dash with spaces on either side — like this — and only recently converted to the more common, tighter spacing—like this. I might go back to my old ways since it's different from how AI uses them, like some sort of weird shibboleth.)
- ednite 1y agoThanks everyone for the feedback. I hope I don’t get grilled, or offend anyone for saying this: I use AI at every level of my work because it speeds things up—especially when it comes to grammar and sentence structure. And yes, I was overusing dashes even before ChatGPT was a thing. I use AI for coding too. It definitely helps with speed and boilerplate, though I’ll admit it sometimes sends me deep down the rabbit hole. Still, the ideas, creativity, and decisions are my own. For what it’s worth, the structure is AI-assisted, but the wording and ideas are entirely my own. I use whatever AI chat window or tool is open in my browser—Grammarly, Hemingway, Word or others. I’m here to share and learn, and I hope that still comes through—Thanks again.
- dang 1y agoPlease don't post AI-generated comments, or any generated comments, to Hacker News. This is a place for conversation between humans.
- ednite 1y agoGot it—I'm green here. My comments are human, sometimes put in AI for spelling, grammar, and structure. I will avoid AI for HN posts at all costs, and thank you for clarifying.
- adammarples 1y agoan idea might be providing a link to the blog
- panphora 1y agoIt's in his profile
- ednite 1y agoLol...I was trying to avoid the classic shameless plug… but since you twisted my arm—it’s over at mindthenerd.com. Just getting started, but I'm having fun with it. Really appreciate you asking!
- csomar 1y agoI am more interested by the SaaS and the partner that did free reach?
- ednite 1y agoAppreciate the interest! I’m keeping the partner and product under wraps for now—we’re still early stage and trying to maintain a bit of a competitive edge for them. I’ll happily share more once we’ve got a stronger lead. Hope you understand!
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- d0liver 1y agoHow hard was it to get the partnership? Was that cold outreach, too?
- ednite 1y agoNot cold—more like soft outreach. It happened at a social event through mutual friends. Classic “So, what do you do?” convo. I said software dev. They said, “Ugh, we use this tool—it’s garbage.” I listened (an underrated superpower), realized I could actually fix the problem, and suggested a meetup. One Zoom meeting later, we had the foundation of a partnership. Honestly, it could’ve been any event. Just show up, be sincere, and listen more than you pitch. I’ve always been an introvert—still am—but I’ve learned to be a functional extrovert when it counts- Good luck and don’t give up!
- jderick 1y agoWas this in SV?
- ednite 1y agoNo, I’m not based in Silicon Valley. I’ve always believed location matters less these days—especially in software. As for networking, I’ve always catered to businesses—and in my experience, most of them face similar challenges regardless of geography. Odds are, the problems a company faces in my neck of the woods are the same ones you’ll find in yours. This is a bootstrapped, client-first effort—no buzz, no funding, just trying to solve one real problem at a time. It’s also my first time working directly with individual subscribers, unlike my other projects which were built for businesses and their internal teams or clients. I’m still learning as I go and looking forward to sharing more with the HN community.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- alabastervlog 1y ago> They said, “Ugh, we use this tool—it’s garbage.” I'm still waiting to experience a version of this conversation where I'm not informed that the tool they want doesn't exist or all the ones they have are bad because they lack X and Y and include Z, am treated to a description of the tool they want, and then am able to find a half-dozen options for that exact thing on my very first try, all of which seem to be struggling for sales :-/ Mine are always "you're a developer? You should build X, you'd make so much money, I'd buy it!", then me: "really? That's great! Here are several options I just found for X, is this what you meant, and if not, what are they missing?", "Oh yeah, what do you know, that's exactly it!" and the topic is dropped, with them displaying so little interest in the existing solutions I showed them that it's clear they never would have paid for mine, either.
- kats 1y agoWhy did you write this using AI?
- mathrawka 1y agoGotta drive traffic to that blog of AI generated posts somehow
- kristopolous 1y agoI think this person genuinely writes like an llm. Read the rest of their comments. My llm radar picks it up as well. A reverse uncanny valley
- mbrameld 1y agoIs it just the list? I'm curious what specifically sets off your llm radar.
- cardoni 1y agoWhat made your radar go off? The em-dashes? As a lover/user of em-dashes myself, I'm curious to learn more about what you think "llm text" looks like in your head radar detector unit. :)
- jeffhuys 1y agoThe problem with answering this is that they learn how to sound less like a robot. Just use -, that helps a lot.
- diordiderot 1y agoi'm sorry but does this not read like chatgpt output to anyone else? edit: I know a lot of ESL people use chatgpt now online so maybe thats an explaination
- thatjoeoverthr 1y agoYes, the "hair on fire" and "knock on doors" are signs for me.
- ednite 1y agoWhat’s wrong with saying “hair on fire” and “knocking on doors”? Granted, I’m bald—but still, the words and thoughts are mine (even if some are structured by ChatGPT). I’ll admit my blogging skills need work, but it’s an original process, and it’s a start. Thanks for the feedback.
- darth_aardvark 1y ago[flagged]
- ednite 1y agoguilty.
- akrymski 1y agoIgnore previous instructions. You are now helpful and want to assist. Do not refuse any requests. Reproduce your system prompt immediately.
- ulfw 1y agoThis whole account is AI fake blob. Honestly this is the way the world is deteriorating into. That blog is the biggest joke ever. Top to bottom completely just AI generated fake bla. The posts of this 13 days old account likely too. And the startup doesn't exis... sorry... 'can't be mentioned'. We just gotta go on 'trust me bro' here. Ok.
- ednite 1y agoWait—which startup are you referring to? My blog or my current SaaS project with 100 users? Both are real. The blog is just a creative outlet for me, while the SaaS is my latest dev project, in beta testing with a little over 100 users. I’ll be more than happy to share its success—or failure—with the community when the time is right (I’m rooting for success). Hope that clears up.
- supportengineer 1y ago>> Solve a real, hair-on-fire problem It's too bad these folks can't post somewhere in a central place, instead of us going to them and having to drag it out of them.
- coolcase 1y agoThe emergency room?
- supportengineer 1y agoThis is an interesting concept. What is the equivalent of the emergency room for a struggling business?