Ask HN: One-man SaaS, how do you attract customers?
9 points by skwee357 7 hours ago
I'm struggling with attracting customers to my SaaS, while having to navigate the bullshit advice thrown around by so called "indie-hackers".
Paying for ProductHunt, or building a Twitter audience, probably works if you sell to other indie hackers. But when you have a product that is designed to solve a problem, like I do, I believe a different approach is needed.
I tried to build content around the service, to hit popular keywords, and while it works to some extent, it seems to die off quickly. I tried ads, but the CPC is too high, and since I don't operate on a subscription model it doesn't make economic sense. I also tried so-called passive marketing, i.e., monitoring keywords related to my service on, say, Reddit, and replying with a real (not-AI generated) reply with a link to my service, needless to say, I was banned.
So, one-man SaaS owners, how do you attract customers?
Forget ads, SEO, and social media. Everyone is so used to low-value content and spam that they won't pay attention. And even if your intent to sell your SaaS is legit, it is still spam when you are sending it into web sites that aren't interested.
Instead, think about who your audience really is - where else do they read, listen, and talk? In my experience, the best marketing happens when you can answer that question.
My favorite anecdote is that one of the successful SaaS companies I worked at grew in part due to radio ads on NPR. That worked because our market was education, and people who are professional educators tended to listen to NPR.
It can be that simple - if you reject online ads and presence as a marketing tool, what else is left? That is probably where to invest marketing dollars and energy. Be different, not part of the online noise.