Buying ads can be expensive and a waste of time early on, especially if you're still trying to figure out who your ideal customer is. Before opening up an Ads Manager or hiring a growth consultant, try a few of these strategies. The best part? The information you get from trying these out will help you run more successful ad campaigns in the future.
- Talk to your friends and colleagues
This seems like an obvious choice, but many early entrepreneurs can be afraid to share their idea with those closest to them. Sometimes, there are legitimate reasons (not wanting your job to find out you're starting a company), but other times the choice to not share an idea with or ask for a favor from with your close network is purely fear based. Try to get over that fear (you'll be doing scarier things as an entrepreneur) and ask those around you for introductions to anyone who might use your product. If you create content, you can also specifically ask them to like and share it - it's a nice, easy way for your circle to offer support.
- Launch on Product Hunt
If you're unfamiliar, Product Hunt is where tons of products make their debut every day. You post information about the company and are added to a list that refreshes every 24 hours. It can be hard to get to the top (there are plenty of articles with tips on successful launches), but even doing moderately well can get you some attention and traffic. If you're not feeling ready for a launch, check out their Upcoming Products list, which will help you build a waitlist.
- Speak on a podcast
Being interviewed on a podcast can be a fantastic way to get the word out about your company. Since you'll likely have 20-40 minutes of air time, you'll be able to go in-depth about topics that you wouldn't be able to with typical advertising. You'll also be able to show off your personality, which can be a great way to convince potential users to try out your product. Plus, there are great, free tools like Matchmaker.fm that can make finding a relevant podcast simple.
- Tap into relevant communities
Some of the more successful founders I've spoken with got a lot of their early success from finding small, niche communities and telling them about their product. Note that I said "telling them about" not "marketing to them." If you're going to get involved in a community, you need to be an active, value-adding member of the community, not a spammer. An easy way to find communities relevant to your potential customers is to check out Reddit, Slack and Discord, but keep in mind many communities may be on independent platforms as well.
As you start to experiment with these strategies, make sure to pay attention to what kinds of users are coming in from each one. Some of them will likely be "better" than others - more engaged, convert to paid users faster, etc. Do a deep dive into the profile of those users specifically. What do they have in common? This will help you start to form a picture of where it may make sense to start spending some money on marketing.
Want to talk through your (paid or unpaid) marketing strategy or about how to sort through the noise to find your target customer profile? Grab some time with me!