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Ask HN: How are you acquiring your first hundred users?

559 points amanchanda | 20 comments | 13 May 25 08:41 UTC | HN request time: 1.305s | source | bottom

I am building a B2C AI SaaS with $50/month price. How would you go about getting with first 100 users and then the next 500 users.

What we are currently doing: 1) Cold outreach to power users - to convert them into affiliates. 2) Cold outreach to individuals who have target ICP communities. 3) SEO for more long term (not for the first 500)

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ednite ◴[13 May 25 14:09 UTC] No.43973175[source]▶
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.)
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1. kats ◴[13 May 25 17:53 UTC] No.43975727[source]▶
Why did you write this using AI?
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2. mathrawka ◴[13 May 25 18:11 UTC] No.43975926[source]▶
Gotta drive traffic to that blog of AI generated posts somehow
3. kristopolous ◴[13 May 25 18:15 UTC] No.43975968[source]▶
I 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

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4. mbrameld ◴[13 May 25 18:22 UTC] No.43976040[source]▶
Is it just the list? I'm curious what specifically sets off your llm radar.
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5. cardoni ◴[13 May 25 18:23 UTC] No.43976044[source]▶
What 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. :)
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6. jeffhuys ◴[13 May 25 18:24 UTC] No.43976060[source]▶
Look at his blog. 0 spelling error, 2 big articles in 1 day. A LOT of —…

This is just an LLM. I would be surprised if this guy writes like this.

Why do you think he’s NOT an LLM?

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7. jeffhuys ◴[13 May 25 18:25 UTC] No.43976074{3}[source]▶
The problem with answering this is that they learn how to sound less like a robot.

Just use -, that helps a lot.

8. jeffhuys ◴[13 May 25 18:27 UTC] No.43976093{3}[source]▶
There are so many little things that sets it off. And this… person? sets off 90% of them.
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9. electroly ◴[13 May 25 18:28 UTC] No.43976098[source]▶
I think they are simply typing on their phone. On an iPhone, three dots and a space becomes the Unicode ellipsis, two hyphens becomes an em dash, apostrophes and quotes become curvy, letters are capitalized automatically. These things are not only easy to type, but hard not to type. I think they just really, really like em dashes. Not even ChatGPT uses them so frequently.
10. ◴[13 May 25 19:47 UTC] No.43976881{3}[source]▶
11. kristopolous ◴[13 May 25 20:15 UTC] No.43977199{3}[source]▶
Information density. LLMs are great at stringing words together but don't pack ideas tightly.

Also there's the personality. I've talked with chatgpt enough...

I'm open to the entire account being an agent. That's certainly possible.

There's a new market for astroturfing virality. Create hundreds of agents on various sites and have them engage in pablum and occasionally mention your product.

We're entering a phase where you can't just have a dumb model to filter that out

12. ◴[13 May 25 20:17 UTC] No.43977216{3}[source]▶
13. mbrameld ◴[13 May 25 20:21 UTC] No.43977256{3}[source]▶
I don't know about his blog since this is a thread about whether or not his comment is AI-generated, but I ran his comment through GPTZero and it reports it's confident the comment is entirely human. I asked Claude to summarize his comment and ran that summary through GPTZero and it reported it was confident that it's entirely AI-generated. Maybe the comment didn't set of my llm radar because I didn't draw conclusions about the comment by looking at the blog, which very well might be 100% AI-generated.
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14. mbrameld ◴[13 May 25 20:23 UTC] No.43977282{4}[source]▶
Too many to list even 1?
15. ryandamm ◴[13 May 25 22:50 UTC] No.43978647{3}[source]▶
Wait... not having spelling errors is now a mark of AI?

Am I the only person who proofreads emails anymore?

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16. zahlman ◴[13 May 25 23:44 UTC] No.43979125{4}[source]▶
> Wait... not having spelling errors is now a mark of AI?

When you output long blog articles more than daily, it is. Proofreading takes time, and someone who cares enough to proofread will probably care enough to put in more time on other things that an LLM wouldn't care about (like information density, as noted in another comment; or editing after the fact to improve the overall structure; or injecting idiosyncratic wit into headings and subheadings).

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17. ednite ◴[14 May 25 00:50 UTC] No.43979547{4}[source]▶
Ok. I’m left speechless—but I can only comment that I’m trying to be genuine—obviously failing at an alarming rate! Yes, my blogs are edited with ChatGPT or whichever AI tool I have open, but my words and experience are my own, for what it’s worth—again, I am not an LLM agent. To be fair, I sometimes think ChatGPT writes like me. Where’s Sam when you need him? (Tasteless joke.)
18. ednite ◴[14 May 25 01:50 UTC] No.43979877[source]▶
"A reverse uncanny valley" I had to look that up, so embarrassing (especially from a tech nerd). Thank you for pointing that out, i will definitely focus less on perfection and be less worried about tyypos from now on— genuinely NOT being sarcastic and sincerely appreciate the feedback.
19. ednite ◴[14 May 25 02:43 UTC] No.43980189{3}[source]▶
I hope I don’t get banned from HN—I really like it here. Not kidding.

I write a lot (maybe too much, some might say). I actually spent last weekend writing 10k words for self-help book that just popped in my mind - and yes, i trust me i did more than 2 big articles in one day, just haven't published them yet and to be frank, i'm a little worried now.

For full transparency: yes, I used ChatGPT, Grammarly, and Hemingway to assist with the writing structure, grammar and spelling. Not originality and wording. It just helps me move faster and keeps the flow going.

Will my book be a bestseller? Doubt it—it’s my first. Will anyone read it? No clue. Maybe if it’s free. Was it worth my time instead of coding? Absolutely. It cleared my mind and shifted my focus—something I think everyone should try at least once. So yeah, maybe I do write like ChatGPT... but one could also say ChatGPT writes like me. Anyway, like i said, I hope I don’t get banned—I really do like it here.

20. ednite ◴[14 May 25 03:06 UTC] No.43980324{5}[source]▶
Please take no offense—I genuinely want to understand. I agree that my blog needs work, especially with less fluff and more value—i'm working on that.

I guess where I’m coming from is this: why is it assumed that using tools like AI or Grammarly takes away from the creative process? For me, they speed up the mechanical side of things—grammar, flow, even structure—so I can spend more time on ideas, storytelling, informing, or just getting unblocked.

I do get frustrated when ChatGPT changes my wording or shifts the meaning of what I’m trying to say. It can definitely throw a wrench into the overall story. But in those cases, I rephrase my prompt, asking it not to touch the narrative or my word choices, just to act like a word processor on steroids or an expert editor.

I’m not saying these tools replace a good human editor—far from it. If I ever get to the point where I can work with a real editor or proof reader and so on, I’d choose the human every time. But until then, these tools help me keep the momentum going—and I don’t see that as a lack of care.

On the contrary, it often takes me more time to get the output right—because I’m trying to make sure it still reflects exactly what I want to say and express.

Maybe it’s just a different kind of process?