How to get first paying customers without an audience
Reaching the right people is difficult when you lack a large social-media following or a big advertising budget. This bottleneck leaves founders struggling to secure initial paying customers and get their business off the ground.
What the numbers show
Counted from the threads quoted below. How we count
- People have been saying this in most months since September 2026.
- This comes up 29.7× more often in r/smallbusiness than across the site as a whole.
What people tried
Every workaround mentioned in the threads below. We haven’t tested any of them — and nobody here is claiming they worked.
Found another way around this?
Share your steps and trade-offs so fellow engineers don't have to reinvent the wheel. No account required.
- 1participating in relevant online communitiesDid this help you?
- 2creating useful contentDid this help you?
- 3Posting in beginner communitiesDid this help you?
- 4Finding people who already want to learn, answering questions, and reaching out individually to offer the app for feedbackDid this help you?
- 5Trying different ideas or suggestions from other business ownersDid this help you?
- 6trying to target solo practitioners or really small firms who are frustrated with big CRM providers and more open to new toolsDid this help you?
- 7Asking existing contacts or clients to try out the app in their portalsDid this help you?
- 8Reaching out to friends, family, and personal networksDid this help you?
- 9Asking happiest customers for quotes and using their exact phrasing in marketing copyDid this help you?
- 10Conducting customer discovery and market demand researchDid this help you?
- 11Focusing on product-market fit to generate word-of-mouthDid this help you?
- 12Posting regularly on social media platformsDid this help you?
- 13Running small-budget Google AdsDid this help you?
- 14Visiting local businesses or funeral directors in person to pitch servicesDid this help you?
- 15talking to peopleDid this help you?
- 16asking about a pilotDid this help you?
- 17Trying outreach in Facebook groupsDid this help you?
- 18Asking on forums like Reddit for advice on client acquisition channelsDid this help you?
- 19Asking experienced business owners on forums for adviceDid this help you?
- 20Selling on platforms like Gumroad or EtsyDid this help you?
- 21Exploring niche marketplacesDid this help you?
- 22Reaching out directly to other ownersDid this help you?
- 23Switching to cold callingDid this help you?
- 24Offering a free marketplace listing without software usageDid this help you?
- 25Asking shop owners how they currently run thingsDid this help you?
- 26Listing products on eBayDid this help you?
- 27Posting content on TikTokDid this help you?
- 28Relying on local networking and referralsDid this help you?
- 29Building relationships with bankers, payroll companies, and wealth advisorsDid this help you?
- 30Joining business networking groups like BNIDid this help you?
- 31Relying on store location, window displays, and word of mouthDid this help you?
- 32Setting up and fully updating a Google Business ProfileDid this help you?
- 33Asking satisfied customers to leave online reviewsDid this help you?
- 34Becoming a parcel pickup point to drive foot trafficDid this help you?
- 35Implementing a physical loyalty card systemDid this help you?
- 36Partnering with non-competing neighboring shops for cross-recommendationsDid this help you?
- 37Switching from online outreach to in-person networking at local eventsDid this help you?
- 38Making detailed product videos on free platforms like TikTok or Pinterest.Did this help you?
- 39Sending products to friends and recording their reactions for social media.Did this help you?
- 40Selling to people you already know or small communities you are already part of.Did this help you?
- 41Focusing consistently on a single social media platform where the target audience hangs out.Did this help you?
- 42setting up a Google business profile and asking early customers for reviews before spending on adsDid this help you?
- 43Reading articles and watching videos online.Did this help you?
- 44Asking questions publicly on forum threads instead of seeking private mentor calls.Did this help you?
- 45Visiting local wholesale markets in person instead of relying on online B2B directories.Did this help you?
- 46finding one or two online spaces where my target people already hung out and just being a regular thereDid this help you?
- 47making the app shareable or having some built-in reason for people to show it to a friendDid this help you?
- 48direct outreach - like 10-15 straight to people who'd actually use it, super plain and shortDid this help you?
In their words
Unedited, grouped by where they were said, most upvoted first within each place, each linked to the thread it came from.
“The website has been live for a few weeks and I haven't had a single customer yet.”source ↗
“My question is: how can i monetize this?”source ↗
“The real problem is: Who would use this in the Dallas Fort Worth area? Construction site? Wedding? How does one advertise this and where?”source ↗
“I don't know how to start. Can someone please advise me?”source ↗
“reaching the right customers is proving to be an entirely different challenge.”source ↗
“I don’t have a large social-media following or a big advertising budget.”source ↗
“The part I didn’t expect: almost total silence. Consistent posting, hundreds of cold emails, free previews offered to local businesses, and very little back. No rejections, just nothing.”source ↗
“Most of my questions are about marketing. I want to understand how you got your first set of customers, which channels actually worked for you (Meta ads, Instagram content, influencers, WhatsApp, marketplaces) and which ones turned out to be a waste of money.”source ↗
“I've been struggling with what to post or say to people to help grow my business.”source ↗
“Does anyone have any ideas on how I could grow my business without sounding too repetitive or desperate in my posts”source ↗
“I started a jewellery brand with way too much confidence and absolutely no idea what I was doing 😂”source ↗
“I'm currently trying to figure out the hardest part: getting actual people to discover it.”source ↗
“basically everything except how to convince someone to actually click "Buy." 😭”source ↗
“I've finally finished setting everything up, but I'm struggling to get my first customers.”source ↗
“Since I have a very limited budget, paid advertising isn't really an option for me.”source ↗
“I built Quoliv on my own, it's a learning app that teaches people how stocks and finance work, lessons plus a practice mode. Live on the App Store, free. Took about 2-3 months .”source ↗
“Problem: I built the whole thing before thinking about distribution. Now it's live and basically nobody knows it exists. I posted in a few beginner communities and got polite nothing back.”source ↗
“For anyone who's launched something with no ad budget, what actually worked to get your first real users?”source ↗
“I have a question about how you guys outreach to get new clients. Mine is for families or small businesses but I need my first clients to get testimonials.”source ↗
“I have tried Facebook groups but I cannot seem to get any traction.”source ↗
“Right now I’m working on figuring out the hardest part: getting people to actually discover a new brand.”source ↗
“Just trying to see if anyone has done this and if so, what steps did they have to go through and how did you develop a good customer base.”source ↗
“I'm looking for advice from people who have experience growing a consumer app or small business, particularly those who have had to do it with a limited marketing budget.”source ↗
“i am on the same boat”source ↗
“Recently I have become one of the co-owners of a small business. We have done a complete rebrand and are struggling to get it back off the ground and really find our audience, does anyone have suggestions on some things that helped push your business off the ground or gain traction ?”source ↗
“i have been to a few funeral homes and they all seem very interested... but have not heard anything back from those funeral directors.”source ↗
“Getting shops on board is where we're stuck.”source ↗
“We started with cold email. We sent about 300 emails and got very few replies.”source ↗
“Half say they're interested, nobody books. Is that just a polite no or are we doing something wrong in how we ask?”source ↗
“If you started with zero connections and sold to small local businesses, how did you get your first 10 customers?”source ↗
“Regulated sector, which means no advertising at all: no Google Ads, no Meta, accounts get suspended. So right now it's window display, location and word of mouth. That's it.”source ↗
“Is 16 transactions a day, going to 20-25 the next month, a normal trajectory for a new shop? I have no benchmark at all.”source ↗
“And mainly: how do you drive footfall when advertising is closed to you?”source ↗
“the silence is way worse than a no, at least a no means someone read the thing”source ↗
“online just felt like throwing messages into a void”source ↗
“I don’t have the funds to pay influences to post about the app, do you know what other ways i can get support from them?”source ↗
“honestly same, ads burned money for me too.”source ↗
“I don't know how to get my first paying customer.”source ↗
“i am a software developer, but i do not know where to look for clients. does linkedin work? if so, where else can i promote my business?”source ↗
“I'm honestly more experienced at running a hostel than at selling digital products, so I'm turning to people who'd actually understand the audience. Where have you had luck selling something like this?”source ↗
“I recently started a small independent clothing brand called Open Road Clothing, and I'm trying to figure out how to actually get the first few customers.”source ↗
“For anyone who's started a small business or clothing brand from scratch, what actually helped you get your first customers?”source ↗
“I'm especially interested in things that worked without having a big budget for advertising.”source ↗
“I’ve finished building a HubSpot app and the listing is validated, but HubSpot requires 3 independent active production installs before submission.”source ↗
“For people who have launched apps recently, how did you get those first few testers before Marketplace discovery existed?”source ↗
“every conversation went the same way. They'd say it looks good, come back when you have some clients using it, then we'll talk. Which is funny because how am I supposed to get clients if nobody's willing to be the first one.”source ↗
“everyone wants social proof before they'll touch it but nobody wants to be the proof”source ↗
“Tried lead-gen services early on and got mostly tire-kickers who never converted.”source ↗
“We tried google ads, seemed promising but was a flop. We would get weird leads and older folks calling us confused thinking we were their accountant.”source ↗
Where this came up
People with this problem also raised
- 9How to launch a physical product with zero audience
- 8How to get business clients without word of mouth
- 7Are paid freelance job board communities actually worth it?
- 19Why isn't cold outreach booking any client meetings?
- 5Finding professionals to interview for a class project without connections
- 7Why do people love my product but not buy?