Last week I watched a founder in our Discord waste 3 hours scrolling through r/startups looking for people who might want his product.

Three hours. Manual searching. Zero leads.

I felt that pain because I did the exact same thing when I launched my first SaaS. Searching "looking for a tool" across 15 subreddits, opening hundreds of threads, and finding out most of them were 6 months old with zero activity.

Then I figured out a system. And I want to share it with you.

Why Reddit is Gold for Finding First Customers

Look, I know what you are thinking. "Reddit hates self-promotion. I'll get banned."

Yeah, if you do it wrong.

But here's what most founders miss: Reddit is the only platform where people actively describe their exact problems and ask for solutions. Twitter? People flex. LinkedIn? Corporate fluff. Facebook? Your aunt's vacation photos.

Reddit? Real people saying "I'm tired of manually doing X" or "Is there a tool that does Y?"

Those are buying signals. You just need to find them before they go cold.

The Wrong Way (What I Did for 2 Months)

When I started, I would:

Search "reddit [my keyword]" on Google
Open every result
Read the entire thread
Realize it was from 2022
Repeat

I was spending 2-3 hours daily doing this. My conversion? Zero paying customers.

The problem? Old threads don't convert. The person who asked that question 8 months ago already found a solution or gave up.

You need fresh conversations. And you need them fast.

The System That Actually Works

After wasting weeks on manual searching, I built a systematic approach. Here's the exact framework I use:

Step 1: Map Your Problem Keywords

Don't search for your product. Search for the problem you solve.

Instead of searching "CRM tool", search:

"tired of managing contacts in spreadsheet"
"is there a tool that tracks customer conversations"
"spreadsheet not enough anymore"

People don't know your solution exists. They describe their frustration in their own words.

I keep a list of 10-15 pain point phrases. Not product names. Pain descriptions.

Step 2: Identify Your Hunting Grounds

Not all subreddits are equal. You need to find where YOUR customers hang out.

For B2B SaaS, I focus on:

r/startups (early-stage founders with problems to solve)
r/Entrepreneur (people actively building businesses)
r/SaaS (your literal target market)
r/smallbusiness (people who actually pay for solutions)
Niche subreddits specific to my industry

For consumer products, different story. But the principle is the same: go where your buyers actually are.

Step 3: Filter for Fresh Opportunities

This is where most people fail.

An 8-month-old thread with 200 comments? Useless. The person already solved their problem.

A 2-day-old thread with 3 comments? Gold. They are actively looking.

I focus on threads that are:

Less than 7 days old (ideally 24-48 hours)
Have low comment counts (under 20)
Show active engagement from the OP

Low competition threads = higher chance of actually helping someone and getting a response.

Step 4: Engage Like a Human

This is where 90% of founders blow it.

Wrong approach: "Hey, I built a tool for this! Check out myproduct.com"

Right approach: Share your actual experience. Answer their question first. Provide value. Then, if relevant, mention you built something that might help.

Example: "Been there. I used to spend 3 hours a week just organizing customer feedback from different channels. What worked for me was consolidating everything in one place first before worrying about analysis. I actually built a tool for this since I couldn't find anything that fit - happy to share if you want. But honestly, even a Notion database would be a 10x improvement over what you're doing now."

See the difference? You're helping first. Not selling.

Tools That Make This 10x Faster

Let me be real: doing this manually is painful.

Searching across 15 subreddits, filtering by date, checking comment counts, opening each thread... it adds up to hours every day.

I ended up building Wappkit Reddit to solve this exact problem. It searches multiple subreddits at once, filters by comment count and engagement, and lets me find fresh opportunities in minutes instead of hours.

Has a 3-day unlimited trial, then $14/month with code BNWPJRLVJH if you want to continue. Nothing fancy UI-wise, but it does the job.

There are other options too. GummySearch is popular. Even setting up Google Alerts with site:reddit.com can help. The point is: automate the discovery process or you'll burn out before you find customer #1.

Real Numbers from My Experience

After implementing this system, here's what happened over 3 months:

| Metric | Before (Manual) | After (Systematic) | |--------|-----------------|-------------------| | Hours/day searching | 2-3 hours | 20 minutes | | Relevant threads found/week | 5-10 | 40-50 | | Actual conversations | 3 | 25+ | | Paying customers | 0 | 11 |

Not viral growth. Not a hockey stick chart. But 11 paying customers who actually understand the problem because they were living it.

And those customers? They stick around. Retention is way higher than traffic from ads.

The Hard Part Nobody Talks About

Finding leads is step one. Engaging without getting banned is step two.

Reddit users have incredible BS detectors. I once got called out as a "shill" with 200 upvotes on that comment. Yikes.

What actually works is being genuinely helpful. Answer the question even if your tool isn't the right fit. Sometimes I tell people "honestly, for your use case, a simple spreadsheet would work better." And you know what? They often come back later when their needs grow.

Quick Action Plan

If you want to find your first 10 customers on Reddit this month:

Week 1:

Make a list of 10 pain point phrases (not product names)
Identify 5-10 subreddits where your customers hang out
Set up a system to find fresh threads (tool or manual alerts)

Week 2:

Engage in 3-5 relevant threads per day
Focus on helping, not selling
Track which subreddits give you the best responses

Week 3:

Double down on what works
Start personalized DM conversations when appropriate
Ask for feedback, not sales

Week 4:

Analyze your results
Refine your approach
Keep going

The Bottom Line

Your first 10 customers are probably hiding in Reddit threads right now. They're asking questions. Describing problems. Looking for someone who actually understands what they're going through.

Your job isn't to spam your product link everywhere. It's to find those conversations and show up with something genuinely useful to say.

The threads are already there.

Go find them.

What's your experience with Reddit marketing? Found any subreddits that worked well for your niche? Drop a comment below - I read all of them.

How to Find Your First 10 SaaS Customers Using Reddit in 2025