What worked to get first 5 customers?
I am building a product that allows users to collect any type of media (images, video, audio, code, 3D models, AI chats, etc.), collaborate, and synthesize insights. The target users are product designers, design managers, creative directors, and user researchers. I have already built the product and it is beyond the MVP stage. My next step is to find the first 5 customers who are willing to try the product and give feedback. This is the part I am struggling with. What I have tried so far: 1. Reaching out to people with specific roles on LinkedIn 2. Reaching out to decision makers in small companies 3. Reaching out to people in my network (which is quite limited) How I approached them: 1. Asking if they actually experience the problem I am trying to solve 2. If I understand their workflow, explaining how the product could benefit them 3. Starting a conversation and asking them to describe the challenges they face in their workflow Most of my outreach has been through LinkedIn and email. Calls are not even in the picture yet and getting someone to actually try the tool has been even harder. For founders who have been through this stage - what worked for you when getting your first 5 customers?
FL score
out of 100
Verdict
high confidence
Competition
13
competitors found, emerging market, funded players
Trend
8 community mentions
A media collection and insight synthesis tool for creative professionals, with strong potential but struggling to validate its specific market gap and acquire first customers.
The pain
The gap
Build angle
Strengths
- Addresses a real pain of fragmented creative workflows.
- Targets professionals with purchasing power.
- Product is already built beyond MVP.
- Leverages growing trends in collaborative tools and AI.
Risks
- Crowded market with heavily funded incumbents.
- Difficulty in acquiring first customers, indicating a potential disconnect in value proposition or GTM.
- High switching costs for users invested in existing tools.
- The 'insight synthesis' differentiator needs stronger definition and proof.
Next steps
- Refine the specific 'insight synthesis' value proposition, targeting a narrower niche (e.g., user researchers analyzing qualitative data from diverse sources).
- Conduct targeted user interviews (not sales calls) with this refined niche to deeply understand their specific workflows, frustrations, and willingness to pay for a precise solution.
- Develop a clear, irresistible offer that addresses a critical pain point for this narrow niche, potentially focusing on a single, compelling use case.
- Explore alternative distribution channels such as niche communities, forums (e.g., specific Reddit subreddits for UX research), or targeted content marketing (e.g., 'How I synthesize insights from video interviews and design mockups').
Fly Labs Method
Is the pain real, is there a gap, is it the right time, can one person build it.
- Problem clarity
- 23
- Solution gap
- 14
- Willingness to pay
- 14
- Buildability
- 11
The problem is real for creative professionals struggling with fragmented media collection and collaboration. While competitors are strong, specific user frustrations and the unique angle of unifying diverse media with 'insight synthesis' offer a potential gap. The challenge lies in proving this specific gap's value and overcoming switching costs for paying customers.
Value Equation
Dream outcome and how likely it feels, against the time and effort it costs.
The idea has potential in a growing market for creative tools, but a clear, compelling value proposition and effective go-to-market strategy are critical to overcome strong competition and acquire paying customers.
One-Person Business
Curiosity pull, identity fit, and a path from free value to paid for a solo creator.
The product addresses a clear problem for a specific audience, but the current customer acquisition strategy needs significant refinement to effectively reach and convert early adopters.
Viral Frameworks
Hook strength, shareability, and how cheaply it can be tested.
The idea has a clear value proposition for a specific audience and a proven business model, but current distribution channels are failing, and core assumptions about market demand remain unvalidated.
Builder Lens
Evidence the problem exists, timing, defensibility, and a model that fits on a napkin.
There's a clear demand for better tools in creative collaboration, but the product needs to sharply define its narrowest wedge and demonstrate real user adoption to prove its unique value.
Why this verdict
Five lenses, one composite. How scoring works
The angle
This weekend
- Refine the specific 'insight synthesis' value proposition, targeting a narrower niche (e.g., user researchers analyzing qualitative data from diverse sources).
- Conduct targeted user interviews (not sales calls) with this refined niche to deeply understand their specific workflows, frustrations, and willingness to pay for a precise solution.
- Develop a clear, irresistible offer that addresses a critical pain point for this narrow niche, potentially focusing on a single, compelling use case.
- Explore alternative distribution channels such as niche communities, forums (e.g., specific Reddit subreddits for UX research), or targeted content marketing (e.g., 'How I synthesize insights from video interviews and design mockups').
Who is already there, emerging market
Miro is an online collaborative whiteboard platform designed for distributed teams to brainstorm, plan, and collaborate visually.
Pricing: Free plan available (3 editable boards). Paid plans start around $10/user/month (billed annually) for Team, Business, and Enterprise tiers.
- MilanoteVisit
Milanote is a visual workspace for creative projects, offering a flexible canvas for notes, images, links, and files.
Pricing: Pro costs $9.99/month (annual). Free plan has limitations (e.g., 100 files, 10 boards).
- Are.naVisit
Are.na is an online platform for saving, organizing, and connecting content, described as 'playlists, but for ideas' or an 'Internet memory palace'.
Pricing: Guest (free/forever, up to 200 total blocks). Premium: $7/month or $70/year.
Collect by WeTransfer allows users to save, store, and share various media formats, enabling the creation of mood boards and sharing inspiration with teams.
Pricing: Free for file transfers up to 2GB. Pro subscribers can transfer up to 200GB, and utilize team collaboration and portals. WeTransfer Pro is €12/month (approximately $13 USD).
- Raindrop.ioVisit
Raindrop.io is a bookmark manager that allows users to capture and organize bookmarks and associated content with real-time collaboration and privacy focus.
Pricing: Free plan available. A 'Pro' plan exists, though specific pricing was not readily available in the search snippets, it is generally considered freemium.
- BublupVisit
Bublup is a bookmark manager that allows users to save bookmarks, files, and notes in visual folders with sharing and collaboration capabilities.
Pricing: Details not readily available in search snippets, but it is a bookmark manager with folder sharing, iOS/Android apps, file uploads, and to-do lists.
FigJam is Figma's collaborative whiteboard tool designed for brainstorming, planning, and team collaboration, especially for product teams and designers.
Pricing: Free plan available; free for educators and students. Paid plans for Figma start from $3/collab seat/month (billed annually).
- WhimsicalVisit
Whimsical is a collaborative visual workspace tool for creating flowcharts, wireframes, mind maps, and sticky notes in real time.
Pricing: Free plan available. Starts from $3/collab seat/month (billed annually).
- EagleVisit
Eagle is a digital asset management tool to collect, search, organize, and unify creative files (images, videos, audio, fonts) with advanced tags and smart folders.
Pricing: $29.95/one-time flat rate.
- KosmikVisit
Kosmik is an AI-powered research tool with a built-in browser that helps users research, capture inspiration, and organize everything without switching apps.
Pricing: $11.99/month yearly.
- NoteeyVisit
Noteey is a personal knowledge management tool with offline capabilities, local media import, and a library to store and manage various content types.
Pricing: Not explicitly stated in search results, but highlighted as an alternative to Milanote.
- SublimeVisit
Sublime is an AI-forward tool designed to help users actively use their knowledge, offering multimedia capture, collaboration, and tools to turn information into insight.
Pricing: Not explicitly stated in search results.
What they charge
What people say, 8 mentions
I spent $47k and 18 months building an "AI startup." Here's the brutal truth about why 90% of AI businesses are doomed.
r/Entrepreneur
The weird way I win clients by “losing” negotiations
r/Entrepreneur
I turned 46 today and just launched my first SaaS. Here's what 30 days taught me that 20 years of dev work didn't.
r/SaaS
I spent 4 hours a day on Reddit to get my first 50 customers. Here's exactly what I learned (and what I'd do differently).
r/SaaS
Solo founder with 0 customers — what actually worked for your first 10?
r/SaaS
How We Got Our First 100 Customers by Doing What Didn’t Scale
r/Entrepreneur
For those who have successfully acquired their first 10-20 customers for validation, what actually worked?
r/SaaS
For founders who broke through the 'first 10 customers' barrier, what actually worked?
r/SaaS
Recent news
Top 10 Are.na Alternatives & Competitors in 2026
G2, 2026
Top 10 Bublup Alternatives & Competitors in 2026
G2, 2026
8 Best Milanote Alternatives in 2026 (Reviewed) | Kosmik
Kosmik, August 10 2025
Top 7 Milanote alternatives for better organization (2026 tested) - Xmind
Xmind, February 06 2026
15 top Miro alternatives for visual collaboration in 2026
SoftwareReviews, February 05 2026
Market signals
The market for media collection, collaboration, and synthesis tools for product design appears to be growing, with numerous alternatives emerging for established platforms like Miro, Milanote, and Figma/FigJam. Several tools are incorporating AI features for content discovery, tagging, and writing assistance, indicating a trend towards more intelligent and automated workflows. There's a strong emphasis on real-time collaboration and unified workspaces to reduce app-switching, catering to distributed teams.
What frustrates people
- Miro's free plan limiting users to only 3 editable boards.
- Milanote being entirely cloud-based and requiring an internet connection.
- Milanote lacking a centralized library for all content, with content tied to individual boards.
- Are.na combining channels and individual saves in the explore feed with often unhelpful image names.
- Are.na lacking AI tagging and robust search features.
I found a way to turn your competitors' angry customers into your customers. Here's the simple trick
This one is almost too effective to share. Every SaaS has unhappy customers. Those customers go to Reddit and vent publicly. And those complaints are your best sales opportunities. **Here's why this is so powerful:** these people already understand the problem space (no education needed), already have budget allocated (they're paying a competitor), are actively unhappy (ready to switch), and are publicly asking for alternatives. That's the highest-intent prospect you'll ever find. Higher than any ad click. Higher than any cold email response. **The method:** **Step 1:** List your top 5 competitors. **Step 2:** Search Reddit for "\[competitor name\]" alternative OR "\[competitor name\]" issue OR "\[competitor name\]" pricing **Step 3:** You'll find dozens of frustrated users describing exactly what they wish was different. **Step 4:** Write a genuinely helpful comment. Don't trash the competitor that looks petty. Instead, acknowledge their frustration and offer objective alternatives: "I've used \[competitor\] too and had similar issues with X. Depending on what matters most to you, here are 3 alternatives I've tested: \[tool A\] for Y, \[tool B\] for Z, and \[your tool\] if you specifically need W." **The key:** be honest and balanced. Recommend competitors when they're genuinely better for that use case. People trust someone who gives objective advice over someone who only pushes their own product. **My results from last month:** 3 customers in one month (high ticket niche), started this strategy since Jan. 2026 + this will compound over time the more I find posts to comment. The hardest part is finding these conversations across 50+ subreddits consistently. I use AI Reddit tools like Reppit AI to monitor competitor mentions in real-time, which surfaces opportunities I'd never find manually. Try it this week: search your #1 competitor's name + "alternative" on Reddit. I guarantee you'll find warm prospects over time, as these posts already rank on goog
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Business
You're not struggling to find customers. You're struggling because you skipped the step that comes before finding customers.
I've been lurking in this sub for a while and I keep seeing the same post over and over, just with different product names. "Launched 3 weeks ago. Less than 20 users signed up. Zero paying customers. What am I doing wrong?" Or "Built for 8 months. Finally launched. Crickets. Help" Or the most painful one: "Gave it away free to 50 people. Asked them to pay $29/month. All 50 ghosted me." I'm not writing this to be harsh. I'm writing this because I've watched talented technical founders waste 12–18 months of their lives on a problem that has a clear, learnable solution, and nobody in this sub is talking about it directly. So here it is. # The real reason you have no paying customers isn't your product, your pricing, or your landing page. It's that you're trying to sell to people who don't yet trust you, don't yet know you, and haven't told you with their own words that they have the problem you're solving badly enough to pay money to fix it. You built something. Then you went looking for someone to sell it to. That order is the problem. # What the amateur approach actually looks like (most of you will recognize yourselves here) You had an idea. You built it, or you're building it right now. You put up a landing page. You posted on Product Hunt, posted here on reddit, maybe posted on Twitter. You got some upvotes, some "congrats on the launch" comments, maybe a few hundred free signups. Then silence. So you started tweaking. Changed the headline. Lowered the price. Added a free tier. Posted again. Maybe ran some Google ads. Still nothing. You're iterating on the wrong variable. The problem isn't the headline. The problem is you don't actually know — with evidence, not assumption — who is in enough pain to pay you, what words they use to describe that pain, and what would need to be true for them to hand over a credit card to a founder they've never heard of. You skipped the step where you find that out. What that step actually looks like Before your first
Business
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