How We Got Our First SaaS Customers Without Paid Ads

We did not start with ads.
We did not have a launch audience.
We did not have a polished funnel.

What we did have was a clear problem and a willingness to talk to people who were already struggling with it.

This is how we got our first SaaS customers without spending money on ads and why this approach worked better than anything else we tried.

Why We Avoided Paid Ads Early

Paid ads force answers you do not have yet.

You need:

• Clear positioning

• Proven messaging

• Confident pricing

• Optimized onboarding

We had none of that in the beginning.

Running ads would have hidden weak spots instead of exposing them. We needed feedback more than traffic.

The Real Breakthrough Was Proximity to the Problem

Instead of asking how to promote our product, we asked a simpler question.

Where are people already talking about this problem?

The answer was obvious once we stopped overthinking it.

They were on Reddit.

Reddit Was Already Full of Our Ideal Customers

Every day we saw posts like:

• “Is there a tool that can help with X?”

• “What software do people use for Y?”

• “I tried Z and it did not work”

These were not casual posts. They were people actively trying to solve something.

That made them perfect early customers.

Why Comments Worked Better Than Posts

We experimented with posting. It rarely worked.

Commenting worked consistently.

When someone described a problem we solved, we replied with:

• A clear acknowledgment of their issue

• A useful insight or alternative

• A brief explanation of how we approached the problem

Only then did we mention our product, and only when it genuinely fit.

The conversation felt natural because it was.

Finding the Right Threads Was the Hard Part

At first, we searched Reddit manually.

That quickly became unsustainable.

Once we realized comments were converting into real users and paying customers, we needed a way to find high-intent threads consistently without spending all day searching.

That is when we started using reddix.

Instead of guessing, we tracked keywords tied to our problem and surfaced relevant Reddit discussions as they happened.

The First Customers Felt Like a Continuation

Our first SaaS customers did not feel like sales.

They felt like the next step in an existing conversation.

Someone would reply saying:
“This is exactly what I am dealing with.”

We would move to DMs.
Then a short call or demo.
Then a paid signup.

Pricing was not a fight because the value was already clear.

Charging Early Was a Key Decision

We did not wait to charge.

We framed early access as:

• Direct access to us

• Faster feedback loops

• Influence over the product

This filtered out casual users and gave us clearer signals about real value.

What We Learned From Each Customer

Every early customer taught us something.

We paid attention to:

• The words they used to describe the problem

• What almost stopped them from signing up

• What finally convinced them

Those insights improved our onboarding, messaging, and future replies on Reddit.

We fed that learning back into reddix by refining the keywords we tracked and the threads we focused on.

Why This Beat Ads for Us

Compared to ads, this approach gave us:

• Higher-quality users

• Faster feedback

• Shorter sales cycles

• Stronger retention

We were talking to people who already cared instead of trying to interrupt people who did not.

Final Takeaway

We did not grow by broadcasting.

We grew by listening.

By showing up in the right conversations, helping first, and systemizing discovery, we turned Reddit discussions into real SaaS customers without paid ads.

If Reddit is part of your growth strategy, tools like reddix make this approach scalable without losing authenticity.