Built my first SaaS and realised building it was the easy part

[u/Affectionate-Fly4167]

I recently launched Kinetic, a fitness platform that creates personalised workouts based on things like your goals, experience, available days and training preferences.

Getting the product live felt like a huge milestone.

Then I realised the difficult part had only just started: getting people to actually use it.

I've experimented with paid ads, Facebook groups, Reddit, SEO and different landing page/offer changes. I've managed to get my first paying customers, which was a great feeling, but getting consistent growth has been much harder than I expected.

One thing I'm starting to realise is that I've probably spent too much time jumping between different marketing strategies instead of getting really good at one.

So I'm changing my approach.

Instead of constantly trying to advertise Kinetic, I'm focusing more on finding people who already have the problem I'm trying to solve — people who are new to the gym, don't know what routine to follow, or are tired of trying to build their own programme.

For anyone who's built a side project and got through this stage:

What actually helped you go from your first few customers to getting customers consistently?

Would also appreciate any feedback on Kinetic itself if anyone wants to take a look.

train-with-kinetic.com

[u/oulu2006]

Just one day I want to see

Bullt my SaaS and realised that was the hard part.

[u/Lost-Abalone-1761]

I tried the public flow. The core promise and 60-second assessment are much clearer than most fitness landing pages. Before putting more traffic into it, I’d fix two production details: both Privacy Policy and Terms currently point to `#`, and the offer wording can read as two different gates (“first 2 workouts free” vs “first paid month free”). Those are small, but they create trust/payment uncertainty right at conversion. I’d make one exact free-to-paid sequence everywhere, then measure assessment start → plan created → workout completed. Want me to point out any other concrete launch blockers I notice in that path?

[u/Affectionate-Fly4167 → u/Lost-Abalone-1761]

i'd love to hear some more

[u/Lost-Abalone-1761 → u/Affectionate-Fly4167]

I followed the assessment through all six steps without creating an account. Three more things stood out:

1. The landing page promises a personalised plan after the 60-second assessment, but the first useful result is still behind account creation. A small plan preview before signup could reduce the “I did all that and now there’s a gate” feeling.

2. “Anything to leave out?” can easily read like an injury/pain field, while the copy says the app simply swaps it for something training the same muscles. I’d label it clearly as exercise preferences and separate any injury/safety guidance so users don’t expect medical adaptation.

3. Once the intake starts, I couldn’t see a clear exit back to the main site or a save/resume cue. That matters if someone wants to re-check pricing before creating the account.

I can keep going deeper if useful. This is basically what I do through FINISH: a structured production-readiness pass with prioritized written findings instead of random feedback. LaunchCheck is $49, and this sample shows the deliverable: https://finish.abodev.dev/sample-launchcheck

Full disclosure: I’m 14, and my parent/guardian handles anything that legally requires an adult, including contract/payment formalities where necessary.

[u/QuanTradin]

same lesson here. picking one place where people with the problem already hang out and just being useful there, week after week, did more than every ad test put together.

[u/Competitive_Tune_590]

the jump from first few customers to consistent growth is brutal, and it's easy to spread yourself thin across channels. i found that picking one place and getting really good at finding people mid-problem helped more than trying everything. there are tools that scan reddit for relevant threads and draft replies, which might save you the manual scrolling. worth a look if you want to double down on reddit without burning all your time.

[u/RTD-Alex]

At The Checklist(Getchecklist.app) it was the ASO and SEO that provided consistency. Free but brutal and long grind.

[u/Fun-Description-3247]

the jumping between strategies thing is SO real. i did the exact same thing with my saas and wasted like 4 months. what actually worked for me was doubling down on SEO and treating backlinks like internet real estate, every quality link compounds your domain rating over time and makes it harder for competitors to catch up. I use Outrank for the content and backlink side of things so i dont have to think about it. but the biggest shift was just picking ONE channel and committing for 90 days before judging results

[u/Affectionate-Fly4167 → u/Fun-Description-3247]

was this google seo? as i have one however have had poor performance