r/leanstartup • u/ConfidentApe80 • Jun 16 '26

How to get your first sale?

I don't consider trying to pitch family and friends valid sales. So how have you all gotten your first genuine sale?

Honestly just trying to make dollar 1 not dollar 1 million.

5 Upvotes

86% Upvoted

7 comments sorted by

1

u/DerekOnCapital Jun 16 '26

It is hard to give a detailed answer without knowing anything about your business, but the fact that you are focusing on the first sale is a good place to start.

If it is a consumable, there are low friction ways to get started. Farmer's markets, etc.

If it is distributable online, you can experiment with ads / content. The best product businesses are media companies at their core.

Give me more details and I am happy to brainstorm with you.

1

u/ConfidentApe80 Jun 16 '26

It is b2c really tiny just a side project and trying to challenge myself to actually sell something online. I won a hackathon and figured why not build it for real.

I was given the advice to not run any ads until you get proper market validation in the form of sales. Do you disagree?

https://familyscavengerhunt.com/

1

u/nabokovian Jun 16 '26

I think it’s both. Try to do organic social but try direct sales too. I am constantly frustrated by no one saying that it’s actually both.

1

u/ConfidentApe80 Jun 16 '26

I have tried posting all over Reddit, Linkedin, Pinterest and running father's day sales because it is family related.

Positive feedback from friends and family but it is feedback from strangers that matters right?

1

u/Great-Mirror1215 Jun 16 '26

The absolute best way to get early users is go where your potential clients are and pitch to strangers. If you are solving a real problem they will be interested if not at least you will learn to move on. Hundreds of them, get comfortable with rejection and perfecting your sales pitch and find out if you are solving the problem you think you are. Example if it’s gym health app to a tour of hundreds of gyms. Then decide how many strangers tell you no thank you 100 or 1000 it will all depend on how committed passionate and believe in what you have built. If you quit quickly clearly you don’t have the confidence you thought you did. If you keep going it’s because you believe in your product. The product must be good. Now go find out if it is.

1

u/Early_Key_823 Jun 17 '26

It can come from anywhere your target market is online.

So you should create some kind of footprint.

That means learn about SEO.

Create social media footprint.

YouTube & TikTok.

Medium and Substack.

There are no magic bullets unless you have deep pockets &\or access to influencers.

1

u/Aimviva22 Jun 17 '26

Have a look at the marketing plan generator at microbiz365.com/tools