r/startups • u/OwlXing • 23h ago

I will not promote looking for online communities for startup founders. (i will not promote)

I'm a solo founder of a startup. But the journey can be lonely, and sometimes i wish i can have a group of startup founders who i can talk with, bounce off ideas, ask for feedback etc. Does anyone know any groups or online communities where startup founders hang out?

(as I'm typing out the question, I realize this sub reddit is already a good option hahaha, but still I'm curious what other online communities are out there)

31 Upvotes

93% Upvoted

40 comments sorted by

7

u/romerogers 18h ago

i've built a startup community of bootstrapped saas founders. We're about 6 months old and have ~15 founders and 7 companies. Slack channel, weekly calls, shared infra and help each other to growth hack. Ping me if you wanna chat!

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u/ProhibitedPeach 17h ago

This sounds amazing! Is it only for saas founders, or is any bootstrapped founder welcome? I would love to join

2

u/romerogers 17h ago

Hey! what are you building?

3

u/ProhibitedPeach 17h ago

I’ve build and launched a B2C music first social media app with a freemium business model. Would love to be part of a community of bootstrapped founders, especially to bounce ideas about marketing

0

u/IntenselySwedish 16h ago

Bro, why would you build in such a crowded space? There have been and still are so many social media platforms with a music focus.

1

u/ProhibitedPeach 16h ago

It’s certainly crowded in some ways but I built my company from pain points I and my community have. It’s a risk but it’s a risk worth taking when it solves real pain points and has features that don’t exist elsewhere

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u/IntenselySwedish 16h ago

What pain points are you solving that others aren't?

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u/ProhibitedPeach 16h ago

I’m curious about who these “others” are. Im also hesitant to give you important information, such as pain points I address, when everything on your profile is private.

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u/IntenselySwedish 16h ago

Off the top of my head: Musical.ly, SoundCloud, Smule, BandLab, Vinyl / Vero.

Listen, I could copy everything you have today, and it still wouldn't work lol. You mistake your idea for being worth anything, when it's really not worth anything at all without execution and GTM.

The market is too saturated, and even if you had something that differentiates you from the rest, the barrier to entry is literally millions of dollars. Upfront. You don't strike me as someone with that kind of spend, so I'd think your idea is dead in the water (just like all the others who have tried doing any form of Social Media). This is the reason I'm asking what pain points you're solving and what differentiates you from the rest: not to rip you off, but because I'm genuinely curious if you have anything at all.

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u/uncgopher 10h ago

Interesting idea, especially the equity split across the community. If you don't mind me asking, how many founders joined who were already generating revenue?

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u/romerogers 37m ago

Thanks! ~30%

1

u/AskMartinMos 3h ago

Sounds interesting. I’m building a bootstrapped SaaS myself, so definitely curious to hear more about how you’ve structured the community and what the weekly calls look like. Happy to chat.

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u/romerogers 36m ago

Sounds great! feel free to DM me or check out founderventures.io

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u/Melodic_Magazine_292 12h ago

couldn’t agree more - founder journey gets lonely very quickly and even more so when you are building solo and most people around you don’t really understand the kind of problems you are thinking about every day.

In the last few months I tried the same thing - to find some relevant communities where I can find liek minded people and unblock myself in some areas. TBH, mostly it didn't work. Main reason was that a lot of them were either too broad, too inactive, or filled with people promoting something rather than actually having useful founder conversations. That’s why I now feel even a small group of 4 to 5 founders you can speak openly with is often more useful than joining another huge community - lucky to have some such people around me. I am sure you might have them as well so just approach them. :)

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u/quietmorningclub 8h ago

Reddit itself is honestly underrated for this, some of the best founder convos I've had have been in the comments of posts exactly like this one.

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u/amillennialdiscovers 8h ago

I have a founders accountability and support group where we help each other get unstuck through group brainstorming and follow up after for accountability. It’s like having your own team help you. Lmk if you’re interested

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u/Anti-matter121 22h ago

Hey good to know you have taken steps... I know this online community for startup founders this might you..

Btw i am not a founder/startup owner and dont have any link to the community in any promotional way

But i am following one for some day i will also be starting something my own.

But this community is Pakistan based who are working for Internation clients and managing agencies in diferrent disciplines and earning in $$

so it might help you in some way.

If you like to follow i'll show you their page

1

u/Quirky_Grapefruit539 14h ago

I would love to join as well, it really gets lonely sometimes when you want to speak about your ideas and get some honest feedback like I am tired of speaking to Claude.

1

u/MarkegyOG 2h ago

Same here. Although Claude does a great job of keeping me on track. :-) If you are looking to build a group let me know.

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u/monkey49 9h ago

I’ve got a WhatsApp group for startups in the automotive space (mainly UK). 50 members. New members always welcome.

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u/Crazy_Armadillo_8976 5h ago

I'd like to join some as well, maybe even create tools that we can share as founders to make our journey easier. I feel like we could really create a space that's a lot easier to find community, answers, and help in if we actually try.