u/lamacorn_
▲ 14 r/micro_saas
I reached $1,000 in revenue and $600 in monthly recurring revenue (MRR) in a single month for a highly saturated product
People told me it would be too hard.
Too much competition.
Too saturated.
So I decided to do it anyway.
First, to solve one of the problems I was facing in my business.
So I built it and turned it into a SaaS product.
I don’t know if it will reach $10K in MRR.
But if it hits $2K in MRR, I’ll be happy.
My goal: Reach $1K in MRR by the end of May.
Right now, I have about $600 in MRR and $400 in sales. Because I’ve set up a trial offer for the product.
u/lamacorn_ — 5 days ago
▲ 2 r/buildinpublic
I spent 5 years manually doing Reddit acquisition.
This is basically what the process looked like at the beginning:
step 1: spam Reddit with my SaaS link everywhere
step 2: get banned 48h later
results:
- 0 customers
- -50 karma
- shadowbanned accounts
- wasted time
That’s what happens in 99% of cases because Reddit is not LinkedIn.
Nobody on Reddit wants to hear about your product.
But every single day, thousands of people post the exact problems your product solves.
The game is not “promotion”.
The game is:
- finding the right conversations
- at the right time
- and replying like a human
So here’s the system I use now.
1/ Define the ICP properly
Not “founders”.
Not “marketers”.
I want:
- the exact problem
- the exact wording they use
- the exact subreddits they hang out in
Example:
A founder struggling to get their first customers won’t search:
“best lead generation tool”
They’ll post:
“How do I get my first customers?” in r/SaaS.
That changes everything.
2/ Find smaller subreddits
The obvious subs are overcrowded.
The real gold is in niche communities:
- r/sweatystartup
- r/agency
- r/sidehustle
- r/Notion
Less traffic.
Way stronger intent.
3/ Scan new posts constantly
Timing matters a LOT on Reddit.
Most posts have a 2-4h visibility window.
Reply 12h later?
Your comment is basically dead.
4/ Filter real buying signals
90% of posts are noise.
The interesting ones contain phrases like:
- “looking for”
- “any tool that”
- “how do you handle”
- “what do you use for”
That’s usually where intent lives.
5/ Reply like a human
Big mistake:
people try to “sell”.
I try to help first.
Rule:
80% value
20% product mention max
I answer the question.
Share experience.
Give something useful.
And only if relevant:
“btw I built something for this, happy to share.”
Never at the start.
Never without context.
6/ Warm up accounts BEFORE mentioning anything
Reddit hates fresh accounts promoting products.
Before posting my product:
- 2-4 weeks of normal activity
- useful comments
- 100+ karma
- active across multiple subs
Otherwise:
instant suspicion.
I also follow subreddits related to my real interests when creating accounts.
It seems to help make the account look natural.
7/ Read every subreddit rule carefully
Some subs use anti-spam bots shared across communities.
If one bot flags you as spammy,
you can end up auto-banned from multiple subreddits at once.
I also check my CQS regularly.
Results I usually get from this:
- inbound leads
- SEO
- LLM visibility
- partnerships
- market research
- customer language insights
For years I did all of this manually.
Now I’m building redditgrow.ai to automate the painful parts:
- subreddit scanning
- opportunity detection
- reply drafting in your writing style
- assisted account warmup
Still early, but it already saves me hours every week.
u/lamacorn_ — 6 days ago
I built a tool that stops you from doing too much on Reddit
Most Reddit growth tools are built to do more. More DMs, more comments, more automation. Mine does the opposite.
I built something that slows you down on purpose.
Five years on Reddit. Found my first customers there. Watched hundreds of founders come in after me and get banned within a week because they treated it like a cold email list. Mass DMs, spammy comments, bots posting at 3am. They thought volume was the strategy.
It's not.
The goal: to identify threads to rank in LLMs and on Google, add value, and build meaningful connections
Reddit bans you for that. And even if you don't get banned, the community just ignores you. You built nothing.
The actual strategy is boring: find the right threads, show up like a real person, be useful. That's it. And it works, tbh. That's how I got my first paying users without spending a dollar on ads.
So I built a tool around that idea. It helps you find threads where your product is actually relevant. Real conversations where someone has the problem you solve. And then it stops you from going too far. No automation, no bots, no bulk anything.
The whole point is to do less but do it right.
Most people don't want to hear that. They want the shortcut. They want to connect their Reddit account to something and wake up to leads. And that's exactly how you blow up your account and your reputation at the same time.
u/lamacorn_ — 1 day ago
▲ 4 r/buildinpublic
I know this sounds dumb but talking about my competitors in posts has really helped me with SEO and drive traffic to my startup.
I was trying to figure out how to get my name out there on Reddit without just shoving my product down people's throats. I saw a lot of folks posting about their own journeys, but they never mentioned anyone else in their space. I figured that was a missed opportunity.
It sounds silly, right? Why would anyone want to write about their competitors? You'd think you'd be boosting them instead of yourself. But here's the thing: by mentioning competitors, you're naturally ranking for keywords that people are searching for. If someone’s looking for info on a similar tool, they might find my post when I mention that tool.
The mechanism? When someone types in a competitor's name, they’re also picking up on other related discussions. Google's algorithms and Reddit’s search features seem to favor diverse discussions, especially if they’re relevant to the keywords.
Since I started doing this, I’ve seen a significant bump in traffic. It’s not just a few extra visitors; I've had a solid increase, and it keeps building. It’s like I stumbled onto a solid strategy without even trying that hard.
What do you think? Have you tried this? Anyone else using competitor mentions to boost their visibility?
u/lamacorn_ — 16 days ago
▲ 10 r/sideprojects
Not a big number. I know that. But for a solo founder with no funding, no team, and three kids at home, doubling MRR in 24 hours felt significant enough to write about.
Here's what actually happened.
What worked
I rebuilt my landing page from scratch. Not a redesign, a rethink. The old one explained what the product did. The new one lets you actually try it before paying anything. Demo mode, no signup required. Conversion changed immediately. People don't want to read about your product, they want to poke at it.
I added a one-time payment option. This sounds obvious in hindsight but I was so focused on MRR that I ignored how many people just don't want a subscription for something they haven't tested. The one-time plan became a trial on-ramp. Some of those people converted to monthly after.
I talked to my first users. Not a survey. Actual conversations. Found out the product was doing too much. Three features they used, six they ignored. Cut the six.
What didn't work
The original product was too complex. I thought more features meant more value. It meant more confusion. Simplifying it was uncomfortable because I'd spent real time building those features. But usage went up after I removed them.
I also wasted probably two months on distribution channels that weren't right for the audience. Tbh I knew they weren't working after week three. Kept going anyway. That's a founder thing I'm still working on.
Where things stand
$250 MRR. Growing slowly. The LP change and the payment structure are doing most of the work right now.
Curious if anyone else has seen the one-time-to-subscription conversion path work. What was your ratio?
u/lamacorn_ — 17 days ago