Want to learn how customer acquisition really happens? Read on...

Most startup founders struggle with acquiring their initial users. Here’s a smarter (and more efficient) way to start acquiring users for your startup.

Start with building your buyer persona (this is important). These are the people who are most struggling to solve the problem (that you have the solution for). I highly recommend this guide by Alex Cowan.

Be as absurdly specific as possible. What demographics, geographics, psychographics, or behaviors do they all have in common?

Know where they hang out! (Sparktoro.com is a great tool to figure it out.) What are the top websites they already go to? Groups they engage in... Influencers they follow on Instagram... Keywords they are searching to find a solution to their problem...

And only then, follow this 5 part-process:

Share your startup:

Share your startup on places like Reddit, Polywork, Pioneer.app, or right here on LinkedIn.

I have shared over 200+ best places to share your startup in my Startup Guide. Here’s the link: nobsstartupguide.com.

Find out customer acquisition channels that usually work for getting new (paying users).

Here is a guide (Zero to User) that might help: https://zerotousers.com/assets/pdfs/acq-channels.pdf

Set up referral and affiliate programs:

Affiliate marketing and referrals are often overlooked as marketing tactics, particularly in the SaaS industry. When done correctly, they can easily increase revenue by 30%.

Get your product in front of marketers by listing it on affiliate networks. Some of the platforms you can use are Affistash or PartnerStack.

These platforms are dedicated to software products.

Promote your program by sharing it with your community and displaying it on your landing page.

Organic content and influencer marketing: This strategy works out in the long run, and when it works, it works really well.

Some of the top companies like Reddit, Instagram, and Superhumans also opted for this approach while they were launching.

LinkedIn is the best platform right now to start building a personal brand and start acquiring customers, especially if you’re in the B2B space. How to grow organically on LinkedIn, here’s a case study:

https://www.demandcurve.com/playbooks/linkedin-organic

Do a press release:

Keep in mind the ROI on this is nowhere near what people think, but still worth doing.

There are plenty of websites that offer these under a budget. Select the ones that best fit your needs! Here are some that might be of help:

• PRnob.com ($29) - Get your press release published on 10,000+ news and media outlets.
• PR Buzz ($299) - While their package is a bit more expensive, it offers unlimited releases in a year. This could be a great way to test out several different releases and styles.
• PRWeb ($99) - Adds some SEO juice to your release by distributing it on their site and others in their network.

Want to see 100+ tools, websites, and resources to acquire your startup’s users as soon as today? Get a copy of the NO BS Startup Guide www.nobsstartupguide.com