Ask HN: What is the best way to promote your startup?

#1

Post by ahmedaly » Tue, Jun 26, 2012, 2:06 PM UTC

I think that customers/users are the key for making a successful startup. But firstly, you have to provide a way to let them reach you and figure about it.

What are the solutions, tricks, and methods you are using to generate a high traffic to your startup?

Re: Ask HN: What is the best way to promote your startup?

#2

Post by goochtek » Tue, Jun 26, 2012, 2:11 PM UTC

Short answer: Blogs.

Long answer: Blogging. Seriously. Write about interesting topics related to your startup. Start to pique people's interest in your product. That's where the best (and free) traffic comes from.

Re: Ask HN: What is the best way to promote your startup?

#3

Post by jfoster » Tue, Jun 26, 2012, 2:18 PM UTC

I think the answer depends on your startup. Social startups have a nice advantage in usually having a viral mechanism. Anything that's sufficiently better than what's already out there will often be something that people want to tell their friends/colleagues about. That's reliable, but from what I've seen word-of-mouth does take a bit longer than most people would expect. There's countless ways, but none can guarantee large volumes of traffic unless you have a similarly large budget. This is part of what makes starting a startup so difficult.

Re: Ask HN: What is the best way to promote your startup?

#4

Post by bcambel » Tue, Jun 26, 2012, 2:20 PM UTC

goochtek wrote: post #2

Short answer: Blogs. Long answer: Blogging. Seriously. Write about interesting topics related to your startup. Start to pique people's interest in your product. That's where the best (and free) traffic comes from.

Totally agree and in addition to that, Tell your story, tell stories about your startup, product, people, bear etc..

Re: Ask HN: What is the best way to promote your startup?

#5

Post by jfoster » Tue, Jun 26, 2012, 2:21 PM UTC

goochtek wrote: post #2

Short answer: Blogs. Long answer: Blogging. Seriously. Write about interesting topics related to your startup. Start to pique people's interest in your product. That's where the best (and free) traffic comes from.

Where does the traffic to your blog come from? Web search?

Re: Ask HN: What is the best way to promote your startup?

#6

Post by PierreMage » Tue, Jun 26, 2012, 2:29 PM UTC

This video might interest you: Rand Fishkin - Inbound Marketing for Startups: How to Earn Customers Without Paying http://vimeo.com/39473593

In short: generate great content.

Re: Ask HN: What is the best way to promote your startup?

#7

Post by mping » Tue, Jun 26, 2012, 2:36 PM UTC

goochtek wrote: post #2

Short answer: Blogs. Long answer: Blogging. Seriously. Write about interesting topics related to your startup. Start to pique people's interest in your product. That's where the best (and free) traffic comes from.

I tried to reach several bloggers, most of them don't respond. I'm having a hard time finding the good blogg(ers) that would write about my app. Maybe I suck at marketing...

Re: Ask HN: What is the best way to promote your startup?

#8

Post by far33d » Tue, Jun 26, 2012, 2:40 PM UTC

It depends!

Options:

* Paid: Ads, other pay marketing.

* Inbound: Blog. SEO. Etc.

* Viral: generate incentives and reasons for users to invite and refer people they know via social networks, email, etc.

* Other "organic" channels: hack your way to the top of the app leaderboard, for instance.

Re: Ask HN: What is the best way to promote your startup?

#9

Post by bennesvig » Tue, Jun 26, 2012, 2:44 PM UTC

mping wrote: post #7

goochtek wrote: post #2

Short answer: Blogs. Long answer: Blogging. Seriously. Write about interesting topics related to your startup. Start to pique people's interest in your product. That's where the best (and free) traffic comes from.

I tried to reach several bloggers, most of them don't respond. I'm having a hard time finding the good blogg(ers) that would write about my app. Maybe I suck at marketing...

When pitching anyone else, always ask yourself: What's in it for them to write about me? Why should they care? Why should their readers care? How can this pitch be made into a blog post? What story do I want them to tell?

If you can answer that, briefly, in your pitch, you'll have a much easier time pitching people with success. The "My product is awesome. Here are the features. Write about me." approach rarely works.

Re: Ask HN: What is the best way to promote your startup?

#10

Post by swGooF » Tue, Jun 26, 2012, 2:45 PM UTC

PierreMage wrote: post #6

This video might interest you: Rand Fishkin - Inbound Marketing for Startups: How to Earn Customers Without Paying http://vimeo.com/39473593 In short: generate great content.

Thanks for sharing.