Find your first SaaS users across Reddit, X, YouTube and TikTok.

This is the demo run from above. Four networks searched at once, narrowed to a high-intent shortlist. You don't need more marketing. You need better signal at the top of the funnel.

Search problems, not personas

Most early outreach fails because founders target identities. "SaaS founders" is too broad. "How do I get beta testers?" finds someone asking for help right now.

• "how do i get first users for my saas"
• "how do i find beta testers"
• "how do i validate a saas idea without ads"
• "manual customer research takes forever"

Cast a wide net, then filter for urgency

Volume isn't the goal. Picking the right ones is. In the demo run, 266 posts became 91 worth reviewing closely. The question that filter forces you to ask: who is actively trying to solve this right now?

• Keep posts where the person names a real constraint (time, cost, a failed alternative).
• Keep posts where they sound open to trying a workflow or a tool.
• Skip generic discussion threads and vague "curious what people think" posts.

Score for who's most ready, not just who's relevant

1. Problem fit: is the pain adjacent to what you solve?
2. Timing: does the post sound urgent, or theoretical?
3. Openness: is the author asking for advice, examples, or tools?
4. Reachability: can you reply publicly and keep the conversation going?

You don't need more channels. You need a tighter list of people describing the exact problem in their own words. Start with recent Reddit threads. Pull the phrases that repeat. Test three replies before you write any cold outreach.

Build a 25-person shortlist, not a 500-lead spreadsheet

A weekly loop that works: collect 25 strong posts, reply to 10 publicly, follow up with the 5 warmest responders, and ask 3 for a short call. You'll learn more from that than from a giant sheet you never revisit.

Traditional ICP work sounds clean because it's built after the fact. People summarize what they think they do, what they wish they did, and what sounds reasonable in an interview. The final doc looks polished, but most of the urgency you actually needed is gone by the time it's written.

Where it usually breaks

• Recall bias: people report what they remember, not what they did in the moment.
• Courtesy bias: interviews are full of nicer answers than real buying behavior.
• Over-generalization: one polished quote becomes a fake rule for a whole market.

What live signal gives you instead

The same Gorilla run that surfaced 266 posts also caught the exact phrases founders used when the pain was active: "first users," "beta testers," "validate without ads," "manual research takes forever." Those lines are more useful than a persona deck because they show urgency, constraints, and failed alternatives all in the same sentence.

A better order of operations

1. Search for the struggle, not the role.
2. Pull recent posts across multiple networks.
3. Group them by repeated problem, trigger, and constraint.
4. Use interviews later, to confirm the strongest patterns.

Your ICP stops being generic once you capture the wording, the recency, and the failed workaround for every strong post. After 25 or 30 examples, you can usually tell which pains are urgent, which channels actually have buyers, and which phrases belong on the landing page right away.