I have an interesting struggle. The platform I'm working on is in an early stage so I would prefer to spend most of my time working on the product (write code). On the other hand, the platform has very few users, so really I should focus on spreading the word and getting users. But obviously the two are in lockstep, the better the product the easier it is to get users. I would really love to find an evangelist but I have no idea how. I'm not sure that's even possible / productive, as obviously it is me who knows most about the product. How do you solve this?

I’d start with asking your very few users, if they, or one of them, would like to be more involved.

Sounds like you have done this before?

You definitely want someone who loves the product. And ideally they can become a liaison between users and developers (just you at the moment, I assume?) and as such influence the roadmap at least a little. That should be very appealing and motivating to some power users.

Exactly, I need someone who loves the product. That's why I didn't think posting a random job post makes any sense.

If you don’t know your users well enough to have such power users in mind, start with reaching out, offer an AMA or invite them to a Zoom call where they can offer you feedback and you can learn what they like and don’t like. Then ask for testimonials. Pretty quickly some people should stand out as asking interesting questions or having suggestions that align with your roadmap.

Yes that makes sense. I think the user base is so tiny for now that I first have to go spread the word more before I do what you suggest.

@Tibor Halter Read the book Lean Startup!

Oh I did, at least 5 times!

Do you have a deadline, fixed runway, etc.? I try to alternate between open and closed phases. But it takes time.

The deadline is long enough to not matter yet (years)

The terms are from https://www.amazon.com/Creativity-Flow-Psychology-Discovery-Invention/dp/0062283251 Open = extroverted, talking about your work, listening to feedback, etc. Closed = heads down, building, etc. If your deadline is long enough, I recommend not trying explicitly to find an evangelist (or any kind of collaborator). Just talk to everyone you can. When someone keeps coming back, then collaboration will be much more organic.

I like to dedicate 2 days per week to meetings and talking to users or potential users...that leaves at least 3 days for full-time coding...and then can sneak in a few hours here and there outside the 3 days...

Ah I see. It's really hard to mix the two.. I tend to feel like I do too much of the closed one, then I work on the open stuff for a while, and looking back, the open part was a waste of time, if only I had been working on the closed parts all the time... xD

You can think of these as the different roles in a typical startup or a small company: you could have sales, marketing, product management, office admin, product development, UX/UI design and user/customer research, for example. When you build things by yourself, you need to think which of these you can outsource, which you can hire others to work on and which ones to tackle yourself.

Yeah but its pretty much impossible to outsource the product and talking to users. Well, at least when the product is the differentiator.

I agree with that.

I used to think talking to users had to be about your product or latest iteration. But sometimes the next iteration would take weeks or months, so there would be no point in talking to users until that was done. I changed my thinking now to consider the 2 completely orthogonal. I schedule meetings to talk/listen to potential users, and more often than not don't talk about my stuff at all, unless I have a new version. What I've found is that it's just often really non-linearly productive to talk to users, who might point you to a product or book or paper that can make a big difference.

I would assume you have few large customers? The average customer value of my customers is so small I'm literally loosing money talking to them - unless it is for learning purposes.

I think the main advantage to talking with customers for a startup or other growth companies is precisely about learning. It helps at directing the product development to right directions and to get insights that you wouldn’t otherwise get (or even know about) and also the opposite, to validate which areas are working or good-enough.

Yes, the point is learning. You should almost always be able to glean at least one bit of new information no matter who you talk to that makes it worthwhile