In this blog post, we'll discuss some salient points from our webinar—“How to Get Your First Customer: Unlock the Door to Start-up Success.” 

Recently, we hosted an exciting Zoom session where we discussed, “How to Get Your First Customer: Unlock the Door to Startup Success,” with our experts and attendees. We were thrilled to have over 14 start-up founders join us on Zoom, sharing their start-up ideas, vision, success stories, and much more. 

The webinar session was buzzing with burning questions, insightful discussions, and helpful suggestions. 

The Zoom session was hosted by Anshuman Sinha, an angel investor and co-founder of Startup Steroid.  

“The topic for today is how to get your first customer. We have a small team today but it’s good. We can have meaningful discussions and interactions with start-up founders on their journeys. We’ll also discuss how to get your first customer and what should be an ideal process for it. We want it to be an interactive session and encourage more and more attendees to share their ideas and thoughts.” — Anshuman Sinha 

We had Lal Sah, a start-up founder, from New Jersey, as the first speaker on the show. After introducing his SaaS start-up, he thanked the host saying such a webinar would help him get the first customer for it.

Our mentor acknowledged him saying the very purpose of these webinars is to empower start-up founders with the right ideas, thoughts, and suggestions. 

Likewise, we also had Man Mohan from Ghaziabad. He is a startup founder and CEO of Orange Pixel Studio. Man Mohan spoke at length about his business and how he got his first customer.  

Also, Rajiv Gupta, founder, Innocreate Global, told us briefly about his start-up. Then, he also stated that his company was committed to working on lean designs offering corporate solutions and consultancy to various firms across the US. 

After the brief introductory sessions, the webinar shifted its focus to the core topic of how start-ups can get their first customers. 

Stuti Lal, the founder of Bikalpherbals, Lucknow, explained how she sells her products online. But somehow, she couldn’t reach out to her targeted customers or scale up her business because she fails to segregate customers based on their specific health needs. 

Since she has multiple herbal products on offer for people of various age groups, she explained her problems. 

Our mentor, Ayushman Sinha, suggested she should create a dedicated WhatsApp group to reach out to specific customers with similar health needs. 

In other words, if you’re selling multiple products, you need to first identify your target customers in advance for each product and then reach out to them with your offerings. Creating a specific WhatsApp group or social media community will be beneficial for you to interact with them. 

Gagan Pal Singh Negi, a branding and communication expert, gave some vital tips on how start-up founders should get new customers. Gagan, the founder and CEO of hiCMO and Metalty Ventures, has vast experience in the corporate world. 

He emphasized the importance of digital marketing, the identification of the right target audience, and the optimum use of social media as the core market strategy to generate business. Besides, he also offered several other tips that start-ups can follow to scale up their firms and stay ahead of their competitors. 

Gagan also shared an interesting anecdote that how he randomly send messages to CEOs of companies on LinkedIn while seeking jobs. And his efforts eventually paid off, when a CEO of a reputed company replied to him back, connecting him with another person from the HR department. Soon, Gagan got a lucrative corporate job that anyone can only dream of. 

Breakdown of How to Get Your First Customer 

Try It Yourself 

When you are creating a new product, you should try to sell it first. Only then you’ll understand the real sense of the market and how your customers feel about it. Here, you have to understand whether your product has lived up to the expectations of customers or not. 

You need not chase perfection, but make sure that your product is unique and innovative. It should also address the pain points of customers. You can even directly interact with your target audience on social media to take their feedback and suggestions on the same. 

Know Your Target Audience 

If you wish to sell products without knowing who your target audiences are, it may lead to a huge loss of effort, time, and resources. 

As Shankar Kumar, a start-up expert, rightly points out that every start-up should know what it has to offer. 

“You must have a clear-cut idea about your business. When we know what we have to offer then we can easily identify our target audience. But target audiences are mostly scattered across various cities and places. In such a case, online platforms can help get in touch with them. We have to find out the right channels where we can directly interact with our potential customers, Shankar added.” 

Offer Value 

As already pointed out, your product should be different from what your competitors are offering. For this, you need to make use of social media to publicize the product you are selling along with its USPs (Unique Selling Propositions). 

You can create a blog post to describe the primary features of your products and how the same can benefit your customers. Also, posting informative videos relating to your business or products on YouTube can educate them more about your product. 

Explore Your Network 

It’s an excellent idea to start exploring your network for customers. Your network—both personal and professional—can be a starting point to get your first client. But you first need to list out the people who may be interested in your product. Then, you should try to interact with them to pitch your products and services. 

Maybe someone from your family or professional network will be your first customer. Just try it out. 

Build Your Online Credibility 

Our mentor also emphasized the importance of using online platforms to build credibility. Reputation always matters. If you wish to stay ahead of your competitors, you need to create a stellar online presence 24*7. 

You can create valuable content and post them on your site to keep your audience up-to-date about your product and start-up activity. Try to engage with your potential clients or customers and build long-term rapport with them. 

Anshuman concluded the session, saying, “The ultimate goal of any business is growth. You can’t be complacent in your business. Every start-up should try to scale up their business in an upward direction.” 

In Conclusion 

Overall, it was an interactive webinar and a lot of things were discussed. The webinar explored various ways through which start-ups can get their first customers, including the creation of email lists, visiting relevant events and seminars, and collaborating with other entrepreneurs and influencers. After all, the success of any start-up depends upon its hard work, effort, innovation, and marketing strategy.