Nobody arrives on their own. The first hundred users come from you going and finding them, individually, which feels like a different job from building — because it is.

Go where the problem is discussed

Not where developers are. Where the people with your problem are: a subreddit, a forum, a Discord, a Facebook group, a professional community.

Then read for a while before posting anything. Every community has norms about self-promotion, and breaking them costs you the audience permanently.

Be useful before you're promotional

The pattern that works: answer questions in your area for a few weeks. Genuinely, helpfully, without linking to anything. Then when your tool is directly relevant to a question, mention it. You've earned the right to.

The pattern that doesn't: joining and posting a launch announcement.

Show the thing

A screenshot or a short video outperforms any description. People decide in seconds whether something is for them, and they decide from the picture.

If your tool works without signup, say so prominently. "Try it, no account needed" removes the largest barrier there is.

Talk to everyone who tries it

At this scale you can email every single user personally. Do it. Ask what they were hoping for and what they actually did.

The people who signed up and didn't return are the most valuable group, and the hardest to reach. One reply from them is worth ten from happy users.

Write about what you learned

Not "introducing my product". The technical problem you solved, the surprising thing you found, the numbers from your first month. People share those, and your tool is mentioned in them.

launch-plan.txt
My tool: <what it does, for whom>
It's live at: <url>

Where do these people actually gather online, specifically? Name real
communities, not categories.

For each: what are the norms about sharing your own work, and what
would a post that gets a good reception look like there?

Then: what's the single most compelling 30-second demonstration of
this, and what should the first screenshot show?

Expect it to be slow

The first hundred takes longer than building it did. That's the normal experience, not a sign that the product is bad.

Ten people who use it weekly beat a thousand who visited once. Optimise for the second visit, not the first.