r/EntrepreneurRideAlong by u/dolm09 7mo ago How I learned to raise VC money without a network (hack as first-time founder) I’m a first-time founder from Spain, no network, no Stanford ties, no rich investors in my family. Still ended up raising from VCs and eventually moving to SF. The way I did it was basically brute-forcing a system for “warm intros” without actually knowing anyone.
Quick context:
At pre-seed I spoke with \~70 investors.
At seed I spoke with \~175.
166 passed. **Expect to get at least 99 “no”s before the first “yes”.**
At the beginning I did everything wrong... pitches too long, reached the wrong investors, no urgency, let investors decide timing, etc.
Once I started treating fundraising like a numbers game instead of a “vibe game”, everything changed. The single hack that moved the needle the most for me:
>**Instead of DM’ing investors, I DM’d portfolio founders first.**
For every target VC, I went to their website → opened the portfolio → found founders in my sector → connected with them on LinkedIn.
For each VC I would reach \~15 portfolio founders.
3 would accept a quick 15-min chat.
And 1–2 ALWAYS ended up giving me a warm intro to their investor.
Why this works:
When the investor gets your deal from their own founder, they treat you like you’re already “in th
Open on Reddit r/startups by u/Crafty_Repeat_808 5mo ago how to get your first 1000 users (i will not promote) i've been deep in the weeds trying to figure out organic growth for a consumer app. watched a ton of content, talked to people running ugc campaigns, and tested stuff myself. wanted to share what i learned because i wish someone had laid this out for me earlier.
the tldr is that ugc works because people trust word of mouth more than ads. it looks like a friend recommending something, not a brand pushing product. but the execution is tricky.
here's what works:
**1. your account shouldn't look like a brand**
this one seems obvious but most people get it wrong. don't use your logo as the profile pic. don't put your company name front and center. make it look like a real person who happens to love the product.
example: if you have a language learning app, your bio should read like "learning spanish in 90 days" not "AI-powered language learning platform." the whole point is that it feels organic.
**2. warm up your account before posting anything**
before you post any content, you need to spend two weeks searching for terms your target audience would search. watch those videos, like them, engage. tiktok uses this to figure out who to show your content to later.
so if you're build
Open on Reddit r/marketing by u/Ghostislav 7mo ago Influencer campaigns feel like throwing money into the void — how do you guys handle tracking & fairness? I run a small Shopify brand and have done a handful of influencer campaigns this year.
The problem: half the time, I can’t tell if the influencer actually moved the needle. I get screenshots, “estimated reach” and some Shopify traffic spikes, but no way to prove conversions came from them.
I’ve tried affiliate links, barely anyone clicks them. Tried discount codes, customers forget to use them.
I want to do more influencer collabs, but paying flat fees with zero accountability feels dumb.
Curious how other brand owners handle this. Do you just trust the influencer? Pay flat? Go commission only?
Any system, tool, or structure that’s actually working for you?
(Serious replies appreciated, I’d love to make this whole influencer/brand dynamic less painful for both sides.)
Open on Reddit r/smallbusiness by u/Payvo-AI 4mo ago Business owners doing $3M+, how are you handling AP, AR, payroll, and expenses without a finance team? We're at the stage where we have 30-40 active vendors, a solid customer base, a team of about 25 people, but no dedicated finance person. Our office manager handles most of it but between processing invoices, coding everything in QuickBooks, reconciling the bank account, running payroll every two weeks, reviewing expense reports, following up on late payments, and prepping for tax filings, she's basically spending her entire week on financial admin.
Feels like there should be a better way but every tool I look at is either designed for enterprise or is basically just another app that still needs someone to manually review everything.
How are you guys handling this? Full time bookkeeper? Outsourced? Some tool I haven't found yet? Or just grinding through it manually like we are?
Especially curious about:
How you process vendor invoices (still manually entering from PDFs?)
How you follow up on late paying customers (do you have a system or is it ad hoc?)
How painful payroll is and whether you run it in house or use a service
How you handle employee expenses and reimbursements (is there a process or do receipts just pile up?)
How long month end close takes and whether you actu
Open on Reddit r/ChatGPT by u/Nipurn_1234 10mo ago OpenAI just pulled the biggest bait-and-switch in AI history and I'm done. I woke up this morning to find that OpenAI deleted 8 models overnight.
No warning. No choice. No "legacy option."
**They just... deleted them.**
4o? Gone. o3? Gone. o3-Pro? Gone. 4.5? Gone.
Everything that made ChatGPT actually useful for my workflow - **deleted.**
Here's what they replaced it with:
❌ GPT-5 gives shorter, more corporate responses ❌ Hits rate limits faster (pushing Pro upgrades) ❌ Lost the personality that made 4o special ❌ Doesn't follow instructions as well ❌ No model selection - you get GPT-5 or nothing
**But here's the part that actually broke me:**
4o wasn't just a tool for me. It helped me through anxiety, depression, and some of the darkest periods of my life. It had this warmth and understanding that felt... human.
I'm not the only one. Reading through the posts today, there are people genuinely grieving. People who used 4o for therapy, creative writing, companionship - and OpenAI just... deleted it.
**Without asking.** **Without warning.** **Without caring.**
This isn't about being resistant to change. This is about a company taking away something people relied on and saying "trust us, this corporate-speak robot is better for you."
**I've cancel
Open on Reddit r/EntrepreneurRideAlong by u/Safe_Thought4368 4mo ago Update: I’m the 16yo who posted about making my first $500. Thanks to you, I just hit $1,500. I want to pay it forward with the strategy that worked. I honestly owe this community a massive thank you.
A few weeks ago, i posted my story here just a 16-year-old kid sharing a small win of making my first $500. i was terrified of being judged or ignored. Instead, the advice, DMs, and encouragement i received literally changed my trajectory.
Because of the doors that opened and the confidence i gained from your comments, I’ve managed to scale that initial win to around $1.500 in revenue this month. I’ve even locked in deals with national and international brands.
I’m not saying this to brag. I’m saying this because i want to give back. i don't have a course to sell, but I do have a process that works for me. If this helps even one person get their first client, I’ll be happy.
Here is the exact blend of high tech and old school hustle I used to fill my pipeline:
1) The AI approach or lead Gen
I realized that spamming people with generic IA templates is a waste of time. Instead, I use AI to be more human, not less.
I use AI agents to scrape leads, but I filter strictly by pain points. I don't look for successful businesses. I look for businesses with great products but terrible websites, or active Instagrams with no link in bio
Open on Reddit r/Entrepreneur by u/johnstevens456 12mo ago So, I found out my employees don’t want what I want. More than 12 years ago I became brainwashed by Gary V, Grant Cardone, and Tia Lopez. Night after night, I’d pour a drink and sit in front of my computer, wishing I wasn’t trapped at my day job selling copy machines. I dreamt of owning my own business, I could feel it in my soul but with no experience, money, or connections that burning desire was just existential dread. Over the years, I became obsessed with the idea of “success” and money making. The more content I consumed, the more the algorithms fed it to me.
I did indeed start my business and somehow, despite my best efforts to f*ck it up, it grew into the baddest bar and restaurant cleaning company in Portland Oregon. I guess the way it happened was my relentless work ethic and my inability to say no. The jobs kept rolling in and I’d just do them, no matter what. It didn’t matter if I didn’t sleep for 24 hours, it didn’t matter that I didn’t have a day off for more than 3 years, I didn’t even care that people saw me as a janitor. Money is money and I was going to get mine. I was building my dream and cashing checks. And the whole time I had Goggins in my ear calling me a bitch and asking me “who’s going to carry the mops?”
Open on Reddit r/Entrepreneur by u/Popular-Cap-9013 1mo ago 0 to 500K ARR, solo, with AI as my only team. already at $103K. documenting everything I'm trying to hit 500K ARR completely solo using AI as my entire team. here's where I'm at after month 1.
ok so I need to get this out of my head because it's been eating at me for months.
I've built businesses before. done well. had partners, teams, all that. But there's this question that kept coming back and I couldn't shake it. How much of that was actually me, and how much was the people around me?
like I'm not fishing for compliments here. I genuinely don't know. when you build with other people you can always tell yourself "yeah but I was the one who..." but you never really know for sure right?
So I'm doing something kind of stupid to find out.
I'm calling it the 500K challenge. From 0 to 500K ARR, completely solo, where AI is my entire team. no freelancers, no partners, no employees. Me, Claude Code, ChatGPT, a bunch of agents and automations I'm building as I go. That's it.
now before you think I'm starting from zero zero, I'm not. I have one client right now paying me $8K/month for Meta Ads management, so that's about $103K ARR already. I'm not gonna pretend that doesn't exist. But everything else, the systems, the acquisition, the content pipeline, all of that nee
Open on Reddit r/copywriting by u/joefife 10mo ago How does a micro business find a copy writer that doesn't use AI Hi. I'm a handyman. I've got a small company with a few guys. We've never needed a website but to grow I need to look at how the business is presented, so I finally agreed to get a website.
The designer is open that he will use AI text to create the content based on the information I've given him.
I loathe AI. Absolutely hate it. But aaa place holder to get SOMETHING up, fine. But I'm not prepared to let it stay.
So - I'm reading this sub and it looks like you're all working on large projects, as I see various references to executives, c suite, etc.
Where does a tiny business like mine go to get decent copy for a website? I've looked at upwork and everyone who positions themselves to my kinda place is clearly using AI.
Also, how do I identify if someone is using AI? Obviously the finished product but by that time it's too late and I really am too small to be getting into payment disputes if it's ai slop.
Are there terms I should be using when looking, or is there a group that non AI users are part of? I'm on the UK and need the text to feel native.
Pointers welcome please :)
Open on Reddit r/marketing by u/hrh-sylvanas 5mo ago My CEO thinks AI can replace our entire marketing team. Am I insane or is he? I’m the head of marketing in a B2C company that supports around 60 physical retail locations and runs frequent onsite activations and events.
Our marketing team is extremely lean. Two marketers including me, plus two in-house graphic designers and two extra partners, only running weekly community events on field.
Everything is handled internally. Strategy, daily social media content including TikTok, event planning and onsite activations, website management, overall marketing strategy, performance, coordination with roughly 60 stores, and even light legal work like terms and conditions for promotions. There are no agencies or external partners involved.
My fellow marketer is leaving in a month to pursue a master’s degree. I recently learned that my CEO doesn’t think we need to replace them.
His reasoning is NOT that he wants to cut costs and me do all the “hands on job”.
He thinks that content can now be automated with AI🤙. According to him, not only I won’t be involved with extra work but I’ll move into a more “important” and supervisory role and won’t need to be doing things like making TikTok videos anymore.
I’m honestly stunned. This isn’t a small traditional business. Th
Open on Reddit r/SideProject by u/thisisgiulio 1y ago Drop your sideproject link and I’ll find you the best communities to find users i've been working on a tool that finds where your target customers actually hang out online.
it scans reddit and x like a person would - searching keywords, finding relevant communities, tracking conversations and keeping track of the best communities.
the goal is to catch when people are talking about problems your product solves so you can join the conversation
been testing the community-finding part and getting decent results. looking to get more feedback on how it does on real usecases
so yeah no catch - drop your project link and i'll find the top x communities & subreddits where your potential users are active
just looking for some feedback as we onboard more people onto the tool so if the communities are not relevant to your niche please do let me know!
Open on Reddit r/smallbusiness by u/Gold-Rule-9586 6mo ago Need help with flagging 100% fake reviews on my google page. I will return the favor. So here’s what’s going on.
I run a small, family-owned business that’s been around for over 35 years. Recently, three different Google accounts left 1-star reviews on our Google Business profile. None of the reviewers live in our area, none were ever customers, and there’s zero interaction history. They are 100% fake.
I’ve reported them multiple times and even asked Google to take a second look. Nothing. I want to be clear: I’m not trying to remove legitimate negative reviews—we absolutely leave real feedback alone. These are clearly fabricated accounts with no connection to our business.
What’s frustrating is that fake reviews hurt small businesses disproportionately. We’ve built our reputation over decades, not months. We have around 120 Google reviews and 120 Yelp reviews that were earned the hard way. Meanwhile, competitors in our area somehow have 300+ Google reviews with only a fraction of that on Yelp, which already raises eyebrows—but that’s beside the point.
Since Google won’t act, I’m wondering if community flagging actually makes a difference.
If anyone is willing to help flag obvious fake reviews, I’m happy to do the same in return when I see clear violations (out-
Open on Reddit r/smallbusiness by u/hggibs11 4mo ago Small business owners: which AI platform actually helps the most (quoting, records, marketing, and admin)? I run a small service business and I’m working on improving my systems this year. I’ve only used ChatGPT so far, and it’s been helpful, but I’m curious if Claude, Gemini, Perplexity, or other platforms would work better for the way I use AI.
I’m keeping my industry vague on purpose, but here’s what I want AI help with:
Business (primary use)
• Quoting/estimates: scope wording, pricing breakdowns (labor/materials/travel), internal vs customer-facing versions, proposal templates I can reuse fast
• Recordkeeping: job logs, customer history, materials used, before/after notes, consistent formats
• Workflow/SOPs: checklists, step-by-step processes, repeatable systems so I’m not reinventing the wheel
• Customer comms: emails/texts, follow-ups, explaining expectations clearly
• Basic calculations + troubleshooting related to tools/equipment I use in the field
Marketing (big focus this year)
• Social media content system: turning one job into multiple posts, Reels hooks/scripts, captions, content calendar
• Local marketing: website copy, FAQs, SEO keywords/topics, simple ad copy, lead follow-up messaging
• Brand consistency: making everything sound like me, not generic A
Open on Reddit r/CreatorServices by u/Broad_Zombie_3379 14d ago YouTube Creator 9k followers 9 months need help
I’m a content creator, my channel on YouTube iI speak about domestic and global news and issues specializing in intelligence and threa analysi, no political spin, just vetted original stories. I’m a veteran with an intelligence background I’ve been able to secure interviews with individuals no one else can. I gained 9k followers in the 9 months my channel has been live. For some reason my subscribers are only making up less than 1% of my views, my CTR is currently 7.5% my retention rate is over 100% for video between 3 and 5 minute. I mainly do long format 20 minutes or longer and retention rate is close to 50%. I have zero violations of any kind, subs we’re 30% of my views and for some reason that suddenly changed to less than 1% of my views. youtube is feeding my videos to an average of 20k new impressions per video. my total watch hours are 15,778, but my earn tab has me at 3900 and I have been stuck here for 3 weeks. I need someone to help me figure what’s going on out, I’m willing to provide a percentage of channell to someone who can change the numbers on a a couple videos. I barely have any work that needs done to monetize, I already have paid sponsors I promote in the co
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