Achiv

First, huge congrats on the $130 MRR, Maks. In a landscape flooded with inflated "lottery ticket" launch metrics, realistic and sustainable growth is the only thing that actually builds a real business. 7 months of resilience is something to be proud of.

You're spot on about the "low-effort content and link-exchange" trap. Google’s recent core updates proved that programmatic SEO built on shallow, manipulated AI content is a ticking time bomb.

Since you're diving into GEO (Generative Engine Optimization) R&D, I have a quick technical question:

Traditional Google SEO is relatively understood (crawlers, indexing, semantic density). But for LLMs (Perplexity, Gemini, ChatGPT Search), the "ranking" variables are much more about entity-relationship mapping, semantic relevance, and being cited in highly authoritative contextual databases rather than traditional backlink volume.

How are you planning to structure your autonomous content engine to optimize specifically for LLM citations rather than just standard Google search results?

Rooting for you, man. Definitely following your journey on X and GitHub!

Respect the honesty here. The lottery winner framing is exactly right. Survivorship bias dominates most SaaS content and it distorts reality for everyone building quietly.

The point about SEO/GEO being an iterative race rather than a hackable system is something more founders need to hear. Tools that try to game the algorithm always have an expiry date.

Curious about your R&D approach. Are you building the content strategy layer around SERP intent analysis or more toward AI citation patterns given the 2026 updates? Both feel relevant for what you're describing.

I like the honesty here. The most valuable part is not the $130 MRR, it's having enough conviction to keep going after seven months when most projects get abandoned long before they find signal.

One thing I've noticed with SEO products is that founders often optimize for content production when the harder problem is content selection. Publishing 100 articles is easy now. Identifying the 10 topics that can realistically compound into traffic is where most of the value lives.

Publishing the research publicly is also a smart move. Even if competitors read it, you're building credibility and collecting feedback at the same time. In markets this crowded, trust is often a bigger differentiator than another automation feature.

Kudos on the transparent approach and hitting $130 MRR the right way! As a UI/UX designer and no-coder, your focus on building a "simple UI where you plan in several clicks" sounds like a dream. Building sustainable SEO/GEO without the sketchy hacks is the way to go. Dropping a follow to watch this R&D month unfold!

Interesting direction. When you say “autonomous SEO/GEO,” what’s the actual loop -content generation, keyword selection, internal linking, or all of it?
Feels like the hard part is still evaluation, not generation.

Thanks for sharing this! Brutal read but it's so factual !

Your story reminds me of this strategy shared by this indie founder: Launch on Product Hunt multiple times

Many founders mistakenly believe a successful Product Hunt launch is the primary gateway to startup success.

The reality is that a launch is just a single day of visibility that rarely leads to long-term growth.

All the best!

Brutal read. I’m building an AI interviewer and was planning a PH launch. Now? Not anymore.

Deleting real comments from real users is unacceptable. That’s not “anti-bot”, that’s anti-founder.

Thanks for the warning. You helped more people than PH will ever admit.

Very interesting and thanks for providing this information, its indeed not the only channel and as with anything its important to diversify the channels!

HAAANK. DONT ABBREVIATE PRODUCT HUNT!!! HAAAAANK...

Thanks for sharing your experience on PH, much appreciated.

Fascinating breakdown of the PH algo shift. The part about them penalizing older accounts and prioritizing weight-based upvotes is brutal but smart from their perspective. Real insight here: PH is one marketing channel, not THE channel. The fact you got 14 points with ~15k engaged reach is actually solid if it converted. Most indie builders obsess over ranking #1 when what matters is qualified traffic. Did the launch drive real signups or mostly vanity metrics?

Interesting perspective. It feels like most platforms are shifting towards filtering “quality signals” more aggressively, but sometimes real users get caught in the same system.

I think the challenge is balancing anti-bot systems without killing organic engagement.

Deleting the actual comments and reviews is the most brutal part here. It's one thing to tweak upvote weight to fight spam, but wiping out genuine feedback from your real users and colleagues is just hostile.

Your point about traffic is a massive wake-up call for all of us. Funneling a warm, highly engaged audience of 1.5k people to PH just to have them filtered out as "bots" is a massive waste of marketing leverage. Direct traffic to your landing page is always king.

PH has felt like a pay-to-play directory for a while now, but this is a new low. Keep building, man. Real active users matter way more than a "Product of the Day" badge.

This is the most useful thing I've read ahead of my own PH launch on June 23rd. The algo cutting 90% of upvotes is genuinely alarming — I'd assumed organic outreach would move the needle.

The traffic breakdown is the real lesson though. IH outperforming PH directly tells me where to focus energy. Thanks for being honest about the numbers rather than dressing it up.

Good luck with Achiv — the problem you're solving is real.

The PH algo change is a real one - I've seen the same pattern with another launch this week. The kicker for me is the "hide them from others" part. If they're going to discount votes, fine, but at least let the maker see what their actual reach was. The silent discounting destroys trust. Sorry it hit you on launch day man.

exactly!! i have launched my product to 2 days back in PH i felt the same.
i got only 3 points because of this originally i got emails of upvotes but PH shows 3 points to my product.. really upset with that..

btw if you wanna know about my product here it is

Driftless : it is a documentation drift detection platform for GitHub repositories. It analyzes your actual codebase, generates accurate READMEs, detects when docs fall out of sync with code, and alerts you before contributors or users run into broken instructions. Think of it as automated quality checks for documentation.

link : https://driftlessx.dev


thank you !

Thanks for sharing this — really useful timing for me, I'm launching on PH next week.

The algo cutting 'suspicious' upvotes makes sense in theory but clearly hurts solo devs who just have a real network. Did you notice any pattern in which upvotes counted vs got cut?

Any advice on what you'd do differently

5 pivots in 7 months and still shipping ..respect

Two paying customers who found you through the work is worth more than a PH badge, so don't let today's points mess with your head. I've written angel checks into companies with less real traction than this. The thing I'd watch isn't acquisition, it's whether those two renew in month two and three. A content tool lives or dies on retention, because the ROI takes weeks to show up and that's exactly when people get cold feet. If you can get one of those two on record saying it changed how they write, that case study will outwork anything you do on Product Hunt. Good luck today.

Wow.. that's a good product, many times while using AI content, I could never get it right at first, maybe 5-6 iterations

The "5 full pivots" part is what separates posts I trust from posts I skim. Real building is unrecognizable from where you started — pretending otherwise is the actual fiction.

I'm two weeks into validating a tool after 3 product attempts that combined for 1 sale. The thing nobody told me until I lived it: the slow MRR is the data. If $128 came from actual work and not hype, you already know more about your customer than someone with $5k from a viral launch that won't repeat.

Good luck today.

yeah that gap between ranking and clicks is sneaky. 0 clicks at page 1 often means zero-click SERP territory - featured snippet taking the answer before anyone scrolls. worth checking what the actual result pages look like for those keywords.

2 paying customers is further than most projects ever get — genuinely. The thing that helped me most was treating the first couple like a research goldmine: I paid attention to the exact words they used when they decided to pay, then started using their phrasing instead of my own "founder" language. Converted noticeably better. Have you been able to get on a call with either of them to dig into the "why now"?

The fact that users are willing to pay for it proves, at the very least, that it has value.

How do you get data from Reddit? If I want to write about a certain topic “let’s say ERP”, how do you find relevant sub Reddits?

You gotta fix your color scheme dude. That combination is not working

Great sir, You got your paying customers.
But I feel 7 months is too long time to get paying customers.

How you stay intacked during the process sir ?
According to me, mostof the people collapse during this process.

5 pivots is the part of this post that says the most. most people quit after 1, maybe 2. the fact you kept going and landed on something people pay for says more about your judgment than the MRR number does.

the positioning angle is smart too. "what your audience wants to read" is a much harder problem than "make my writing better" and if you've actually cracked that, the ceiling is way higher than a polishing tool.

2 paying customers at 7 months is 2 more than most — congrats on shipping and launching today. Rooting for the PH run. What's the one thing you'd do differently in those 7 months?

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Congrats on the launch

The “built in public and multiple pivots” part really stands out — that’s honestly the real founder journey most people don’t talk about enough.

I like the positioning shift: not “another AI writing tool” but something that surfaces what people actually want to read. That’s a much stronger angle if it’s executed well.

$128 MRR might feel small, but it’s already validation that someone is willing to pay for it — which is more than most ideas ever reach.

Wishing you a strong Product Hunt launch today. Curious to see how you differentiate long-term as more tools move into “audience insight” territory.

7 months, 5 pivots, $128 MRR and still shipping. that's the real thing, good luck today.

the "find demand before writing" angle is genuinely different. most content tools assume you already know what to say.

went and upvoted on PH.

Congratulations on the real result. This is what most founders wait for and having a repeat payment definitely shows there is a real valye in the product. It's only about distribution. One golden line I read and abide by is "Sell the problem you solve, not the product you have." — Richard Branson

Honestly, 2 paying customers is worth more than 2,000 free users. Plenty of people launch with hype and no revenue. The fact that strangers are already paying means you're solving a real problem for someone. Good luck with the PH launch.

The lottery-winner framing in your latest update is exactly right. The "$2k MRR overnight" posts survive because the 99% who ran the same playbook and got nothing never write postmortems. Two paying customers who stuck around after 7 months of research is more signal than a launch spike. And your PH writeup about the new algo cutting real upvotes as "suspicious" is genuinely useful intel for anyone planning a launch - sorry it cost you the comments, but thanks for documenting it. Publishing the SEO/GEO results on a public repo is a strong move: verifiable beats persuasive. Following along.

2 paying customers and $128 MRR after 7 months of real work is not tiny. it's proof the problem is real enough that strangers paid money for it. the terrified feeling on launch day is normal and doesn't mean anything about whether it'll work. good luck today

I want to be a part of this please let me know if we can connect and discuss more!!

Consistency and commitment is the new moat when anyone can build anything! Props for sticking with it

It tells you what your audience actually wants to read. Very fascinating. I like how you're building stuff 100% in the open that's respectable. OK I see from your Product Hunt more about your business that you pull stuff from reddit. I don't know what to make of reddit are they legit? I always hear conflicting stuff about it. Stop guessing what to write. I'm going to look more into your stuff. I appreciate it. That's fascinating nicely done II like what you're about here. Thank you brother.

Congrats on the launch!

Honestly, I think the most impressive part isn't the $128 MRR it's sticking with the problem through 5 pivots and 7 months of research. Most founders either fall in love with their first solution or quit before they find real demand.

Also appreciate the transparency. In a world full of AI-generated marketing, it's refreshing to read a post that sounds human and shares the uncertainty behind the journey.

Two paying customers may sound small to some people, but it's proof that someone found enough value to pay. That's a much stronger signal than hundreds of free users.

Curious: what was the biggest insight that caused one of those pivots? Was there a specific customer conversation or moment that changed your understanding of the problem?

Good luck on Product Hunt today 🚀

Congrats on the launch! Love seeing unique takes on problems many other products try to solve with the same approach.

As a CS student who is eager to ship my first project this post is actually really motivating, do you have any users before you started charging?

Congrats on the launch! The "building from real demand instead of guessing" framing really resonates — that's exactly the trap most solo founders fall into early on. I'm in a similar spot myself, just launched a UK deals tracker and the hardest part is figuring out which features users actually want vs what I think they want. Good luck with the PH launch today!

7 months, 5 pivots, and you still shipped - that's the part most people don't talk about. The pivots aren't failures, they're just the actual cost of finding something real.

The positioning is sharp too. "Finds what your audience is actually struggling with, in their own words" is a completely different angle from every other AI content tool screaming about writing faster. That specificity is what gets people to actually try it.

1.5 months into building zer0email and about to do the same thing on PH - the terrified feeling right before launch might just be the sign you actually care about what you built. Good luck today, going to check it out on PH.

This is so motivating to see. I just launched my first SaaS on Product Hunt today too — ViCareerAI. No revenue yet but taking that first step already feels huge. Respect for putting in 7 months and still showing up on launch day 🙏

$128 MRR after 7 months and 5 pivots isn't tiny — it's proof, and proof is the hard part. Most people quit before the first paying stranger ever shows up. You got two. That's a different category from "I have an idea."

The "I didn't use my own AI tool to write this" line landed, by the way. It says more about your confidence in what the product actually does than any feature list would.

I'm a bit behind you (early organic users on my own tool, no real launch yet), so reading the honest version of the messy middle is genuinely useful — the polished launch posts hide exactly the part founders need to see.

One question, since you've clearly thought about it: across those 5 pivots, what was the signal that finally told you this version was the one to commit to? I'm trying to learn how people recognize that moment vs. pivoting again out of fear. Good luck today — go get it.

Launched today too. No revenue yet. Reading this at 11 PM after a full day of fixing bugs nobody saw because nobody's using it yet.

The terrified part is real. Good luck today — genuinely rooting for you.

congratulations man, you just take a leap 95% of people won't take

Don't be afraid, i wish you good luck in your launch on producthunt, you gained my vote 9 already :)

Congrats on shipping, and doing it with real revenue instead of hype. 2 paying customers from the work itself beats a flashy launch with no retention.

The part that stood out for me: "finds what your audience is actually struggling with, in their own words." That's the gap most content tools skip. They help you write faster, not write the right thing. Writing from real demand instead of guessing is the whole game.

Also respect the note about not using Achiv to write this. It says a lot that it's positioned as "what to say", not "fix my grammar".

I'm at a similar early stage (building in public, first couple of sales, same launch day terror), so this one hit. The 5 pivots especially. That's not failure, that's you actually listening to your users.

Heading to your PH page now. Curious: of the 5 pivots, which one unlocked the first paying customer?

I believe perseverance is essential. I've also developed customer service systems, Christian apps, and Christian intelligence systems. The income is currently meager, but I'm still striving to continue.

Congrats on hitting publish, Maksym! That 'terrified' feeling on launch day is universal — I remember my first launch and thinking everyone would immediately see through every flaw. But you know what? The founders who ship are the ones who learn.5 pivots in 4 months is intense. I'm curious — what was the biggest pattern you noticed across those pivots? Was it the audience that changed, the problem you were solving, or the actual solution?Also, $128 MRR from 2 real customers is more than most people ever get. That's proof of demand, not just hype. Rooting for you on PH today

The point about reading comments more than posts is underrated. The original question is what people ask, the comments show what answers keep failing them — and most content just repeats those same failed answers.

Using a similar approach for building goNutriTrack actually — looking at r/nutrition and r/loseit threads to understand what people actually struggle with, not what I assumed they did.

That's the real thing most GEO "experts" are really missing - you can generate 100s posts that AI will likely cite, but what's next? User landed with that post will bounce instantly because of your effortless, boring content.

The contrast between AI SEO and pain-driven content is something more people need to hear. AI-generated content can cover topics at scale, but it doesn't know what actually keeps someone up at night — only real research into the pain does.

"People don't search for solutions, they search for their pain" is a reframe I'm going to be thinking about for a while. I'm in the middle of validating a product right now and this changes how I'm thinking about the landing page copy. Instead of leading with what the tool does, lead with the specific frustration someone is typing into Google at 11pm.

What was the process for finding the pain-driven keywords? Did you do manual research, interviews, or something else?

You should check StartupSubmit for visibility, backlinks, and early traffic.

How can I find customers that I am working on a app dream analysis and now I am going to make an mvp where can I test that

This tool solves a frequent and current problem, and it can greatly help us reach the customers we want. Congratulations! Can it be used with any URL from any website/app?

The sharpest thing in here is not the cloner, it is the realization that your own tool became a diagnostic for your broken landing copy. When your ICP tool gets your own ICP wrong, the tool is working and your positioning is the bug. I would build that into the product instead of treating it as an embarrassing side story. "Run it on yourself first and see if we read you the way your buyers do" is a stronger hook than the cloner.

On the ethics question, since you asked directly: the mechanic does not make me twitch, the word does. You are not stealing anything. Audiences are not owned, and reverse-engineering where buyers gather from public positioning is just market research with cleaner inputs. But "stole" and "clone" will scare off the careful B2B buyers you actually want and attract the spray-and-pray crowd you do not. I would reframe around borrowing a competitor's clarity, not their audience. Same feature, very different customer.

This lines up exactly with what I'm seeing in a niche right now. "Tech workers worried about RSU concentration" has 100 AI-generated articles that all read identically — diversify, talk to a CPA, 25% cap — and you can feel within a paragraph that nobody writing them has ever stared at a vesting screen at 70% concentration. The specific texture of the pain (which Reddit and Blind articulate beautifully) gets erased into a smooth surface.

One question on your 6 months of data: did the gap between Google ranking and LLM citation diverge for you? My hunch is LLMs are more forgiving of generic content because they synthesize across many sources, while Google increasingly punishes it — so the optimization targets might subtly diverge. Curious if your data backs that up or contradicts it.

That's really a helpful information. Thanks 👍

The sharpest thing here is the accidental insight: your tool reading your copy as "general Reddit users" is not a bug, it is your actual buyers reading you the exact same way. The cloner is a clever workaround, but it treats the symptom. The tool got confused because every visitor gets confused. Fix the landing and the tool stops needing the workaround.

You asked about the ethics, so a straight answer: cloning a competitor's audience does not make me twitch, because an ICP is not owned. You are analyzing public Reddit data about a public company's public positioning. That is just competitive research, and everyone serious already does it by hand. What makes me twitch is the framing. "I stole my competitor's entire audience in one click" is a great launch hook and a bad brand, especially for you. Your whole pitch is that you are the anti-slop, value-first alternative to Reddit spam tools. "Steal" is zero-sum and undercuts that in one word. For Product Hunt I would lead the feature as competitive ICP research, not theft. The hook earns clicks today and chips at the exact trust you are building. What does retention look like on the free tier so far, are people coming back to run a second product or is it one and done?

I tried this one my own website and it's genuinely good. Good luck on your launch on PH!

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Going to try Achiv right now. Good information on Reddit posting.

I made a to-do list app for people who would forget to do steps of big tasks like planning a child’s birthday party and forgetting the party favors, or planning a vacation and forgetting to set up your dogs boarding while you’re away. I went to the ADHD subreddit since that was my main audience. I instantly saw people selling similar products constantly. Most of the advice I gave was helpful but if I even mentioned it, I would get roasted. Then I was banned permanently for using AI generated content, even though my comments were my own. I was identified and judged and lost my main target audience.

Overall, I realized that the space is too crowded and I needed to make something more valuable and unique. I killed the tool and excited to be working on something more unique and valuable. I’m also much more aware of what I need to do marketing my next product through Reddit.

Thank you so much. I was going to post on reddit to get my users and you genuinely helped me avoid the mistakes i would have made, if i were on my own.

The trap most SaaS founders fall into on Reddit is treating it like a distribution channel instead of a knowledge channel. The moment a thread starts smelling like an ad, the comments turn on you and the mods step in. What's actually worked for the teams I've watched scale: pick three subs where your customer already lives, spend a month answering questions with no link to your product, then earn the right to drop the product when someone literally asks "what do you use for this?" It's slow. It compounds. And it's mostly written by you, not by a tool.

Didn't just post wrong — got permanently banned.

I launched an open-source POS system and did exactly what you described: posted in r/selfhosted and r/opensource thinking "these are my people." Turns out there's a big difference between "these people use self-hosted software" and "these people are looking for a new self-hosted tool right now."

The ban came fast. No warning, no explanation. Account just stopped being able to post. I still don't know exactly which rule triggered it — probably looked like spam because I posted across a few subs in the same week.

The part that stings most: I spent more time crafting those Reddit posts than I did on actual ICP research. I assumed I knew where my buyers were without ever sitting in those communities first and just reading.

Your point about niche subs is exactly right. The real signal is in threads where someone says "I'm still using Excel for client bookings and it's killing me" — not in r/SaaS where everyone is a founder selling something.

Starting over on IH and dev.to now. Slower, but at least I'm not shadowbanned here.

Sometimes people are wondering why it's not surface some subreddits they think are relevant.

The answer is - they are not relevant.