Overcoming "Cold Start" & Building Traction for your Startup through Active Marketing

It's been a few days since we kick-started the marketing for Creavio, but since until now that wasn’t our primary focus. My co-founder and I have come to realize that we're spending a majority of our time on the product itself, which is hindering our marketing efforts. We're barely managing to get new sign-ups on the waitlist due to this lack of attention.

With that in mind, I've decided to invest more time into formulating a marketing strategy. Although marketing is a broad spectrum, it can essentially be divided into two main categories: active and passive.

Passive marketing involves posting on social media and spreading the word about our product. While this strategy holds its own significance—especially when there's an initial audience to keep engaged—it's not the best solution to overcome the "cold start". This term, commonly used in the startup world, refers to the initial phase when a new product or service has no engagement or users.

To mitigate this, it's crucial to engage in active marketing. As the name suggests, active marketing involves reaching out to people, contributing to product-related communities, presenting your product as a solution to existing problems, and inviting supporters of competing products to try out yours and share their feedback. Unlike passive marketing, active marketing doesn't rely on potential users noticing you; instead, it involves going out there and drawing them in. Even though it can be challenging, active marketing often leads to valuable feedback and, most importantly, it works!

How do you execute active marketing? The answer primarily depends on your product and your niche. For Creavio, we plan to focus on:

1. Creator outreach
2. Contributing to discussions on Product Hunt
3. Engaging with Reddit communities
4. Attracting competitors' current users (you can find some of them by checking who follows your competitors on social media)
5. And much more

This strategy may not appear scalable, but that's okay. There's no need to worry about scaling your marketing in these early stages. The initial months should be spent closely with your early adopters and refining your Minimum Viable Product (MVP). Once you've gained a substantial user base, things become easier due to word-of-mouth, referrals, and network effects.

That's our current strategy for Creavio, and I'll definitely keep you updated on our progress!

This is Day 3 of our #100DaysOfStartup journey, building Creavio, which is an all-in-one platform designed for creators to monetize their content and community. If this sounds like something you need, join our waitlist for VIP 1-1 onboarding and early access.

Want to delve deeper into our journey? Feel free to revisit Day 2 of our startup adventure here where I discussed some of the initial challenges we faced when planning our MVP for a rapid market entry. For real-time updates, insider perspectives, and engaging discussions around our progress, I encourage you to follow me on Twitter, Linkedin, and of course, here on Medium.

Remember, every follow brings you one step closer to our shared vision of empowering creators. By signing up for our waitlist, you'll not only get a front-row seat to witness the evolution of Creavio, but you'll also contribute immensely to the refinement of a tool designed for creators like you.