Skip to main content
Kasspian
Where to find customers
Grounded readSoftware & SaaS

Where to find customers for a developer tool

6 places, read by Kasspian on 18 August 2026. Rooms and their rules change, so check before you post.

Who actually buys

Software engineers and small engineering teams who have already hit the specific pain point this tool solves and are actively searching for or asking about a fix right now.

The 6 places

  1. 01

    Hacker News Show HN (news.ycombinator.com/show)

    Community

    Over 10 million monthly readers who are engineers and technical founders, the exact buyer for an API and CLI tool. A strong Show HN can drive 5000 to 50000 visitors in 48 hours and generates direct, honest technical feedback that converts to early users.

    What to do there

    Post a Show HN on a Tuesday to Thursday morning ET slot. Lead with the specific problem, not the product name. Stay in the thread for the first 4 hours and reply to every comment personally.

    Open the roomUsually: Show HN posts are open to any account. Titles must be factual and descriptive, not promotional. Engage the thread yourself or it dies fast.
  2. 02

    Indie Hackers community (indiehackers.com)

    Community

    Technical founders who buy and recommend developer tools are active here. Journey posts with specific numbers consistently outperform product announcements and generate direct feedback from potential buyers.

    What to do there

    Post a build-in-public update with a specific technical problem you solved and honest numbers. Ask for feedback, not signups. Buyers will DM you.

    Open the roomUsually: Self-promotion is allowed once using the SHOW IH flair, framed as a feedback request rather than an advertisement. Journey posts with real numbers perform best.
  3. 03

    DevOps Engineers Slack community (devopsengineers.com)

    Community

    Active Slack community of DevOps engineers of all levels who discuss tools and platforms in dedicated channels. Direct access to the exact buyer persona for an API and CLI tool.

    What to do there

    Join and spend a week answering questions in the relevant tool channels before mentioning what you built. When you do mention it, offer a free key and ask for honest feedback.

  4. 04

    r/devops (reddit.com/r/devops)

    CommunityComment first

    DevOps and SRE practitioners actively seek and recommend tooling here. This is a buyer-rich audience for infra and developer tooling, and members ask tool recommendation questions regularly.

    What to do there

    Search for threads where people are asking about the specific pain point your tool solves. Reply with a technical answer first, then mention you built something for this and offer a key.

    Open r/devops (reddit.com/r/devops)Usually: Promotion is confined to a weekly thread. Commenting on existing threads with genuine technical help is open and is the right door here.
  5. 05

    r/SaaS (reddit.com/r/SaaS)

    CommunityGated

    Tolerates founder product posts more than most subreddits. Engineers and technical founders who buy tools are active here and respond to honest build stories.

    What to do there

    Frame a post as a build story or a specific technical decision you made, let the product be part of the narrative rather than the headline. One post allowed every 60 days.

    Open r/SaaS (reddit.com/r/SaaS)Usually: Max one promotional mention every 60 days per subreddit rules formalized in April 2026. Comments that plug your product in other threads are counted against tha.
  6. 06

    r/webdev Showoff Saturday megathread (reddit.com/r/webdev)

    CommunityComment first

    Over 900000 members who are working web developers comparing stacks, hosting, and deployment tools. One of the highest-intent developer surfaces for tool discovery.

    What to do there

    Post in the weekly Showoff Saturday megathread with a short technical description of what the tool does and the specific problem it kills. Link to a working demo or quick-start.

    Open the roomUsually: Standalone self-promotion posts are not allowed. Project promotion must go in the weekly Showoff Saturday megathread. Commenting on technical threads is open.

If you only do one thing

Find 10 to 15 live threads on Hacker News, r/devops, r/webdev, or niche Discord servers where engineers are complaining about or asking for help with the exact problem your tool solves. Reply with a genuinely useful technical answer, then mention at the end that you built something to handle this and offer a free trial key in exchange for 15 minutes of feedback. That conversation, not a landing page, is your first sales call. Do this before you write a single word of marketing copy.

This is the read on a developer tool. Yours is narrower than the category. Describe your business and get the same thing for it, with the live threads to answer this week.

What this read used
Other readsAll →