u/Downtown_Pudding9728

Ok so, $8k in 6 months isn’t exactly retirement money just yet (far from it), but creating a SaaS business with almost 50 active users from nothing in 6 months since launch, is something I’m proud of nonetheless.

For some context, last year I worked in sales and got a warning from LinkedIn for automating sending messages, so I decided to create my own safer LinkedIn automation tool instead (called ZenMode), using Claude and Claude code.

I was so convinced in myself and what I was doing that I quit my job before I even had a single customer. Some will say this is stupid and risky, but that’s just who I am 🤷‍♂️

Below I’ll talk more about how to actually do this (based on my own experience so far).

1. Validate the fuck out of your idea

I see a million SaaS founders think their idea is solid gold. Usually it’s the most minor, easiest thing to copy, and they just spend a weekend vibe coding it.

You really need to look at the actual market for your niche. Don’t create something if there’s no tangible demand for something like that (unless it’s truly unique and everyone will want it, but that’s a unicorn and doesn’t likely exist).

If loads of businesses have done it and done it well, and you don’t have any unique angle, don’t waste your time.

The best businesses iterate on what already exists rather than create something unique.

2. Build in public

Start building your audience before you even launch.

Get on X, Reddit, YouTube, LinkedIn and wherever else you can go - post what you’re building, why you’re building it, and create a waitlist in your site for it.

Try to build a community around it from day 1.

If you don’t, you’ll spend all your time building something and then suddenly realize you are not getting a single customer.

Marketing and distribution is harder than building and just as (if not more) important.

An average product with a big audience always outsells an amazing product with no audience.

3. Dogfood your product 🐕

You should be the number one fan and biggest user of what you’re building. Build something you would genuinely use/need yourself and get great value from.

If you’re benefitting from it, so will others.

4. Never stop iterating

There are always new features that can be added, design improvements, backend hardening etc.

Building products doesn’t have an endpoint - don’t do something for a weekend then leave it and expect people to just flood in at any point.

5. Optimize for GEO and search

Pretty obvious one but you need to apply best practices from day 1 for this.

There are tonnes of online resources for how to do this properly, just ask your LLM.

6. Start off with lifetime access deals and/or beta testers

The most important thing for new businesses is getting users to stress test your product. It might look great to you but you’d be surprised about the hundreds of possible edge cases that seem to come up.

Giving people lifetime access early on (maybe first 1-2 months) helps validate your idea without the immediate pressure of trying to get people to subscribe

7. Ignore the haters

So many people will try to shit on you and your product, but they probably look like wojack and live in their mom’s basement. Hate often comes from projection, jealousy and insecurity. Just ignore them.

8. Look at what other people did

There are plenty of success stories of people growing businesses and audiences online, and many books too - do some studying and get out of your comfort zone. Learn what works and apply it to your own projects.

So far following the above steps have been really useful for building ZenMode, hope you find it useful too! 🙌

Hey guys 👋

5 months ago I launched my LinkedIn automation software, having built it entirely with Claude code, and I’m now approaching $3k MRR with over 50 active paying customers (happy to share TrustMRR if requested).

I know everyone is this sub is interested in growing a business, so really I just want to show how I’ve been doing it and offer some guidance based on my experience.

Below I’ll go into the what, why and how, and how I’ve been scaling the business, and hope you find it useful.

What I built

I built a LinkedIn outreach automation tool called ZenMode, which scrapes profiles of your target customers, sends connection requests and follow up messages on autopilot.

The main purpose is for Founders, Sales teams, Marketers and anyone else who uses LinkedIn for outreach, to generate more meetings and grow their businesses.

It’s a software that controls a dedicated chrome browser to automate LinkedIn, without needing plugins/the cloud.

Why I built it

Last year I got a warning from automating on LinkedIn using another tool (automating on LinkedIn is against their ToS and can result in account bans - people automate at their own risk).

I wanted to automate my outreach as I was working in sales, and it was really helping me to generate more discovery calls, without the manual grind of sending loads of messages and connection requests manually.

I didn’t trust any of the existing tools for safety, as the majority are on the cloud using IP addresses that are different from where you normally use LinkedIn from, and are slightly higher risk for being flagged as a result.

So, I solved for my own pain point, and created a software that’s desktop based, using your own IP address, and essentially acting like a human would when performing actions on LinkedIn.

How I built it

From day 1 I used Claude to figure out how to do it. We jointly made architectural decisions based fully around safety mechanisms - what would the safest tool look like in practice and how would we build it?

So I figured out that the easiest/safest way would be to make an electron desktop application controlling a browser, which was governed by a dashboard that fed/stored all the data.

There was a lot of setup involved at the start with various tools - Vercel, Cloudflare, GitHub etc but eventually I was able to start building.

It was a huge amount of learning to not just build, but build in a scalable and sustainable way. At first I was shipping without even testing then spending much longer fixing bugs afterwards. And building on top of LinkedIns comes with its own challenges too, which thankfully now I’m on top of.

How I scaled it

1. So primarily, I actually use ZenMode itself to promote ZenMode on LinkedIn, through cold outreach.

I have a set target market of customers/locations/industries, then the tool scrapes profiles for me, and sends connection requests and follow up messages in a sequence.

I run this daily, and typically book 5 or so meetings per week. I’m not the best at demo calls but I do generate new business this way.

2. I also post a lot on Reddit, LinkedIn, X; I post mostly build in public style posts, and usually people naturally gravitate towards it.

I like Reddit because you can usually get 10’s of thousands of views if you post good quality content in the right subs.

Be careful though as often you get a lot of random haters or people who will just criticize you for no reason, and some subs are more warmer/receptive to posts than others (this one has generally been kinder).

3. On my site I’ve tried to do good SEO practices where possible - I have quite a few “alternative to” pages where I talk about the difference between ZenMode and other LinkedIn automation providers, along with a regularly updated blog, and a whole host of inner pages.

When you have a high volume of good content, more pages get indexed by google and your visibility/impressions are also likely to increase over time.

As a result I do get an ok amount of organic traffic from google, sometimes from LLM’s too.

Lately I’ve been trying to do more offsite SEO - especially reviews across various platforms, a few directories, and on my to do list is some listicle/comparison articles and more YouTube content.

4. I work very closely with my customers - I handle every query myself, and even make new features/enhancements based on what my customers are asking for. This interpersonal relationship/human element I think makes a big difference to retention.

5. I think primarily though the number one thing for scaling is really making a good product that solves a problem well, with great customer experience, and to keep iterating/making improvements.

What’s next

ZenMode still has a long runway and a massive roadmap but I’m just going to keep grinding away at it one day at a time, and so far at least what I’m doing seems to be working.

Hope you find this story helpful for your own journey and happy to answer questions/comments 🙏

Hey guys 👋

5 months ago I launched my LinkedIn automation software, having built it entirely with Claude code, and I’m now approaching close to $2k MRR with over 50 active paying customers (happy to share TrustMRR if requested).

I know everyone is this sub is interested in growing a business, so really I just want to show how I’ve been doing it and offer some guidance based on my experience.

Below I’ll go into the what, why and how, and how I’ve been scaling the business, and hope you find it useful.

What I built

I built a LinkedIn outreach automation tool called ZenMode, which scrapes profiles of your target customers, sends connection requests and follow up messages on autopilot.

The main purpose is for Founders, Sales teams, Marketers and anyone else who uses LinkedIn for outreach, to generate more meetings and grow their businesses.

It’s a software that controls a dedicated chrome browser to automate LinkedIn, without needing plugins/the cloud.

Why I built it

Last year I got a warning from automating on LinkedIn using another tool (automating on LinkedIn is against their ToS and can result in account bans - people automate at their own risk).

I wanted to automate my outreach as I was working in sales, and it was really helping me to generate more discovery calls, without the manual grind of sending loads of messages and connection requests manually.

I didn’t trust any of the existing tools for safety, as the majority are on the cloud using IP addresses that are different from where you normally use LinkedIn from, and are slightly higher risk for being flagged as a result.

So, I solved for my own pain point, and created a software that’s desktop based, using your own IP address, and essentially acting like a human would when performing actions on LinkedIn.

How I built it

From day 1 I used Claude to figure out how to do it. We jointly made architectural decisions based fully around safety mechanisms - what would the safest tool look like in practice and how would we build it?

So I figured out that the easiest/safest way would be to make an electron desktop application controlling a browser, which was governed by a dashboard that fed/stored all the data.

There was a lot of setup involved at the start with various tools - Vercel, Cloudflare, GitHub etc but eventually I was able to start building.

It was a huge amount of learning to not just build, but build in a scalable and sustainable way. At first I was shipping without even testing then spending much longer fixing bugs afterwards. And building on top of LinkedIns comes with its own challenges too, which thankfully now I’m on top of.

How I scaled it

1. So primarily, I actually use ZenMode itself to promote ZenMode on LinkedIn, through cold outreach.

I have a set target market of customers/locations/industries, then the tool scrapes profiles for me, and sends connection requests and follow up messages in a sequence.

I run this daily, and typically book 5 or so meetings per week. I’m not the best at demo calls but I do generate new business this way.

2. I also post a lot on Reddit, LinkedIn, X; I post mostly build in public style posts, and usually people naturally gravitate towards it.

I like Reddit because you can usually get 10’s of thousands of views if you post good quality content in the right subs.

Be careful though as often you get a lot of random haters or people who will just criticize you for no reason, and some subs are more warmer/receptive to posts than others (this one has generally been kinder).

3. On my site I’ve tried to do good SEO practices where possible - I have quite a few “alternative to” pages where I talk about the difference between ZenMode and other LinkedIn automation providers, along with a regularly updated blog, and a whole host of inner pages.

When you have a high volume of good content, more pages get indexed by google and your visibility/impressions are also likely to increase over time.

As a result I do get an ok amount of organic traffic from google, sometimes from LLM’s too.

Lately I’ve been trying to do more offsite SEO - especially reviews across various platforms, a few directories, and on my to do list is some listicle/comparison articles and more YouTube content.

4. I work very closely with my customers - I handle every query myself, and even make new features/enhancements based on what my customers are asking for. This interpersonal relationship/human element I think makes a big difference to retention.

5. I think primarily though the number one thing for scaling is really making a good product that solves a problem well, with great customer experience, and to keep iterating/making improvements.

What’s next

ZenMode still has a long runway and a massive roadmap but I’m just going to keep grinding away at it one day at a time, and so far at least what I’m doing seems to be working.

Hope you find this story helpful for your own journey and happy to answer questions/comments 🙏

Hey guys 👋

I’ve shared a few posts on this sub before, so apologies for repeating myself if you’ve already read some of my previous posts.

The last time I posted here I was generating $1,100 a month, and that was only 3 weeks ago.

Now I’m approaching close to $2k MRR, and if the momentum continues I should hit that fairly soon.

(Happy to share TrustMRR if requested)

I know everyone is this sub is interested in making money, so really I just want to show how I’ve been doing it and offer some guidance based on my experience.

Below I’ll go into the what, why and how, and how I’ve been scaling the business, and hope you find it useful.

What I built

I built a LinkedIn outreach automation tool called ZenMode, which scrapes profiles of your target customers, sends connection requests and follow up messages on autopilot.

The main purpose is for Founders, Sales teams, Marketers and anyone else who uses LinkedIn for outreach, to generate more meetings and grow their businesses.

It’s a software that controls a dedicated chrome browser to automate LinkedIn, without needing plugins/the cloud.

Why I built it

Last year I got a warning from automating on LinkedIn using another tool (automating on any social media platform is usually against their terms - people automate on social media at their own risk).

I wanted to automate my outreach as I was working in sales, and it was really helping me to generate more discovery calls, without the manual grind of sending loads of messages and connection requests manually.

I didn’t trust any of the existing tools for safety, as the majority are on the cloud using IP addresses that are different from where you normally use LinkedIn from, and are slightly higher risk for being flagged as a result.

So, I solved for my own pain point, and created a software that’s desktop based, using your own IP address, and essentially acting like a human would when performing actions on LinkedIn.

How I built it

From day 1 I used Claude to figure out how to do it. We jointly made architectural decisions based fully around safety mechanisms - what would the safest tool look like in practice and how would we build it?

So I figured out that the easiest/safest way would be to make an electron desktop application controlling a browser, which was governed by a dashboard that fed/stored all the data.

There was a lot of setup involved at the start with various tools - Vercel, Cloudflare, GitHub etc but eventually I was able to start building.

It was a huge amount of learning to not just build, but build in a scalable and sustainable way. At first I was shipping without even testing then spending much longer fixing bugs afterwards. And building on top of LinkedIns comes with its own challenges too, which thankfully now I’m on top of.

How I scaled it

1. So primarily, I actually use ZenMode itself to promote ZenMode on LinkedIn, through cold outreach.

I have a set target market of customers/locations/industries, then the tool scrapes profiles for me, and sends connection requests and follow up messages in a sequence.

I run this daily, and typically book 5 or so meetings per week. I’m not the best at demo calls but I do generate new business this way.

2. I also post a lot on Reddit, LinkedIn, X; I post mostly build in public style posts, and usually people naturally gravitate towards it.

I like Reddit because you can usually get 10’s of thousands of views if you post good quality content in the right subs.

Be careful though as often you get a lot of random haters or people who will just criticize you for no reason, and some subs are more warmer/receptive to posts than others (this one has generally been kinder).

3. On my site I’ve tried to do good SEO practices where possible - I have quite a few “alternative to” pages where I talk about the difference between ZenMode and other LinkedIn automation providers, along with a regularly updated blog, and a whole host of inner pages.

When you have a high volume of good content, more pages get indexed by google and your visibility/impressions are also likely to increase over time.

As a result I do get an ok amount of organic traffic from google, sometimes from LLM’s too.

Lately I’ve been trying to do more offsite SEO - especially reviews across various platforms, a few directories, and on my to do list is some listicle/comparison articles and more YouTube content.

4. I work very closely with my customers - I handle every query myself, and even make new features/enhancements based on what my customers are asking for. This interpersonal relationship/human element I think makes a big difference to retention.

5. I think primarily though the number one thing for scaling is really making a good product that solves a problem well, with great customer experience, and to keep iterating/making improvements.

What’s next

ZenMode still has a long runway and a massive roadmap but I’m just going to keep grinding away at it one day at a time, and so far at least what I’m doing seems to be working.

Hope you find this story helpful for your own journey and happy to answer questions/comments 🙏

Ok so, I can’t retire just yet 😅 but getting a business off the ground and attracting customers is the hardest part in my opinion.

There’s still a long way to go but considering it’s only been 4 months since launching ZenMode, I’m pretty happy with the results so far.

For some context, ZenMode is a LinkedIn automation tool, that scrapes profiles, sends connection requests and a follow up message sequence.

I created it with AI tools, and now it has paying customers.

I get asked a lot about how I get customers, so thought I’d give more info on how I do distribution, in case you might find it useful.

1. Make sure your website is set up for success

Before sending people to your site, make sure you’re confident it has good CRO potential. Your mission statement and objective needs to be very clear, along with clear incentives for people to try the product out.

2. Offer free trials, but only behind a payment info gate

Now this is just my personal opinion, and I know a lot of people disagree, but the proof is in the numbers. I get fewer free trial signups, but significantly higher conversion rates into paying users from people who provide payment info at the start.

Yes, a few of them are people who simply forget to cancel, but mostly I get people who are more engaged in the free trial and actually using the product.

I actually did an AB experiment where I did offer completely free trials to people (no payment info needed), but the overwhelming result was that people barely even tried out the product and were mostly tire kickers that never came back. I did convert some but not a meaningful number.

3. Create a waitlist before launching

Try to generate interest in your product before it launches - build in public and try to ensure that you’re not scrambling to get customers through the door on day 1 when you launch.

I had 3 customers on day 1 from this, who took higher paid tiers as well.

4. Post and comment everywhere (where relevant)

Social media is free, so there’s no excuse not to leverage it. Post about your product and what you’re building on Reddit, LinkedIn, X, YouTube, Facebook etc.

I posted a simple screenshot on LinkedIn recently, of someone using a low quality LinkedIn automation tool message to contact me, and me offering my own much better tool in response, and that post generated 90,000 views and led to several signups and demo calls.

I’ve also had some posts on Reddit go into hundreds of thousands of views, mostly just posting about what/why/how I built my automation tool.

5. If you have competitors, make “alternative to” inner pages

If done in the right way, this type of inner page can be useful for SEO. It won’t be picked up automatically but usually if you work in a competitive industry, this will sometimes attract customers who had a bad experience elsewhere.

6. I actually use my own LinkedIn automation tool (dogfooding) to do LinkedIn outreach

So it’s always important to practice what you preach - I use ZenMode to actually promote ZenMode.

It’s a great way to get buy-in for booking demos, as when someone replies, I simply tell them I used my tool to get a response from them, so it works.

Anyway hope you enjoyed reading the above, and good luck on your journey if you’re building anything, or growing your business 🙌

Ok so, I can’t retire just yet 😅 but getting a business off the ground and attracting customers is the hardest part in my opinion.

There’s still a long way to go but considering it’s only been 4 months since launching ZenMode, I’m pretty happy with the results so far.

I get asked a lot about how I get customers, so thought I’d give more info on how I do distribution, in case you might find it useful.

1. Make sure your website is set up for success

Before sending people to your site, make sure you’re confident it has good CRO potential. Your mission statement and objective needs to be very clear, along with clear incentives for people to try the product out.

2. Offer free trials, but only behind a payment info gate

Now this is just my personal opinion, and I know a lot of people disagree, but the proof is in the numbers. I get fewer free trial signups, but significantly higher conversion rates into paying users from people who provide payment info at the start.

Yes, a few of them are people who simply forget to cancel, but mostly I get people who are more engaged in the free trial and actually using the product.

I actually did an AB experiment where I did offer completely free trials to people (no payment info needed), but the overwhelming result was that people barely even tried out the product and were mostly tire kickers that never came back. I did convert some but not a meaningful number.

3. Create a waitlist before launching

Try to generate interest in your product before it launches - build in public and try to ensure that you’re not scrambling to get customers through the door on day 1 when you launch.

I had 3 customers on day 1 from this, who took higher paid tiers as well.

4. Post and comment everywhere (where relevant)

Social media is free, so there’s no excuse not to leverage it. Post about your product and what you’re building on Reddit, LinkedIn, X, YouTube, Facebook etc.

I posted a simple screenshot on LinkedIn recently, of someone using a low quality LinkedIn automation tool message to contact me, and me offering my own much better tool in response, and that post generated 90,000 views and led to several signups and demo calls.

I’ve also had some posts on Reddit go into hundreds of thousands of views, mostly just posting about what/why/how I built my automation tool.

5. If you have competitors, make “alternative to” inner pages

If done in the right way, this type of inner page can be useful for SEO. It won’t be picked up automatically but usually if you work in a competitive industry, this will sometimes attract customers who had a bad experience elsewhere.

6. I actually use my own LinkedIn automation tool (dogfooding) to do LinkedIn outreach

So it’s always important to practice what you preach - I use ZenMode to actually promote ZenMode.

It’s a great way to get buy-in for booking demos, as when someone replies, I simply tell them I used my tool to get a response from them, so it works.

Anyway hope you enjoyed reading the above, and good luck on your journey if you’re building anything, or growing your business 🙌

Ok so, I can’t retire just yet 😅 but getting a business off the ground and attracting customers is the hardest part in my opinion.

There’s still a long way to go but considering it’s only been 4 months since launching ZenMode, I’m pretty happy with the results so far.

I get asked a lot about how I get customers, so thought I’d give more info on how I do distribution, in case you might find it useful.

1. Make sure your website is set up for success

Before sending people to your site, make sure you’re confident it has good CRO potential. Your mission statement and objective needs to be very clear, along with clear incentives for people to try the product out.

2. Offer free trials, but only behind a payment info gate

Now this is just my personal opinion, and I know a lot of people disagree, but the proof is in the numbers. I get fewer free trial signups, but significantly higher conversion rates into paying users from people who provide payment info at the start.

Yes, a few of them are people who simply forget to cancel, but mostly I get people who are more engaged in the free trial and actually using the product.

I actually did an AB experiment where I did offer completely free trials to people (no payment info needed), but the overwhelming result was that people barely even tried out the product and were mostly tire kickers that never came back. I did convert some but not a meaningful number.

3. Create a waitlist before launching

Try to generate interest in your product before it launches - build in public and try to ensure that you’re not scrambling to get customers through the door on day 1 when you launch.

I had 3 customers on day 1 from this, who took higher paid tiers as well.

4. Post and comment everywhere

Social media is free, so there’s no excuse not to leverage it. Post about your product and what you’re building on Reddit, LinkedIn, X, YouTube, Facebook etc.

I posted a simple screenshot on LinkedIn recently, of someone using a low quality LinkedIn automation tool message to contact me, and me offering my own much better tool in response, and that post generated 90,000 views and led to several signups and demo calls.

I’ve also had some posts on Reddit go into hundreds of thousands of views, mostly just posting about what/why/how I built my automation tool.

5. If you have competitors, make “alternative to” inner pages

If done in the right way, this type of inner page can be useful for SEO. It won’t be picked up automatically but usually if you work in a competitive industry, this will sometimes attract customers who had a bad experience elsewhere.

6. I actually use my own LinkedIn automation tool (dogfooding) to do LinkedIn outreach

So it’s always important to practice what you preach - I use ZenMode to actually promote ZenMode.

It’s a great way to get buy-in for booking demos, as when someone replies, I simply tell them I used my tool to get a response from them, so it works.

Anyway hope you enjoyed reading the above, and good luck on your journey if you’re building anything, or growing your business 🙌

Ok so, I can’t retire just yet 😅 but getting a business off the ground and attracting customers is the hardest part in my opinion.

There’s still a long way to go but considering it’s only been 3 months since launching ZenMode, I’m pretty happy with the results so far.

I get asked a lot about how I get customers, so thought I’d give more info on how I do distribution, in case you might find it useful.

1. Make sure your website is set up for success

Before sending people to your site, make sure you’re confident it has good CRO potential. Your mission statement and objective needs to be very clear, along with clear incentives for people to try the product out.

2. Offer free trials, but only behind a payment info gate

Now this is just my personal opinion, and I know a lot of people disagree, but the proof is in the numbers. I get fewer free trial signups, but significantly higher conversion rates into paying users from people who provide payment info at the start.

Yes, a few of them are people who simply forget to cancel, but mostly I get people who are more engaged in the free trial and actually using the product.

I actually did an AB experiment where I did offer completely free trials to people (no payment info needed), but the overwhelming result was that people barely even tried out the product and were mostly tire kickers that never came back. I did convert some but not a meaningful number.

3. Create a waitlist before launching

Try to generate interest in your product before it launches - build in public and try to ensure that you’re not scrambling to get customers through the door on day 1 when you launch.

I had 3 customers on day 1 from this, who took higher paid tiers as well.

4. Post and comment everywhere

Social media is free, so there’s no excuse not to leverage it. Post about your product and what you’re building on Reddit, LinkedIn, X, YouTube, Facebook etc.

I posted a simple screenshot on LinkedIn recently, of someone using a low quality LinkedIn automation tool message to contact me, and me offering my own much better tool in response, and that post generated 90,000 views and led to several signups and demo calls.

I’ve also had some posts on Reddit go into hundreds of thousands of views, mostly just posting about what/why/how I built ZenMode.

5. If you have competitors, make “alternative to” inner pages

If done in the right way, this type of inner page can be useful for SEO. It won’t be picked up automatically but usually if you work in a competitive industry, this will sometimes attract customers who had a bad experience elsewhere.

6. I actually use my own LinkedIn automation tool (dogfooding) to do LinkedIn outreach

So it’s always important to practice what you preach - I use ZenMode to actually promote ZenMode.

It’s a great way to get buy-in for booking demos, as when someone replies, I simply tell them I used my tool to get a response from them, so it works.

Obviously I’m biased but if you are looking for a way to automate lead generation on LinkedIn, you might find ZenMode useful.

Anyway hope you enjoyed reading the above, and good luck on your journey if you’re building anything, or growing your business 🙌

In January I started building a LinkedIn outreach automation tool from scratch, which scrapes LinkedIn leads, sends connection requests and a follow up message sequence on autopilot.

I worked in sales and wanted a safer tool than what currently existed for my own outreach, with less risk for my LinkedIn account.

For this reason I built a desktop-based automation software that automates in a browser (similar to Linked Helper), with many human-like features like daily rate limits, randomized delays between actions, human-like mouse clicks etc.

So far none of the users have been banned, and I also have been using it myself daily for my own outreach.

For the first month I offered lifetime deals, and then moved to monthly subscriptions in May.

Now I’m approaching $1,200 MRR and growing. Obviously not enough to live on just yet but I’m happy with the direction it’s going in.

I’m still mind blown that I’ve actually been able to do this just through using AI tools, but still a long way to go 🚀

Hope this story inspires people on their own journey too.

In January I started building a LinkedIn outreach automation tool from scratch, which scrapes leads, sends connection requests and a follow up message sequence on autopilot.

I worked in sales and wanted a safer tool than what currently existed for my own outreach, with less risk for my LinkedIn account.

For this reason I built a desktop-based automation software that automates in a browser (similar to Linked Helper), with many human-like features like daily rate limits, randomized delays between actions, human-like mouse clicks etc.

So far none of the users have been banned, and I also have been using it myself daily for my own outreach.

For the first month I offered lifetime deals (hence the spikes), and then moved to monthly subscriptions in May.

Now I’m approaching $1,500 MRR and growing.

I’m still mind blown that I’ve actually been able to do this just through using AI tools, but still a long way to go.

Try the automation tool completely free for two weeks through the website.

Proof - https://profile.stripe.com/zenmode/W5uYorNA

In January I started building a LinkedIn outreach automation tool from scratch, which scrapes leads, sends connection requests and a follow up message sequence on autopilot.

I worked in sales and wanted a safer tool than what currently existed for my own outreach, with less risk for my LinkedIn account.

I used Claude and Claude to build the whole thing, with zero knowledge of how to code. It was a LOT of work, and still is - using AI tools opens a lot of opportunities, but it doesn’t mean it’s easy either.

I have working 8-10 hours a day, even on weekends for the last 6 months to get it this far.

For this reason I built a desktop-based automation software that automates in a browser (similar to Linked Helper), with many human-like features like daily rate limits, randomized delays between actions, human-like mouse clicks etc.

So far none of the users have been banned, and I also have been using it myself daily for my own outreach.

For the first month I offered lifetime deals (hence the spikes), and then moved to monthly subscriptions in May.

Now I’m approaching $1,500 MRR and growing.

I’m still mind blown that I’ve actually been able to do this just through using AI tools, but still a long way to go. Not going to retire just yet 😅

Hope you find this story inspirational in some way 🙌

In January I started building a LinkedIn outreach automation tool from scratch, which scrapes leads, sends connection requests and a follow up message sequence on autopilot.

For context I have no idea how to code - I used Claude and Claude code for everything. Not to say it was easy - it’s been extremely gruelling and I’ve worked 8-10 hours a day, even on weekends to get it built and working well.

I worked in sales and wanted a safer tool than what currently existed, with less risk for my LinkedIn account.

For this reason I built a desktop-based automation software that automates in a browser (similar to Linked Helper), with many human-like features like daily rate limits, randomized delays between actions, human-like mouse clicks etc.

So far none of the users have been banned, and I also have been using it myself daily for my own outreach.

It was very buggy at first, but with a lot of research and hard work I was able to launch a fully functional MVP on April 1.

For the first month I offered lifetime deals (hence the spikes), and then moved to monthly subscriptions in May.

Now I’m approaching $1,500 MRR and growing.

I’m still mind blown that I’ve actually been able to do this just through using AI tools, but still a long way to go.

Hope you find this story inspiring in some way.

Hi everyone,

Earlier this year, I vibe coded a LinkedIn Automation tool from scratch, with zero engineering background, simply using Claude, Claude code and vercel.

I won’t go into details as to how/why I created it as I’ve already shared this before many times, but one of the questions I get asked the most is about distribution, and how I attract customers, so I thought it might be useful to share this info.

In my opinion, before you even build something though, you should take the below into account;

1. You don’t need to re-invent the wheel

People often think they need to come up with the next Facebook or create the next billion dollar idea - usually the most successful apps are often the most simple, or very similar to what’s out there already.

The best apps simply improve on what already exists, or solve a problem most tools in the space don’t.

2. Make sure there’s actually demand for your niche

I see loads of SaaS tools which are just not something most people would pay for - usually something someone could create in a weekend. If it’s easy to create, it’s easy to replicate and unlikely to really be valuable/unique. It’s important to know your audience from day 1, not just build and hope.

3. Be willing to fail, and work hard

Everything comes with risk, but if you really put the work in then you’ll have a much better chance of making it. I wanted to give up several times but so far have always kept going.

And here’s what I actually did to market the tool;

1. Create a waitlist

I created a waitlist on the site, and talked very publicly about what I was building on every platform I could - Reddit, LinkedIn, YouTube, X etc.

In the end I had 33 people on the waitlist after a couple of months.

2. Launch at MVP, even if it’s not yet perfect

You don’t need to wait until your project has every single possible feature - it might take over a year of building before you get to a point where you’re actually satisfied with the product, and people are more than willing to use yours at MVP anyway.

Also, early users are essentially gold dust for learning edge cases, bugs, and usually give great feedback as to what can be improved.

It also will take time to build up your customer base, so you should start as early as possible and continue iterating.

3. Offer lifetime deals at the beginning

Very few people will subscribe to something that they have never heard of and has no reputation - how do they know it works or is worth paying money for?

Getting lifetime deals helps a) fund your project early on, and b) gets users through the door, who will most likely continue to use your tool and be your biggest fans long term. User data, especially in the beginning is key to building something that works well too.

I offered lifetime deals for the first month and generated about $1,800 in revenue from that, before switching to monthly subscriptions.

4. Post on Reddit frequently (don’t use AI though)

Whatever your product is, there’s probably multiple relevant subs here with many thousands of regular visitors where your ICP hangs out.

The challenge is finding one where you are less likely to get banned, and also you need to post in a less promotional way.

Usually the best posts are where you talk about challenges/accomplishments with building your product, rather than directly selling it or “build in public” posts.

Some people will indirectly become interested in whatever it is you’re building, if enough people read your post.

I have often posted about early revenue success from solo vibe coding a SaaS tool from scratch, and probably about 60-70% of the signups came from doing this many times on Reddit.

One caveat is that you should always write out your posts. It sometimes takes 15-20 mins or longer, but it’s worth it (and costs nothing).

5. Dogfood your own product

I have been using ZenMode since day 1 to test my account. Not only do I use it for testing, I actually do LinkedIn outreach with the tool itself.

It works for generating at least 3-5 demo calls a week for me, so I know first hand that it works well from a user perspective.

Because I’m always using it, I also spot things as a user that I feel could be improved - I’m building for myself as much as I am for others.

6. Build for organic / LLM visibility from the beginning

When building your site, make sure it’s built with organic/LLM visibility in mind from the beginning. At first it won’t have much impact, but it will compound over time. Make sure you have a blog with frequent, high quality posts, with relevant keywords in your niche.

The harder / more valuable part is offsite signals - aim to get mentioned on other blogs, and try to build reviews from TrustPilot, G2 and Capterra - more reviews equals more trust and more signals.

Getting mentioned in listicles like “best x in 2026” is extremely powerful if you’re able to do that.

Personally I have already got 8 5* reviews on TrustPilot since launching it recently, and will aim to get more moving forward.

7. Make a YouTube channel

YouTube is another free lever you can use to post content on, and posting regular build in public/demo content will help find a new audience. Again it’s most likely a slow burn, but as with everything, consistency is key.

Full disclosure - I myself need to do better at this 🤦‍♂️

8. Paid Ads

I’ve started doing this recently with Google ads, but so far it hasn’t yielded great results - still optimising the strategy and aiming for long tail traffic. Potentially worth doing depending on your niche and if you have the budget.

9. Demo calls & relationship building

Try to schedule demo calls and communicate as much as possible with your customers - don’t just hand them off to AI, as the human touch is key to keeping users engaged.

And that’s pretty much it. I did do a Product Hunt launch but it did not really lead to anything - if you really have a great network of people who are PH users and will vote for you then it can be great, but if you don’t have the network then it’s not that valuable.

Personally I also need to improve on conversion of free trial users (many of them are tire kickers who take a look for 30 seconds and never log in again), but retention of paid users lately has been very strong, and the tool is growing quickly.

Hope the above is useful! 🙏