Your Ultimate B2C Marketing Guide

Every single day on Reddit I see something like, "I built X, but have no idea how to get users." "How do you get users to your app?" "What is working for you to get users?" Every. Single. Day. It's exhausting. I wrote this as a comment on one such post, and I am turning it into a top level post in the hopes that I prevent even one, "What is the best way to get users for my app?" post. If I prevent just one, I'll consider this post a win.

Every single app is different in what works. The key is to tap into every stream, figure out what works, then go all in on that stream.

Every app I build I do the exact same things to market:

1. App Specific Social media account creation and posting (Insta, Youtube, Tiktok, Reddit, etc). Make posts about the product itself on these accounts. These accounts should have your app name, photo, and bio. Nothing about you personally.
2. Social media 2: Point number one is an account with the app name. This is using your personal accounts talking about the building process. Build in public gets a bad wrap, but I haven't found a reason to skip this step yet.
3. Affiliates. Always create an affiliate program. Give them free access, commission, etc and give them a code to bring users. Use a service like Affonso or build out a form and see if there is interest. On my apps step one is a separate page with a short questionnaire that sends me emails if its filled out. If I get just 3 of these, I set up an actual affiliate program
4. Newsletter/Email list. Anyone who signs up to the app is added to an email list and I use Tags to update their status. If you are not doing this, start. Even if you don't have a newsletter yet, collecting emails in a list is a massive potential revenue stream you are missing. Personally I use Beehiiv but there are a lot of solutions. Everyone who signs up is Tagged as "free" and this is updated programmatically if they sign up for Pro/Subscription. Every once in a while I send emails to all users tagged "free" with the benefits of the pro/upgraded features of the app. Ex. Run a campaign asking for users to fill out a feedback form for a free month of premium, give them the free month, and see how many convert to paid after the full month.
5. Freemium. Not all subscribe to this type of app, but I don't think I can find an argument for anything other than freemium when building B2C applications. Free trials are cool and a maybe, but if it's a free trial with a credit card required, I immediately pass unless you have a name I know and trust. If you have a name I know and can trust, you probably aren't reading this post. Make your app Freemium or stop requiring credit cards on trials.
6. Ads. When first starting, you do not need to go crazy. Let's say $15 dollar boosted post on insta and tiktok. $15 ad on reddit and X. See if any results come from this. Less than $100 USD. I know many builders have a budget of $0, and it is what it is, but I highly highly recommend scraping some cash together to at least try some extremely localized boosted posts in the areas where you get most engagement. If you have enough money to boost just ONE post, pick the account that is performing the best from steps 1 and 2.
7. Outreach. After all of the above, there will still be people who qualify for your app, but do not see it. Go and find them and send them a DM, call them, knock on their door, idc whatever you prefer. Every social app has improved their search mechanism so heavily you can easily targeted search nowadays without a paid tool. Don't fall into the trap of a service that finds Reddit Leads for you for $50 a month when you can search yourself. (Sorry if that's what you're building).
8. SEO AEO. I put this at the bottom because it is the slowest burn. Optimize the best you can, wait 30 days, then check and adjust if needed, rinse and repeat. If you're not on Google Search Console, set that up, takes two minutes. Lots of free resources to read on optimizing this channel. I don't really consider this marketing, but it's worth writing down.
9. Honorable mentions: Discord Server and Custom Subreddit for your app. I don't do this every time, but it may work for your app. I have a Discord server for one app and a subreddit for the other.

I will give you two different examples from two apps I have built:

The first is Micro Coach, a mobile app that automatically builds your workout split and a bunch of other stuff.

I did all of the above, and found that Affiliates and My App Social Media Accounts performed the best by far in the first few weeks. So I slowed down (I did not STOP any step, just slowed down) and poured the rest of my energy into these two. Taking the time to make better content for the social media accounts, daily engagement, etc. Making the affiliate program as attractive as possible. This ended up working so well, I bought products in bulk and now offer a free hat, shirt, and shaker bottle to all affiliates I onboard and approve. This is by far our best revenue stream.

The second is The Idea Lab, a web app that validates your ideas, generates ideas, and a whole list of other stuff.

For this one I found that targeted outreach, surprisingly, worked the best. Honorable mention is Ad's have worked well, and so has the Newsletter. These three channels worked to convert users the best for me on this app.

Let me know what you guys think.

If you perform a marketing step that I missed, drop it in the comments and I will update the post.