Checklist

The Indie Dev Marketing Checklist

50 actionable items across four phases, from idea to $10K MRR. Tick them off as you go.

50Actionable items

4Growth phases

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How to use this: Start at Pre-Launch and work sequentially. The phases are in the right order, so resist the urge to skip ahead. Check off each item as you complete it, then move to the next phase. Your progress is saved in this browser.

Pre-Launch

The 10 things to do before you launch

Define your ideal customer with one sentence: who they are, what problem they have, and what they're currently using as an alternative.
Map 3–5 direct competitors. Read their 1-star and 2-star App Store, Play Store, or G2 reviews and document the frustrations that repeat.
Identify the three specific communities where your ideal customer actually spends time, not just general startup or SaaS communities.
Write your positioning statement: who it's for, what it does, and why it's different from the alternatives they already know about.
Optimize your App Store listing or landing page with a keyword-rich title, subtitle, and description before your first user arrives.
Recruit 5 beta testers from communities who have the problem. Not friends who'll be polite, people who are actively looking for a solution.
Set up basic analytics before you launch: PostHog, Plausible, or Simple Analytics. You need a baseline from day one.
Write three outreach messages you're comfortable sending: one for cold DM, one for community participation, one for direct email.
Find 10 newsletters or podcasts in your niche. Introduce yourself to at least three of them before launch so you're not a stranger on launch day.
Plan your launch day explicitly: choose one primary platform, write the post, and decide what your follow-up looks like if it's quiet.

First 100 Users

How you get from 0 to your first 100

Post to one community before Product Hunt to accumulate comments and social proof before the big launch.
Reach out personally to 20 pre-qualified people. Not 'check out my product', a conversation about the problem, with an offer to hear how they're handling it.
Schedule a 5-minute check-in call with every active user in the first 30 days. Watch them use it. Don't coach. Just listen.
Identify your single best-performing acquisition channel from week one and double down on it. Ignore the others for now.
Write your first piece of content based on a question you heard from a real user or saw in a community thread.
Set up an email list before your first 100 users are gone. Even 'sign up for updates' is better than nothing.
Ask your first 10 users who else they know with the same problem. Personal ask, not an automated referral widget.
Fix the single biggest friction point in your onboarding before doing any more acquisition marketing.
Document the three most common objections you've heard and write a clear, honest response to each.
Pick one metric that matters for your product type, daily actives, paying customers, or retained users, and track it every week.

Growth Phase

Building channels that compound

Write one long-form SEO article targeting a high-intent query that emerged from your user conversations.
Set up review-request prompts at the right moment: right after a user gets clear value from the product, not at random.
Establish a weekly publishing rhythm on the channel that worked best in your first-100 phase.
Run a cold outreach campaign to 100 pre-qualified contacts. Track reply rate, not open rate.
Submit to 5 directories, app roundups, or curated lists in your product category.
Set up a referral ask at your product's happiest moment: a direct personal message template, not a widget.
Guest-post on one relevant blog or appear as a guest on one podcast or newsletter in your niche.
Test one paid channel at a small daily budget ($5/day) to establish a baseline cost-per-lead or cost-per-signup.
Set up a structured onboarding email sequence, at minimum, a welcome email and a day-3 check-in.
Build a comparison page on your site: your product vs. the alternative your customers mention most often.
Create a free tool, template, or resource that solves one specific step of the problem your product addresses.
Analyze your 30-day churn. Find the pattern in who leaves and address that pattern in your onboarding or product.
Set up a win-back sequence for churned or lapsed users. Three emails over two weeks is enough to start.
Add 3 concrete social proof elements to your landing page: customer reviews, screenshots of results, or real numbers.
Run a 15-minute weekly marketing review: what channel drove the most value, what didn't work, what you're trying next week.

Scale Phase

Systems that run without you pushing them

Hire or contract someone to help with one high-leverage task: content creation, paid ads management, or SEO.
Build a content hub: a resource library, glossary, or blog archive that organizes and indexes everything you've created.
Set up a proper SEO content calendar targeting 20 keyword clusters relevant to your product and audience.
Run an affiliate or co-marketing program with 3–5 non-competing products that share your ideal customer.
Build your own community around the problem your product solves: a Slack workspace, Discord server, or moderated forum.
Write a case study from your best customer story. Include real numbers, specific outcomes, and a quote. Avoid vague testimonials.
Set up automated lead scoring or audience segmentation based on engagement signals: logins, feature usage, email opens.
Test increasing your price by 20–40%. If conversion rate holds, the old price was too low.
Establish a regular launch cadence: feature announcements, limited-time offers, or seasonal campaigns that keep existing customers engaged.
Build a press and media kit: product screenshots, founder bio, company description, and contact info in one shareable URL.
Set up automated re-engagement campaigns for users who haven't logged in for 14 and 30 days.
Create short video content showing the product in use for your top 3 use cases. Doesn't need to be polished.
Build one integration or get listed in one complementary product's marketplace or directory.
Run a systematic A/B test on your single biggest onboarding conversion drop-off point.
Document your full growth system. If you stopped working on it for 60 days, what would break first?

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