Growth StoriesGrowth Story

Where the first hundred customers actually came from

Not the channel everyone assumed. The founder walks through what they tried first, and what quietly worked.

Marcus F.August 2, 20266 min read

At a glance

Company

Northstar

Category

B2B SaaS

Stage

Seed

Team

Remote

By the numbers

100First customers
5Channels tried
1That scaled

The story they tell later

The story companies tell about their first customers is almost never the real one.

By the time growth is repeatable, the origin has been tidied into a clean narrative that leaves out the luck.

The channel that didn't scale

The channel that eventually scaled was invisible at the start. The first hundred came from somewhere much less repeatable.

Understanding that gap — between what worked once and what works forever — is the whole point of asking.

“Our best early channel was one I'm slightly embarrassed to admit still worked.”
— Founder, Northstar

Key takeaways

  • The origin story is almost never the repeatable one.
  • The first hundred came from something that didn't scale.
  • Knowing the difference is the whole point of asking.
Marcus F.
Written byMarcus F.

Covers growth and distribution — how companies actually find their first customers.

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