Six months ago, Founders Today was just an idea.
Today, we've grown into a community of 100+ active founders and have helped launch 36 startups.
Together, those launches have generated 14,600+ product impressions, with some products already starting to rank on Google through their launch pages.
That may not sound huge compared to the big platforms, but every community starts somewhere. What matters is that we're growing, improving, and staying focused on one thing:
Helping founders get discovered.
We believe most communities have the order backwards.
At Founders Today, our priorities are:
🥇 Visibility first: Every feature is designed to help your startup reach more people, from product launches to SEO, discussions, and founder discovery.
🥈 Authority second: We're building a place where founders can establish credibility by consistently shipping, contributing, and building in public.
When you join, you're not just creating another profile.
You get access to:
If you're an indie hacker, solo founder, or startup builder, I'd love for you to give it a try. We are inviting you
It takes less than 2 minutes to join, and it's completely free.
We're still early, and that's exactly why your feedback can help shape what becomes one of the best communities for founders.
See you inside. 👋
14.6K impressions across 36 startups is about 400 views per product — which, honestly, is better than most first launches. The real metric I'd want to see is how many of those 36 founders got their first paying customer through your community, not just traffic.
I say this from experience. I've driven 251 views to my Shopify tutorial landing page through Twitter, Medium, Product Hunt, and Quora. 7 people reached checkout. Zero paid. The traffic was real but the conversion wasn't there — and I still don't know if it's a product problem or a payment gateway problem.
For Founders Today, the value prop that would get me to join isn't "we'll drive 400 views to your launch" — it's "we'll drive 10 conversations with potential customers." A community that connects founders with buyers, not just with other founders, would be genuinely differentiated from every other launch platform. Have you thought about building buyer-side discovery (e.g. "find a tool for X") alongside the founder-side visibility?
That's a good point, and I agree that conversations and customers matter more than raw page views.
Visibility is simply the first problem we're solving because without it, nothing else happens.
One thing I didn't mention in my original post is that we're also building distribution outside the founder community. We recently launched our publisher program, where blogs and newsletters can feature products from Founders Today and send traffic from audiences that aren't founders. The goal is to get products in front of potential users, not just other builders.
Long term, I want Founders Today to become more than a launch platform. I want it to be a place where founders can consistently get discovered by customers, partners, and early adopters. I think that's a much bigger opportunity than a one-day launch.
Thanks for the thoughtful feedback. Comments like yours help me think more clearly about where we should invest next.
14.6K impressions across 36 launches is a solid early result, especially for a community with only 100 members. The next metric I’d be most interested in is what happens after the impression: outbound clicks, sign-ups, and whether founders still receive traffic a few weeks after launch.
The SEO angle could become a real differentiator if those launch pages continue ranking instead of producing only a short launch-day spike. I’m building SongTrailer, a done-for-you music-video trailer service, and this looks like a relevant place to test whether a focused launch page can generate qualified discovery rather than just views.
Are you currently sharing click-through or conversion data with founders after their launch?
Thanks, I appreciate that.
We do share post-launch analytics with founders. They can see page views, outbound website clicks, upvotes, and organic search traffic for their product, so they're not left wondering how their launch performed.
I'm particularly interested in the long-term side of things too. A lot of launch platforms create a spike for a day or two and then everything goes quiet. We're investing in SEO because I want launch pages to keep bringing in qualified traffic weeks and months later, not just on launch day.
SongTrailer sounds like a great fit for that kind of experiment. If you decide to launch it on Founders Today, I'd genuinely be interested in seeing how it performs over time and hearing your feedback on what worked and what didn't. That's the kind of data that helps us improve the platform.
Interesting take on "visibility first" - the 14.6k impressions raise a question though: of those, how many converted to genuine founder relationships vs one-time launch traffic? The moat here feels like it's the founder network itself, not the visibility tool. The best distribution partners aren't platforms, they're people who care because they've built alongside you. That's where retention beats acquisition. How are you thinking about turning launch participants into recurring community members?
That's a thoughtful question.
I don't think visibility and relationships are separate. Visibility is often what starts the relationship. If nobody discovers your product, it's hard to start conversations or build connections.
Our goal isn't to have founders launch once and disappear. That's why Founders Today isn't just a launch platform. After launching, founders can keep posting updates, join discussions, share milestones, attend community events, discover jobs, and continue building their presence over time.
We're also expanding distribution beyond our own community through our publisher network, so founders continue getting exposure after launch instead of relying on a single launch day.
I agree that the real moat is the network. Features can be copied, but an engaged community can't. That's why we're spending as much time thinking about founder participation and long-term value as we are about visibility. Our success depends on founders wanting to come back, not just launch once.
The early traction shows founders are willing to use the platform for discovery.
What would convince you that launches themselves create a recurring habit, rather than founders joining only when they have a product to promote?
That's something I think about a lot.
For me, success isn't measured by whether founders launch more than once. Most founders don't have a new product every month.
Success is when they keep coming back even when they aren't launching. That means they're commenting on other products, sharing what they're building, joining discussions, attending events, hiring, looking for opportunities, or discovering tools they can use themselves.
If Founders Today becomes part of a founder's weekly routine instead of a place they visit once to promote a product, then I'll know we're building something valuable. That's the direction we're aiming for.
Appreciate the context.
The distinction between a launch platform and a founder ecosystem is the interesting part. It’ll be interesting to see what behaviors emerge over time.