Win mindshare in one dense community completely before expanding to the next
Instead of spreading thin across multiple channels, dominate one community where your target customers densely congregate. For Assembled, that was Support Driven Slack where all customer support leaders hung out trading notes. Their strategy: get so much mindshare in that one community that when anyone asks 'What do you think about Assembled?', multiple happy customers jump in to share their experience. Ryan's framing: think about communities as 'ponds to fish in'—once you've won a pond (full mindshare, recognized brand, trusted voice), then leap to the next. This works because dense communities amplify word-of-mouth. A happy customer in a fragmented market might refer one person. A happy customer in a tight Slack community might influence 50 buying decisions through one thread. The key is resisting the temptation to chase every possible channel and instead earning complete dominance in one before expanding.
When to use
When you have a clear community where your customers congregate (Slack groups, subreddits, forums, conferences). When selling to specific professional roles (support leaders, DevOps engineers, product managers) who have their own communities. When you have happy customers willing to share their experience. When deciding between spreading marketing budget across many channels vs dominating one. When building B2B products where word-of-mouth in professional communities drives adoption.
Don't do this
Trying to be everywhere at once. Spamming communities with self-promotion instead of building genuine relationships. Jumping to next community before winning the current one. Not identifying where your customers actually hang out. Assuming you need paid ads when community-led growth could work. Treating communities as just another distribution channel instead of places to build trust. Measuring vanity metrics (impressions, clicks) instead of mindshare (mentions, recommendations, trust).
4 Founders Who Did This
Saturated every Notion-related community (Facebook groups, subreddits, Slack) before expanding to broader channels
Mercury focused on winning the startup ecosystem specifically — partnering with YC, building VC fund banking, partnering with startup law firms and accountants. They won this one dense community completely before expanding to ecommerce and professional services.
Focused entirely on Massachusetts for first year, deploying more salespeople in one state than they now have nationally
Spread campus by campus through hyper-localized viral mechanics. Won mindshare completely in individual college communities before expanding