Let's Find Your "Ride or Die" Customer

Good morning. In this edition:

• 🚀 Let’s find your “ride or die” customer

• 🔥 Meta is rolling out some new features for lead capture

• 🌟 WTF is ROAS?

Let’s Find Your “Ride or Die” Customer

So you filled out the messaging framework worksheet (if you didn’t, you can find it here). Now let’s talk about something that will actually make you some money: finding those first few customers who’ll rave about your product/service like it’s the second coming of sliced bread. You know who I’m talking about…those magical unicorns that Lord Voldemort needed to sustain himself during Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone. These unicorns:

• Reply to your emails within seconds

• Actually open their wallets without you having to nudge them 17 times

• Tell their friends about you without being bribed

• Give you brutally honest feedback (even when it hurts)

These aren't just any customers. These are your ride-or-dies. Your day ones. The people who'll stick with you through the buggy beta, the pricing changes, and the "oh crap we accidentally deleted your data" moments.

How to Find Them Without Losing your Mind 🧠

Look, I could tell you to "do market research" or "create detailed buyer personas" but we both know you don't have time for that MBA textbook nonsense right now. Instead, try this 80/20 approach:

1. Get in the trenches where your people hang out. Reddit, Discord, Twitter (never calling it X), Slack groups, Facebook, TikTok, wherever. Don’t pitch - just listen. What problems keep coming up? What solutions are they cobbling together with duct tape, thoughts, and prayers?

2. Find the complainers. The people publicly griping about the problem you solve are giving you a 🎁. They care enough to be annoyed. They're practically raising their hand saying "take my money!"

3. Do the unscalable thing. Cold DM 50 people who fit your ideal customer profile. Offer to solve their specific problem for free. Yes, manually. Yes, it's "inefficient." That's the point. I've seen founders waste months on automated funnels when they could've just talked to actual humans.

4. Use the "beer test." Would this person grab a beer with you? If not, they're probably not your ride-or-die. Chemistry matters. You want early adopters who you actually enjoy talking to.

The Cold Outreach That Actually Works 📬

Next time you're thinking about sliding into someone's DMs with your pitch, try this instead:

Hey [First Name],

Saw your post about [specific problem]. I'm building something that might help with [specific solution related to their problem].

Not selling anything – I'm just looking for 3-4 people to test this with and give honest feedback. 

Any chance you'd be up for a 15-min chat this week?

- [Your Name]

Why does this work? Because you’re not asking for a commitment or a purchase. You’re not selling anything yet. You’re trying to solve a real problem for a real person who’s been vocal about it.

Do This Now ✅

1. Make a list of 5 places where your potential ride-or-dies hang out online

2. Spend 30 minutes each day this week just observing conversations

3. Identify 10 people who've expressed the exact problem you solve

4. Reach out to them using the template above

5. Schedule 3 conversations for next week

Do this BEFORE you spend another cent on Facebook ads or fancy landing pages. I promise you'll learn more in those 3 conversations than in any marketing webinar.

Meta is Rolling Out Some New Features For Lead Capture

Contrary to my last point…if you are going to spend on Facebook (assuming you’ve had those 3 conversations already and found your ride or die customers and they hang out on Facebook), Meta is making it easier to capture high-quality leads by rolling out a few new features.

1. Direct Email Delivery: No more manual exports or complicated Zapier workflows! When creating a Leads campaign with an Instant Form, you can now select 'Email' for lead delivery. This lets you:

   • Choose which team email(s) receive the leads

   • Set delivery frequency by specific days and hours

   • Select your preferred file format (CSV or XLS)

     

This means your sales team can follow up faster without the technical headaches of API integrations.

2. Control Over Form Pre-filling: Meta's autofill feature has been a double-edged sword—convenient for users but sometimes leading to low-quality leads who didn't actually input their information. Now you can:

   • Toggle pre-fill settings on/off within Instant Form settings

   • Reset your form to default state when turning off autofill

   • Better qualify leads by requiring manual information entry

     

3. Phone Number Verification: This might be the most valuable update for startups tired of fake phone numbers. When creating a new Instant Form, you can now select 'Verified mobile number' as a Form type. This adds a verification step that confirms the user's phone number before submission.

All these updates signal Meta is doubling down on improving lead quality—likely in response to advertiser feedback about junk leads. For startups with tight budgets, these features could dramatically improve your cost per qualified lead without requiring additional spend.

What this means for your startup: If you've been burned by low-quality Meta leads in the past, it's time to give them another shot. These updates address the exact issues that have made lead ads frustrating for early-stage companies.

The smartest play? Run a small test campaign using these new features and compare quality metrics against your previous lead campaigns. Look specifically at:

• Contact rate (% of leads you can actually reach)

• Qualification rate (% who fit your target customer profile)

• Cost per qualified lead (not just cost per lead)

If the numbers improve, you've just found a more efficient channel for filling your sales pipeline.

WTF is ROAS

Marketers love acronyms. I mean…love. Like they would marry an acronym if they could. For people who don’t speak fluent marketing, the acronyms can be a bit intimidating. And even when a marketer tells you what the acronym stands for, you’re likely to just smile and nod wondering if you should ask to explain it for a 5 year old or just Google it later. That was me when I first heard it, standing there thinking "am I the only one who doesn't know what this means?"

ROAS (Return On Ad Spend) is exactly what it sounds like: for every dollar you put into advertising, how many dollars come back to you. It's the "show me the money" metric of digital marketing. If you spend $100 on ads and make $600 in revenue from those ads, your ROAS is 6. That's it. A ROAS of 6 means for every $1 you spend, you get $6 back. Pretty sweet, right? That's the formula:

ROAS = Revenue from ads ÷ Cost of ads

What this means for your startup: For early-stage startups, ROAS isn't just a vanity metric—it's your financial lifeline. Here's what you need to know:

If you're pre-revenue or just starting with ads: Don't obsess over perfect ROAS right away. Your first campaigns will likely underperform as you figure out messaging and targeting. Budget small amounts ($500-1000) for initial testing before scaling.

If you're bootstrapped: Target a minimum ROAS of 4 to ensure profitability after accounting for your COGS and operations. You simply can't afford to run ads that don't directly contribute to revenue.

If you're venture-backed: You have more flexibility to accept a lower ROAS (2-3) if you're prioritizing growth over immediate profitability. But beware—many startups have burned through millions chasing "growth at all costs" only to discover too late that their unit economics were broken.

This newsletter is for you. What marketing challenges are you facing in your startup journey? Reply directly to this email with your questions or topics you'd like to see covered in future issues.

Until next week,

Adam

P.S. Found this helpful? Forward it to another founder who might benefit—we're all in this together.