By Mehdi HassanHow can a startup recruit user research participants with no users?
A startup with no users can recruit research participants by finding people who have the problem it plans to solve, wherever they already spend time, and asking them personally for a short conversation. You don't need customers to do research. You need people with recent, real experience of the problem.
That shift in framing matters. You're not looking for 'users'. You're looking for an ops manager who reconciled invoices by hand last month, or a clinic owner who lost a booking because of a scheduling mix-up. Those people exist long before your product does, and they're often happy to talk about a problem that annoys them.
This guide is part of our user research for startups playbook. Once you've booked people, our guides to running customer interviews and usability testing on a budget cover the sessions themselves.
Where do you find research participants before launch?
You find research participants before launch in eight main places: your personal network, introductions from investors and advisors, LinkedIn, niche communities, competitor review sites, social media, a waitlist page and industry events. Start with the warmest sources, because a personal introduction gets a reply far more often than a cold message.
Source | Warmth | Best for | Watch out for |
|---|---|---|---|
Your network | Warm | Fast first sessions | Friends being too polite |
Investor and advisor intros | Warm | Senior or hard-to-reach roles | Using favors sparingly |
LinkedIn outreach | Cold | Specific job titles at specific company sizes | Low reply rates for generic messages |
Niche communities | Lukewarm | Practitioners who discuss the problem openly | Community rules on self-promotion |
Competitor reviews | Cold | People with strong opinions on current tools | Finding contact details respectfully |
Social media threads | Lukewarm | People publicly complaining about the problem | Being seen as spam |
Waitlist page | Warm | A growing pool of interested people | Needs some traffic to fill |
Events and meetups | Warm | Quick in-person chats | Time cost for a small number of contacts |
Don't overlook people who've complained publicly about the problem. A thread where someone vents about a clunky process is an open invitation, as long as you approach them politely and don't pitch.
How do you write outreach that people actually reply to?
Outreach gets replies when it's short, personal and clearly about the other person's expertise. Say why you're writing to them specifically, what you're asking for, how long it takes and what's in it for them. Ask for advice on a problem rather than feedback on your product. People like helping and dislike being sold to.
- Keep it under 100 words. Long messages read as effort to reply to.
- Lead with why them. 'I saw your post about…' beats 'I'm reaching out to professionals in…'.
- Name the time. '20 minutes' is easier to say yes to than 'a quick chat'.
- Make it about learning. 'I'm trying to understand how teams handle X' signals you're not selling.
- Offer something. A thank-you, a summary of what you learn, or simply your gratitude for warm contacts.
- Make replying easy. A calendar link or a yes/no question.
Outreach templates you can adapt
LinkedIn, cold: 'Hi [name], I saw you lead finance ops at [company]. I'm researching how teams close the books each month, and I'd value 20 minutes of your experience. I'm not selling anything, just trying to understand the real problems. Happy to send a $25 gift card as thanks, or share what I learn across the conversations. Would next week work?'
Warm introduction request: 'Do you know anyone who manages scheduling for a small clinic? I'm trying to learn how they handle cancellations today, 20 minutes on a call, no pitch. A short intro would mean a lot, and I'm happy to write the blurb so it's easy to forward.'
Community post: 'I'm researching how [role] handle [problem]. If you've dealt with it in the last few months, I'd love 20 minutes of your experience. No pitch, and I'll share a summary of what I learn with this group. Comment or message me if you're up for it.'
Waitlist follow-up: 'Thanks for joining the waitlist. Before we build, we're talking to a few people about how they handle [problem] today. Would you have 20 minutes this week? You'd be shaping what we build first.'
The dollar figure in the template is an example, not a rule. Pick a thank-you that fits the person's seniority and your budget, and state it clearly so nobody feels surprised later.
How do you screen research participants?
Screen participants with two to four short questions that check for recent, real experience of the problem, not just a matching job title. A product manager who hasn't touched reporting in a year will give you opinions. One who rebuilt the weekly report last Friday will give you evidence.
Ask about recent behavior
'When did you last [do the task]?' with options like this week, this month, in the last six months, longer ago. Prioritize recent answers.
Check their role in the decision
'Who decides which tool your team uses for this?' tells you whether they're a user, a buyer or both.
Check the current solution
'How do you handle it today?' A spreadsheet, a competitor or a manual process each tell you something different.
Filter out conflicts
Exclude people who work for competitors or in UX research, unless that's your audience.
How many participants should you recruit, and how do you reduce no-shows?
Recruit a few more people than the sessions you need, because some bookings won't happen. For a round of five to eight interviews or usability tests, aim to book a couple of extra sessions. Then reduce no-shows by making it easy to attend and easy to cancel.
- Confirm right away. Send a calendar invite with the video link as soon as they agree.
- Remind them the day before. One short message with the time in their time zone.
- Keep sessions short. 20 to 30 minutes is easier to protect than an hour.
- Offer flexible times. Include early mornings or evenings for people in operational roles.
- Deliver incentives promptly. It builds goodwill and makes future recruiting easier, especially in small communities where people talk.
Track every contact in a simple spreadsheet: name, source, screener answers, session date and whether they'd be happy to talk again. Within a few rounds, this becomes your research panel, which is the single most valuable research asset an early-stage startup can build.
How do you build a waitlist that doubles as a research pool?
Build a waitlist that doubles as a research pool by adding one or two screening questions to the sign-up form and a checkbox asking whether people are open to a short call. Then every visitor who signs up becomes a potential participant, already sorted by role and need.
The page itself can be simple: a clear headline about the problem, a short description of what you're building, the sign-up form and nothing else. If you're choosing how to build it, our comparison of Framer vs Next.js for startup websites covers the trade-offs, and a no-code tool is fine for a first version.
Questions worth asking at sign-up: role, company size, how they handle the problem today and whether they'd talk to you. Keep it to three or four fields so it doesn't hurt sign-ups. Our guide to conversion research methods covers how to use short surveys on a live site without annoying visitors.
When you do launch, the same people become your first test group for onboarding and new features. Our guide to feature discovery and adoption explains how to keep learning from them after they become users.
Which tools help recruit user research participants?
Most early recruiting needs only a booking link, a spreadsheet and a form. Paid participant panels become useful when you need niche roles quickly or run research every week. Before that, your network and waitlist are cheaper and usually produce better-matched people.
Our guide to user research tools for startups compares free and paid options for scheduling, screening and incentives. Whatever you use, collect only the personal data you need, explain how you'll use recordings and delete them when the research is done. After the sessions, our guide to research synthesis shows how to turn notes into decisions.
