To find your first 10 users on campus who aren't your friends, pick one narrow group with the problem (say, students in one lab course or one club), go where that group already gathers, ask about their past experience before showing anything, and set the product up with them on the spot. Expect most people to say no; plan to approach several times as many people as the users you need.
How do I find my first 10 users on campus who aren't my friends?
Your friends tried your app. They said it was great. Then they stopped opening it. Now you need users who don't know you, and a campus of thousands of students suddenly feels empty.
Ten real strangers is a small number, but it is the hardest ten you will ever find, because nothing about it scales. The good news is that a campus is one of the easiest places on earth to do unscalable work: the people you want are within walking distance, and they gather in predictable places.
What do the sources agree on?
Few pages answer this exact question. Most results are generic growth listicles. But a handful of solid sources, from investors, founders and university programs, line up on four points.
You have to go to them. Paul Graham's essay Do Things That Don't Scale (2013) says that recruiting users by hand is the one unscalable thing almost every startup has to do, and that founders avoid it mostly because talking to strangers is uncomfortable. His line is blunt: "You can't wait for users to come to you." Lenny Rachitsky's study of how the biggest consumer apps got their first 1,000 users (2020) found the same thing in practice: most went directly to users, offline or online, and offline tactics included pitching sororities and fraternities at USC and putting flyers around Stanford.
Start narrow. Rachitsky's first rule, before any tactic, is to narrowly define your target user. Graham points to Facebook, which began as a site for one college's students only. A small group that feels the product is built for them beats a big group that shrugs.
Ask about their life, not your idea. Yevgeniy Brikman's review of The Mom Test summarizes Rob Fitzpatrick's rules: talk about the person's life, ask about specific things they did in the past rather than what they would do, and treat compliments as weak evidence. That is exactly why friends are a poor test. They are trying to be kind. The University of Virginia's Discovery program page, a regional I-Corps program, makes the same point from a university angle: customer discovery is not about pitching your solution, and teams should limit what they reveal.
It takes volume and weekly effort. NSF's I-Corps training for its Phase I startup awardees requires a minimum of 100 interviews. The UVA program asks for interviews every week, 20 in total, and warns that finding and scheduling people takes real time. Your bar is far lower than theirs, but the shape is the same: a steady weekly habit, not one big launch post.
Where do the sources disagree or go quiet?
Graham notes that building for yourself and your friends works well when your friends are early adopters, and Rachitsky lists "invite your friends" as one of seven strategies. So the sources don't say friends are useless. They say friends are a starting point, not proof.
None of these sources addresses campus rules, and that gap matters. Many residence halls control what gets posted. The University of Delaware's posting policy, for example, requires flyers to be authorized by Residence Life and Housing in advance, allows one flyer per building, and does not allow commercial advertisements in the halls. Before you tape anything to a wall, ask your housing or student activities office.
A two-week plan to find 10 users who aren't friends
Days 1–2: pick one group and one problem. Write one sentence: "Students who ___ and struggle with ___." Good groups are ones you can physically find: people in one large intro course, one club, one lab section, one campus job, one dorm floor's study room.
Days 3–7: have 15–20 short conversations. Go where the group already is: the club meeting, the line before office hours, the course Discord, the hallway after a lab. Ask a question about the past, not about your app:
- "When did you last deal with ___? What did you do?"
- "What did you try before that? What was annoying about it?"
- "Who else do you know who deals with this?"
That last question is how you leave your friend circle: each stranger can point you to the next one.
Days 8–10: show it only to people who have the problem. When someone describes the problem in detail, show the product right then. Do what Graham calls the Collison installation: instead of sending a link later, set it up with them on the spot, on their phone or laptop.
Days 11–14: follow up and count honestly. Message each person once, a few days later, with one question about how it went. Count someone as a user only if they used it on their own after the first meeting.
| Where to look | What to check first | What it's good for |
|---|---|---|
| Club meetings | Ask the officers before pitching to members | A group that shares one problem |
| Course Discord or group chat | Read the channel rules; ask a moderator | Fast, specific conversations |
| Physical flyers | Your school's posting policy | Reaching people you'd never meet |
| Campus events and fairs | Event organizers' rules on tables and handouts | Many short conversations in one day |
| Referrals from people you talked to | Nothing; just ask | The cheapest path past your friends |
How many people say no?
Most of them. That isn't a sign your product is bad. It is how outreach works, and it is why the plan above starts with 15–20 conversations to find ten users. If almost nobody you talk to recognizes the problem, the useful conclusion is that you picked the wrong problem or the wrong group, and week one has done its job.
How STARC uses this
STARC's one-person company cohort is built around this step. Week 1 asks each student to talk to at least 10 potential users and pick one problem. By week 3, at least 5 real users should have tried the product, with notes on where they got stuck, and week 5 is a channel experiment, which can be your campus. To graduate as Shipped, a student needs at least 10 real users who aren't classmates, friends or family, backed by screenshots, analytics or an anonymized list. A student who does all the work but falls short of that can still finish as Completed, with a case study on why.
The first cohort hasn't run yet, so there are no results to point to. The rules are on the How it works page, and common questions are in the FAQ.
The short version
Pick one narrow group with one problem. Go where they already gather. Ask about what they did last time, not whether they like your idea. Set the product up with them on the spot, ask each person who else has the problem, and count only people who come back on their own. Check your campus posting rules before you print anything.
Related questions
Can I count my friends as users at all?
You can mention them as people who tried it, but keep them separate. Friends tend to be polite rather than honest about your idea, and anyone reading your numbers will discount them. Strangers who come back without being asked are the signal that matters.
Am I allowed to put up flyers in my dorm?
Check first. Many residence halls require approval from the housing office before anything is posted, and some, such as the University of Delaware's, do not allow commercial ads in the halls at all. Your school's residence life or student activities office will tell you the rules.
How many people do I need to ask to get 10 users?
Nobody has a reliable ratio, and it depends on how sharp your problem is. Treat 10 users as the end of a funnel: ask many more people for a conversation, have conversations with fewer, and set up the product with the ones who show real interest.
Should I pitch my app in the first conversation?
No. University customer-discovery programs tell teams to learn about the person's problem first and limit what they reveal about the solution. Show the product only after you know they have the problem.
Want to build your own product?
The OPC cohort: 12 students, 8 weeks, one real product with real users.
Last updated: 2026-10-25. Written by the STARC team. Rules quoted here come from our transparency page; if they change, this post is updated.
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