Get your First Customers
I help founders master marketing, validate business ideas, and get their first customers.
What if marketing didn't have to be such a struggle?
You’ve built an incredible product. The tech stack is solid, the code is clean, and the features work. But there's one thing standing between your software and revenue: finding customers.
Marketing feels like a guessing game because technical founders are taught to prioritize the product over the pitch. There's no algorithm for human behavior. You have to put yourself out there, hear "no," and ask strangers for money.
But here's what most technical founders get wrong: marketing isn't a dark art. It's a learnable skill. And like any skill worth having, it gets better with practice and the right process.
When you learn to market you'll be able to:
- ✓ Know your product will sell before you write a single line of code because you tested the message first.
- ✓ See your market clearly; who your customers are, where they hang out, and what makes them buy.
- ✓ Turn a vague idea into a concrete offer that you can put in front of real people today.
- ✓ Stop guessing and start making decisions based on real customer data.
Why My Clients Succeed
Most founders start by building their product. That's great for figuring out if you can make something — but it tells you nothing about whether anyone will buy it.
I flip the order. Before you build anything, I'll show you how to:
- ✓ Start with your offer, not your product. Craft the message that makes the right people care about your project before you write a single line of code or design a single feature.
- ✓ Reverse engineer what's already working. Study successful marketers in your space and borrow their proven strategies instead of starting from scratch.
- ✓ Talk to real potential customers. Have honest one-on-one conversations that build trust, sharpen your idea, and often lead directly to sales.
- ✓ Test demand before you build. Run lightweight ads to see if your market actually wants what you're selling — before you invest months building it.
❤️ From Past Clients
I had the pleasure of working with Walt on my marketing strategy.
He is incredibly knowledgeable, professional, and has a keen eye for identifying growth opportunities.
Walt doesn't just give advice, he provides actionable steps that truly move the needle. Highly recommended for anyone looking to scale their business!
Guillaume
311mph.com
I am truly grateful for Walt's support in building my first product for my brand.
Prior to working with Walt, I had been stuck for six months. I had been building a personal brand, but struggled to turn my ideas into a product that my social media audience would be interested in.
Together with Walt I clarified the value I wanted to offer my audience, was able to get unstuck and ship.
After six months of feeling stuck, this is a breakthrough. I feel like my personal brand is beginning to take shape.
Jack
foccacia_ai
I learned more about positioning and marketing in a couple hours with Walt than I did in all my college marketing courses.
In a single session, he walked me through how to identify the real pain points, the dream outcome, and the benefits of my product and helped me restructure my strategy.
Easily one of the most valuable conversations I've had as a founder.
Pedro
Jumboree
What I Offer
Free
Free Marketing Roundtable
Several times a month, a small group of entrepreneurs gets on Google Meet to talk about what's working (and what's not) when it comes to getting customers. It's free, and there's no pitch. Just founders helping founders figure out distribution.
$60 · 1-on-1 Session
1:1 Marketing Messaging, Research and Strategy Session
You walk away with a clear strategy you can use to get into the market.
- ✓ Get clear on how to reach your market — research your market and find viable GTM strategies
- ✓ Nail your messaging — tune up your home page messaging
- ✓ Get clear on how you can get into the market
$250 / month
Ongoing Coaching & Mentoring
Guided entrepreneurship and marketing coaching with the goal of running inbound and outbound marketing tests.
- ✓ Regular weekly sessions
- ✓ Async support, guided through the full process
- ✓ Strategy + moral support
- ✓ Past clients have gotten great results in 1-2 months of sessions
Hi, I'm Walt 👋
I'm an engineer by training. I spent years in Silicon Valley startups, including a stint as founding engineer and head of data science at Hired.com. I could build anything. But what I always wanted was to build and sell my own products.
After Hired I decided to strike out on my own. My first several projects went nowhere. I could build sophisticated software but I couldn't get it in front of people. I tried writing articles, building apps for the app store. Nothing worked. Marketing was a mystery to me. In fact, I looked down on it.
It took me a while but I finally started to get it. Clear messaging and deep empathy for real problems are the foundation of a great product. I started having conversations with customers, helping people and slowly realized that marketing is learnable and is a lot of fun. I hope I can help you make the transition too.
You could spend years piecing this together yourself, or you could have someone who's already made the mistakes show you exactly what to do right now. Ready? Let's talk.