

Before I tell you how to get to the top of Product Hunt, why donโt I first share with you what MOST people do to get to the top (and fail miserably, followed by crying themselves to sleep).
Letโs face it, Product Hunt is a โzero sum gameโ, itโs binary. Either youโre on the front-page and reap the rewards, or youโre not, and get f*ck all traffic from it all. So we need to guarantee weโre on the front page (at a minimum), and hopefully in the top 3.
DISCLAIMER: This wonโt work if your product absolutely sucks. Itโll probably work still if your product sucks a little bit though.
SECOND DISCLAIMER: Some of this information is like, 12โ18 months old, but should be pretty accurate still. Do your own homework and double-check this, plus discover any new hacks.
So you have a spreadsheet now with at least 10โ20 (potentially 50) factors that impact how youโll rank on Product Hunt. And no, itโs not all about upvotes, itโs far more complex. Just head over there now and youโll notice that the order isnโt based just on upvotes.
Some factors matter more than others. YES, upvotes is a major one, but so is the hunter, and so are a lot of other things. Iโm in a good mood, so Iโll be giving you a list of factors to kick-start this for you, but Iโm not going to give you everything I worked out, because I want those that actually put the work in to be the ones that win, not just the ones that can read one damn articleโฆ (ima give you quite a bit of help still though)
(tough love, right)
We want to rank potential impact on 3 factors:
1. CertaintyโโโHow sure are we that this actually matters. This comes from how consistently we hear this as a factor (from articles, our network, anyone we talk to, how much we actually see it happening)
2. PowerโโโHow much do we think this will move the needle? If this was the ONLY thing we need (i.e. if we legit got 10k upvotes) would it be enough to rank us alone? That would make it a 10. If itโs a basic little thing that might move the needle like 1%, then itโs a 1.
3. Impact On Other FactorsโโโThis is a common one for founders to miss completelyโโโsome factors impact others. Iโll give you an exampleโโโone of the best hacks is to post at the right time of day (when the new day starts on Product Hunt). This gives you a head-start on the competition, and allows you to accrue more upvotes before they get online; which means you rank higher on the front page, and get more upvotes because of your ranking. So this seemingly small factor impacts other factors, so has a high over impact score.
This one is a little easier to work outโโโhow much work is it going to take. If itโs going to take a full week of your time (which should be 80+ hours if youโre serious about winning in the startup world), then itโs a 1. If it takes under 10 minutes, itโs a 10.
One thing to consider is thisโโโcan YOU do it, or are you relying on others. If something is going to require me managing/communicating with other people, itโs immediately getting a sh!ttier score (I donโt play well with others).
Multiply the two scores together. This gives you your Overall Score. The higher the score, the higher the priority.
Some examples so this is clearer:
Factor: Use a GIF instead of a still image (catches eyeballs better, higher click-through-rate = influences the algorithm)
Impact Score: 2
It gets a 2 rather than a 1, because it actually influences the Product Hunt algorithm a bit if you get a higher CTR.
Ease To Implement Score: 7
Itโs not getting a 10, because you have to make it actually look good, and then compress it and stuff. Might need to use a designer if youโre not good at this; and they have to know how to work with video/animation. Still pretty easy though.
Overall Score: 14 (7x2=14, quick maths, Skrrat, skidi-kat-kat)
Factor: Get a good hunter (they rank MUCH higher, this definitely matters)
Impact Score: 10
Nothing matters more than this other than Upvotes, and they correlate a lot, for a lot of reasons Iโll get into later.
Ease To Implement Score: 6
This is a 6 for me. Itโs not as easy as just emailing a few people, you might need to build relationships. We gave a beta test on our closed-beta plus some other perks. You also need to RESEARCH. You want a hunter that consistently gets their stuff on the front page, AND has an interest in what you do, then reach out. So itโs not that easy to be honest.
Overall Score: 60 (BOOM!)
So obviously, if we had to pick, weโd be working on getting that hunter instead of making a fancy GIF. The thing is though, you want to hit as many factors as possible, while going through your priority list from the top.
Right now youโre probably thinking, geez Jared, this is a f*kn lot of work isnโt it? Well yes, but Product Hunt pays dividends.
Ranking at the top helped us get onto TechCrunch (where I had the #1 article for 4 days straightโโโif you want the full method for that, check out my site www.newhackeveryweek.comโโโitโs paid membership though), and led to an 8-figure valuation with 7-figure investment; so itโs worth it. Product Hunt is an instrumental part of many launches. So just do the damn work.
Yes.
The Low Hanging Fruit Method works for everything, from manipulating the media, to Facebook, to SEO.
This is REAL โGrowth Hackingโ, getting your damn hands dirty and learning everything about the platform youโre trying to game.
If you do something better than the competition in every single way (i.e. every single factor), you canโt NOT win. (intentional poor English is something I do oftenโโโI hated my English teacher in High School, so now Iโm making sure Iโm a syndicated author while using dat terrible grammah nd spellinโโโโsuck shit Ann Rose from Callaghan College, youโre a hack)
One thing Iโve learnt (the hard way) is that I canโt make someone successful. I mentor so many people, and itโs literally up to them. BUT, I can give you an awesome nudge.
Iโm literally sitting here conflicted. Because I know if I just hand it to you, 99.947% of the people that read it wonโt even do it. Or theyโll half-ass it, which is worse, because you get shitty results but it still costs you time.
But f*ck it.
Impact: 10, Ease: 6, Overall: 60
I know I touched on this before, but I wanted to explain it a bit more.
To find awesome hunters, go here: http://500hunters.com/
The right hunter does a number of things:
Donโt half-ass working out the right hunter. And donโt send them a dumb email. Theyโre time-poor, so be cool about it.
Your email should go a little like this, and should go out about 2 weeks before you actually want to get hunted. If theyโre a top hunter, theyโre typically quite successfully (i.e. busy), so give them time to respond, and have time to go to your backup plans if they decline. Donโt be a dick if they decline, thank them for their time regardlessโโโthe startup community is small, and we talk.
Hey XYZ!
Just wanted to reach out, because weโre launching on ProductHunt soon, and we would love it if you would be our Hunter.
I noticed you recently hunted ABC Startupโโโours is actually quite similar, but different in that we <insert one-sentence pitch>.
If you want, I can give you early access, and Iโll give you everything you need to hunt it.
If youโre interested, just let me know. We have a day/time weโd like it hunted, happy to fill you in on details if youโre open to it.
P.S. I noticed youโre an XYZ fan, are you free when they play ABC on the 1st of April? If so, Iโve got 2x tickets with your name on themย ;)
Note: I didnโt give any tickets away, Iโd do this if I REALLY wanted the Hunter. We had 3 potential options, and we got our first pick for free.
Impact: 10, Ease: 9, Overall: 90
You want to launch at Midnight PST so you get the jump on the USA competition, and accrue Upvotes from the EU traffic. This will let you get a top ranking, which of course means more visibility, and more upvotes. This early kickstart makes it near impossible for those that launch late to catch up.
Impact: 10, Ease: 4, Overall: 40
You should be doing this anyway!
But basically, if you have a pre-launch list of, lets say, 1k people, and you can get even 200 to upvote you (especially if you get them to do it early in the day), youโll have a huge headstart.
Use something like viral-loops.com (we did this but custom built ours).
PRO TIP: We discovered that CTR (Click-Through-Rate) on the home page of ProductHunt matters. You want to have your audience go to the front page, scroll to you, and click on you. THEN, upvote you from inside your page. DO NOT send directly to your page, itโll have a smaller impact.
Impact: 3, Ease: 10, Overall: 30
Look, if you werenโt going to already do this, youโre a dick. But I feel I need to mention it, because itโs actually a factor with the Product Hunt algorithm. Replying swiftly to comments also gives good-will, and gives you a higher chance of these people sharing your hunt.
PRO TIP: Actually put some damn effort into the comments. This ISNโT the time to take a shortcut, these people are potentially evangelists for you; and some of our commenters helped immensely down the track for us.
PRO PRO TIP: Quickly do your homework on all commenters. If they have a decent following (1k+), DM them, and ask them to share it on social media for you. Once again, be cool about it. (This can work REALLY well)
Impact: 2, Ease: 10, Overall: 20
We used this as a chance to link to our Medium article, Press Kit, and give a longer more thorough description. We did this because we found that a lot of the top guys were doing it, and it was super simple to do.
This also shows that youโre engaged, and ready to answer any questions that people have in the comments sectionโโโby encouraging comments, youโre going to get more, and this is a ranking factor.
Impact: 2, Ease: 10, Overall: 20
From our research, we concluded this had the biggest return (most overall upvotes), which means more competition, but also more payoff (i.e. traffic)
Impact: 5, Ease: 7, Overall: 45
You know who uses Product Hunt the most? Popular hunters.
DO NOT email asking them to UpVote. Instead, email them asking them to check it out and give feedback. Naturally, a lot will upvote.
The higher ranked the hunter, the more impact their comment will have on the algorithmโโโso make it clear youโd like their feedback via a comment, so you can engage with it publicly.
If they really like it, they may also share it on social media.
Impact: 4, Ease: 6, Overall: 24
Get everyone to hit up everyone they know on social media to go and upvote it. Remember, send them to the front-page, not your actual page, this really does matter.
Impact: 10, Ease: 6, Overall: 60
I invented a viral bot competition method, itโs killer. Anyway, run a competition and build a FB messenger list from it, then when you launch on PH, get the list to go to the front page, scroll to you, click on you, then upvote you (yes, all of those steps, weโve heard about direct traffic to your page counting as a zero-vote due to their anti-fraudโโโdumb I know, but it is what it is)
Hereโs a video on how to do this competition:
Thatโs all Iโm going to give you. There is moreโโโgo and work it out. Research it yourself. If youโre not willing to do that, youโre not willing to follow my tips anyway you lazy mug.
As a Growth Hacker, Iโm always looking for ways to hack sh!t. So when I first saw Product Hunt, I thought โOh hell yes, Iโll just get heaps of fake upvotes and dominate thisโโโsuckers!โ.
But then I did my homework, and discovered a few things:
Go to www.NewHackEveryWeek.com where (and this may shock you) you can get a New Hack Every Week. Plus access to my archives of awesomeness.
GIMME DEM CLAPS! (like 20โ50 of those suckers)
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