Thought about applying to YCombinator? Founder of SigmaOS (YC S21) here, AMA! 👇

@claudiu_cogalniceanu heyo! we launched SigmaOS straight out of our YC batch into the public (ie, we never had a closed-beta really). At the beginning, we were growing slowly through word-of-mouth and a bit of our own social media (all 3 founders on twitter/linkedin). We were heads down and focused on product. Then we launched on PH for the first time in 2021, and that brought in our earliest adopters! What idea/product are you looking to apply with?

@mahyad that’s awesome! I was thinking about the same thing - get early users through word of mouth, and when I would have a bigger-ish following, I would have an “official” launch on PH. Did YC help you in any way in the early stages in terms of acquiring users? Well, I built a web app for Gmail users to help them get rid of spam and useless junk, and I was thinking of applying to YC with it. I know I missed the deadline for the winter batch, but I didn’t feel comfortable enough to apply without users :)

@entreeden If you can, get in touch with someone that has been through the process in a previous batch. I believe Pioneer fund have a link somewhere to book in a session with a YC alum. There’s lots of great resources online, but one tip I’d give is prep really really well for their usual first question: 'what are you building?’ Sounds obvious, but you need to have this nailed.

@mahyad how you answered this question: 'what are you building?’

@arslanaut we applied with a small number of early adopters (<100). You don’t necessarily need to have a full product with loads users when you’re applying, but proving early signs of traction is useful for sure :)