A founder on Indie Hackers sent 343 cold emails and wrote 27 posts in March 2026, and made $0.
Each channel takes weeks to try by hand, and most tries come back near zero.
Find the channel that brings you paying users
For small software teams with no channel that works yet. Channelwise runs small tests every week across cold email, affiliates, influencers, SEO pages, directories and small ads, shows the cost per paying user for each, cuts the losers and puts more into the winners.
Most channel tests cost weeks and come back near zero.
Small software teams try cold email, launches, directories, short videos and a few ads, one at a time. Each test costs weeks of founder time or hundreds of dollars, and it’s rarely clear which one brought paying users.
Another founder listed on about 30 directories in a month and got four visits a month (Indie Hackers, Sep 2026).
Without a cost per paying user for each channel, it’s hard to know what to stop.
Small tests every week, judged on revenue.
Channelwise studies your product, plans 5 to 10 small tests with a budget and a kill rule for each, runs the ones it can, and tells you each week what to stop and what to grow.
Connected
Site, Stripe and analytics
Stripe with read access, so each paying user can be traced back to the channel that brought them.
See the planLater
The channels it runs, and the posts you make.
Channelwise runs what it can from your own domain and accounts. Reddit, Hacker News, Product Hunt, X and LinkedIn limit automation, so it drafts those posts and you post them.
What it runs
- Cold email from your domain
- Affiliate and partner outreach
- Influencer outreach
- SEO and answer pages
- Directory listings
- Small Google Ads tests
For every test
- Trackinglinks and Stripe
What you get
This week’s answer
- AFAffiliates$42 per paying user
- CECold email$95 per paying user
- DLDirectoriesStopped
Community posts: drafted for you to post
Cost per paying user, channel by channel.
Every week you see what each test cost, what it brought and what happens next. Early results rest on small numbers, so a winner starts as a lead. The numbers here are made up.
Spent this week$420
Paying users6
Best so farAffiliates, $42
| Channel | Spent | Signups | Paying | Cost per paying user | Next |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Affiliate outreach | $168 | 31 | 4 | $42 | Grow |
| Cold email | $95 | 14 | 1 | $95 | Keep testing |
| SEO and answer pages | $60 | 8 | 1 | $60 | Keep testing |
| Small Google Ads test | $70 | 5 | 0 | No payers | Cut |
| Directory listings | $27 | 6 | 0 | No payers | Cut |
A kill rule for every test
No paying user by the deadline, and the test stops.
Traced to Stripe
Signups and payments are matched to the channel that brought them.
Honest about small samples
Each result shows how many users it rests on.
Today’s options, and where Channelwise fits.
Agencies run tests by hand at agency prices. AI CMO tools like Okara draft content for you to approve. Instantly sends cold email and ListingBott submits to directories, one channel each. In the products we checked, none shows cost per paying user for each channel.
Job
Tests many channels
Recruits affiliates and partners
Cost per paying user, per channel
Cuts losers on a rule
What it costs
Growth agencyOr a freelancer
By people
Sometimes
In their reports
Their call
From about $4,000 a month
AI CMO toolsSuch as Okara
Drafts content
Influencer drafts
Not shown
Not shown
From $129 a month
Single-channel toolsInstantly, ListingBott
One each
Not their job
They send
You decide
$47 to $555 a month
Doing it yourselfWith Claude Code or by hand
As time allows
By hand
Your spreadsheet
Your call
Weeks of your time
ChannelwiseWeekly channel tests
5 to 10 at a time
From the open web
Every week, from Stripe
A kill rule per test
Set with early teams
Day one: a channel plan and 100+ prospects.
The same day you get a ranked channel plan with a budget and kill rule for each test, over 100 named affiliate, partner and influencer prospects with contacts, outreach ready to send and directory submissions started. Clear calls on which channel works take 2 to 4 weeks of data.
Who it’s for
- Self-serve SaaS and AI apps in the US, 1 to 20 people
- Some revenue, and no channel that reliably brings paying users
- The founder runs growth and approves each test budget
Common questions
It runs small customer tests for your product every week across cold email, affiliate and partner outreach, influencer outreach, SEO and answer pages, directory listings and small Google Ads tests. It shows the cost per signup and per paying user for each channel, cuts the losers and puts more into the winners.
Founders of self-serve SaaS and AI apps in the US with 1 to 20 people, some revenue, and no channel that reliably brings paying users yet. The founder usually runs growth.
On day one you get a ranked channel plan, over 100 named affiliate, partner and influencer prospects, outreach ready to send and directory submissions started. Clear calls on which channel works take 2 to 4 weeks of data.
No. Those platforms limit automated posting, and many communities treat it as self-promotion. Channelwise drafts those posts and you post them yourself.
Each test gets its own tracked links, and Channelwise reads Stripe with read access to match payments to the channel that brought each user. Where the source can’t be seen, the report says so.
Cold email goes from a warmed second domain, with an opt-out in every email, so your main domain stays out of it. Warming a new domain takes a few weeks.
Early results rest on small numbers, so the report shows the users behind each one. A strong early channel is treated as a lead and gets more budget step by step.
Small Google Ads tests, as one channel among many. Paid influencer deals aren’t part of it.
You do, directly. Each test has a budget you approve before it starts.
We’re setting the price with our early-access teams. Join the waitlist and you’ll see it before you commit to anything.