I have done 218 episodes of my podcast. It is an interview style podcast where i interview founders and entrepreneurs and the first question i ask them is
a universal question, but the answers are rarely the same. Some build through partnerships, others through sheer persistence, others by leveraging platforms like TikTok, and some collapse years of selling into one presentation.
Here’s exactly how they got their first customers—in their own words.
1. Partnerships Beat Marketing (Flutterwave)
When I asked how Flutterwave got its first 1,000 customers, here’s what I was told:
“What we did to acquire our first 1,000 customers… Flutterwave’s DNA is like an enterprise payments firm. We didn’t have the stomach for running around SMEs. What we leveraged was partnership. The first partnership we did was with Access Bank. Access Bank had a lot of merchants that needed payments. At the time, the only option they had was InterSwitch, which asked for ₦500,000 and three to six months of back-and-forth. When we came with a superior product, all we had to do was plug in through Access Bank’s relationships. That’s how we scaled our first 1,000 users. We never really spent any money on marketing.”
Lesson: Sometimes the fastest way to 1,000 customers isn’t through ads or cold calls it’s by leveraging a bigger partner’s trust and network. Ask who is already doing business with my target audience
2. Persistence Wins (The 26th Call)
Another entrepreneur told me a story that highlights the power of persistence and setting clear targets:
“To set a goal that , I would make 150 sales calls before i quite real estate. On the 26th call, I sold my first property. Because for every goal I set, I put a number to it. I wasn’t going to stop until I hit that number.”
Lesson: If you’re stuck at 0 customers, don’t underestimate the power of committing to a number calls, emails, or meetings and refusing to stop until you hit it.
3. Volume & TikTok (Toby Corban, London Luxury Real Estate Broker)
Toby Corban, a luxury real estate broker in London, broke into the market by playing the volume game and leveraging TikTok.
First, he treated outreach like a full-time job:
“I decided that every morning at 8 a.m. I would send out 10 emails, just before 9 so I’d be the first thing in their inbox. I did this for 10 days—about 60–100 emails. I got 10 to 20 callbacks, three or four interviews, and eventually two offers. It was just a numbers game.”
And then, he flipped the script on how people think about TikTok:
“I think I got my first 1,000 users by going live on TikTok. I wasn’t spending on marketing. I was just showing up consistently.”
“I even sold two luxury houses directly from TikTok.”
Lesson: It’s not about being fancy—it’s about volume and visibility. If you’re sending five emails or posting once a week, you’re not in the game. Send 100. Go live three times a week. Be visible until the right opportunities hit.
4. One-to-Many Selling (Dr. Kunle Adeyemi)
And then there are those moments when one opportunity changes everything.
Dr. Kunle Adeyemi told me a story that shows the power of one-to-many selling:
“In Nigeria, one of the biggest banks invited me to make a presentation to their staff. And I had 3,000 sales in one day. I sold 3,000 plots in one day. That estate is one of the biggest estates we have in Nigeria. I don’t want to mention the brand. Now, 3,000 sold plots in one day gave me ₦84,000,000 in commission. As a matter of fact, when that ₦84,000,000 in February 2006 hit my account with Standard Trust Bank in those days, the branch manager and the area manager invited me for a conversation. Because, at that time before that major breakthrough, what I had in my account was less than ₦2,000. And that was a paradigm shift.”
Lesson: Speaking one-to-many whether through a presentation, a webinar, or even TikTok Live—can collapse years of sales into a single day.
5. 1,000 Users from Tik Tok: Winner Oyebanjo CEO NILE got his first 1,000 users by going live on tiktok
The Takeaway
Whether it’s:
Partnerships (Flutterwave)
Persistence (26 calls)
Volume & Platforms (Toby Corban, TikTok + email blitz)
One-to-many selling (Dr. Kunle Adeyemi’s ₦2,000 → ₦84,000,000 shift)
…the playbook for getting your first 100 or next 1,000 customers is always the same: numbers, leverage, and positioning.
No shortcuts. Just systems.
If you have made it this far i say thank you.
Here are three ways i can help you
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