Max Kolysh

First Customers Come From Founder-Led Work, Not Sales Automation

YC visiting partner Max Kolysh argues that a startup’s first 10 customers usually come from founder-led, manual work rather than cold-email tooling or automated sales systems. In a Startup School talk based on founder examples, he says early acquisition starts with understanding where buyers actually spend time, exhausting warm networks, showing up in person, and doing enough specific work to earn attention before asking for a meeting.