How Product Hunt Actually Works

To launch successfully on Product Hunt, your product needs to make it to the front page. To get to the front page, your product needs to attract a lot of upvotes and engagement.

Product Hunt is similar to Google search results in that few people look past the first several results. Audience attention is concentrated among the highest-ranking posts.

But this doesn't mean you should fish for upvotes at any cost.

Product Hunt doesn’t like when marketers game the system.

Product Hunt’s algorithm actively demotes posts that show clear signs of fishing for upvotes, such as when a product receives a large number of votes from newly created accounts.

The Product Hunt team even monitors Twitter for Product Hunt vote fishing spam.

But there’s a nuance here:

While Product Hunt doesn’t want you to blast the internet with upvote requests, they, too, need new users to grow.

So if you’re authentically hustling—respectfully—and asking your true social network for feedback on Product Hunt, it's unlikely you'll be punished.

We have lots of nitty gritty aspects of PH to teach you in a minute, but here’s the short version of how you can get upvotes without being spammy:

• Prepare an existing seed audience in advance, and have them engage with you on Product Hunt on launch day. You should be doing most of the work before launch day.
• Build a positive reputation in startup communities in the weeks leading up to launch, and ask your advocates to support you on launch day.
• If you get connected to a well-known hunter, ask them to hunt your product. You’ll be fast-tracked to the front page and the added social proof may get you more votes from established Product Hunt members. We'll explain how to pull this off shortly.