Founders: where do you find leads beyond LinkedIn in 2026?
I've been going deep on Telegram as a prospecting channel and I'm curious how others handle it.
The problem I keep hitting: Telegram communities are full of buying signals — people asking for tool recommendations, complaining about a workflow, looking to switch vendors — but reading every thread manually doesn't scale, and scraping members is spammy and mostly useless.
What's actually working for you?
- How do you decide which communities are worth monitoring?
- What signals tell you someone is genuinely in-market vs just venting?
- How do you reach out without coming across as a spammer?
For transparency: I'm building Leadgram (https://leadgram.io), an AI search tool for finding high-intent leads in Telegram conversations — so I'm clearly biased. But I'd really like to hear how manual, non-tool, or completely different approaches compare. What's your workflow?
Replies
Interesting approach. i noticed is that buying signals often come repeated question . when some brings up the same issue more than once they're usually looks for a solution not just venting.
@meganscottjb0 Agreed - repetition signals deep-seated pain. That's someone who's looking for relief.
I think intent matters more than the platform itself. Someone complaining about a problem repeatedly is usually more valuable than someone just asking for recommendations.
The hardest part is filtering. A lot of people talk about tools casually, but only a few are actually ready to switch or buy.
@alicia_klein Good point - if that pain has been there a long time, they may be reluctant to make a change, no matter the benefit.
What’s worked best for me is treating communities like a listening surface first, not a lead list.
The signal I trust most is not “looking for recommendations.” It’s when someone describes the same pain in a specific enough way that you can tell they’ve already tried to work around it. Stuff like “we’re juggling three tools for this” or “we hacked this together but it keeps breaking.” That usually means they’re closer to buying than the people asking broad comparison questions.
I’d also separate public engagement from outreach. In a lot of communities, the useful move is just to answer well in public and let the right people come to you after that. Cold outreach from inside a discussion thread usually feels gross fast.
I’m building DukieX, so I spend a lot of time around these “high intent but easy to spam” conversations. My rule is simple: if the reply still helps with no product mention, it’s probably safe. If it needs the pitch to make sense, I leave it alone.
that's a new one, never saw anyone using telegram for leads - how's it working out? is prospecting easier there? i'd love to know more...
some issues i can see is, lots of people don't use their real name, or username and they're just for fun - so how do you actually "know" that those people have high buying intent? and identifying if they need help or not - you can do it with scrapping the chats only as far as I understand or maybe reaching out cold?
I’d look at niche communities like Telegram, Reddit, Slack groups, and Product Hunt.
The strongest signal is specificity: current tool, clear pain, deadline, or budget. And outreach works best when you help first, not pitch immediately.
Receiptor AI
LinkedIn is really powerful for our market (AI for bookkeeping, SMBs and accounting firms)
Cold emailing & cold calling are interesting channels but harder to master, I'd say. Digital communities or events are more time-consuming, but lead qualification is easier. You can easily do social listening on certain communities to 1) find leads, 2) get some visibility in those communities, which might impact your GEO positively
Interesting approach. I like the idea, but trust is everything in these communities. If users feel like they’re being monitored, the whole thing losesits values.
I've been on the same questions since we launched.
Which platform actually tells you that someone needs the product? I do understand it's the discussions where most leads are, but then what?
Honestly, I hadn't really considered Telegram for lead sourcing - I'd be curious how Leadgram helps with that.