Most founders who try Reddit marketing get banned within the first two weeks. Not because Reddit is hostile to founders, but because new accounts that only talk about one product look exactly like spam bots. Because they usually are.
Your account needs to look like a real person before you start mentioning your product. Here's what that means in practice.
What Reddit actually looks at
Reddit doesn't publish its rules for what triggers moderation, but the signals are consistent:
Account age: A 2-week-old account looks suspicious regardless of karma. Most subreddit automod systems filter or flag comments from accounts under 30 days old. Some require 90 days.
Karma: Comment karma below 100 to 200 puts you in a category where many subreddits automatically hold your posts for review. You won't know this is happening, you'll just wonder why your comments disappear.
Comment history variety: If every comment you've ever made is about the same product, moderators and spam filters treat your account as a shill account. Even if your individual comments are helpful.
Build the account before you need it
If you don't have a Reddit account yet, create one today. Don't wait until you're ready to promote. Account age is the one thing you can't speed up, so start the clock now.
For the first few weeks, comment on things that have nothing to do with your product. Answer questions in communities you genuinely know about. r/programming, r/personalfinance, r/cooking, whatever is actually relevant to your life. The goal is a comment history that looks like a real person.
The practical minimum before you promote
Before you mention your product in any comment:
- Account is at least 30 days old (60 to 90 is better)
- At least 100 comment karma
- Comment history shows activity across more than one topic
- You've already been active in the target subreddit for at least a few days
You don't need to hit every threshold perfectly. But the more of these you have, the less likely your comments get removed before anyone reads them.
What actually gets you banned
Posting links to your product: Almost every active subreddit has a no-links rule or at least heavy suspicion of links in comments. Don't do it. Mention the product name. People can search for it.
Repeating the same comment: If you leave variations of the same comment across multiple threads in a short period, Reddit's spam detection picks it up. Write each comment fresh for the specific thread.
Your whole account is about one thing: Browse your own comment history from the outside. If it reads like a bot promoting one product, that's how moderators will see it too.
If you already got banned
Most founders who get banned get banned from one subreddit, not from Reddit entirely. These are different situations.
A subreddit ban means you can still use Reddit everywhere else. Message the moderators, acknowledge what happened, and ask politely if there's a path back. Don't create a new account to work around it. Reddit detects ban evasion and the result is a site-wide ban, which is much harder to recover from.
If a subreddit is important to your strategy and you got banned, the patience play is to appeal once, then move on and build your presence in other communities while you wait.