Slack/Discord Reconnaissance

Discover and rank Slack workspaces and Discord servers where your ICP participates. Produces a prioritized engagement target list with detailed profiles for each community. Runs once at play start and is refreshed quarterly.

Input

• ICP definition (firmographics, job titles, pain points, triggering events) from the icp-definition drill
• Your product category and the problems you solve
• Competitor names

Steps

1. Generate discovery keyword lists

From your ICP definition, produce three keyword lists:

Pain-point keywords — problems your ICP discusses in communities:

• Extract the top 3 pain points from your ICP doc
• For each, generate 3-5 natural-language phrases: "how do I handle X", "anyone solved Y", "struggling with Z"
• Include tool-seeking variants: "what tool do you use for X", "is there a way to automate Y"

Category keywords — your product category and adjacent spaces:

• Product category and synonyms
• "best [category] tool", "[category] recommendations", "[category] for [ICP role]"
• Competitor names and comparison queries

ICP identity keywords — terms that describe your target person:

• Job titles: "startup founder", "head of growth", "devtools"
• Industries: "B2B SaaS", "fintech", "developer tools"
• Community archetypes: "indie hackers", "SaaS operators", "growth marketers"

2. Discover candidate communities

Using the community-directory-search fundamental, run the following discovery methods:

Slack community directories:

• Search https://slofile.com for each keyword
• Search https://standuply.com/slack-chat-groups for industry terms
• Search "site:slack.com {keyword}" via web search
• Search "{keyword} slack community join {current_year}" via web search
• Check https://www.saastr.com/saastr-slack/ and similar curated lists for your industry

Discord server directories:

• Search https://disboard.org for each keyword
• Search https://discordservers.com for each keyword
• Use Discord's discovery API: GET https://discord.com/api/v10/discovery/search?query={keyword}&limit=25
• Search "discord server {keyword} {industry}" via web search

Cross-platform:

• Use Clay's Claygent to ask: "What are the most active Slack communities for {ICP role} in {industry}?"
• Use Clay's Claygent to ask: "What are the largest Discord servers for {topic}?"
• Check competitor websites and docs for community links (many SaaS companies have public Slack or Discord communities)
• Search Product Hunt and Indie Hackers for community mentions

Target: 20-40 candidate communities before filtering.

3. Evaluate each candidate

For each Slack workspace you can access, using the slack-api-read fundamental:

1. Get workspace info: team.info API call. Note member count, workspace name, icon.
2. List channels: conversations.list API call. Count total channels, identify the most relevant channels by name and topic.
3. Sample activity: For the 3-5 most relevant channels, pull the last 100 messages. Calculate messages per day, unique posters per day, and average thread reply count.
4. Check ICP density: Read 50 recent messages. Count how many are from people matching your ICP (by job title in profile or content of messages).
5. Check rules: Look for #rules, #guidelines, or pinned messages in #general. Note any restrictions on self-promotion, link sharing, or vendor participation.

For each Discord server, using the discord-api-read fundamental (where bot access is available):

1. Get server info: Note member count, verification level, and server description.
2. List channels: Identify text channels and forum channels relevant to your expertise.
3. Sample activity: Pull the last 100 messages from the 3-5 most relevant channels. Calculate activity metrics.
4. Check ICP density: Read member roles and recent message content to assess ICP fit.
5. Check rules: Read #rules or #welcome channel for community guidelines.

For communities where API access is not possible, manually evaluate by joining and observing for 48 hours.

4. Score and rank

Score each community (0-50) on five dimensions:

| Dimension | Weight | Scoring | |-----------|--------|---------| | ICP fit | 30% | 0=no ICP presence, 5=majority matches ICP, 15=dedicated ICP community | | Activity level | 25% | 0=dead, 5=weekly activity, 12.5=daily active discussions | | Engagement quality | 20% | 0=announcements only, 5=shallow chat, 10=deep technical discussions | | Accessibility | 15% | 0=invite-only/paid, 3=application, 7.5=open join | | Competition saturation | 10% | 5=no vendors, 3=some vendors, 0=saturated with vendor spam |

Sort by total score. Select:

• Primary (3-5 communities, score 35+): Daily engagement
• Secondary (5-8 communities, score 25-34): 2-3x per week, test for promotion
• Watch list (remaining): Monitor only via keyword alerts

5. Build engagement profiles

For each selected community, produce:

## {Community Name} Engagement Profile

- **Platform**: Slack / Discord
- **Members**: X | **Daily active**: ~Y
- **Score**: XX/50
- **Join URL**: {url}
- **Cost**: Free / $X per month
- **Key channels**: #{channel1} (topic), #{channel2} (topic), #{channel3} (topic)
- **Rules summary**: [no self-promo / links OK in #showcase / vendor intros in #introductions]
- **Peak activity hours (UTC)**: [when messages get the most engagement]
- **Recurring events**: [weekly AMAs, monthly demos, daily standups]
- **Top contributors**: [3-5 regulars who set the tone — note their roles and topics]
- **Competitor presence**: [none / low / moderate / saturated]
- **Your angle**: [specific expertise gap you can fill]
- **First 5 interactions plan**: [specific messages/threads you would engage with]

6. Store in CRM

Using the attio-lists fundamental, create an Attio list called "Slack/Discord Community Targets" with entries for each community. Include score, platform, tier (primary/secondary/watch), key channels, and the engagement profile as structured fields.

Output

• Ranked list of 10-15 target Slack/Discord communities with engagement profiles
• Attio list with community targets and metadata
• Three keyword lists (pain-point, category, ICP identity) for use in monitoring
• Join URLs and access instructions for each community

Triggers

• Run once at play start
• Re-run quarterly or when ICP changes
• Ad-hoc when a new relevant community is discovered