Most founders don't quit because the business failed.
They quit because they were alone when it got hard.
I know that feeling. A few years ago I was running a SaaS, the numbers were stuck, and I had nobody to talk to who actually got it. My friends thought I was nuts. My partner was tired of hearing about churn. So I did something that still sounds stupid out loud: I paid $13,000 to join a mastermind run by founders doing $15-20K a month.
Six months later that same SaaS was doing $75K/month. I sold it. Then I built Profitable Founder Club so other founders wouldn't have to choose between going broke and going it alone.
That's the whole pitch for an entrepreneur support group. You stop guessing in the dark because someone two steps ahead just tells you what worked.
But "support group" covers a lot of ground online. Some are free Reddit threads. Some cost $8,500 a year and won't let you in unless you're already doing millions. Below are the 8 best entrepreneur support groups online in 2026, ranked, with what each one actually costs and the honest catch with every one.
What makes an entrepreneur support group worth joining
Before the list, three filters. I've wasted money on rooms that failed all three.
→ Stage match. A room of pre-revenue dreamers and a room of $5M founders are different planets. You want people one or two steps ahead of you, not ten.
→ Real talk, not pitching. The second a community turns into people selling each other courses, it's dead. You want founders sharing actual numbers, not a networking event in disguise.
→ Small enough to be seen. A 40,000-person Slack is a feed, not a group. Real support happens in rooms small enough that people remember your last problem.
Keep those in mind. Now the list.
1. Profitable Founder Club
Full disclosure: this one's mine. I built it after living the exact problem, so take the ranking with that in mind. But here's why it's first for the founder I'm writing this for.
Profitable Founder Club is a small peer group for SaaS founders between $5K and $50K MRR who are trying to get to $100K. Not pre-revenue. Not nine-figure CEOs. The messy middle, where most masterminds ignore you because you can't afford $8K a year yet.
What you get: bi-weekly calls where we hot-seat three member problems and actually solve them, a monthly Q&A with founders who've crossed $100K+ MRR, and a batch capped at 20 so you're never a username in a feed.
→ Who it's for: bootstrapped SaaS founders at $5K-$50K MRR who want a stage-matched room, not a megaphone.
→ Cost: a fraction of the $13K I paid for my first one.
→ The catch: it's deliberately small and SaaS-specific. If you run an agency or an e-commerce brand, one of the broader rooms below will fit you better.
Apply to Profitable Founder Club →
2. Indie Hackers
If you're building software and you've never posted on Indie Hackers, start today. It's free, it's owned by Stripe, and it's the closest thing the bootstrapped world has to a town square.
The format is part forum, part build-in-public diary. Founders post revenue milestones, teardown threads, and "here's exactly what I tried" stories. The interviews alone are a free MBA in bootstrapping.
→ Who it's for: early indie founders who want feedback and a public record of progress.
→ Cost: free.
→ The catch: it's a feed. Engagement comes and goes, and there's no one holding you accountable. Great for ideas, weak for follow-through. I broke down the rooms that fix that in my guide to the best indie hacker communities.
3. MicroConf Connect
MicroConf has been the home of bootstrapped SaaS since before it was cool. Connect is their online community, and the whole thing is built on one rule: no pitching.
That rule is the product. You get channels by topic, AMAs with founders who've been at it for a decade, and the same crowd that shows up to the legendary in-person events. It's calm, useful, and refreshingly hype-free.
→ Who it's for: SaaS founders who want a quiet, high-signal room instead of a loud one.
→ Cost: free to join.
→ The catch: it leans toward people who are already shipping. If you're still deciding what to build, you'll lurk more than you post.
4. r/Entrepreneur
Reddit's r/Entrepreneur has millions of members, which makes it the loudest room on this list and the noisiest. But buried in the noise is something the paid clubs can't give you: total strangers with zero reason to flatter you.
Post your landing page and you'll get brutal, useful feedback in an hour. The "what worked for me" threads are gold if you sort by top and ignore the get-rich-quick crowd.
→ Who it's for: anyone who wants fast, anonymous gut-checks on an idea or a page.
→ Cost: free.
→ The catch: signal-to-noise is rough. For every sharp answer there are ten people who've never sold anything. Use it for quick reactions, not for the deep relationships you actually need.
5. The Dynamite Circle (DC)
The DC started as a crew of location-independent entrepreneurs and grew into one of the best networks for people running remote, bootstrapped businesses. Think founders who'd rather run a profitable $1M company from Lisbon than chase a unicorn from a San Francisco office.
It runs on a private forum plus 100+ local chapters and global events, so the online community spills into real meetups in actual cities. That mix of digital and in-person is rare and it's the reason members stick around for years.
→ Who it's for: established founders, often remote, doing real revenue who want a global tribe.
→ Cost: around $499/year, or $147/quarter.
→ The catch: there's a $100K/year revenue minimum to get in. If you're pre-six-figures, come back when you've crossed it.
6. Hampton
Hampton is Sam Parr's private network for high-growth founders, and it's the premium tier of this whole list. It launched in 2023 and already has over 1,000 members, with an acceptance rate around 8%.
The core is the "core group": eight founders with similarly sized businesses, meeting monthly with a trained facilitator. Members average around $23M in company revenue, so the conversations are about problems most of us won't hit for years.
→ Who it's for: founders already doing serious revenue who want a peer room at their level.
→ Cost: $8,500/year.
→ The catch: you need $3M+ in revenue, $3M+ raised, or a $10M+ exit to qualify. For most bootstrappers this is the room you grow into, not the one you start in.
7. Entrepreneurs' Organization (EO)
EO is the old guard. It's a global membership organization with chapters in dozens of countries and a structured "forum" model that's been refined over decades. If you want a serious, in-person-heavy network with real governance behind it, this is it.
The forum experience is the draw: a small confidential group that meets monthly and follows a strict no-advice-only-experience format. Done right, it's one of the most powerful support structures in business.
→ Who it's for: owners of established companies who want a lifelong, structured peer network.
→ Cost: requires roughly $1M+ in annual revenue to join, plus membership and chapter dues that run into the thousands.
→ The catch: it's expensive, in-person-centric, and built for bigger businesses. Overkill if you're a solo founder at $8K MRR.
8. SCORE
SCORE is the underdog on this list, and it's completely free. Backed by the U.S. Small Business Administration, it pairs you with volunteer mentors who've actually run businesses, plus free workshops and templates.
It's not a glamorous founder club. But if you're early, cash-strapped, and want a real human to look at your plan with zero agenda, it's hard to beat the price.
→ Who it's for: early-stage and small-business founders who want free 1:1 mentoring.
→ Cost: free.
→ The catch: mentor quality varies, and it skews toward traditional small business over fast-moving tech. Treat it as a free second opinion, not your main room.
How to actually choose one
Don't join four. Join one and show up.
If you're pre-revenue or broke: start free with Indie Hackers, r/Entrepreneur, or SCORE. Build the habit of asking for help in public.
If you're a SaaS founder at $5K-$50K MRR: you want a small, stage-matched room. That's exactly who I built the Club for, and if SaaS isn't your thing, MicroConf Connect is the free version of the same energy.
If you're past $100K/year: the DC, and eventually Hampton or EO, give you peers at your altitude.
The mistake I see most is founders treating these like a Netflix subscription. They join, lurk, and cancel. A support group only works if you bring a real problem and bring it often. If you want the format that makes that stick, I wrote a whole piece on building a SaaS accountability group that doesn't fizzle out.
FAQ
What is an entrepreneur support group, exactly?
It's a group of founders who meet regularly, online or in person, to swap real advice, hold each other accountable, and not feel insane while building something hard. The good ones are small and stage-matched. The bad ones are networking events with a Slack link.
Are free entrepreneur support groups good enough?
For early validation and quick feedback, yes. Indie Hackers, r/Entrepreneur, and SCORE will get you a long way for $0. The thing free rooms struggle with is accountability and depth, because nobody has skin in the game. That's usually what paid rooms are selling.
When should I pay for a mastermind or community?
When the free feedback stops being specific enough and you keep hitting the same wall alone. If a single piece of advice would save you months, the math is easy. I broke down the real numbers in my guide to how much a mastermind costs.
How many groups should I join?
One you pay attention to, maybe one free one you lurk in. More than that and you spread yourself thin and ghost all of them. Depth beats breadth here.
The point of all this
Building alone is the slowest, most painful way to do this. I learned that the expensive way.
You don't need to spend $13K like I did. You just need one room where people are a step ahead and willing to tell you the truth.
If you're a bootstrapped SaaS founder grinding toward $100K MRR and tired of figuring it out solo, that's exactly who Profitable Founder Club is for.
