Steel growth playbook

Publish /use-cases/<job> pages for the 12 jobs, starting with the four that have recipes and logos behind them (web scraping, deep research, price monitoring, QA). Each page: the problem in the searcher's words, a 20-line code sample from the recipe, which Steel features matter for that job (profiles, proxies, human-in-the-loop, traces), a real cost estimate at Launch and Scale rates, a customer logo or quote, and a "Start with $30 free credits" button. Link every page from the homepage tiles that already name the jobs.

Problem-shaped pages catch searches and AI-assistant answers at the moment of need, and turn existing docs into acquisition pages with very little new writing.

H1: <Job> with real cloud browsers
Problem: what breaks when you run this yourself (2-3 lines)
Code: 20 lines from the cookbook recipe
What Steel handles: profiles / proxies / human takeover / traces
What it costs: example run at $0.10 and $0.08 per browser hour
Proof: customer logo or quote
CTA: Start with $30 free credits (no credit card)

• Thin pages

  Ship each page only with working code and a real cost example.

• Docs and site drift apart

  Pull code from the cookbook so one source stays current.

• HiringFounding Growth Lead (Toronto, posted October 14, 2026): "turn Steel's organic momentum into systematic, repeatable user and revenue growth". Steel believes developer-tool growth "comes down to three things: developers discovering you when they have the problem, experiencing immediate value, and wanting to tell others." The GTM motion is "product-led growth combined with product-led sales. Most users discover Steel, sign up, and upgrade through self-service."Source
• Your websiteHomepage: H1 "Browser Infrastructure for AI Agents"; "Loved by 30,000+ engineers at" 16 logos (Readwise, Zo Computer, Avoca, Profound, Cognizant, Navattic, Magical and others); "Steel runs millions of browser sessions every week"; counters of 1,500,000+ browser hours, 35,000,000+ sessions and "4 Trillion+" tokens scraped; a GitHub link showing "7.9K stars". A "What people build on Steel" block names 12 jobs: AI Agents, Foundational Model Training, AI Shopping Assistants, Web Scraping, RPA Software, Sales Automation, QA Software, Customer Service Agents, Deep Research, Price Monitoring, Form Filling and Travel Booking.Source
• Your websiteSitemap (61 URLs, checked October 23, 2026): the homepage, 51 blog posts and nine other pages (pricing, enterprise, partners, FAQ, changelog, launch week, brand kit, terms, privacy). There is no page for any of the 12 use cases, no customer or case study page and no comparison page; head-to-head content exists only as two blog posts, "Steel vs Browserbase: a practical comparison" (January 14, 2026) and "Steel vs Kernel" (January 20, 2026).Source
• Your docsdocs.steel.dev (150 URLs): about 30 integration pages (Playwright, Puppeteer, Selenium, Stagehand, Browser Use, CrewAI, LangGraph, Mastra, Agno, Pydantic AI, Replit, Bolt.new, x402 and coding-agent setups) and about 45 cookbook recipes, including "convex-price-watch", "deep-research", "scrape", "credentials", "temporal-browser-workflow" and "trigger-dev-browser-job", plus an llms-full.txt and five Steel skills for agents.Source
• Your websitePricing: Launch "$0 per month + usage" with "$30 of credits, one time", 10 concurrent sessions, sessions up to 15 minutes; Scale "$250 per month + usage" with $100 of credits a month, 100 concurrent sessions and a dedicated Slack channel; Enterprise custom. Browser hours $0.10 (Launch) and $0.08 (Scale); CAPTCHA solves $3/1k and $1/1k; proxy bandwidth $10/GB and $6/GB. "Stealth browser" is included only on Enterprise, while the homepage gives stealth its own section ("Keep browsing unblocked").Source

Create /compare with one page per rival: what each does, pricing and limits side by side, open-source and self-hosting, session start time, observability, and when the rival is the better fit. Move the two blog posts into this format and add Hyperbrowser, Browser Use and Anchor. Date every page and refresh quarterly.

Comparison searches are the highest-intent searches in a crowded category, and fair pages are what AI assistants quote when developers ask which provider to use.

• Claims go stale

  Date every page and cite each rival's own page.

• Looks hostile

  Say plainly when a rival fits better.

• Your websiteSitemap (61 URLs, checked October 23, 2026): the homepage, 51 blog posts and nine other pages (pricing, enterprise, partners, FAQ, changelog, launch week, brand kit, terms, privacy). There is no page for any of the 12 use cases, no customer or case study page and no comparison page; head-to-head content exists only as two blog posts, "Steel vs Browserbase: a practical comparison" (January 14, 2026) and "Steel vs Kernel" (January 20, 2026).Source
• Competitor researchRivals' own homepages: Browserbase, "Give your agents access to the whole web"; Kernel, "browser infrastructure for web agents and automations" with a customers page; Hyperbrowser, "Cloud browsers, isolated sandboxes, and web data APIs for AI agents"; Browser Use, "connect your own agent to stealth browsers at $0.02 an hour"; Anchor, "Secure Infrastructure for Computer Use Agents".See the research Source
• Your websitePricing: Launch "$0 per month + usage" with "$30 of credits, one time", 10 concurrent sessions, sessions up to 15 minutes; Scale "$250 per month + usage" with $100 of credits a month, 100 concurrent sessions and a dedicated Slack channel; Enterprise custom. Browser hours $0.10 (Launch) and $0.08 (Scale); CAPTCHA solves $3/1k and $1/1k; proxy bandwidth $10/GB and $6/GB. "Stealth browser" is included only on Enterprise, while the homepage gives stealth its own section ("Keep browsing unblocked").Source
• HiringFounding Growth Lead (Toronto, posted October 14, 2026): "turn Steel's organic momentum into systematic, repeatable user and revenue growth". Steel believes developer-tool growth "comes down to three things: developers discovering you when they have the problem, experiencing immediate value, and wanting to tell others." The GTM motion is "product-led growth combined with product-led sales. Most users discover Steel, sign up, and upgrade through self-service."Source

Interview five logo customers across different jobs (research, sales automation, QA, shopping, customer service). Write short stories: what they built, why they chose Steel over building browsers themselves, sessions or hours they run, and what changed. Publish at /customers, put one quote on each use-case and comparison page, and send the stories to enterprise leads.

Peer proof moves self-serve users to paid plans and shortens enterprise evaluations.

• Customers decline to be named

  Offer anonymised stories with numbers.

• Your websiteHomepage: H1 "Browser Infrastructure for AI Agents"; "Loved by 30,000+ engineers at" 16 logos (Readwise, Zo Computer, Avoca, Profound, Cognizant, Navattic, Magical and others); "Steel runs millions of browser sessions every week"; counters of 1,500,000+ browser hours, 35,000,000+ sessions and "4 Trillion+" tokens scraped; a GitHub link showing "7.9K stars". A "What people build on Steel" block names 12 jobs: AI Agents, Foundational Model Training, AI Shopping Assistants, Web Scraping, RPA Software, Sales Automation, QA Software, Customer Service Agents, Deep Research, Price Monitoring, Form Filling and Travel Booking.Source
• Your websiteSitemap (61 URLs, checked October 23, 2026): the homepage, 51 blog posts and nine other pages (pricing, enterprise, partners, FAQ, changelog, launch week, brand kit, terms, privacy). There is no page for any of the 12 use cases, no customer or case study page and no comparison page; head-to-head content exists only as two blog posts, "Steel vs Browserbase: a practical comparison" (January 14, 2026) and "Steel vs Kernel" (January 20, 2026).Source
• Third-party storyFly.io publishes a customer story about Steel, "How Steel.dev Turns AI Agents Into True Browser Ninjas", on its own site; steel.dev links to no customer stories of its own.Source
• HiringFounding Growth Lead (Toronto, posted October 14, 2026): "turn Steel's organic momentum into systematic, repeatable user and revenue growth". Steel believes developer-tool growth "comes down to three things: developers discovering you when they have the problem, experiencing immediate value, and wanting to tell others." The GTM motion is "product-led growth combined with product-led sales. Most users discover Steel, sign up, and upgrade through self-service."Source

Add a calculator: sessions per day, minutes per session, share with proxies and CAPTCHAs. Show the monthly cost on Launch and Scale, the break-even point, and when Enterprise is worth a call. On the homepage stealth section, add a line saying which plan it comes with and what Launch and Scale users get instead (fingerprints, proxies, CAPTCHA solving).

Showing the math removes the main reason a developer stalls between a free plan and a $250 one, and clear plan labels prevent disappointed upgrades.

• Estimates look high

  Show cost per task as well as per month.

• Your websitePricing: Launch "$0 per month + usage" with "$30 of credits, one time", 10 concurrent sessions, sessions up to 15 minutes; Scale "$250 per month + usage" with $100 of credits a month, 100 concurrent sessions and a dedicated Slack channel; Enterprise custom. Browser hours $0.10 (Launch) and $0.08 (Scale); CAPTCHA solves $3/1k and $1/1k; proxy bandwidth $10/GB and $6/GB. "Stealth browser" is included only on Enterprise, while the homepage gives stealth its own section ("Keep browsing unblocked").Source
• HiringFounding Growth Lead (Toronto, posted October 14, 2026): "turn Steel's organic momentum into systematic, repeatable user and revenue growth". Steel believes developer-tool growth "comes down to three things: developers discovering you when they have the problem, experiencing immediate value, and wanting to tell others." The GTM motion is "product-led growth combined with product-led sales. Most users discover Steel, sign up, and upgrade through self-service."Source
• Your websiteHomepage: H1 "Browser Infrastructure for AI Agents"; "Loved by 30,000+ engineers at" 16 logos (Readwise, Zo Computer, Avoca, Profound, Cognizant, Navattic, Magical and others); "Steel runs millions of browser sessions every week"; counters of 1,500,000+ browser hours, 35,000,000+ sessions and "4 Trillion+" tokens scraped; a GitHub link showing "7.9K stars". A "What people build on Steel" block names 12 jobs: AI Agents, Foundational Model Training, AI Shopping Assistants, Web Scraping, RPA Software, Sales Automation, QA Software, Customer Service Agents, Deep Research, Price Monitoring, Form Filling and Travel Booking.Source

Set one post a week: alternate an engineering story (a bug, a benchmark, a design decision), a recipe from the cookbook turned into a tutorial, and a data note from aggregated session stats. Keep a running list from the engineers' Slack and changelog; the growth lead edits, engineers draft.

A steady stream of real technical posts compounds in search and gives every social channel something to share.

• Engineers short of time

  Interview them for 20 minutes and write it up.

• HiringFounding Growth Lead sample projects: "Building our content machine: turn AI agent experiments and research into high-value blog posts, demos, and technical content that establishes Steel as the authority on browser automation"; influencer campaigns "with AI engineers and developer advocates"; fast experiments on "channels, messaging, value props, and best-fit customer profile"; launches for features and open-source releases; optimizing "activation, conversion, and retention to turn freemium into paying customers"; "events, dinners, and community gatherings"; presence on "X, Reddit, HN, Discord". It asks for someone who prioritizes "growth loops over linear channels" and "compounding acquisition where one cohort brings the next".Source
• Your websiteBlog dates: launch weeks in October 2025 (v2) and June 2026 (v3, with Stealth Browser, Dedicated IPs, Rust and Go SDKs, Atlas and new pricing); posts on July 15, 22 and 30, 2026, then nothing until "Build the agent. Don't build its computer." on October 7, 2026, a ten-week gap. A July post reported that "Customer-supplied proxies failed 22x more often than managed ones".Source
• Your docsdocs.steel.dev (150 URLs): about 30 integration pages (Playwright, Puppeteer, Selenium, Stagehand, Browser Use, CrewAI, LangGraph, Mastra, Agno, Pydantic AI, Replit, Bolt.new, x402 and coding-agent setups) and about 45 cookbook recipes, including "convex-price-watch", "deep-research", "scrape", "credentials", "temporal-browser-workflow" and "trigger-dev-browser-job", plus an llms-full.txt and five Steel skills for agents.Source

Instrument signup, API key created, first session started and first session over one minute. Put a copy-paste first-session snippet on the empty dashboard, pick the user's language, and send a nudge email to anyone without a session after an hour.

Activation is the lever for a free plan with one-time credits; small gains compound across every channel.

• Over-nudging

  One email, then stop.

• HiringFounding Growth Lead (Toronto, posted October 14, 2026): "turn Steel's organic momentum into systematic, repeatable user and revenue growth". Steel believes developer-tool growth "comes down to three things: developers discovering you when they have the problem, experiencing immediate value, and wanting to tell others." The GTM motion is "product-led growth combined with product-led sales. Most users discover Steel, sign up, and upgrade through self-service."Source
• Your websiteHomepage developer section: "Use Steel's Python and Node.js SDKs or its REST API", or "connect Playwright, Puppeteer or Selenium directly, no agent needed. Coding agents can set Steel up for you too", with a one-line CLI install, "steel login", "steel browser start" and a copyable agent prompt in the hero. Launch needs "No credit card".Source
• Your websitePricing: Launch "$0 per month + usage" with "$30 of credits, one time", 10 concurrent sessions, sessions up to 15 minutes; Scale "$250 per month + usage" with $100 of credits a month, 100 concurrent sessions and a dedicated Slack channel; Enterprise custom. Browser hours $0.10 (Launch) and $0.08 (Scale); CAPTCHA solves $3/1k and $1/1k; proxy bandwidth $10/GB and $6/GB. "Stealth browser" is included only on Enterprise, while the homepage gives stealth its own section ("Keep browsing unblocked").Source

Tag signups and API keys that come through the CLI, skills and llms-full.txt; test that the main coding agents can go from "add a cloud browser" to a working session with Steel in one prompt; fix what trips them. Publish the one-prompt setup as a page and a short video.

Being the default answer inside coding agents is a distribution channel that rivals cannot buy, and measuring it shows whether it is growing.

• Agents change often

  Re-test monthly.

• Your websiteHomepage developer section: "Use Steel's Python and Node.js SDKs or its REST API", or "connect Playwright, Puppeteer or Selenium directly, no agent needed. Coding agents can set Steel up for you too", with a one-line CLI install, "steel login", "steel browser start" and a copyable agent prompt in the hero. Launch needs "No credit card".Source
• Your docsdocs.steel.dev (150 URLs): about 30 integration pages (Playwright, Puppeteer, Selenium, Stagehand, Browser Use, CrewAI, LangGraph, Mastra, Agno, Pydantic AI, Replit, Bolt.new, x402 and coding-agent setups) and about 45 cookbook recipes, including "convex-price-watch", "deep-research", "scrape", "credentials", "temporal-browser-workflow" and "trigger-dev-browser-job", plus an llms-full.txt and five Steel skills for agents.Source
• HiringFounding Growth Lead (Toronto, posted October 14, 2026): "turn Steel's organic momentum into systematic, repeatable user and revenue growth". Steel believes developer-tool growth "comes down to three things: developers discovering you when they have the problem, experiencing immediate value, and wanting to tell others." The GTM motion is "product-led growth combined with product-led sales. Most users discover Steel, sign up, and upgrade through self-service."Source

Build /integrations on steel.dev with one card per integration linking to its docs. Ask the five frameworks with the most Steel users for a listing in their docs or marketplace, a joint tutorial and a shared launch post.

Each framework listing puts Steel in front of developers at the moment they choose a browser, and joint posts reach audiences Steel does not have.

• Partners list rivals too

  Offer the best tutorial and fast support.

• Your docsdocs.steel.dev (150 URLs): about 30 integration pages (Playwright, Puppeteer, Selenium, Stagehand, Browser Use, CrewAI, LangGraph, Mastra, Agno, Pydantic AI, Replit, Bolt.new, x402 and coding-agent setups) and about 45 cookbook recipes, including "convex-price-watch", "deep-research", "scrape", "credentials", "temporal-browser-workflow" and "trigger-dev-browser-job", plus an llms-full.txt and five Steel skills for agents.Source
• Your websitePartner page form options: "Integrate Steel into your product", "Resell or refer Steel", "Build with Steel for your clients", "Co-marketing". Blog posts announce distribution through others' products: "Steel Browser is live in Stripe Projects" (July 15, 2026) and a browser plugin for Hermes Agent (July 22, 2026).Source
• Your websiteSitemap (61 URLs, checked October 23, 2026): the homepage, 51 blog posts and nine other pages (pricing, enterprise, partners, FAQ, changelog, launch week, brand kit, terms, privacy). There is no page for any of the 12 use cases, no customer or case study page and no comparison page; head-to-head content exists only as two blog posts, "Steel vs Browserbase: a practical comparison" (January 14, 2026) and "Steel vs Kernel" (January 20, 2026).Source

Add a sign-up to the leaderboard and blog for a monthly "what moved on the leaderboards" email, with one Steel recipe per issue. Add "run this benchmark on Steel" guides for the browser benchmarks.

An owned list turns one-off visitors into a channel Steel controls, and the leaderboard gives a reason to subscribe that is not a sales pitch.

• Small list early

  Keep it monthly and short.

• Your websiteSteel's own channels: Discord (discord.gg/steel-dev), X (@steeldotdev), GitHub (steel-browser, Apache-2.0, 7,859 stars and 997 forks on October 23, 2026, with commits the same day) and a public leaderboard site, leaderboard.steel.dev, comparing agents on WebVoyager, BrowseComp, DRACO, WebArena and OSWorld with source-linked scores. The site has no newsletter sign-up.Source
• HiringFounding Growth Lead sample projects: "Building our content machine: turn AI agent experiments and research into high-value blog posts, demos, and technical content that establishes Steel as the authority on browser automation"; influencer campaigns "with AI engineers and developer advocates"; fast experiments on "channels, messaging, value props, and best-fit customer profile"; launches for features and open-source releases; optimizing "activation, conversion, and retention to turn freemium into paying customers"; "events, dinners, and community gatherings"; presence on "X, Reddit, HN, Discord". It asks for someone who prioritizes "growth loops over linear channels" and "compounding acquisition where one cohort brings the next".Source
• Your docsdocs.steel.dev (150 URLs): about 30 integration pages (Playwright, Puppeteer, Selenium, Stagehand, Browser Use, CrewAI, LangGraph, Mastra, Agno, Pydantic AI, Replit, Bolt.new, x402 and coding-agent setups) and about 45 cookbook recipes, including "convex-price-watch", "deep-research", "scrape", "credentials", "temporal-browser-workflow" and "trigger-dev-browser-job", plus an llms-full.txt and five Steel skills for agents.Source

Add a "move to Cloud" guide and a CLI command that points an existing script at Steel Cloud with the same code. Show a short note in the self-hosted server's startup logs and README about Cloud features, with credits for active contributors.

Self-hosters are the warmest leads Steel has; making the move a one-line change turns open-source reach into revenue.

• Community dislikes upsell

  Keep the note short and useful.

• Your websiteSteel's own channels: Discord (discord.gg/steel-dev), X (@steeldotdev), GitHub (steel-browser, Apache-2.0, 7,859 stars and 997 forks on October 23, 2026, with commits the same day) and a public leaderboard site, leaderboard.steel.dev, comparing agents on WebVoyager, BrowseComp, DRACO, WebArena and OSWorld with source-linked scores. The site has no newsletter sign-up.Source
• HiringEvery Steel job post: "over 7,000 GitHub stars, dozens of paying customers, and millions of sessions served monthly, we grew our platform 50x in 2025 purely through word-of-mouth and our open-source community." The growth role offers "strong organic momentum (7K+ stars, 70% MoM growth)" and work "with innovative AI companies transforming healthcare, supply chain, accounting, and more".Source
• Your websiteHomepage developer section: "Use Steel's Python and Node.js SDKs or its REST API", or "connect Playwright, Puppeteer or Selenium directly, no agent needed. Coding agents can set Steel up for you too", with a one-line CLI install, "steel login", "steel browser start" and a copyable agent prompt in the hero. Launch needs "No credit card".Source

Recruit ten builders with real audiences who already use Steel; give them credits, early access and a small fee per project; ask for one public build a month with code. Feature the builds on the blog and in the cookbook.

Developers trust builders more than ads, and each build becomes a reusable recipe.

• Undisclosed sponsorship

  Require clear disclosure.

• HiringFounding Growth Lead sample projects: "Building our content machine: turn AI agent experiments and research into high-value blog posts, demos, and technical content that establishes Steel as the authority on browser automation"; influencer campaigns "with AI engineers and developer advocates"; fast experiments on "channels, messaging, value props, and best-fit customer profile"; launches for features and open-source releases; optimizing "activation, conversion, and retention to turn freemium into paying customers"; "events, dinners, and community gatherings"; presence on "X, Reddit, HN, Discord". It asks for someone who prioritizes "growth loops over linear channels" and "compounding acquisition where one cohort brings the next".Source
• Your docsdocs.steel.dev (150 URLs): about 30 integration pages (Playwright, Puppeteer, Selenium, Stagehand, Browser Use, CrewAI, LangGraph, Mastra, Agno, Pydantic AI, Replit, Bolt.new, x402 and coding-agent setups) and about 45 cookbook recipes, including "convex-price-watch", "deep-research", "scrape", "credentials", "temporal-browser-workflow" and "trigger-dev-browser-job", plus an llms-full.txt and five Steel skills for agents.Source
• Your websiteSteel's own channels: Discord (discord.gg/steel-dev), X (@steeldotdev), GitHub (steel-browser, Apache-2.0, 7,859 stars and 997 forks on October 23, 2026, with commits the same day) and a public leaderboard site, leaderboard.steel.dev, comparing agents on WebVoyager, BrowseComp, DRACO, WebArena and OSWorld with source-linked scores. The site has no newsletter sign-up.Source

Each week, pick one striking run from the team's own agents (an agent booking, shopping or researching), cut the replay to 30 seconds with the trace on screen, and post it with the code. Never use customer sessions.

It shows the product working, costs almost nothing to make and suits X, LinkedIn and YouTube Shorts.

• Privacy

  Use only Steel's own demo sessions.

• HiringMarketing Intern (Winter 2027, Toronto, posted October 21, 2026): "Shooting and editing short-form videos, product demos, and behind-the-scenes content", "Designing graphics, social assets" in Figma, "Helping launch new features, open-source projects, and creative campaigns" and "Working with engineers to uncover interesting stories". A Software Engineer Intern (Summer 2027) was posted on October 20.Source
• Your websiteHomepage: H1 "Browser Infrastructure for AI Agents"; "Loved by 30,000+ engineers at" 16 logos (Readwise, Zo Computer, Avoca, Profound, Cognizant, Navattic, Magical and others); "Steel runs millions of browser sessions every week"; counters of 1,500,000+ browser hours, 35,000,000+ sessions and "4 Trillion+" tokens scraped; a GitHub link showing "7.9K stars". A "What people build on Steel" block names 12 jobs: AI Agents, Foundational Model Training, AI Shopping Assistants, Web Scraping, RPA Software, Sales Automation, QA Software, Customer Service Agents, Deep Research, Price Monitoring, Form Filling and Travel Booking.Source
• Your websiteHomepage developer section: "Use Steel's Python and Node.js SDKs or its REST API", or "connect Playwright, Puppeteer or Selenium directly, no agent needed. Coding agents can set Steel up for you too", with a one-line CLI install, "steel login", "steel browser start" and a copyable agent prompt in the hero. Launch needs "No credit card".Source

Score accounts on concurrency hits, session-length cuts, hours per week and seats. When a score passes a threshold, the founder or growth lead sends a short personal note with a cost estimate for Scale, or an offer to talk about Enterprise.

Reaching accounts at the moment they hit a limit converts far better than generic upgrade emails.

• Feels like surveillance

  Keep the note helpful and specific.

• HiringFounding Growth Lead (Toronto, posted October 14, 2026): "turn Steel's organic momentum into systematic, repeatable user and revenue growth". Steel believes developer-tool growth "comes down to three things: developers discovering you when they have the problem, experiencing immediate value, and wanting to tell others." The GTM motion is "product-led growth combined with product-led sales. Most users discover Steel, sign up, and upgrade through self-service."Source
• Your websitePricing: Launch "$0 per month + usage" with "$30 of credits, one time", 10 concurrent sessions, sessions up to 15 minutes; Scale "$250 per month + usage" with $100 of credits a month, 100 concurrent sessions and a dedicated Slack channel; Enterprise custom. Browser hours $0.10 (Launch) and $0.08 (Scale); CAPTCHA solves $3/1k and $1/1k; proxy bandwidth $10/GB and $6/GB. "Stealth browser" is included only on Enterprise, while the homepage gives stealth its own section ("Keep browsing unblocked").Source
• Your websiteEnterprise page: a two-step form asking for target sites, estimated monthly browser hours, concurrency, "What do you use today? Another provider / Self-built / Nothing yet / Steel", go-live timing and monthly budget. Homepage enterprise block: 1,000+ concurrent sessions, SSO, "HIPAA signed BAAs" and Steel Outpost for self-hosting "inside your network". A Vanta trust center is at trust.steel.dev.Source

Send three emails: at 50% used (what you have built, what it would cost monthly), at 90% (add a card, or what Scale includes), and at zero (a one-click way to keep going). Show the same in the dashboard.

Clear timing at the credit cliff keeps active builders from churning by accident.

• Annoying

  Three emails at most.

• Your websitePricing: Launch "$0 per month + usage" with "$30 of credits, one time", 10 concurrent sessions, sessions up to 15 minutes; Scale "$250 per month + usage" with $100 of credits a month, 100 concurrent sessions and a dedicated Slack channel; Enterprise custom. Browser hours $0.10 (Launch) and $0.08 (Scale); CAPTCHA solves $3/1k and $1/1k; proxy bandwidth $10/GB and $6/GB. "Stealth browser" is included only on Enterprise, while the homepage gives stealth its own section ("Keep browsing unblocked").Source
• HiringFounding Growth Lead (Toronto, posted October 14, 2026): "turn Steel's organic momentum into systematic, repeatable user and revenue growth". Steel believes developer-tool growth "comes down to three things: developers discovering you when they have the problem, experiencing immediate value, and wanting to tell others." The GTM motion is "product-led growth combined with product-led sales. Most users discover Steel, sign up, and upgrade through self-service."Source

Host a monthly demo night in Toronto and a quarterly dinner in San Francisco: three Steel users show what they built, then open conversation. Invite active users and prospects from the enterprise form.

Small, high-quality events create advocates and enterprise relationships that online channels do not.

• Low turnout

  Start small with 20 seats.

• HiringFounding Growth Lead sample projects: "Building our content machine: turn AI agent experiments and research into high-value blog posts, demos, and technical content that establishes Steel as the authority on browser automation"; influencer campaigns "with AI engineers and developer advocates"; fast experiments on "channels, messaging, value props, and best-fit customer profile"; launches for features and open-source releases; optimizing "activation, conversion, and retention to turn freemium into paying customers"; "events, dinners, and community gatherings"; presence on "X, Reddit, HN, Discord". It asks for someone who prioritizes "growth loops over linear channels" and "compounding acquisition where one cohort brings the next".Source
• HiringMarketing Intern (Winter 2027, Toronto, posted October 21, 2026): "Shooting and editing short-form videos, product demos, and behind-the-scenes content", "Designing graphics, social assets" in Figma, "Helping launch new features, open-source projects, and creative campaigns" and "Working with engineers to uncover interesting stories". A Software Engineer Intern (Summer 2027) was posted on October 20.Source
• Your websiteEnterprise page: a two-step form asking for target sites, estimated monthly browser hours, concurrency, "What do you use today? Another provider / Self-built / Nothing yet / Steel", go-live timing and monthly budget. Homepage enterprise block: 1,000+ concurrent sessions, SSO, "HIPAA signed BAAs" and Steel Outpost for self-hosting "inside your network". A Vanta trust center is at trust.steel.dev.Source

Publish an aggregated, anonymised report: session lengths by job, failure causes, which page types slow agents down, how human takeover is used. Never name customers or target sites. Launch it with a post, a talk and press outreach.

Original data earns links, press and AI citations, and makes Steel the authority on browser automation, as the growth role asks.

• Customer data concerns

  Aggregate and publish the method.

• Your websiteBlog dates: launch weeks in October 2025 (v2) and June 2026 (v3, with Stealth Browser, Dedicated IPs, Rust and Go SDKs, Atlas and new pricing); posts on July 15, 22 and 30, 2026, then nothing until "Build the agent. Don't build its computer." on October 7, 2026, a ten-week gap. A July post reported that "Customer-supplied proxies failed 22x more often than managed ones".Source
• Your websiteHomepage: H1 "Browser Infrastructure for AI Agents"; "Loved by 30,000+ engineers at" 16 logos (Readwise, Zo Computer, Avoca, Profound, Cognizant, Navattic, Magical and others); "Steel runs millions of browser sessions every week"; counters of 1,500,000+ browser hours, 35,000,000+ sessions and "4 Trillion+" tokens scraped; a GitHub link showing "7.9K stars". A "What people build on Steel" block names 12 jobs: AI Agents, Foundational Model Training, AI Shopping Assistants, Web Scraping, RPA Software, Sales Automation, QA Software, Customer Service Agents, Deep Research, Price Monitoring, Form Filling and Travel Booking.Source
• HiringFounding Growth Lead sample projects: "Building our content machine: turn AI agent experiments and research into high-value blog posts, demos, and technical content that establishes Steel as the authority on browser automation"; influencer campaigns "with AI engineers and developer advocates"; fast experiments on "channels, messaging, value props, and best-fit customer profile"; launches for features and open-source releases; optimizing "activation, conversion, and retention to turn freemium into paying customers"; "events, dinners, and community gatherings"; presence on "X, Reddit, HN, Discord". It asks for someone who prioritizes "growth loops over linear channels" and "compounding acquisition where one cohort brings the next".Source

Package a healthcare page: common jobs (payer portals, prior authorization forms, records lookups), the security pack, a BAA path and Outpost. Find two healthcare customers for stories and go to two healthcare AI events.

A vertical with compliance needs pays more, churns less and favours vendors that already have the paperwork.

• Long sales cycles

  Keep self-serve for small teams.

• Your websiteEnterprise page: a two-step form asking for target sites, estimated monthly browser hours, concurrency, "What do you use today? Another provider / Self-built / Nothing yet / Steel", go-live timing and monthly budget. Homepage enterprise block: 1,000+ concurrent sessions, SSO, "HIPAA signed BAAs" and Steel Outpost for self-hosting "inside your network". A Vanta trust center is at trust.steel.dev.Source
• HiringEvery Steel job post: "over 7,000 GitHub stars, dozens of paying customers, and millions of sessions served monthly, we grew our platform 50x in 2025 purely through word-of-mouth and our open-source community." The growth role offers "strong organic momentum (7K+ stars, 70% MoM growth)" and work "with innovative AI companies transforming healthcare, supply chain, accounting, and more".Source
• Your websitePricing: Launch "$0 per month + usage" with "$30 of credits, one time", 10 concurrent sessions, sessions up to 15 minutes; Scale "$250 per month + usage" with $100 of credits a month, 100 concurrent sessions and a dedicated Slack channel; Enterprise custom. Browser hours $0.10 (Launch) and $0.08 (Scale); CAPTCHA solves $3/1k and $1/1k; proxy bandwidth $10/GB and $6/GB. "Stealth browser" is included only on Enterprise, while the homepage gives stealth its own section ("Keep browsing unblocked").Source

Open a gallery of runnable templates (price watcher, researcher, form filler) that anyone can publish. Each deploy from a template credits its author and signs the new user up to Steel. Feature top templates monthly.

Every published template brings the next users, and the authors are motivated to promote their own work.

• Low-quality templates

  Review before featuring.

• HiringFounding Growth Lead sample projects: "Building our content machine: turn AI agent experiments and research into high-value blog posts, demos, and technical content that establishes Steel as the authority on browser automation"; influencer campaigns "with AI engineers and developer advocates"; fast experiments on "channels, messaging, value props, and best-fit customer profile"; launches for features and open-source releases; optimizing "activation, conversion, and retention to turn freemium into paying customers"; "events, dinners, and community gatherings"; presence on "X, Reddit, HN, Discord". It asks for someone who prioritizes "growth loops over linear channels" and "compounding acquisition where one cohort brings the next".Source
• Your docsdocs.steel.dev (150 URLs): about 30 integration pages (Playwright, Puppeteer, Selenium, Stagehand, Browser Use, CrewAI, LangGraph, Mastra, Agno, Pydantic AI, Replit, Bolt.new, x402 and coding-agent setups) and about 45 cookbook recipes, including "convex-price-watch", "deep-research", "scrape", "credentials", "temporal-browser-workflow" and "trigger-dev-browser-job", plus an llms-full.txt and five Steel skills for agents.Source
• Your websiteSteel's own channels: Discord (discord.gg/steel-dev), X (@steeldotdev), GitHub (steel-browser, Apache-2.0, 7,859 stars and 997 forks on October 23, 2026, with commits the same day) and a public leaderboard site, leaderboard.steel.dev, comparing agents on WebVoyager, BrowseComp, DRACO, WebArena and OSWorld with source-linked scores. The site has no newsletter sign-up.Source

Add a referral link in the dashboard: both developers get $30 of extra credits when the new one runs ten browser hours. Show referrals in the account.

Rewarding what already happens lets Steel see and grow it.

• Abuse

  Require real usage before rewards.

• HiringEvery Steel job post: "over 7,000 GitHub stars, dozens of paying customers, and millions of sessions served monthly, we grew our platform 50x in 2025 purely through word-of-mouth and our open-source community." The growth role offers "strong organic momentum (7K+ stars, 70% MoM growth)" and work "with innovative AI companies transforming healthcare, supply chain, accounting, and more".Source
• Your websitePricing: Launch "$0 per month + usage" with "$30 of credits, one time", 10 concurrent sessions, sessions up to 15 minutes; Scale "$250 per month + usage" with $100 of credits a month, 100 concurrent sessions and a dedicated Slack channel; Enterprise custom. Browser hours $0.10 (Launch) and $0.08 (Scale); CAPTCHA solves $3/1k and $1/1k; proxy bandwidth $10/GB and $6/GB. "Stealth browser" is included only on Enterprise, while the homepage gives stealth its own section ("Keep browsing unblocked").Source

Every week, pick the five best Discord answers, rewrite them as FAQ entries or docs pages, and link back to the thread. Track which entries get search traffic.

It turns support work into search content and cuts repeat questions.

• Out-of-date answers

  Date and review quarterly.

• Your websiteSteel's own channels: Discord (discord.gg/steel-dev), X (@steeldotdev), GitHub (steel-browser, Apache-2.0, 7,859 stars and 997 forks on October 23, 2026, with commits the same day) and a public leaderboard site, leaderboard.steel.dev, comparing agents on WebVoyager, BrowseComp, DRACO, WebArena and OSWorld with source-linked scores. The site has no newsletter sign-up.Source
• Your docsdocs.steel.dev (150 URLs): about 30 integration pages (Playwright, Puppeteer, Selenium, Stagehand, Browser Use, CrewAI, LangGraph, Mastra, Agno, Pydantic AI, Replit, Bolt.new, x402 and coding-agent setups) and about 45 cookbook recipes, including "convex-price-watch", "deep-research", "scrape", "credentials", "temporal-browser-workflow" and "trigger-dev-browser-job", plus an llms-full.txt and five Steel skills for agents.Source

Keep one dated stats block (stars, sessions, hours, engineers) and use it in the homepage, job posts, decks and press kit. Update it monthly.

Consistent, current numbers are more believable and easier for press to quote.

• Numbers go stale

  Monthly update.

• HiringEvery Steel job post: "over 7,000 GitHub stars, dozens of paying customers, and millions of sessions served monthly, we grew our platform 50x in 2025 purely through word-of-mouth and our open-source community." The growth role offers "strong organic momentum (7K+ stars, 70% MoM growth)" and work "with innovative AI companies transforming healthcare, supply chain, accounting, and more".Source
• Your websiteHomepage: H1 "Browser Infrastructure for AI Agents"; "Loved by 30,000+ engineers at" 16 logos (Readwise, Zo Computer, Avoca, Profound, Cognizant, Navattic, Magical and others); "Steel runs millions of browser sessions every week"; counters of 1,500,000+ browser hours, 35,000,000+ sessions and "4 Trillion+" tokens scraped; a GitHub link showing "7.9K stars". A "What people build on Steel" block names 12 jobs: AI Agents, Foundational Model Training, AI Shopping Assistants, Web Scraping, RPA Software, Sales Automation, QA Software, Customer Service Agents, Deep Research, Price Monitoring, Form Filling and Travel Booking.Source
• Your websiteSteel's own channels: Discord (discord.gg/steel-dev), X (@steeldotdev), GitHub (steel-browser, Apache-2.0, 7,859 stars and 997 forks on October 23, 2026, with commits the same day) and a public leaderboard site, leaderboard.steel.dev, comparing agents on WebVoyager, BrowseComp, DRACO, WebArena and OSWorld with source-linked scores. The site has no newsletter sign-up.Source

Defer the hero animation until after first paint, split the long homepage into lazily loaded sections, and set a performance budget in CI.

Developers judge infrastructure companies by their own speed, and a budget stops the slide before real visitors feel it.

• Less impressive hero

  Keep the animation, start it later.

• Google PageSpeedsteel.dev homepage: real Chrome visitors pass Core Web Vitals (largest paint 1.4 seconds at the 75th percentile, interaction 87 ms, no layout shift), though largest paint is trending about 10% slower. The mobile lab test scores 41 with a 6.1-second largest paint (the hero sub-heading) and 1.4 seconds of main-thread blocking; desktop scores 68.Source