It’s true: you really don’t need 10,000 or 1 million people to start. You just need 100.

100 passionate followers. In fact, you could start with 10, running for the first 100.

Think about it, you know 100 people. Combine your family with your friends.  Real friends mind you, not the 1300 people you may or may not really know that you call Facebook friends.  If you were passionate about starting something it only take 10 advocates and a run to the first 100 people to get something worthwhile rolling.

Jon Acuff talks about it in his book Start.

I told 100 friends about the site and started writing goofy paragraphs. On the eighth day of existence, 4,000 people from around the world showed up to read it. Turns out the 100 friends had passed the URL to 100 friends who had passed the URL to 100 friends who eventually told people in Singapore to read it.” (It’s now read by 4.5 million people. Just saying.)

Seth Godin on his blog and in several of his books:

I think the ability to find and organize 1,000 people is a breakthrough opportunity. One thousand people coordinating their actions is enough to change your world (and make a living.)

I’ve seen it first hand with many clients (churches, startups, businesses).  So many times they forget about the first 10 and run to 100 in lieu of the thousands of millions they want to serve.  You know, the BIG numbers. Oops. When it doesn’t work, they wonder what went wrong.

They missed the first 10 and run to 100 and sold out for something too hard to attain. There is power in passionate advocates; businesses and movements are built on it.

Even Jesus started with 12. Arguably, he has a lot more followers than that today. Worked for Him, I am betting it will work for the rest of us.