The Superwall Podcast · 2025-08-11
Canyon Pergande - The Secret Behind Weirdly Viral Apps
Canyon Pergande, co-founder of SideShift (a UGC job marketplace of college students), on high-volume organic TikTok. SideShift grew from ~10K to 150K+ job seekers in 3-4 months on ~$10K, with 5 creators posting twice a day and all copying the first winning format. Case studies: solo-founder AI photo app Photogenic hired one creator (from 600 applicants) and got 35M views on 46 posts, 10x weekly downloads and App Store conversion up from 5-10% to 50%+; studio Vert Ventures sparks winning organic formats into paid. Also: creator briefs, hybrid pay, account warm-up, 2-week tests.
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Numbers mentioned
| Subject | Metric | Value | Quote |
|---|---|---|---|
| SideShift | users Job seekers (creators) on the platform before the organic playbook, from own socials and campus visits | 10K users approximate | “I think we were probably around like 10,000 kind of job seekers on our platform” |
| SideShift | users Active job seekers (creators), 3-4 months after starting high-volume organic | 150K users approximate | “over the past 3 to 4 months have kind of grown that to be now over 150,000 uh active job seekers” |
| SideShift | marketing spend Total spend on the high-volume organic UGC playbook over ~4 months | USD 10K approximate | “We've spent probably around 10k across the board, and so you just like run the numbers on that, and like a customer acquisition cost that's, you know, pennies is just ridiculous.” |
| SideShift | cac Implied cost per new job seeker from ~$10K spend and ~140K new users | pennies estimate | “We've spent probably around 10k across the board, and so you just like run the numbers on that, and like a customer acquisition cost that's, you know, pennies is just ridiculous.” |
| SideShift | views Most recent of two organic campaigns, ~300 posts by 5 creators; roughly half of SideShift's total views. Guest unsure whether 16M or closer to 20M | 16M–20M viewsper campaign approximate | “was 16 million through, it was I think a 300-post campaign, um, maybe maybe it was a little bit more, it might have been closer to 20” |
| SideShift | count Posts in the most recent organic campaign | 300 postsper campaign approximate | “From from 300 posts, 300 posts, so.” |
| SideShift | count Creators on the campaign; most posted twice a day | 5 creatorsper campaign | “We had We had five creators making content, posting, most of them were posting twice a day” |
| SideShift | time to milestone Time from first posts to finding the first winning format | 2–3 weeks approximate | “For us, it took like 2 to 3 weeks, and then as soon as we found one format, we were just doubling down on that.” |
| SideShift | views Top individual videos once the winning format was found | 2M–5M viewsper video approximate | “it was a 2 million-video view video here, a 5 million-view video here, you know, 100,000 video views that start to stack up” |
| SideShift | views 'Rate out of 10' slideshow naming SideShift on the last slide, from a fresh account with ~1,900 followers | 84K viewsper video | “That got 84,000 views, and you listed the name of the app on the last slide” |
| personSideShift creator running the job-market slideshow account (started from zero followers) | followers Account started from zero followers; shows small fresh accounts can get 84K+ views | 1,900 followers | “He has 1,900 followers.” |
| SideShift | users New creators who joined in 1-2 weeks, before funnels were turned off in mid-May | +50K users approximate | “when we had like, you know, 50,000 new kind of creators join our marketplace in the span of like a week or two, like product started breaking” |
| SideShift | count Applicants businesses were getting on SideShift job posts during the mid-May spike | 3,000 applicantsper business approximate | “our businesses were getting like 3,000 applicants, which is like great in theory” |
| SideShift | team size Engineers at SideShift in mid-May 2025 | 1 engineers | “We only had one engineer at the time” |
| SideShift | count College campuses visited in person to onboard the first users | 25 campuses | “we physically went to 25 different college campuses in person to onboard kind of that first 10 to 20,000 users” |
| SideShift | users First users onboarded through campus visits | 10K–20K users approximate | “we physically went to 25 different college campuses in person to onboard kind of that first 10 to 20,000 users” |
| benchmarkUGC creator pay for organic TikTok programs, as recommended by SideShift | creator pay Per-video rate on top of a base retainer, plus performance bonuses | USD 15–20per video approximate | “We kind of recommend like a hybrid model, so $15 to $20 per video with a base retainer is is pretty common.” |
| Photogenic | count Creator applicants for one UGC role on SideShift | 600 applicants approximate | “He had like 600 applicants. Obviously, it takes a while to sift through, and he was only hiring one” |
| Photogenic | views 46 posts by one creator on a fresh TikTok account; first organic campaign | 35M viewsper campaign approximate | “40 46 posts on this campaign, and doing 35 million total views.” |
| Photogenic | count | 46 postsper campaign | “40 46 posts on this campaign, and doing 35 million total views.” |
| Photogenic | downloads Weekly downloads vs before the organic campaign | +10 x/week approximate | “he saw like a 10x growth in just like the amount of downloads that he was getting on a on a weekly basis” |
| Photogenic | conversion rate App Store page view -> download, before the organic campaign | 5–10% approximate | “before, when people would go to his app, it would convert at around 5% to 10%” |
| Photogenic | conversion rate App Store page view -> download after the organic campaign ('over 50%'); guest credits the credibility of organic content | 50% approximate | “since running this organic playbook, you know, it was converting at over 50%.” |
| Astra | rank Top five in App Store category for the past few weeks, in and out | 5 rank approximate | “I think both of their apps have been like top five in their category for past few weeks, or they've been in and out of it” |
| Haven | rank Top five in App Store category for the past few weeks, in and out | 5 rank approximate | “I think both of their apps have been like top five in their category for past few weeks, or they've been in and out of it” |