Practitioner pattern · Josh Peleg (Heads M&A at BlueThrone, an app acquirer he pitches as a buyer for founders during the episode)
Use weekly plans for apps people need for a short time, like dating
Works well in dating and follower-tracking apps; fine for cash flow, weaker for an exit
What they did
What happened
In their words
Josh Peleg - $172M of App Building Advice in 50 Minutes
Joseph ChoiI I want to ask also about this slide. So $19.99, like $20 a month is sort of like the the price that consumers are anchored on because of ChatGPT. But I've seen a lot of apps recently doing weekly versus annual pricing. So do you still see like seven, eight-figure acquisitions on apps that are doing monthly pricing, or are people doing like weekly, annual?
Josh PelegIf the weekly is sticky enough, it works. But weekly tends to work in certain categories. Like, for example, dating can be very strong with weekly, because people ideally don't want to be on a dating app for like two or three months. They want to be on it and then off it as soon as possible. So if they can just do it for weekly, it's much better. The other categories where I saw weekly performing really well, in a nutshell, it's apps that you need for a short period of time. There's a bunch of apps now where you can like track people's Instagram actions, like who they're following, who's unfollowing them, who's stalking them, etc. A lot of people use these apps to like stalk their exes.
Josh PelegThey don't want to be stalking their ex for like three months. They want to do it once, maybe over a week, maybe after a breakup, or when they think someone's cheating or whatever, and then get rid of it. So in these short-duration apps, weekly works, but weekly tends not to be as good of a long-term strategy.
Joseph ChoiSo if you're doing weekly, you're probably in a category that is not even a good acquisition target, is that what you're saying? Cuz from the previous rule, like you want sticky revenue. You don't want like short, like weekly revenue.
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New tactics from the week's founder interviews, each linked to where it was said.
More from this episode
- Pitch the app as #1 in women's health instead of competing in all of healthBecame the first women's health unicorn: $200M+ raised at a $1B+ valuation
- Aim the app at first-time runners doing couch to 5K, not all sportsEarned a strong valuation; Strava bought it to reach beginner runners
- Charge $20 a month or $150 a year for a meditation app~25K downloads a month bring in over $1M a month (Sensor Tower estimate)
- Build the app around a trusted podcaster, and put his voice in the first sessionTiny download numbers earn $200K-$1M+ a month; creator-dependence makes the app harder to sell
- Run over 100 experiments a monthGuest cites it as part of what made it a top health app; no direct numbers
- Buy a beginner running app so new runners later move up to your app
- Buy a viral food-scanning app for its knack for pulling in new users
- Sell the app again after its growth has already slowedResold for over $100M less than the $475M paid five years earlier
- Buy apps that already found fans, then add a full team to grow themWorked really well, per the guest; no portfolio numbers given
- Buy apps that get lots of downloads but lose users, then fix the productA couple of such deals brought outsized returns for founder and buyer, per the guest
- If you charge under $10 a month, test $20 on 10-20% of users
- Pick a buyer type, study its last 5 deals, and start talking a year earlyGuest's favorite deals came from founders he'd messaged with for ~12 months
- Once a TikTok works, spin up 20 to 100 more videos on the same ideaBuyers value a repeatable viral machine over one-off hits; no numbers given
Tags: weekly-plan, short-use-apps