Give big fitness influencers a cut of revenue instead of paying per post

Pat Walls… that we're creating, the design, and that makes it basically a different app. It's the- it's the same concept, but it's like a plumber here in the US where I live is going to be way different than a plumber out in Israel. So let's talk about that. A lot of people are building apps right now, and they don't have any users, but you went very quickly from zero to $80,000 a month. So walk me through that. What did you do to grow your app so quickly?

Tomer… is the most efficient for your specific market. For me, it was paid ads. CPMs are significantly lower than in the US, so you can run paid ads profitably without a ton of testing capital. So, I studied the most viral content from similar apps in the US, and the most viral fitness and nutrition content in Israel. Based on that, I created the creatives and I used them in the ad campaigns. That got me to around 20k per month in four months. And I always knew that once I have the traction, the social proof needed, I'll start working with influencers to create a strong brand that's hard to copy. And I knew that working with big influencers will cost a fortune just for a single story or reel. So, I came up with a better idea: partnering with big influencers. They get a percentage of the revenue, and as a result, the incentives are aligned. The more money I make, the more money they make. It also meant that now I have two well-known faces to represent my app. That's what took the app from 20k to 80k per month.

Pat Walls… watching this and you're this far into the interview, this might be one of the coolest things that I've seen anyone that I've talked to on Starter Story do from a marketing perspective. So I'd love if you could just dive a little bit deeper into how that works and what have you learned after working with these big names? Obviously, they're not building the apps or probably not super involved with the product day to day. So how does that work?

TomerSo, to make sure that they are on schedule, they are delivering the content that they have to, the entire agreement is based on work timelines. So you want to create an agreement which says how many pieces of content they have to deliver to you and how many filming days or recording days they have to do each month. So I think for me specifically, I got really lucky because I know the fitness niche in Israel super well and I happened to know the guy personally that then I signed the deal with. So, what we did is we have a rev share deal for all the revenue that comes from Israel. But the main thing that I I think everyone should focus about here is that you have to get some social proof and to show that the app is working and users are excited and happy about it before approaching these mega big influencers or celebrities.

Pat WallsOkay, so are you giving like half your business away to these influencers? What if you want to go find more influencers or one influencer doesn't work out? Are you giving away like all your business to these influencers?