Cal AI · B2C · photo calorie tracking app
Have a UGC creator post on the brand's own page, and restart as influencers get pricier
Paused while influencer CPMs were cheap; now restarting for cheaper views
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What they did
Early on, a creator (Dawson) with his own personal brand made UGC and posted on the Cal AI page. Stopped once influencer deals gave better CPMs. Now restarting UGC because agents have pushed influencer prices up. Guest would run UGC and influencers side by side for a new app: UGC gives cheaper views but likely lower conversion.
“We had a guy called Dawson do a lot of UGC at the start for us. He already had a good personal brand, and he would just post on our page as well.”
“because we got such good CPM deals with our influencers, it wasn't really worth doing UGC at the time.”
Related topics
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More from Cal AI
All 84 Cal AI tactics- Pay $350-450 for four posts plus view bonuses that stop at 1M viewsKeeps the upside of viral hits; founder gives no numbers
- Price a creator on the average of their 5 worst of 20 recent videosMost deal videos land nearer the mean, so the rest is profit
- Ask creators to cross-post on both platforms as a casual, no-big-deal extraCreators accept most of the time; founder's claim, no numbers
- Pay creators a base rate plus view bonuses, capped at about 1M viewsViews past the cap come free; founder's reasoning, no numbers
- Match download spikes to each creator post early on to learn what convertsEach early video showed as a spike (e.g. 100 to 200 downloads an hour)
- Run a short ad with a one-line hook, the app in use, then the store linkAd has run about four months, which the host reads as a winner
More from this episode
- Cal AI: Agree with a creator's view boast, then guarantee 700-800K views when they claim 1MGuaranteed a profitable CPM on every deal; creators couldn't back down
- Cal AI: Have 25 hired assistants each email 100 creators a day~220K creators contacted, 2-3K signed; roughly 1 signed per 1,000 emailed
- Cal AI: Let AI answer creators' email replies and hand warm ones to a managerAssistants' job ends at the first email; no results reported
- Cal AI: Pitch 'keep making your normal videos, just sneak us in', then ask for a callCalls ~10x the chance of signing; the pitch often lowered creators' prices
- Cal AI: Have creators show the photo-scan naturally in the first 15 seconds, with no scriptCalled one of the biggest rules; no numbers
- Cal AI: Pay big lifestyle creators to scan their breakfast in day-in-the-life vlogs, 4 times a monthMost profitable content; one video drove hundreds to thousands of promo code uses
- Cal AI: Schedule a reality-TV star's posts just before and after her new season airsVery low CPM for a famous creator; no exact figure
- Cal AI: Buy only very cheap views at first, then pay more per deal once people know youDeals got more profitable over time, not less
- Cal AI: Test creators beyond fitness: moms, comedy, and fitness sub-nichesMixed: some moms profitable at $10 CPM; comedy got views but low intent
- Cal AI: Pay recipe, cooking and mukbang creators to promote a calorie trackerDidn't convert; cut early. Healthy-meal videos only okay
- Cal AI: Pay a Love Island contestant for day-in-the-life videosStarted well but underperformed; viewers mostly came for his partner
- Cal AI: Pay creators $100-200 when a friend they refer signs a dealReally helped; got direct numbers and deals around talent agents
- Cal AI: Give outreach assistants monthly prizes for most creators contacted or signedKept assistants motivated; no numbers
- Cal AI: Befriend creators' managers, then ask to add the creator to the group chatLanded deals with a TV star; guest calls relationships the key
- Cal AI: Sign a second creator in the same niche as your best oneDidn't work at all; the first creator made $100K profit in a month