Cal AI · B2C · AI calorie tracking app
Sign funny, charismatic creators on cheap deals before their views take off
One creator went from ~10K views to a 7M-view video, then never under 500K
Workedinfluencercreator-ops
What they did
Judge content quality, not current views: a cult-like following is a lagging indicator. Creators without a track record can be signed on cheaper deals. Jake signed a funny, charismatic creator (roughly his 12th-15th signing) getting 10-12K views; kept a friendly relationship through two quiet months; in month three a video hit seven million views.
What happened
Breakout to 7M views in month three, then never under 500,000 views per video; made Cal AI 'a bunch of money'. Jake says a couple of similar stories happened.
In their words
Sub Club by RevenueCat · How Cal AI turned creators into a growth machine — Jake Castillo, Cal AI“What I would say is a cult-like following is a lagging indicator. If you're a great creator, the cult-like following will come.”
“So you can get them on a cheaper deal and then you're just riding that wave as they're following and influence skyrockets.”
“he was getting 10,000, 12,000 views. And then month three, he had a video get seven million views. And then from that point forward, there's never under 500,000 views.”
Related topics
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More from Cal AI
All 80 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
- 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
- Have 25 hired assistants each email 100 creators a day~220K creators contacted, 2-3K signed; roughly 1 signed per 1,000 emailed
- Pay creators $100-200 when a friend they refer signs a dealReally helped; got direct numbers and deals around talent agents
- 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: Ask fitness creators to scan their food with your app in their what-I-eat videosConverted very well and scaled across creators; founder gives no numbers
- Cal AI: Test many video angles with one willing creator, then copy the winner everywhereFound the format that worked, which was then copied across fitness creators
- Cal AI: Give creators an app version that shows your name and logo on screenFounder says it made the message clearer; no numbers
- Cal AI: Keep popups out of creator videos so the core demo plays uninterruptedKept the scan-analyze-result sequence clean; founder says it worked really well
- Cal AI: Add a 'tracked with' caption only when the app appears subtly in the videoCaptions helped subtle videos; left off obvious ones because they cut views
- Cal AI: Sponsor UFC fighters who count every calorie to promote a calorie trackerNo download spike after thousands of dollars; viewers don't want to track
- Cal AI: Have mukbang creators scan their giant meals with a calorie trackerDidn't work; viewers treat it as a cheat-day treat and avoid calorie info
- Cal AI: Pick creators whose comments thank them for help, not ones full of fire emojis
- Cal AI: Pay creators a flat rate set to break even on their average viewsViral hits become pure profit; founder says that's where the real money is
- Cal AI: Never pay creators more per 1,000 views than you earn per 1,000 viewsMeans turning down many creators; no outcome numbers
- Cal AI: Decide which creators to renew with a score built from many metricsHelped untangle attribution with 50-70 creators posting a day; no numbers
- Cal AI: Send creators surprise bonuses when they crush it, even without a bonus clauseFounder says creators referred their friends; no numbers
- Cal AI: Meet a creator's asking price but ask for more videos in return
- Cal AI: Manage hundreds of creators from one automated Google Sheets systemFounder calls it instrumental; avoided a bandwidth bottleneck
- Cal AI: Message creators every day, by the thousands, for a year and a halfLow hit rate, but it built the creator machine; no exact rates given
- Cal AI: Start paid ads by running your influencer videos as adsSome results, but well behind dedicated ad creative
- Cal AI: Make separate hard-sell videos for ads instead of reusing subtle organic onesPerformed far better than recycled influencer videos
- Cal AI: Get ad videos from creators paid a share of the ad spend behind themBiggest win since the acquisition; faster sourcing, great ad quality
- Cal AI: Repeat the pain points from your ads in onboarding, then show the price
- Cal AI: Share your growth wins and failures publicly on X, even if it invites clonesClones and 'Cal AI clone' threads drove traffic back; founder claim
- Cal AI: Charge about $30 a year so your app is the easiest to buyFounder credits it with mass popularity; price tests run but no numbers
- Cal AI: Let anyone sign up in the app to earn $10 per paid signup