Sway AI · B2C · dating profile feedback app
Post unbranded slideshows until views come, then brand every slide with the app
One branded Christmas Day post got ~4M views and $5-6K revenue in a day
Workedorganic-short-video
What they did
New TikTok account started with aesthetic, fully unbranded carousels (photo backgrounds), testing no CTA vs a CTA on the last slide, to warm up the account. Once a few videos popped and views felt guaranteed, switched to full branding (orange theme) with the app plugged on every slide, e.g. 'five mistakes when flirting over text, dating advice from Sway AI app'.
What happened
Branded pinned post posted on Christmas Day hit millions of views (~4M on screen) and drove $5-6K revenue that day, the best day to that point; guest credits heavy branding
- Stage
- launch
In their words
The Superwall Podcast · Daniel Heintzma - I speedran a new app from 0 to $2m/year in 6 months (here's how)“I actually started off with doing the these like aesthetic carousels where it was like more of like these pictures in the background which were fully unbranded. If you're starting a brand new account, and it's like fully branded, I almost feel like it wouldn't have gone as viral initially.”
“And then once we like started getting traction and it was like guaranteed views, then we just made the whole branding like, you know, the orange theme and all of that.”
“Yeah. I mean, it it helps that it was heavily branded too, so.”
Related topics
Get tactics like this every Monday
New tactics from the week's founder interviews, each linked to where it was said.
More from this episode
- Sway AI: Grow an Instagram account on Hinge prompt tips before building, with a preorder linkSome videos took off within weeks; audience existed before launch
- Sway AI: Charge followers $15 by DM for a manual profile review before buildingPeople paid before any app existed; proved willingness to pay
- Sway AI: Copy the text of a men's self-improvement account's most viral slideshows into your own designsSlideshows averaged 10-50K views; one hit 600K
- Sway AI: Make a month of TikTok slideshows in 1-2 hours from a spreadsheet and templateSeconds per slideshow; a month of posts in an hour or two
- Sway AI: Have one dating influencer make promo videos, then run them as ads from his pageTook revenue from $30-40K/month to about $2M a year; creative supply became the limit
- Sway AI: Open onboarding with short videos explaining the app before asking any questionsAdded after emails asking what the app does; no numbers given
- Sway AI: Ask for profile screenshots after the paywall, not before itSimple onboarding before the paywall performed a lot better; no numbers
- Sway AI: Sell extra analysis credits to people who rerun the profile checkAbout 11% of revenue
- Sway AI: Sell AI photo packs at $14.99 for one and $49.99 for tenBiggest upsell in the app; no spending cap lets big spenders pay more
- Sway AI: Preselect the yearly plan on the paywall to collect cash upfrontWeekly plan also tried; grew a lot slower
- Cal AI: Redesign the meal logging screens so people keep paying after the 3-day trial
- Cal AI: Let users join friend groups and topic groups with streak leaderboards
- Cal AI: Add daily logging streaks, copied from Duolingo
- Cal AI: Let users post progress photos, meals and streak badges to Instagram storiesA lot of users share progress and meals; no numbers
- Cal AI: Make the 3 screens creators film (camera, loading, food detail) instantly clear
- Cal AI: Grow through fitness creators who sell coaching, so the app doesn't compete with themMain growth driver; guaranteed views vs hoping to go viral
- Cal AI: Ramp up paid ads once influencer growth is workingMarked Cal AI's big growth inflection point; no numbers
- Robinhood: Launch in a month with game-like branding unlike bank-style crypto appsWent really viral; idea to launch in about a month