The Exchanges

Q Um, and just curious, like, are there one, two, three apps that you can think of that you look up to that you're like, they've done these things that people should look at as like a, uh, inspiration for, for, for, for, you know, mobile app ideas?

A Um, I think that, you know, if you want to look for consumer social inspo, I'd hope that people look to, to some of my apps, uh, specifically MGL. Uh, I think on the AI side, I do think that Zach, uh, and Blake and the guys at CalAI crushed that, really did an amazing job on the AI app side. Um, and then I'd say like, um, I mean, there's lots of apps that I respect. You brought up Lockit. That's a great example of an app that crushed on social. Um, and, uh, we didn't talk about that, but also Pengu. Um, I, I know those guys well, and I think that what they're doing with, you know, character animation and AI and kind of creating this more, this, like, human experience between an AI is very interesting, uh, and, like, definitely worth exploring. I feel like we're gonna see a lot more of those things for different, like, contextual-based use cases. Um, you know, not just, like, an AI friend, but, like, Different, you know, kind of personalities to help you on the way. So Pengu is a great one to look at. Um, yeah, I mean, those are the ones that like just jump out to me just from like pure, uh, memory, but, uh, very, very impressive apps.

AI assessment note: “on the AI side, I do think that Zach, uh, and Blake and the guys at CalAI”

Q Ok, well, where do you want to start?

A I mean, we can kind of start with just the obvious picks on that list. Um, you know, Cal AI is a great example of how to use, you know, classic tools and AI that are publicly available to everybody. But then if you package it nicely, if you create a good onboarding experience, you create like a user investment in that onboarding experience. Um, if you kind of package these simple tools the way that they did, That's why they've seen the success that they've had, right? You know, the reality is anyone can go and make a calorie tracking app, but they built an amazing funnel, right? So I think like the key lesson in a Cal AI is they packaged it really, really nicely and made it seem even more valuable than it is, which I think is, you know, part of the genius of, of an app that simple.

AI assessment note: “we can kind of start with just the obvious picks on that list”

Q Cause they have the daily prayers. They have sleep meditations. They've got minute meditations. Um, and then they've got like, Kind of a multiplayer experience around community challenges. So I think that if you're creating a spiritual app, think about it as like single player first. How do I create the best daily driver single player? And then how do I add multiplayer? How, how would you think about it?

A I mean, I think that in an app like this, like this is very much single player first. I think you look at the multiplayer side as like a way to leverage like a different growth lever, right? So if you have, you know, you have a really good single player app, it's easy to then add like some kind of multiplayer experience or some kind of social experience where you're porting in contacts or you're connecting socials or they're sharing something to socials. I feel like all of that is like great growth levers. Uh, once you have an amazing single player experience, once you have some kind of habit that you formed, Then, you know, you can add a little gate, right? You can, you know, you can gate monetization with some kind of share mechanism. You can, you know, encourage them to invite their friends and family for a discount. A lot of things that you can do in that realm, but you do need to crush that core experience before you can do this.

AI assessment note: “you look at the multiplayer side as like a way to leverage like a different growth lever”

Q So once you've done that, say you've got close to 90% or 90% or more, what do you, what, what's next?

A Um, at that point, then you want to continue seeding it, right? Because now you've, you've, um, you've proven that you can get enough people to complete the action in the app. So now you need to seed it with like a really, like you gotta, you kind of did the test content, you got users on, you iterated. Now you need to kind of take all those learnings and then apply more pressure, and then just start trying to seed it in different audiences, different niches, um, you know, work with creators in different countries, Um, in different time zones that have different kinds of audiences. Um, you know, just really like push. Like once you know that you can get people to do the core action, your job is now just to get more people onto the app. Uh, and what I like to do is like part of the core action. I do like to have some, some kind of sharing or inviting in that, in that core action, right? You know, um, you know, we've seen apps like, you know, uh, that have a hard invite gates. We saw that with, uh, with Laps, for example, very viral photo app. You would invite, I think, three to five friends to get in the app. Um, so a lot of people would, you know, hit that wall and maybe not go over, but if you got over the wall, you are an extremely valuable user because you brought in all these people with you. So it's like, if you have some kind of loop in the app or some kind of way of invi…

AI assessment note: “at that point, then you want to continue seeding it, right?”

Q How do you think about, um, what to work on and then how to structure your apps so that you know that it's going to do at least a million dollars a month?

A I mean, the main thing that I focus on is building like a really simple experience. So, you know, I start with like figuring out what the features are going to be for like a V one, like what's like my bare bones MVP version of this concept that is, is good enough to solve the problem I'm trying to solve, but it's probably not optimized. It's probably rough around the edges, but it's enough to kind of solve that issue. Um, I then like to get users on pretty quickly, right? So just, if it could be a couple hundred, it could be a couple thousand. So, you know, once you have kind of built this core concept, you have, like, some kind of MVP for it, um, just testing content, right? You know, and this could be even when the app is in pre-order stage, right? It doesn't even have to be live for you to do this. Um, you can test content on TikTok or on Instagram Reels and, you know, see are people responding to these formats that, you know, your app is, you know, kind of The premise of the app is around these formats, are the formats working or not? Um, once you drop some people into the app, then really what you're looking for is You need to get a high percentage of people to complete a core action. So you select a core action, and then you kind of orient your decisions around a core action or like a north star metric. This is like something that I'm really bullish on, like always having…

AI assessment note: “start with like figuring out what the features are going to be for like a V one”

Q three trends that, trends in tech that, you know, you, you think are interested in, that you're interested in. If you're just starting out, you know, you want to make your first million dollars, ten million dollars, maybe even more, um, and you're trying to create a startup to go and do that, um, what sort of trends in tech should people be, um, you know, focused on, I guess?

A I do think that for young people that I can talk to more specifically about this, like people that are in their teenage years, twenties, you know, in college or post college, I do think that, um, you know, when you're young, you, you want to take a lot of swings and a lot of risks and a lot of like, you want to have a lot of at bats, a lot of tries. So I do think that building consumer mobile apps is like the best thing to be doing. If you're a young person, obviously I'm biased. That's like, All I've ever done my whole life. But I do think that like when it comes to understanding human psychology, figuring out how to build a product that people love, um, figuring out how to go viral and kind of create these, you know, global experiences. Like you can really like touch the whole world using, you know, consumer social and consumer, um, consumer, just consumer apps in general, right? It's like the way that people and the way that humans interact with the world is through apps and through our phones. So I feel like if you're a young person and you're looking at tech and like, where do I go? I would really go on the consumer side, um, versus going on like the B to B side, the SaaS side, just cause I feel like, um, you know, those things aren't as call it traditionally fun than compared to a consumer app, right? Consumer app is a little bit more fun. You know, you're, you're dealing…

AI assessment note: “I do think that building consumer mobile apps is like the best thing to be doing.”