Jacob Eiting
Co-founder/CEO of RevenueCat and occasional co-host of Sub Club with David Barnard. Mostly contributes framing questions and general startup heuristics.
Bias to keep in mind: commentary rather than first-hand growth data; RevenueCat sells to these apps.
Sources: sources/youtube/sub-club-by-revenuecat/.
Notes citing Jacob Eiting
- Affiliate programs for subscription apps — commissions, tracking, recruitingHow to run an app affiliate program — 15–40% commission (None to Run pays 20%), tiered bonuses, links plus in-app short codes, creator-branded paywalls with longer trials, recruiting affiliates from your own users — plus David Barnard's 100%-commission test, Cal AI's $10/sale and the AI-search halo.
- Content creators vs influencers — which to hire for an appWhy Coconote hired content creators (good videos, small followings) instead of influencers, why Cal AI's ex-influencer lead now runs UGC alongside influencers, and the trade-off — UGC gives cheaper views, established influencers give trust that converts.
- Creator outreach at scale — funnel math, emails, calls and referralsHow Cal AI signed 2,000–3,000 creators from ~220,000 contacted (25 assistants sending ~2,000 emails a day, AI-handled replies, a sales call, $100–200 referral bonuses), plus Coconote's rule for spotting reachable creators and why relationships compound.
- Credibility vs relatability — matching creator, hook and buyerDawson Gibbs's framework — considered purchases (flights, buying a business) need credible creators ("I'm an ex-flight attendant"), impulse products need relatable ones ("I'm broke like you") — and how a wrong creator ICP brought 45% churn at SMB Market until older creators and borrowed credibility fixed it.
- Free tier or not? Freemium vs charging from day oneWhether to offer a free tier at all — RevenueCat data shows no-free-tier apps convert 10.7% vs 2.1% by day 35 with equal retention, but a free tier pays when free users are your marketing (Opal) or your network (Tinder).
- Growing an app without paid ads — Cal AI, Coconote and WeWard comparedSide-by-side numbers and choices of three apps that scaled mainly on organic channels — Coconote ($1M ARR in 4 months, no paid ads, ~50% EBITDA), Cal AI (creators, then paid after a few months, $30/yr for mindshare) and WeWard (PR only for 4 years) — and when each added paid.
- Hard vs soft paywallsWhen to force users to pay or leave (hard paywall) versus letting them close it (soft), with a case where adding the X halved revenue.
- International expansion — which markets, localization depth and local pricingLocalization as a growth lever in 2026 — start where you have an edge, use cheap similar-converting geos, price with a purchasing-power index (Simply's "Big Mac index" lifted ARPA), localize consistently end to end, and expect culture-specific surprises (Simply's Japan paywall; Replika's failed Japan bet).
- Is paid acquisition incremental? Organic ceilings, cannibalization and geo holdoutsOrganic-heavy apps (Replika, Solid Starts) eventually saturate their niche and find that new paid spend often cannibalizes organic; Simply measures this with geo holdouts (switch app or web campaigns off per country) and aims for "enough truth" in CAC models, not perfect attribution.
- Judge paywall tests on net revenue after refunds (matured cohorts)Trial-start lifts from forcing tactics (no X, undismissable discount) can be wiped out by refunds — BoldVoice's refunds rose more than trial starts — so score paywall experiments on net revenue after refunds per exposed user on a matured cohort (trial + ~1 week + ≥2 weeks).
- Lead ads with the product's "magic moment" (often an AI feature)Features that make people react — PhotoRoom's AI background removal, Simply Draw bringing a child's drawing to life, Cal AI's photo-to-calories, Pingo's AI roasting pronunciation — make the best ad hooks, cut CAC and can unlock markets that never worked with paid ads.
- Long or short onboarding before the paywall? (avoid the middle)Sesame's GLP-1 intake went from 3 to ~25 steps and conversion rose 40% (step-to-step >99%), while Tinder won by cutting dating sign-up to ~90 seconds — pick long or short based on the aha moment and decision stakes, never a "balanced" middle; remove negative-psych steps like password creation.
- Measuring creator and UGC attribution (RPM, spikes, vanity URLs, codes)Practical ways to attribute organic creator content to revenue — reading per-post spikes to get revenue per 1,000 views, secondary engagement signals and a renewal score at scale, vanity domains that redirect to the app, per-creator promo/affiliate codes, and cohort churn checks.
- Organic content that converts vs content that only gets viewsWhy a 41M-view Coconote video earned nothing, and the patterns that do convert — product framed as a solution or identity (not a toy), talking-to-camera formats over looping text, subtle-but-unmissable integrations, and judging creators on paying, retained users.
- Partner ("gym buddy") and family/bundle plans in web funnelsAsking in the quiz whether the user wants to add a partner at 15% off each got ~15% of Built With Science trial starts to take it, raising order value and retention; Simply's multi-profile, multi-app family plans are its best-retaining segment and are sold on the web.
- PR and celebrity partnerships as an app growth channel (WeWard)How WeWard grew four years with zero Meta/Google spend on a $3–5K/month PR retainer (one French TV segment gave 300K downloads in under five minutes), why the same PR failed in the US, and how an ambassador-plus-investor deal with Venus Williams changed press, hiring, CAC and retention.
- Removing the free trial (pay-up-front plans)When dropping the free trial wins — Natal's no-trial monthly grew monthly subs 2,000% (quarterly +46%, annual +21%), Claim went paid-only after 34% trial starts and 50–55% trial-to-paid — and the prerequisites, plus counter-cases (Ladder, Skylight).
- Reposting and boosting organic winners (Spark Ads, partnership ads)When to repost a promising UGC video (10–20K views and ≥3% engagement) and when to put paid money behind it (engagement rate >7.5–10%, 3–5× the account's average). Spark/partnership budgets and kill rules, and the counter-evidence that dedicated paid creative beats recycled organic.
- Reverse trials — converting users who closed the paywallGive users who dismiss the paywall a free week of Pro, push them to enable Pro features, then warn that Pro is ending and offer a discount — Momingo's free-user conversion went 0.4% → 4.5%.
- Running funnel experiments — problem first, big swings, document everythingBuilt With Science's experiment process for web quiz, onboarding and paywalls — find the biggest drop-off, list problems before solutions, test bundled big swings when traffic is limited, write every test down (≈70% fail first time), and re-check winners months later by segment (Simply's soft-paywall lesson).
- Send paid traffic to a web quiz or straight to the App Store?Evidence from Built With Science (90% of paid traffic to a long web quiz after it beat direct-to-store head to head) and Simply (web flows made Facebook work for the first time, ~20% of Simply Piano revenue) on when a web quiz outperforms an app-install campaign — lean-back social users, older non-app-native audiences, bundles.
- Setting your first subscription priceStart higher than feels comfortable — Ravi Mehta's $20–30/month "high waterline" doubles as a PMF test — then anchor on competitors, cost-plus-perceived-value (AI apps), ROAS/payback math and the value of the user's whole problem; text-AI wrappers cluster at $30–40/year, niche custom-prompt chat apps get $20+/month.
- Subscription funnel benchmarks (trial start, trial-to-paid, install-to-paid, LTV per install)Target numbers for subscription apps — 5–10% install-to-trial (10%+ with a hard paywall), 30–40% trial-to-paid, ~2–3% install-to-paid, and ≥$3 realised LTV per install before scaling Meta.
- The three-screen pre-paywall sequence (explain the free trial)A 2–3 screen sequence before the paywall ("try free", "we'll remind you before it ends", trial timeline) that raised trial starts 56% in one app; Blinkist, Rest of Me, Cal AI variants.
- Tiered subscriptions plus consumables (fitting the demand curve)Tinder's model — 2–3 subscription tiers (Plus, Gold, Platinum) with à-la-carte consumables (Super Likes, Boosts) layered on top to capture both low and high willingness to pay; subscriptions act as a force multiplier for consumables, which free users rarely buy.
- Web paywall and checkout best practices for web2appChecklist for the web paywall/checkout in a web2app funnel — hard paywall without trial, ≥50% real discount with a real timer, long scroll with FAQ and social proof, per-day pricing, intro price that renews higher, Apple/Google Pay, guarantee, personalised coupon.
- What to put behind the paywall (drawing the free/paid line)How to decide which features are free vs paid — keep the core promise free, gate new self-explanatory features, start things behind the paywall (moving out is easy, moving in is painful), meter usage visibly, and watch for "disgust" reactions, not just A/B lifts.
- Why run web2app funnels (and when not to)The business case for selling app subscriptions through a web quiz + web checkout instead of the app store — fees, cash flow, attribution, control — plus the cases where it underperforms.