---
title: Finding app ideas from search demand — the Tentacle Strategy
slug: app-idea-tentacle-strategy
summary: Steve P. Young's step-by-step method to pick an app idea by finding an under-served keyword "tentacle" of a big, high-earning app (e.g. brown noise from Endel/Calm), validated before building.
domain: mobile-apps
tags: [product-strategy, app-ideas, validation, aso, keyword-research]
related: [high-rpi-app-categories, app-growth-stages-organic-to-paid, app-mvp-single-problem-scope, aso-keyword-selection-criteria, aso-keyword-difficulty-manual-check, aso-competitor-keyword-mining]
sources: [yt:cq6KhOH6GAw]
updated: 2026-10-23
---

# Finding app ideas from search demand — the Tentacle Strategy

## TL;DR
- Don't ask "what app should I build?" — ask **"which tentacle can I pull from a successful app?"**[^1]
- Big apps (the "octopus", e.g. **Calm**) grow by adding side products — sleep stories, soundscapes, focus music, green noise — but can't rank for all of them; Calm doesn't even rank #1 for "meditation".[^2][^3]
- An indie builds a focused app for one such tentacle and ranks #1 for its keywords.[^3]
- Validate **before** writing code: high-RPI category → big app with ≥3:1 revenue:downloads → 6–10 keywords at score ~30 with low difficulty → manual SERP check.[^4][^5]
- App Masters' results with it: one app **$550K last year**, another **$2–3K/month** fully organic, a client **profitable from day one** reaching **$12–15K/month** organically.[^6][^7]

## Details
**Procedure (August 2026):**
1. **Pick a high-RPI category** — health & fitness, education, business ([[high-rpi-app-categories]]).[^8]
2. **Find the octopus** in **AppMagic** (appmagic.rocks, free): filter category, **iPhone/iPad only** (iOS users pay more than Android), top grossing; scroll past the obvious names.[^9]
3. **Check its economics.** Endel: ~$500K/month on ~100K downloads in AppMagic; Sensor Tower says ~$600K. Look for **≥3:1** revenue per download (Steve prefers ≥$300K/month and ~100K downloads — bigger apps have more tentacles).[^10][^4]
4. **List its indexed keywords** in ASOMobile → App Keywords, sorted by search-ads score ([[aso-competitor-keyword-mining]]).[^5]
5. **Shortlist 6–10** relevant keywords at score ~30 (25–28 OK, ≤20 weak) with complexity < 3; you need only 2–3 to win. Example: "brown noise" and "brown noise free", both 35 (green noise/green noise free would also work).[^5][^11][^12]
6. **Check the live App Store results** for ratings counts and keyword-in-title; skip terms where a 200K-rating app has the keyword in its title ([[aso-keyword-difficulty-manual-check]]).[^13][^14]
7. **If you believe you can reach #1, build** the simplest version ([[app-mvp-single-problem-scope]]), then follow [[app-growth-stages-organic-to-paid]].[^12]

**Why search is the right validator.** ASO traffic is free and high-converting because the user is already searching for the tentacle; ranking top 3 drives sales.[^3]

**Competitive backdrop.** RevenueCat's subscription report (cited by Steve) shows a surge of new, mostly iOS, apps since early 2026; apps launched before 2020 earn ~69% of subscription revenue, apps launched 2025+ only ~3%. Ideas "from your dome" will probably fail.[^1][^15]

## Disagreements / caveats
- Steve coined the name and his examples are his own/clients' apps (survivorship bias); one $2–3K/month app was not in a high-RPI category and still worked.[^7]
- Third-party revenue estimates differ (AppMagic vs Sensor Tower) — cross-check.[^10]

## See also
- [[high-rpi-app-categories]]
- [[aso-keyword-selection-criteria]]

[^1]: yt:cq6KhOH6GAw @ 00:00 — Steve P. Young
[^2]: yt:cq6KhOH6GAw @ 03:10 — Steve P. Young
[^3]: yt:cq6KhOH6GAw @ 04:24 — Steve P. Young
[^4]: yt:cq6KhOH6GAw @ 14:08 — Steve P. Young
[^5]: yt:cq6KhOH6GAw @ 07:33 — Steve P. Young
[^6]: yt:cq6KhOH6GAw @ 11:29 — Steve P. Young
[^7]: yt:cq6KhOH6GAw @ 12:47 — Steve P. Young
[^8]: yt:cq6KhOH6GAw @ 02:22 — Steve P. Young
[^9]: yt:cq6KhOH6GAw @ 05:35 — Steve P. Young
[^10]: yt:cq6KhOH6GAw @ 06:22 — Steve P. Young
[^11]: yt:cq6KhOH6GAw @ 08:59 — Steve P. Young
[^12]: yt:cq6KhOH6GAw @ 14:59 — Steve P. Young
[^13]: yt:cq6KhOH6GAw @ 09:49 — Steve P. Young
[^14]: yt:cq6KhOH6GAw @ 11:29 — Steve P. Young
[^15]: yt:cq6KhOH6GAw @ 01:12 — Steve P. Young