{"id":"2064050514619474012","url":"https://x.com/simonecanciello/status/2064050514619474012","text":"","author":{"name":"Simone Canc","username":"simonecanciello","avatarUrl":"https://pbs.twimg.com/profile_images/1819850832537411584/TrTlc_Iu_200x200.jpg"},"createdAt":"Mon Jun 08 18:22:45 +0000 2026","engagement":{"replies":25,"retweets":40,"likes":696,"views":309656},"article":{"title":"how i find $100k app ideas before everyone else ($0 method)","previewText":"i’ve been posting app ideas almost every day for the last year.\nsome of them went viral, some of them got built, and some of them are now making over $30k/month.\nbecause of that, i thought it would be","coverImageUrl":"https://pbs.twimg.com/media/HKNtaGLawAAqQPr.jpg","content":"i’ve been posting app ideas almost every day for the last year.\n\nsome of them went viral, some of them got built, and some of them are now making over $30k/month.\n\nbecause of that, i thought it would be more useful to share the process behind the ideas instead of posting another random concept.\n\ni'm not going to promote any tool in this article.\n\ni simply want to show you the workflow i use every week to find ideas that people actually want.\n\n# what you should avoid\n\nthere's a huge trend right now where people say:\n\n> just copy a $100k/month app\n\nand while i understand why this advice is popular, i think it's one of the reasons why so many founders end up quitting.\n\nthe problem is that most people stop thinking after the \"copy\" part.\n\nthey see an app making money and assume that the product is the reason behind its success, when in reality they're ignoring everything else that happened before.\n\nthey're ignoring the audience, the positioning, the marketing, the content, the distribution and all the iterations that happened after launch.\n\nwhat usually happens is pretty predictable.\n\nsomeone finds a successful app, gets excited, spends a couple of weeks building it, launches, gets almost no users and immediately starts looking for the next idea.\n\nthen they repeat the same process again.\n\ni've seen this pattern hundreds of times because there's a version of the \"consumer app dream\" being sold on X where all you need to do is copy an existing app and wait for the money to arrive.\n\nthat's not how it works.\n\nconsumer apps are hard, competition is brutal and users have more options than ever. if you're building the exact same thing as someone else, you need a very good reason for users to choose you instead.\n\nthat's why i almost never start from the question:\n\n> what app should i copy?\n\ninstead, i start from:\n\n> what problem can i solve better, differently or for a different audience?\n\nthose are two completely different ways of thinking.\n\ni'm not saying you should ignore successful apps. actually, i think studying successful apps is one of the most important things you can do.\n\nbut there's a huge difference between studying an app and cloning it.\n\nthe best opportunities usually come from taking something that already works, understanding why it works and then adding your own twist, positioning or audience.\n\nthat's exactly what we're going to do in the next steps.\n\n# 1. creator search insight\n\nthis is probably the best method i've found in the last year and the reason i'm sharing it first is because it's where most of my app ideas come from.\n\nthe intuition is pretty simple.\n\nif we're building products for gen z, where is gen z spending hours every day?\n\ntiktok.\n\nso one day i thought: why am i trying to find app ideas on twitter when people are literally telling me their problems on tiktok every single day?\n\nthey're already sharing what they struggle with, what they want, what they're searching for and what they're trying to improve.\n\nwe just need to pay attention.\n\nto access it, open tiktok and search:\n\n> creator search insight\n\nyou'll find a dashboard with trending keywords and search queries that people are actively looking for.\n\n![](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/HKOHBTpasAAUhla.jpg)\n\nit's basically a version of google trends built specifically for tiktok, which makes it incredibly valuable if your target audience spends most of their time there.\n\nwhat i usually do is go to the suggested section, select \"all\" and start looking for keywords with at least 100k weekly searches.\n\ni'm generally not interested in broad trending topics because they tend to be too generic. instead, i'm looking for specific problems to get better app ideas.\n\nwhile writing this article, for example, i found the keyword:\n\n> what to have for dinner\n\nwith over 219k weekly searches.\n\n![](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/HKOHErma8AA1zVr.jpg)\n\nmost people would stop there and think they found an idea.\n\ni don't.\n\nthe keyword itself isn't the opportunity.\n\nthe opportunity is understanding why hundreds of thousands of people are searching for it.\n\nare they too busy to cook?\n\ndo they want healthier meals?\n\nare they trying to lose weight?\n\ndo they simply run out of ideas every evening?\n\nthose are completely different problems, even though they're all hidden behind the same keyword.\n\nthat's why i also spend time watching the videos that appear for that search term. not only can you find creators that could potentially promote your app later, but you can also understand which content formats are already working in that niche.\n\nsometimes you'll discover marketing angles before you even discover the product.\n\nand that's incredibly valuable because distribution becomes much easier when you already know what type of content people engage with.\n\nonce i find a keyword with enough searches and enough interesting content around it, i move to the next step.\n\nbecause a keyword tells me there's attention, but it doesn't tell me whether there's money.\n\nthat's what we're going to validate next.\n\n# 2. validate with sensor tower\n\njust because people are searching for something doesn't mean they're willing to pay for a solution.\n\nthis is one of the biggest mistakes i see founders make. they find a keyword with hundreds of thousands of searches, immediately get excited and start building without checking if money actually exists in the niche.\n\nthat's why my next step is always the same: i open sensor tower.\n\ngoing back to our example, let's say we found the keyword:\n\n> what to have for dinner\n\nthe first thing i'd do is search for recipe apps and see what's already happening in the market.\n\ni'm not looking for inspiration yet. i'm simply trying to answer one question:\n\n> are people already spending money here?\n\nif the answer is yes, that's a very good sign.\n\nit doesn't guarantee success, but it tells me that users are already paying to solve that problem and that i'm not trying to create demand from scratch.\n\nin the recipe niche, you'll quickly find apps making hundreds of thousands or even millions every month. that's enough validation for me to continue researching the idea.\n\n![](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/HKOHMF7bEAIN5ww.jpg)\n\nbut this is also where most people make another mistake.\n\nthey find a successful app and immediately decide to copy it.\n\ninstead, i use those apps as research.\n\ni'll download them, go through the onboarding, read reviews, look at screenshots and try to understand why people are paying for them in the first place.\n\nreviews are especially useful because users will literally tell you what's missing, what's annoying and what they wish existed.\n\nthat's often where the best opportunities come from.\n\nour goal is understanding what's already working so you can build something better positioned, easier to market or more focused on a specific audience.\n\ni always prefer starting from proven demand and adding my own twist rather than trying to invent a completely new category from scratch.\n\nit's less risky, faster to validate and usually leads to much better ideas.\n\n# 3. study the audience before building\n\nthis is probably the most underrated step in the entire process.\n\nbefore building anything, i spend time scrolling.\n\ni'll search the keyword on tiktok, reels or wherever that audience spends time and start paying attention to how people talk about the problem.\n\ni want to understand what frustrates them, what outcome they're trying to achieve and how they describe the problem in their slang.\n\nthe reason this matters is because every complaint, frustration or desire can eventually become both a product feature and a marketing angle.\n\nusing our recipe example, someone searching \"what to have for dinner\" isn't necessarily looking for the same thing as everyone else.\n\nsome people want quick recipes because they're tired after work and don't want to spend an hour cooking. some people want healthy recipes because they're trying to lose weight. others simply enjoy cooking and are looking for something new to try.\n\n![](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/HKOJe4zbwAAKaIc.jpg)\n\nthey're all searching for the same keyword, but they're solving completely different problems.\n\nthat's why i spend so much time reading comments and watching content in the niche. i want to understand which type of person shows up the most and which pain points appear over and over again.\n\nsometimes this research completely changes the app i was planning to build.\n\ninstead of building a generic recipe app, i might realize there's a better opportunity in recipes for women, recipes for gym people or recipes for students living alone.\n\nsame niche, same demand, but much stronger positioning.\n\nthis is also where you start understanding distribution. by looking at creators, you'll naturally discover which content formats are working, which hooks are getting engagement and which topics people care about enough to comment on.\n\nthat's why i believe you should know how you're going to market the app before you start building it.\n\nif you can't imagine how people will discover your product, it's usually a sign that you need to spend more time understanding the audience.\n\n# 4. build the app\n\nat this point everything becomes much easier because you're no longer starting from a random idea.\n\nyou already know that people are searching for the problem, you've validated that money exists in the niche, you've studied competitors and you've spent enough time understanding how your audience thinks and talks.\n\nmost founders skip all these steps and jump straight into building, which is why they often spend months creating something nobody wants.\n\nwhen you do the research first, the product becomes much more obvious.\n\nyou already know which features users care about, which problems they complain about and which marketing angles you'll use to promote the app later.\n\nthat's why my advice is always the same: build the simplest version that solves the problem and get it into users' hands as fast as possible.\n\ndon't spend weeks choosing colors, redesigning screens or debating tiny details that nobody will notice.\n\nthe goal is to validate that real people actually want the solution you're building.\n\nonce users start using the app, they'll tell you what to improve. you'll get feedback, feature requests and complaints, and that's usually worth more than spending another month building in isolation.\n\na lot of founders think they need a perfect product before launching, but in reality most successful apps become good after launch, not before it.\n\nship something functional, learn from users and keep iterating.\n\n# 5. promotion\n\nthis is where most founders fail.\n\nthey spend months building the app and then they spend a few days trying to promote it.\n\nyou can have an average app with great marketing and still get users, but it's very difficult to save a great app that nobody knows exists.\n\nthat's why i think you should start thinking about promotion long before the app is finished.\n\nif you've done the previous steps correctly, you already know how your audience talks, what type of content they consume and which marketing angles resonate with them.\n\nnow it's simply a matter of testing.\n\n## founder-led UGC\n\nbefore hiring creators or running ads, i think every founder should create content themselves.\n\nyou need to learn which hooks stop the scroll, which formats people engage with and which messages actually make users curious enough to download your app.\n\nthe fastest way to learn this is by posting yourself.\n\ni'd aim for at least 100 videos across tiktok and instagram before spending money on creators.\n\nthat sounds like a lot, but you're not trying to get every video viral.\n\nyou're collecting data.\n\nafter 100 videos you'll usually start noticing patterns. certain hooks will consistently perform better, certain formats will generate more comments and some marketing angles will clearly resonate more than others.\n\nthat's the information you need before scaling.\n\nif i was starting from zero, i'd probably focus on simple formats like hook + demo videos, snapchat-style content or talking UGC if you're comfortable being on camera.\n\nrecently i found an app called herbi that wasn't even launched yet, but the founder managed to get over 10M views on a single tiktok and generated more than 30k waitlist signups.\n\nthat's what happens when distribution works.\n\n## ads & ugc\n\nonce you've posted enough content and found formats that consistently perform well, that's when i'd start hiring UGC creators.\n\nat this stage you're no longer guessing because you already know what type of content works for your audience.\n\nyou can find creators through platforms or directly on tiktok, and i'd usually pay a fixed monthly amount ($400) + bonuses tied to performance.\n\nonce creators start producing videos that work organically, you can often reuse those same videos inside paid ads, which makes the transition much easier.\n\nfor ads i'd keep things simple at the beginning.\n\nstart with tiktok or meta, spend around $50/day and focus on learning rather than scaling.\n\nyou don't need massive budgets to validate an app.\n\nif the product is good and the content resonates with the audience, scaling becomes much easier.\n\n# the end\n\ni wanted to write this article because every time i share parts of this process people get curious.\n\nespecially creator search insight.\n\nit's still crazy to me that most people don't use it because it completely changed the way i look for ideas.\n\npeople are literally telling you their problems every day.\n\nyou just need to listen.\n\nif you found this article useful, let me know.\n\nand if you have any questions, feel free to DM me.\n\nbye."},"adhxContext":{"savedByCount":1,"publicTags":[],"previewUrl":"https://adhx.com/simonecanciello/status/2064050514619474012"}}