Most apps are dangerously unprofitable, 30- 50% profit margins ( is it even worth it? )

if your app is making $100k/mo

but after the long list of operational expenses

take home is just 30k split 3 ways across your co-founders

is all that stress and workload worth it?

it would be easier for you to just go tech UGC on instagram

and make $10k of full profit doing significantly less

the winning app founders have already thought about this

and there are many ways to increase profit %

here are 4 of them

1. building with AI - this ones super clear, development cost are 1% of what they use to be just 2 years ago ( i use Rork + Fable 5 )

2. web2app funnels - saves 15-25% immediately

most of the biggest apps are using this style of payment collection

3. AI UGC - video productions are significantly lower than than real UGC

cents on the dollar in some cases

4. Datapoint - significantly cheaper to test new ideas/concepts before starting production

It took me 4 years of learning the hardest way possible

before i actually started making significant money online

i lost ( A LOT ) of time and money

and after reflecting about this with a few of my millionaire friends

we realized it took everyone several years of failing for it to finally click

and it's always because of the same reason

"the lack of information" or the "wrong information"

the lack of information has the highest cost

both in actual loses and opportunity cost

being in the right place at the right time

has asymmetrical upside like no other

it's exponential results

instead of linear

getting an opportunity with that level of upside

was nearly impossible unless you had connections

20 years ago,

if your close group of friends didn't know

then you didn't either

Today,

you have full access to all the information in the palm of your hand

you can find out anything almost immediately

There are countless blogs, articles, YouTube videos, and podcasts that all show very niche information that would help you get ahead, specific to the exact goal you have.

this is equivalent to time travel in my opinion

you can skip 6 months of trials and failures

by just consuming the right information.

There's not a single time in history that it's been easier to make the right decisions constantly because of how accessible all the data is

i realized this is the biggest barrier between someone getting their first bit of significant online money

everyone's ego makes them want to just try and fail on their own

I've spoken to over 10,000+ other business owners and they all agree

in the app space this is EXTREMELY important

getting into the wrong app niche gives you a near 0% chance of success

it's painfully brutal

you'll lose months of time and thousands of dollars on an idea that never had a chance in the first place

and that's not me being negative

it's literally just exactly how business and apps is

if you start building some bs that no one wants to buy

well expect no one to pay

you have to solve a huge huge core problem

either your own problem or a big demographics problem

it doesn't take anyone super gifted or smart to pull this off

just make solutions to problems people are already paying for

for reference if you made $500k at my age

this would put you within the top 1% in the US among all ages

i did that between 21-22

and it was great money but that alone is not going to fulfill you

not the way growing an app/business

that you're extremely passionate about will

with that money is was able to:

→ move my mom out from her 1 bd 1 bath home to a 3 floor townhouse

→ buy one of my dream cars

→ travels to Arizona, Las Vegas, Mexico, Virginia, & more

→ gift my parents new iPhones & iPads

→ give my grandma so many special experiences

→ buy one of my dream watches ( Cartier santos )

→ and plenty of other things i always wanted to do

but it took me going through everything to realize it just wasn't enough

Purpose is the only thing that will make you feel fulfilled and fired up

no amount of money can replace that

and online business gives you that

but only if you're providing value to the marketplace

and dedicate yourself to a mission

i live in Miami and got full location and time freedom

i can get up and go wherever i want

which for me, it ends up being working all day but from different places

that's what i have the most fun doing

1. stop wasting your time (validate the idea first)

here are 32 validated ideas:

following these ideas already give you a +50% chance of winning

those app ideas each have several active apps making over $100k/mo

so before you start

→ building the app

→ and creating the social media accounts

choose an idea that has money proving it's value

2. check winners in the niche

make sure people are already paying for this. if a handful of apps in your niche are pulling $10k/mo+, that's your green light

all of the information on how profitable apps are is completely public

you can check softwares created by founders just like you

like @tadasgedgaudas & @jacobrodri_

with a tool like the one shown above, appkittie

it shows you the app's MRR, the # of apple ads & more

when it comes to B2C Apps

everything is fully public

→ Revenue → Downloads → Ranking → Onboarding Structure → App Loop → Winning creatives → Meta ads → Pricing structure

literally everything

validation has several layers

you can even get more specific

and ask your ICP for their exact option on a topic

before fully committing to a launch

this wasn't easy a few years ago

but @datapoint made it possible

the old way:

→ put it in front of buyers and test it blind

( a lot of loss money in this method )

but that method has real cons

whether you're selling a physical product or an online one

you're either wasting inventory or ad spend

running experiments blindly

and if you're marketing organically unless you are posting a lot

it can take a long long time to really find what works

this isn't just for app founders either

whoever you are, testing before you build saves you months

→ vibecoders —

validate the idea before you prompt a single screen

→ D2C brand owners —

test packaging, creative, and pricing before you manufacture

→ startup founders —

know if the market wants it before you spend a dollar on it

→ digital marketers —

test the hook and messaging before it ever hits ad spend

same tool, different question, but ultimately the same result

you stop guessing and start building for people who already said yes

that's why founders are switching

from guessing to using datapoint instead

it lets you send a real survey

straight to the exact demographic you want

FOR EXAMPLE:

• building a gym app for women based in US

• target the survey to 18-24 y/o women in the US specifically

get real answers from real people fast

and make more informed decisions

here's a couple ways people are using it:

so before you build something no one wants

and put money behind ideas that go nowhere

you can send a survey to your exact test group in a matter of minutes

datapoint lets you do exactly that

right now you can filter by:

→ state

→ gender

→ age range

→ country

• more

so before you blindly set up ads campaign and risk significant ad spend

here's what running a targeted survey would look like:

you answer a few questions about

who exactly is your ICP ( ideal client profile )

and it asks those specific people what they think

once the surveys are sent just wait till the answers return

a full report gets created for you and make your informed decision

you can try it out at https://trydatapoint.com/

2. the toolstack ( how i build everything )

the key is to launch and learn as fast as possible

here's my tech stack:

→ Rork Max + Fable 5 — build and automated approval

→ Datapoint —- research and idea validation

→ @wave2app — to build a web2app funnel ( recover up to 25% apple fee)

→ Supabase — the database, when i need one

→ Arcads MCP — AI UGC creatives

3 to 7 days max to submit to the Appstore

once it's approved you can start marketing

fix the bugs as you go but don't just stop marketing

you can't spend weeks or months stuck here building

( this is where most people delay their success )

3. get it live on the Appstore

once you decided which validated app you want to build

you have to study the competitors and build similarly

successful apps are build in specific ways that aren't accidental at all

there's a countless set of A/B testing that has gotten them to this point

so you can save a lot of time if you start from that foundation

Each of the winning apps have 3 sections

A. Onboarding

B. Paywall

C. App Loop

but before that, we have to make sure you can submit to the Appstore

nothing you build matters until it's actually in someone's hands

that's the only way they can actually pay

first step is getting the apple developer license

which is $99 a year

takes about 3-5 days to get approved

so apply now

Rork actually has a CLI that fully helps you

get approved to the Appstore autonomously

just send this line

"submit to the AppStore via the App Store Connect CLI"

this makes the entire submission process automated completely

within the same exact chat

and today they just launched the Rork Max iOS app

it's fully cross platform ready launching for windows next week

this gives anyone the ability to create and launch an app within days,

all while being fully unexperienced and untechnical

i don't know a single line of code

you literally just have to type a sentence explaining what app you want to build

then toggle on "Claude Fable 5" so you have the most powerful agent working for you

and within a few minutes you'll have a rough version 1

then just keep touching it up and submit it

they also just launched Rork Games recently

which now lets you create almost any game

Rork + Fable 5 now handle everything

→ 3D models

→ Sounds and effects

→ Lighting logic

→The animations

→The map design

their team actually made a few games to show you what's possible

⬇️

here's some stuff i made myself

( each took me 10-15 minutes max )

any feature that your iPhone has

can be utilized to make your apps more immersive

since there's a library of 600+ premade animations

making a realistic game with accurate mechanics isn't hard at all

but the most important step is DISTRIBUTION

4. marketing/distribution

once you have built an app that people want

and you built it in a way that will help them

it's time to get eyes on your product

there are a ton different channels to market your app through

these are the main 5

1 - Instagram

2 - TikTok

3 - Facebook

4 - Youtube shorts

5 - Reddit

most people only ever try 1 and 2

but you could be leaving a lot of money on the table doing so

some app niches are easier to sell in specific platforms

you have to think about where your ideal client spends time

for example there's a tai chi app for seniors making $102k/mo

their ICP lives on Facebook,

they even market using AI

since older people can't really tell the difference

for the first time in history we are seeing more

and more apps start marketing with AI

just 6 months ago this was not happening at all

this is an alarm app is at $203k/mo 😭

using AI UGC

the truth is it doesn't matter if it's AI or human

if the video stops the viewer and it converts into a sale

then it worked and for a cheaper cost than real UGC

here's WayK doing that flawlessly:

this won't work in every app niche however

certain users just buy differently than others

and that's normal

what is universal however is,

people won't pay if no value is being provided

So make your ad actually show how it will help the user with their current problem and they will pay

5. increasing profit 15-25%

Apple immediately by default charges you a 30% fee on all your revenue

then you can sign up to the small business owner program

and cut it down to 15% until you reach $1M in revenue

but that 15% is still way too much

and it'll be very hard to actually be profitable

specially if you are giving away that much money

some of the biggest apps have already made the pivot

this was expected because imagine owning

Flo an app making $23M/mo

and being forced to give up 30% of it

and it's not just Flo

it's 100s of the biggest apps

here are 10:

why aren't more founders doing this ? 😭

if you've decided to be in the space for a longtime

this is honestly an inevitable move

sooner or later you'll have to pivot too

because after the apple fee, marketing fee, development cost, VAs, APIs, ads spend, and any other expenses that come with app scaling

well it's pretty hard to stay significantly profitable

@web2wave_com is actually one alternative to that 15-30%

they are trusted by some big names

and has collected over $10M in payments

it's also very flexible when it comes to available payment processors

( 100+ available )

there have been over 6,000 paywalls built in their editor

which is a no code platform

setting this up is pretty easy

and if you planned on running paid ads in the future

Attribution is much simple easier and accurate within web2app funnels

everything is pretty straight forward

6. Summary

these are just 4 ways everyday founders

are increasing their profitability

→ building with AI

dev cost is 1% of what it was 2 years ago (Rork + Fable 5)

→ Datapoint

test ideas for a fraction before you build

→ web2app funnels

save 15-25% instantly, biggest apps already use it

→ AI UGC

cents on the dollar vs real UGC

most of the newer founders think about increasing revenue

and never think about ways to increase profit

revenue is vanity if the profit is not there

the truth is

if your revenue increases by 50%

but your profit is still the same

it's a dangerous spot to be in because the reason business close their doors is always the same

• they ran out of money

try to see how you can maximize the profit inside of your app

because that's more money you have to scale further

and it's more time you give yourself

without having to work a 9-5 or doing side gigs

if you are already build and scaling an app

you might as well maximize the profit

Links

• trydatapoint.com/
• x.com/web2wave_com