| Readwise URL | https://read.readwise.io/read/01kt2ktybcqebtayycyxasawqr |
|---|---|
| Readwise ID | 01kt2ktybcqebtayycyxasawqr |
| Date | 2025-10-30 |
| Author | youtube.com |
| Category | video |
\n\nSource: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=orYTlk_BhW8
I cloned a very successful app and in the firstmonth of revenue, I made $5,000.This is David Adius, a guy from Francewho, up until 6 months ago, had a regularjob. That was until he saw anopportunity that most people would miss.
I was very amazed by the fact they weremaking 200,000 a month. But when he used it,he thought to himself, “I think I canbuild something better.” So, in a coupleof weeks, he vibecoded a one-for-one clone,changed the colors, switched the niche,and just 6 months later, he’s gone from0 to $10,000 a month. I brought Davidonto the channel to break down hisentire playbook.
And in this video, we’ll dive into the app he cloned andhow he validated it was worth cloning,how he built his new app in just amonth, and the key change he decided tomake to it. Lastly, we’ll go overthe exact playbook he would use if hehad to start over today. All right, thisone is going to be fun. Let’s get intoit. I’m Pat Walls and this is StarterStory.All right, David, welcome to theChannel. Tell me about who you are, whatyou built, and what’s your story.
My name is David. I made an app thatmakes 5,000.>> That’s awesome. It is something thatI’ve been hearing about recently, takingkind of proven English or American appsand localizing them to differentcountries. So, I think there’s somethingthere. So, I’d like to just know alittle bit more about your app. Whatdoes it do? Who uses an app like this?And how does it work?
So, that’s a mobile app for women tostop their zog. My customers are around13 years old to 25, mostly GenZ women. We have a monthlysubscription. We have a weekly plan and wealso have the trial as well.>> Okay, cool. That’s amazing. And I thinkwhat you did is really cool with thisapp. But before we get into that, I justwant to understand some of the numbersbehind this. How many downloads? Howmany users? How much revenue has thismade?
So, in 5 months, I got 60,000 downloadsfrom paying customers. It’s around 900people. And I’ve been working mainlywith French influencers because Inoticed that there was no one in Francedoing something to help women bycutting a process.
Okay. My next question is, how do youeven get into building mobile apps? Iunderstand you don’t come from adeveloper background. How do you evenfind the idea to do something like this?
I worked 8 years as a quant trader. So,basically, I was helping the traders tofigure out which stocks to buy. Then,I discovered some famous indie actors,like Peter Level and Tibo from Rank andJack, who made PB bridge. I got reallyinspired by their story because theywere able to generate a lot of cashquickly. Five months ago, I was watchinga podcast on YouTube with the threefounders of Quitter. After month three, I heardthat they were making around $200,000 per month, and I wasenvious. I was jealous, and that is what gotme started.
Okay, I want to talk for a second abouthow David built this app. It was a fewmonths ago, and he used Cursor and a fewOther tools can clone the app in about amonth. But this space is changingquickly, and I want to tell you about anew tool that makes it even easier andfaster to build: Rocket. Rocket lets yougo from just a few sentences to a fullstack app. Just describe your vision, andin a few minutes, you will get a completefunctional app: backend integrations andproduction-ready code — everything. WithRocket, you can import designs fromFigma just like David did and integratewith Stripe and Subbase in just a fewclicks. Four hundred thousand users from around theworld are building with Rocket becauseit’s the simplest way to turn ideas intoapps in minutes, not months. So, ifyou’re ready to finally build your ideafaster than ever, check out Rocket atthe first link in the description. Thankyou to Rocket for sponsoring this video.
I love what you guys are building. Allright, let’s get back to the video. Oneof the big reasons I wanted to bring youon the channel is that you took a proven appand you sort of made it 1% different, andnow you have a really successful app.So, can you tell me a little bit moreabout how you found the idea and how youdecided to clone that specific idea?
The way that I found this idea was fromYouTube. I saw those three guys onYouTube, and I was very amazed by thefact that they were making $200,000 per monthafter three months. And then when I haddownloaded the Twitter app, I was verypleased by their onboarding, and I didan exact copy of their onboarding,because it was so good.
Well, okay, cool. That’s amazing. Onthis topic of cloning, you can find anidea, then you can find another niche toput it in. But my question for you is,how did you know that this niche,quitting sugar, was an app that was worthbuilding and something that people wouldpay for? How did you validate this?
Basically, what I did was go on GoogleTrends. I was looking for a keyword suchas “stop sugar,” and because for the pastfive years, the trend of those keywordshas been going higher and higherand higher. Then I checked for the samekeywords on TikTok and Instagram, and Isaw that there were a ton of womeninfluencers talking aboutquitting sugar and stopping sugar. SoI validated this by keyword research and bycontent research on TikTok andInstagram, and that’s how I knew.
Making an app to stop sugar cravings waspotentially a great idea.>> Okay, amazing. So you validate thisidea. What’s the next step? Building it.Tell me about how you actually builtStopper.>> So my first step was to download Twitterto take some screenshots of each screen.What I wanted to see is basically how we go from screen one to screen twoto screen three.So I was continuingcursor. Please make the same screen withthe same visual elements, with the samecolor and the same image. In two weeksand a half, I did one full copy ofTwitter, and then to submit the firstversion of the app and get theapproval from Apple, that took me oneweek.
Cool. I think anyone watching this rightnow is hopefully getting excited aboutpotentially doing the same.So my next question for you is if you were to dothis again, to start over from scratch,what would be your playbook to clone asuccessful app from the App Store in2025?>> The first step would be to find avery successful app to check, basically,that it’s for like a specific niche.
And if that app markets for specificregions and the countries to confirm therevenue, you have to go to Sensor tohave a sense of what the app is earningas a monthly recurring revenue. Step two,you want to research on TikTok andGoogle Trends if it’s a niche worthbuilding. Step three, that will bebuilding the designs using a Figmaplugin to import all those JPEGscreenshots in Figma. You’re going to seesome discrepancies here and there, butfor 80% of all the screens, that’s nearlyperfect. There are some websites likescreen.com and mobin.com. So forexample, you will go there, search for a
quitter, and you can download all thescreenshots from a given app with oneclick. Step four, I think for most apps,that’s not needed, but if you need somebackend, the easiest option is Firebase,because Firebase manages theconnections with Google, manages theconnection with email and password, and withthe Apple settings as well. Right now,like with Figma MCP, you can connect yourFigma MCP to Cursor, and before it tookme like one month to do the MVP; right now,with the Figma MCP, that wouldprobably take me two weeks.
Okay, amazing. Thank you for sharingthat playbook. It’s crazy to see howfast AI coding is getting better. I wantto change topics slightly to tech stack.Can you break down the full stack thatstopper is built in? What’s it built on?
To V code, I use a cursor to track myrevenue within the app. I am usingrevenue cat to have some deeperanalytics about what my users are doing.I am using a mix panel. I am using atool called topy yappers.com,which is basically a SaaS that scrapes TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube to findthe exact profiles that I need ofinfluencers who have worked with other appsbefore. I will add the emails that I findfrom topers.com, and then I will feedthat into lindy.ai. I have beenusing ads on Menaand Sparkas on TikTok since last week. So Sparkad is agreat way to increase the number ofviews you have for a current viralvideo.
And on that same note, I’m also curiousabout the costs to run an app likethis. What do your profit margins looklike? Could you break that down for me?
You have the ultra plan of cursor, whichcosts 100 for the TikTok spot ads. What I’ve been doing forthe past months has cost me around $100 permonth. So, after five months, my profitmargin for the stopper is 35%.
The last question that I have for you, whichwe ask everyone who comes on StarterStory, is: If you could stand on youngDavid’s shoulders before you startedyour app, found this app, cloned it,and built it, what would be your advice foranyone watching this right now?
The fastest way to make some money right nowis to do a one-to-one copy of a verysuccessful app. And when I say one-to-onecopy, I mean you copy eachscreen and each word. I changeblack to pink, replace “add content” with"sugar," and then it’s done. Yep. I mean, Iagree. I think it’s totally okay to copyan app. And actually, I think that’s theright thing to do, especially whenyou’re starting out. The only thing thatI think you shouldn’t do is copy the niche. Youdon’t want to go andtake their customers, take everythingthey did, and put it to a differentniche. You’re not taking theircustomers. So, anybody who’s watchingthis right now, I think this is a greatThank you, David, for coming on and sharing everything. For anyonewatching right now, let us know in the comments if you enjoyed David’s story,if you’d want him to come back and deep dive more into this cloning playbook.
Thank you, David, for coming on.Thank you. Bye-bye.
Thank you to David for coming on to the channel. Personally, I love this becausehe took a successful app, he switched the niche, changed the customer base,and took proven principles such as onboarding flows and a bunch of other things,and basically cloned it into his new app. I think that’s super smart,especially if you’re starting your first business idea. You want to get to yourfirst 20,000 a month.
What I loved even more was that he vibecoded this entire thing in a couple of weeks. That isthe power of building with AI. You can have an idea in your head and turn itinto a working app faster than you’ve ever been able to do before.And this is exactly what we show you how to do inside Starter Story Build.We will guide you step by step on how to use AI to bring your app to life.If you’re interested in actually buildingSomething and getting off the sidelines,head to the first link in thedescription and check out Starter Story Build.
All right, guys. That’s it forthis episode. Thank you again forwatching. We’ll see you in the next one.Peace.