Esc
I Make $50K Per Month Working 5 Hours A Week
Starter Story
Jul 23, 2026
Timo built an AI app that today makes over $50K/month. His entire growth has come from one system that allows him to only work 20 hours per month on the app. In this video, we break down what it takes to scale an app from zero to $50K and how much it costs to run the whole thing.
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https://twitter.com/timoxkoehler
https://www.skool.com/appfounder
Check out ChartDetector: https://chartdetectorai.com/
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🏁 We're hiring: starterstory.com/jobs
This video is an educational case study of this founder’s experience. It is not financial advice and does not guarantee any income or results. Every business is different and your results may vary.
Chapters
Stack
Transcript
Chapters
Stack
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ChartDetector AI (link)
This
is
Timo
He
built
a
mobile
app
that
makes
over
50
000
a
month
But
here's
the
crazy
part
He
only
works
on
the
app
20
hours
per
month
Currently
I'm
traveling
the
world
and
I'm
only
working
20
hours
per
month
on
this
app
While
most
founders
are
working
80
hour
weeks
just
to
get
a
few
downloads
Timo
found
a
way
to
build
an
app
that
grows
essentially
on
autopilot
And
it's
all
thanks
to
one
little
secret
Essentially
what
we
are
doing
I
asked
Timo
to
come
on
the
channel
to
break
it
all
down
And
in
this
episode
we'll
dive
into
his
app
that
makes
over
50
000
a
month
on
autopilot
the
most
underrated
growth
channel
that
is
working
right
now
and
his
step
by
step
playbook
that
you
can
copy
right
now
for
your
business
if
you
want
to
do
the
same
Let's
dive
in
I'm
Pat
Walls
and
this
is
Starter
Story
Timo
welcome
to
the
channel
Tell
me
about
who
you
are
what
you
built
and
what's
your
story
My
name
is
Timo
I'm
23
years
old
and
I
built
a
mobile
app
that
makes
more
than
50
000
per
month
Me
and
my
brother
launched
the
app
a
little
over
a
year
ago
And
over
the
last
13
months
we've
gone
from
zero
to
more
than
90
000
in
downloads
and
more
than
260
000
in
revenue
in
total
That
allowed
me
to
quit
my
job
after
only
six
months
And
currently
I'm
traveling
the
world
and
I'm
only
working
20
hours
per
month
on
this
app
That's
actually
crazy
what
you
just
mentioned
I
want
to
go
back
to
that
real
quick
20
hours
per
month
not
per
week
per
month
So
I'm
excited
to
talk
about
that
But
before
we
do
let's
talk
about
the
app
you
built
What
is
the
app
that
you
built
And
could
you
pull
up
some
of
your
revenue
dashboards
to
show
this
is
actually
legit
The
app
is
called
Chart
Detector
AI
And
the
concept
of
the
app
is
pretty
simple
It's
AI
chart
analysis
app
So
you
can
just
take
a
picture
of
a
stock
chart
or
a
crypto
chart
and
AI
will
analyze
it
and
give
you
some
directions
here
how
the
stock
chart
will
go
We
are
currently
at
56
000
per
month
and
we
are
getting
around
13
to
14K
in
downloads
every
month
Regarding
views
and
numbers
we
did
in
total
close
to
40
million
in
total
impressions
And
over
the
last
30
days
we
did
a
total
of
7
8
million
in
views
And
that's
for
a
pretty
cheap
price
Currently
we
have
two
main
plans
that
we
offer
One
is
a
weekly
plan
that
is
12
99
per
week
and
one
six
month
plan
that
is
59
99
every
six
months
We
also
have
a
hard
paywall
We
don't
offer
any
free
trials
or
something
like
that
If
you
watch
a
lot
of
Starter
Story
videos
you'll
notice
that
a
lot
of
people
who
come
onto
here
they
have
this
hard
paywall
So
there's
something
there
And
then
you
mentioned
also
that
you
have
a
six
month
plan
I
think
that's
genius
It's
the
very
first
time
I've
heard
of
someone
doing
that
there
but
it
sounds
like
you
split
tested
it
and
it
worked
So
I
love
that
But
I
do
want
to
understand
how
do
you
get
to
the
point
where
you
have
this
app
that's
doing
over
50
000
a
month
Do
you
have
a
technical
background
What's
your
background
look
like
and
how
do
you
get
here
Before
I
started
this
app
I
was
working
a
nine
to
five
as
a
software
engineer
at
a
big
car
brand
in
Germany
So
I
started
this
whole
thing
with
my
brother
and
we
both
always
wanted
to
start
a
business
and
tried
a
lot
of
different
businesses
But
mobile
apps
were
the
first
thing
that
really
worked
out
and
allowed
us
to
quit
our
jobs
and
pursue
this
full
time
As
I've
been
saying
2026
this
year
is
the
year
of
iOS
I
think
it's
a
huge
opportunity
So
I'm
curious
how
did
you
come
up
for
the
idea
for
this
app
I
know
you
had
previous
ideas
before
that
didn't
work
out
How'd
you
come
up
with
the
idea
for
this
one
And
then
how'd
you
know
it
was
something
that
could
eventually
make
50
000
a
month
Back
then
it
was
pretty
fresh
this
new
feature
from
ChatGPT
that
you
could
upload
images
So
the
first
initial
idea
was
just
a
Telegram
bot
that
could
analyze
some
stock
charts
with
AI
Then
we
got
the
first
initial
idea
to
turn
this
Telegram
bot
into
a
mobile
app
I
love
that
It
reminds
me
of
an
interview
we
just
did
They
were
building
stuff
and
then
all
of
a
sudden
a
new
feature
came
out
in
one
of
the
big
AI
APIs
which
created
this
new
wave
of
apps
and
they
caught
that
wave
It
sounds
like
it
was
something
similar
when
ChatGPT
released
its
new
feature
So
I
want
to
switch
topics
real
quick
and
talk
about
distribution
Because
you
figured
out
something
where
you
only
have
to
work
20
hours
per
month
and
your
distribution
is
essentially
solved
Could
you
tell
me
a
little
bit
more
about
that
and
how
this
app
went
from
zero
to
50
000
a
month
month
Essentially
what
we
are
doing
is
paid
ads
So
with
paid
ads
always
the
main
goal
is
that
you
pay
less
for
downloads
than
you
earn
from
an
average
user
For
example
when
you
spend
1
50
per
download
and
you
earn
an
average
of
3
per
user
then
you
have
a
2x
ROAS
When
you
reach
that
level
then
you
have
built
a
money
printing
machine
And
the
main
goal
is
to
spend
as
much
as
possible
in
ads
to
make
more
money
I
love
everything
Timo
is
breaking
down
right
now
I
think
this
is
such
a
smart
and
underrated
way
to
grow
your
app
in
2026
But
this
is
just
one
of
dozens
of
channels
that
you
can
use
to
grow
your
app
Well
to
show
this
to
you
we
put
something
together
and
it's
called
the
mobile
app
growth
cheat
sheet
Inside
of
this
cheat
sheet
you
will
find
seven
different
strategies
real
app
founders
are
using
to
grow
their
apps
right
now
So
if
you're
serious
about
growth
and
distribution
then
you
should
check
out
that
link
that
I'll
put
there
right
in
the
description
It's
100
free
to
download
So
what
do
you
have
to
lose
All
right
let's
get
back
to
the
episode
Okay
cool
Could
you
just
break
down
a
couple
of
like
the
TikTok
ads
that
are
working
for
you
For
example
that
is
one
of
our
best
videos
we
had
It's
pretty
simple
We
are
just
mainly
showing
the
app
itself
Our
user
is
using
the
app
This
ad
alone
generated
us
over
15
000
in
revenue
and
got
close
to
5
million
views
Thanks
for
showing
that
showing
some
of
your
highest
performing
TikTok
ads
I
want
to
talk
about
one
thing
that
I
know
is
going
to
come
up
in
the
comments
If
you're
all
you're
doing
is
running
ads
are
you
actually
profitable
And
how
profitable
is
this
Yeah
sure
I
recently
did
a
tweet
about
this
And
I
made
an
April
of
43
700
And
we
have
a
total
profit
margin
of
around
25
after
all
of
our
costs
So
the
majority
of
the
cost
is
the
ad
spend
around
20
000
in
ad
spend
And
the
Apple
fees
around
15
and
made
a
total
profit
of
around
11
and
a
half
thousand
dollars
I
think
actually
these
numbers
are
pretty
standard
especially
for
people
that
are
running
running
paid
ads
The
benefit
of
paid
ads
is
that
you
don't
spend
a
whole
lot
of
time
on
it
If
you
were
to
actually
break
down
your
numbers
you're
essentially
making
500
per
hour
Let's
talk
about
the
playbook
on
how
others
can
do
this
because
I
know
a
lot
of
people
watching
this
are
thinking
well
I've
tried
to
create
some
content
It
was
really
hard
It
took
a
long
time
It
didn't
make
any
money
I
want
to
run
ads
profitably
like
you
What
would
be
your
playbook
if
you
had
to
start
over
build
a
new
app
and
successfully
run
paid
ads
like
you
do
if
you're
starting
over
in
2026
The
first
step
is
to
make
sure
that
your
app
is
ready
for
paid
ads
The
first
thing
is
improving
your
onboarding
Focus
on
selling
the
actual
outcome
of
the
app
not
the
features
not
really
the
benefits
the
actual
outcome
that
your
app
solves
And
I
also
would
highly
recommend
to
put
a
lot
of
social
proof
in
your
onboarding
so
that
the
user
can
have
more
trust
in
you
as
a
business
I
would
definitely
use
a
tool
like
Screens
Design
to
analyze
onboarding
flow
of
other
successful
apps
Also
regarding
pricing
I
can
highly
recommend
having
a
hard
paywall
with
no
free
trial
That
works
the
best
in
combination
with
ads
because
you
get
immediately
your
money
back
So
the
next
step
is
that
you
create
your
TikTok
business
manager
account
Really
important
topic
in
ads
is
tracking
Especially
really
important
that
TikTok
gets
a
lot
of
data
from
you
on
which
people
bought
in
your
app
For
this
you
need
MMP
For
that
I
would
recommend
to
use
a
tool
like
AppsFlyer
After
that
integrate
AppsFlyer
I
recommend
you
to
hire
a
freelancer
on
Upwork
to
do
this
for
you
because
it
can
be
a
really
complex
topic
and
there's
a
lot
of
stuff
that
you
can
misconfigure
that
in
the
end
can
cost
you
a
lot
of
money
money
So
in
the
next
step
you
need
to
set
up
your
ads
What
I
can
recommend
is
that
you
need
to
have
at
least
six
videos
to
start
your
first
TikTok
ads
campaign
You
may
be
asked
why
It's
mainly
because
the
TikTok
algorithm
needs
to
get
some
opportunities
to
test
different
videos
on
different
audiences
Setting
up
the
whole
campaign
is
pretty
simple
We
use
a
concept
called
Smart
Plus
campaigns
This
type
of
campaigns
uses
a
smart
AI
powered
algorithm
from
TikTok
that
is
designed
to
find
the
best
audience
for
you
Also
the
whole
topic
of
budget
allocation
is
also
completely
handled
by
the
Smart
Plus
campaign
Another
important
topic
is
your
optimization
optimization
goal
The
optimization
goal
is
essentially
an
instruction
that
you
give
to
the
TikTok
algorithm
on
what
you
should
focus
on
A
lot
of
people
are
trying
to
optimize
on
app
installs
I
would
recommend
to
optimize
on
subscription
events
because
then
only
if
a
user
downloads
your
app
app
and
also
pays
you
money
TikTok
gets
a
good
signal
about
it
and
good
data
back
And
I
would
recommend
to
set
the
campaign
budget
to
at
least
50
per
day
We
saw
the
best
results
with
50
per
day
Regarding
the
targeting
we
always
have
a
pretty
broad
targeting
The
only
thing
that
we
select
in
our
targeting
is
the
country
we
want
to
advertise
in
Also
additional
pretty
good
tip
A
lot
of
people
first
want
to
advertise
in
the
U
S
but
what
we
saw
when
we
tested
a
lot
of
ads
in
other
countries
is
that
you
have
a
lot
better
return
on
investment
in
other
countries
When
you
start
your
campaign
it
will
first
get
into
a
learning
phase
The
learning
phase
essentially
is
a
quick
time
that
is
around
seven
days
where
TikTok
tries
to
test
all
of
your
videos
on
different
audiences
and
tries
to
find
your
ideal
audience
It's
pretty
important
that
you
don't
change
any
settings
of
your
campaign
in
that
time
Now
I'll
give
you
a
little
bit
more
insights
on
how
you
can
monitor
your
campaigns
and
how
you
can
scale
them
So
what
we
do
every
week
is
we
monitor
our
ROAS
If
it's
stable
and
profitable
we
will
increase
our
budget
If
our
ROAS
is
not
profitable
we
will
create
some
new
videos
and
put
them
into
the
campaign
Also
pretty
important
thing
to
know
Don't
increase
your
budget
too
fast
There's
like
the
rule
that
you
should
not
increase
your
budget
more
than
20
every
three
days
Otherwise
your
ads
will
go
back
into
the
learning
phase
and
a
lot
of
times
the
ads
get
unprofitable
There's
also
creative
fatigue
This
means
that
when
you
spend
too
much
money
on
one
video
that
it
will
die
because
too
many
people
saw
your
ad
So
to
prevent
this
you
always
need
to
have
a
constant
pipeline
of
new
videos
Thank
you
for
giving
this
a
shot
because
I
think
this
is
genius
what
you're
doing
Let's
switch
topics
a
little
bit
and
talk
about
TechStack
You
built
this
basically
between
you
and
your
brother
You
guys
built
everything
What's
the
TechStack
that
runs
your
app
that
makes
over
50
000
a
month
Our
app
is
built
in
React
Native
and
Expo
For
our
whole
backend
we
use
Superbase
For
all
of
the
coding
we
use
Purser
AI
For
actual
infrastructure
we
use
Home
AI
as
our
AI
behind
our
app
Additionally
we
use
RevenueCat
for
all
of
our
paywalls
and
subscription
handling
Also
a
pretty
essential
part
AppsFlyer
for
all
of
our
TikTok
data
tracking
We
use
CapCut
as
our
video
editing
software
and
TikTok
Ads
Currently
we
are
spending
around
18
000
per
month
there
Cool
Well
thank
you
for
sharing
Last
question
that
we
ask
everyone
who
comes
on
If
you
go
back
in
time
before
you
had
this
very
successful
app
what
would
be
your
advice
to
young
Timo
or
for
anyone
who
wants
to
build
super
cool
simple
app
like
yours
and
only
work
20
hours
a
month
month
I
would
highly
recommend
you
to
start
now
the
execution
because
I
always
watch
too
many
YouTube
videos
and
procrastinated
and
I
thought
I
was
productive
It's
really
important
that
you
build
up
this
momentum
and
start
putting
the
work
in
then
you
will
see
some
results
Well
that's
great
advice
Thank
you
Timo
for
coming
on
and
sharing
Awesome
business
you
built
20
hours
per
month
super
cool
Let
us
know
in
the
comments
what
you
think
about
Timo's
app
Thanks
for
coming
on
and
sharing
inspiring
many
Thank
you
very
All
right
Gus
producer
of
Starter
Story
what
do
you
think
I've
actually
been
getting
a
lot
of
TikTok
ads
for
apps
and
my
first
thought
is
this
approach
seems
just
like
a
lot
simpler
Just
makes
me
think
like
oh
is
this
the
next
chapter
of
like
how
to
promote
apps
online
I
think
this
is
going
to
become
a
lot
bigger
At
first
this
whole
UGC
thing
was
like
completely
new
and
ads
were
like
more
traditional
But
now
you're
seeing
everyone
who
created
all
this
organic
content
or
they're
paying
influencers
The
next
logical
step
that's
going
to
happen
is
that
you
run
them
on
paid
But
what's
so
genius
about
this
is
it's
doing
all
the
work
for
you
Sure
you're
going
to
take
a
little
bit
less
on
the
profit
his
profit
margins
which
was
awesome
that
he
shared
was
25
30
percent
He's
putting
capital
to
the
business
so
that
he
can
go
work
on
other
things
so
he
can
have
a
lifestyle
so
he
can
travel
And
I
think
we're
going
to
start
seeing
this
a
lot
more
So
I
will
put
a
link
down
there
to
our
mobile
app
growth
cheat
sheet
It
shows
you
seven
different
growth
strategies
that
you
can
try
for
your
app
based
on
real
people
that
are
building
real
apps
And
these
are
strategies
that
are
actually
working
for
them
So
check
that
down
there
in
the
description
You
can
watch
that
one
100
percent
for
free
Let
us
know
what
you
thought
about
the
tick
tock
playbook
Hope
to
see
you
in
the
next
one
Peace
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