1 hour a day of short-form video: 30,000 app downloads in a month, no ads
- 30,000
- Downloads
- 300
- Videos to find a winner
- $0
- Budget
- Not disclosed
- Duration
Jack Friks spends about an hour a day making and posting 6 short videos across warmed-up TikTok and Instagram accounts. He reports 30,000 downloads for his B2C app in a month, with no paid ads.
01The problem
Get thousands of downloads for a B2C app without a paid-ads budget.
02The hypothesis
New accounts warmed up in the target niche, posting remakes of formats that already work, with a CTA pointing at the app, will drive downloads — not just views.
03The experiment
Open a new Instagram or TikTok account and warm it up: 15 minutes a day for 2–3 days, scrolling, following, liking and commenting only in your target niche. Save videos you could remake to promote your app.
On day 3, post a remake of one saved video. The caption, a comment or the end of the video must point at the app.
Post one thoughtful video a day per warmed account while testing formats. Aim for short videos that drive watch time and comments. Finding his winning format took 300+ videos; after that he posted 3 a day on one account and 2 a day on another.
Instagram is his main account; each video is re-uploaded to YouTube, TikTok and others with his own scheduler, Postbridge. If an account can't break ~500 views, he pauses 2–3 days and works on the content.
04Results
| Metric | Result |
|---|---|
| Downloadslast month, with this routine | 30,000 |
| Videos to find a winner“300+” | 300 |
| Hours a daymaking + posting 6 videos | 1 |
| Revenue | Not disclosed |
| Spend | $0 |
“Not disclosed” means the source doesn't say. We never estimate or fill in missing numbers.
05What worked — and what didn't
What worked
- Warming up each new account in the niche before posting (critical on TikTok)
- Remaking formats that already work, with a CTA tied to the app
- One thoughtful post a day until a format wins, then more volume
- Posting once and cross-posting everywhere with a scheduler
What didn't work
- Buying old accounts — he says they're very hard to warm up or retarget
- Spraying out many low-effort videos a day before finding a format
- Chasing views without a download CTA
“If you just want views but no downloads, whats the use of this?”
06Source & evidence
- View original
Originally shared on X · Nov 11, 2024
1 hour a day marketing my app: 30,000 downloads last month
Public source. Extracted from publicly available content by the founder.
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- Channel
- Short-form video
- Estimated effort
- High
- Original duration
- Not disclosed
- Original budget
- $0
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