This idea validation formula has made him $500K from iOS apps
A developer shares their strategy for building and flipping iOS apps, having made over $500,000 across four app flips. The approach centers on identifying trending app categories in the App Store and validating revenue potential using third-party tools before building.
Summary
The speaker outlines a systematic method for identifying profitable iOS app opportunities and flipping them for profit. Having completed this process four times and earned over $500,000, they describe a two-part validation formula.
The first step involves spotting trends in the App Store by examining which apps are currently ranking number one across different categories. The speaker then looks beyond the top app to identify whether multiple apps in the top 20 are addressing the same concept but targeting slightly different niches — a signal that a broader market opportunity exists.
The second step involves using a tool called Sensor Tower to verify the actual revenue numbers of these top-performing apps. If multiple apps in the same category are generating over $100K or $500K in monthly recurring revenue (MRR), the speaker treats this as strong validation that the market is real and worth entering. The transcript cuts off before further steps are revealed, but the methodology shown emphasizes data-driven market validation before committing to building.
Key Insights
- The speaker claims to have built and flipped iOS apps four times, generating over $500,000 in total from this strategy.
- The speaker argues that looking beyond the #1 ranked app to identify multiple top-20 apps serving similar niches is a key signal of a viable market opportunity.
- The speaker uses Sensor Tower specifically to verify real revenue figures for competing apps before deciding to build in a category.
- The speaker sets a revenue threshold of $100K–$500K in monthly recurring revenue across competing apps as the benchmark for confirming that a market is worth entering.
- The speaker frames the entire validation process as happening before building — trend spotting and revenue verification are prerequisites, not afterthoughts.
Topics
Transcript
[0:00] I build apps and flip them. I've done this four times and made over $500,000. Step one is spotting trends in the app store. And how you do that is actually pretty simple. You just essentially go to the app store and be able to see, okay, who is currently number one in the different categories. And then once you do that, you're able to then see, are there other apps also, let's say, in the top 20 who are doing exactly the same thing, but maybe for slightly different niches. Then I go to center tower to be able to see okay what's actually the revenue numbers of each and if I see all [0:31] of them are…
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