The Story
Three friends - Ramone, Blaine, and Justin - went from $0 to $120,000 MRR with an AI app in less than 10 months. They all came from VC-backed startups but grew sick of the system and decided to build something for themselves.
Blaine hosts DTC Pod with Ramone and noticed a painful problem: writing show notes from podcasts. He couldn't assign it to a VA who wouldn't understand the context. When AI emerged, they realized it could solve this problem.
- •"The real lesson there for any founder is just by doing something and putting yourself in a situation where you're constantly doing, you're going to unearth problems that are worth solving."
They built Cast Magic - an AI tool that leverages AI to create content from videos, audio files, and conversations. Any media can be repurposed into show notes, social posts, and more.
The AppSumo Launch
When AppSumo approached them with a 2-week deadline to launch, they took the opportunity despite the tight timeline.
- •"AppSumo was a sort of like a great springboard for us in order to establish a solid brand."
Results from the AppSumo launch:
- •One of the most successful launches ever on AppSumo
- •~$350,000 in revenue generated
- •~10,000 users acquired
- •Offered lifetime deals to build brand and get feedback
Growth Strategy
Creator Partnerships
- •Started incentivizing people to create content on socials
- •Some paid, some affiliate arrangements
- •Scraped Instagram and platforms to find adjacent industries
- •Built volume of outreach, then negotiated rates based on responses
One-Person Marketing Team
Ramone runs marketing with contractors for specific verticals. His approach:
- •Research how similar companies got distribution
- •Map out their affiliate strategies
- •Create systems (like a Notion doc of content concepts) to scale
- •"Something people don't do enough is research. You can actually go and map out how did this company that is similar to us get distribution."
Why Cast Magic Won
Three key reasons for success:
- •Solved their own problem
- •Built a brand by partnering with the right creators
- •Continuously invested in product quality
- •"In an AI product it's not just how does a platform work but what is the quality of the output that I'm getting here."
Business Numbers
- •$120,000+ MRR
- •Growing 20%+ month over month
- •Single-digit net churn
- •Marketing spend always under 20% of revenue
- •Profitable from early on
Tech Stack
- •Elixir with Phoenix and LiveView (full-stack in one language)
- •Webflow for landing page
- •LLMs and transcription services
Team Structure
Three co-founders with complementary skills:
- •Ramone: Marketing (Fort Lauderdale)
- •Blaine: Product (Miami)
- •Justin: Engineering (Austin)
How they work:
- •Mostly async during work week
- •Monday and Friday 30-minute standup calls
- •Quarterly in-person meetups for at least a week
- •Focus on shipping, not being stuck on calls
- •"Find a great group of people wherever they are in the world and do your own thing but make sure you also get together to get really aligned."
On VC Funding
The team is anti-VC this time around:
- •"We spent all the time we would have spent talking to VCs explaining the broad vision for our product and we just spend it talking to customers and building crap for ourselves."
Ramone's previous experience: Tried raising for 4 years for his business Trend.io. Learned that fundraising is a skill set that can distract from building.
Key Advice
- •Accept building an imperfect product
- •Embed yourself into existing workflows
- •Remove friction from barrier to entry
- •Build something customers want and are willing to pay for
- •Don't seek validation elsewhere - solve real problems
Resources
- •Cast Magic: https://www.castmagic.io/
- •DTC Pod (Blaine & Ramone's podcast)