30 Post IdeasFrom 2,385 Top Posts
Most people decide what to post about by gut. This guide ranks 13 topics by how often they became one of the creator's best posts, then turns the 6 that win most into 30 post ideas you can fill in.
Free · 30 fill-in post ideas · 1 Claude prompt
01 · Read this first
Pick your topic by the numbers
You'll know which topics to post about more and which to stop leaning on, plus a prompt that turns your own facts into 10 post ideas.
You can use every idea by hand: copy it and change only the parts in {curly brackets}. Or paste your notes into the prompt in section 05 and let Claude fill them in from your own facts.
02 · How we built this
2,385 posts, 49 creators
Step 1
2,385
top posts from 49 creators, May 31 to October 14
Step 2
15
topics, one written definition each
Step 3
2,297
posts ranked (88 fit no topic)
Step 4
13
topics after merging money and investing
Step 5
30
fill-in post ideas from the top 6
- We pulled every qualifying post from our swipe file, the same one behind our 50 opening lines and 25 post templates: 2,385 posts from 49 creators, published between May 31 and October 14, 2026.
- Qualifying means the post already beat 80% of its creator's other posts, so every post was a winner before we touched it.
- This time we sorted each post by what it's about, not how it opens or how it's laid out. Claude read every post in full and gave it one main topic, using a written definition and tie-break rules for each of 15 topics.
- We merged making money with investing, since both are posts about money. The 88 posts that fit no topic (memes, giveaways, personal updates) are left out of the ranking, which leaves 13.
- Post ranks are as of October 19, 2026, and drift a little as new posts come in.
How to read the numbers
- Hit the top 5%: out of every 100 posts on this topic, how many became one of that creator's own best 5% of posts. It measures how often a topic produced a creator's best work, not how often a post went viral. The average across all 2,297 ranked posts is 27%.
- vs. their usual: how often the topic hit the top 5% compared with what the same creators usually hit. 1.3x means 30% more often than their own normal. It stops one prolific creator from carrying a whole topic.
The method has three limits. Every post was already a winner, so this ranks topics among winners and can't tell you how often a topic flops. Topics overlap more than openers do, so some calls were close: a post about an AI tool that made money could sit in either. And every post is from X, so section 07 covers what to change when you bring a topic over.
03 · The scoreboard
All 13 topics, ranked
Rows 01 to 06 are the topics in section 08, and the weakest ones are in section 09. The full numbers are in the table under the chart.
| Topic | Posts | Creators | Top 5% | Hit rate | vs. their usual |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 01 Money | 180 | 33 | 61 | 34% | 1.30x |
| 02 Mindset & life | 289 | 22 | 92 | 32% | 1.11x |
| 03 AI tools | 261 | 42 | 82 | 31% | 1.20x |
| 04 Marketing & growth | 581 | 37 | 163 | 28% | 0.96x |
| 05 Building a product | 82 | 19 | 23 | 28% | 1.04x |
| 06 Startups & fundraising | 172 | 34 | 47 | 27% | 1.02x |
| 07 Tech & platform news | 19 | 7 | 5 | 26% | 0.96x |
| 08 Running a team | 91 | 19 | 22 | 24% | 0.89x |
| 09 The future of AI | 49 | 17 | 11 | 22% | 0.84x |
| 10 Careers & the 9-to-5 | 68 | 20 | 15 | 22% | 0.84x |
| 11 Growing an audience | 277 | 28 | 56 | 20% | 0.73x |
| 12 Sales & outbound | 213 | 26 | 43 | 20% | 0.80x |
| 13 Famous stories | 15 | 9 | 3 | 20% | 0.77x |
| All ranked posts | 2,297 | 49 | 623 | 27% | 1x |
Tech news (19 posts) and famous stories (15) are too small to read much into. Famous people still show up all over the set, just as the opener of a post about something else, which is why they win as a first line and barely register as a topic.
04 · 8 things we learned
What wins, what loses
The patterns behind the ranking, so you can spot a weak topic before you write the post.
1. Money wins most often. Posts about revenue, income, pricing or investing hit the top 5% 34% of the time, across 33 creators, the best rate of any topic. They beat their creators' usual rate by 1.3x, so this isn't one account carrying it.
2. AI tools are the safest bet. 42 of the 49 creators posted about a specific AI tool, more than any other topic, and those posts still hit 31%, above the 27% average.
3. Show the AI tool, don't predict the future. Posts about what AI will do to jobs and industries hit 22%. Posts showing one tool doing one job hit 31%.
4. Your own lane is often your weakest topic. Creators who teach audience growth hit 21% when they posted about growing an audience and 32% when they posted about anything else. Sales and cold email creators: 20% on sales, 30% on everything else. The one big exception is AI: AI creators did better staying on AI (31% vs. 23%).
| Creators (how many) | Their own lane | In their lane | Outside it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Audience growth creators (7) | growing an audience | 21% of 174 | 32% of 440 |
| Sales and cold email creators (8) | sales and outbound | 20% of 133 | 30% of 73 |
| Ads and ecommerce creators (7) | marketing | 26% of 97 | 32% of 141 |
| SaaS builders (8) | building, startups and money | 28% of 127 | 26% of 288 |
| AI creators (7) | AI | 31% of 106 | 23% of 181 |
| Every creator with a clear lane | 25% of 893 | 29% of 1,302 |
5. Growing an audience is the weakest big topic. 277 posts from 28 creators hit 20%, and 0.73x their usual is the lowest of all 13. People follow you for what you know about their world, not for how you got followers.
6. Sales posts sit at the bottom too. 213 posts on selling, cold email and outbound hit 20%, level with growing an audience. When sales and cold email creators posted about anything else, they hit 30%.
7. Marketing is everywhere and dead average. 581 of the 2,297 posts were about marketing, about a quarter of the set, and they hit 28%, a point off the 27% average. Volume didn't buy them anything.
8. Mindset works best for people who live there. Mindset posts hit 32%, but Jay Yang wrote 57 of the 92 top posts. Without him the topic hits 29%, still above average.
- Weaker
- Stronger
Predict AI, or show the tool
Future of AI 22%AI tools 31%Audience creators: their lane, or anything else
In lane 21%Outside 32%Sales creators: their lane, or anything else
In lane 20%Outside 30%Grow an audience, or talk money
Audience 20%Money 34%
05 · Write 10 post ideas with Claude
1 prompt, your facts only
Get 10 post ideas in the topics that win, built only from facts about your own business.
- Open section 08 and copy the topics you want to try, or the whole section.
- Paste a few notes about your business and the topics into the prompt below, where it says.
- Send it to Claude and answer its questions.
You're helping me plan LinkedIn posts in the topics that win most often. Here's what I do and who I sell to: [2 OR 3 LINES ABOUT YOUR BUSINESS] Here are notes I can draw on (results, numbers, clients, tools I use, people I've met, opinions): [PASTE YOUR NOTES HERE] Here are the winning topics, with fill-in post ideas: [PASTE SECTION 08 HERE, OR ONLY THE TOPICS YOU WANT TO TRY] Before you write anything, ask me for any fact you'd need: a revenue number, a tool and what it did, a person and their result, a bet I'd make. If I don't have it, drop that idea. Rules: - Use only facts from my notes or my answers. Never invent a number, a name, a quote or a result. - Write 10 post ideas across the topics, at least 2 from Money and 2 from AI tools if my notes allow it. - For each idea, give the first line and 3 bullets on what the post covers. - If an idea is about my own lane (what I sell), rewrite it through money, a tool or someone else's result. - No em dashes, no hashtags, no "Here's the thing", and never open on "Most people". When you're done, give me: 1. The 10 ideas, grouped by topic 2. The one I should write first, and why 3. Any idea that needs a fact I haven't given you yet
Claude asks for the facts each idea needs before it writes one. Give it real numbers and real names and it won't have to guess.
06 · Turn your lane into a winner
Same expertise, a better topic
You don't have to stop posting about what you know. Write it through a topic that wins.
| If your post is about... | Write it as... | Example first line |
|---|---|---|
| Growing an audience (20%) | Money (34%): what the audience earned you | One post brought in {3 clients} worth {$40k}. Here's the post: |
| Sales tips (20%) | AI tools (31%): the tool that books the meetings | We gave {Claude} {300 old leads} and {one job}. {12} replied. |
| Where AI is going (22%) | AI tools (31%): one tool, one job, today | I let {an agent} {run our invoicing} for {a month}. What it got wrong: |
| Your team (24%) | Money (34%): what a hire or a cut did | The {one hire} that {doubled our margin}, and what we paid: |
| Your career (22%) | Mindset (32%): the lesson, not the job title | The {confidence} you get from {doing what you said you'd do} is insane. |
| Marketing tips (28%) | Money (34%): the tip with the revenue attached | We added {Reddit} at {$10k MRR}. It took us to {$25k}: |
07 · Taking these to LinkedIn
What changes on LinkedIn
Every post in the set ran on X. The topics carry over, the packaging needs a few changes.
| On X | On LinkedIn |
|---|---|
| Revenue screenshot or MRR milestone | Say what the number means for the reader first, then show it. Put the screenshot under the text. |
| One-line mindset post, all lowercase | Keep it to one or two lines, in sentence case, with nothing after it. |
| AI tool demo video | Upload the video natively and put the tool's link in the first comment. |
| Thread with a list ("10 boring websites:") | Put the whole list in one post, or turn it into a carousel. |
| Profanity and edgy jokes | Cut them. The same line reads harsher on LinkedIn. |
| Links in the post | Put them in the first comment. |
08 · The 6 topics that win
30 post ideas you can fill in today
Open any topic for the numbers, why it works and 5 fill-in post ideas. Under the ideas are the 5 real posts they came from, word for word, so you can see the topic working. The first 3 topics beat the average clearly. The next 3 land around it, so use them when you have a name or a number to pin them to.
01MoneyRevenue, income, pricing and investing: what something earned, cost or is worth.34%hit top 5%
Why it works
A number with a dollar sign is the one thing every reader holds up against their own life, so they stop, compare and save.
This {guy} sells {AI employees} to {small businesses}. He's done {21 setups} in {6 months}, almost all from {referrals}.
Best tip I can give {first-time founders}: get to {$1M liquid} outside the business as fast as you can.
{Your company} just crossed {$300k MRR}. Here's why most {AI startups} never get past {$1k}:
Your brain can't comprehend how {rich a billionaire} is. {A Ferrari} costs {$350K}...
{Boring websites} are earning {$532,000+} a month. {10} of them:The 5 real posts, as they ran
Corey Ganim@coreyganimThis guy sells AI employees to small businesses.
He's a non-technical designer with no audience, spends $0 on ads, has no tech background. Yet he's still done 21 agent setups in 6 months, almost all from referrals. His model: install one AI agent as a digital employee, then get paid monthly to manage it and coach the owner. Setup fee plus a per-agent monthly rate.
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@fhlcreative came on the Build With AI pod to walk us through the whole playbook. Here's what I learned: 1. The product is the coaching, not the agent. Owners treat AI like Google. You get paid to manage it so they never have to. 2. Raise your price every yes. $500 setups became $1,000. Now he's targeting $2,000 setups plus $1,000/month per agent. 3. Give the agent a value ledger. It logs every task and sends a weekly ROI report. One client's first week: 63 hours saved, $6,300 in value. 4. Put yourself in the group chat. Telegram group with Phil, the client, and the agent. The client learns by watching him talk to it. 5. The agents handle real multi-step work. One prompt: find the invoice email, extract the PDF into Excel, save to Dropbox, send the link. Done in 10 minutes. 6. Uptime is a selling point. The best prospects tried agents themselves and quit when they broke. Phil fixes it before the client notices. 7. Free work is the referral engine. Friends in his small Georgia town told friends in Atlanta and Dallas. Now he has clients nationwide. 8. The pitch is one text. "I'm testing a managed agent service. Want to be a guinea pig? I'll charge you less." First client: $250/month. 9. Make the agent write to Excel, not its own markdown. A shared source of truth is the difference between a demo and a system. 10. Phil builds his agents on @orgo. $29/month gets your agent a computer with pre-built templates. Phil's agent handles the Orgo admin itself. His 2 key takeaways: 1. You only need to be one step ahead. If you've built an agent for yourself, you know more than the owner who never has. Charge from day one. 2. Visible ROI is the retention strategy. A weekly "you saved $6,300" report re-sells the retainer every single week. Phil is doing this at a level most technical people are not, and we had a blast going deep on it. Go follow @fhlcreative Full video below. https://t.co/mlTEqIQYAN (Also available on the Build With AI podcast wherever you get your pods)
Ayman Al-Abdullah 🧱@aymanalabdulBest tip I can give first-time founders:
Get to $1M liquid outside the business as quickly as you can $1M invested at ~10% = ~$100K/year That’s baseline survival secured so you can keep building forever Want to get there faster? Get the CEO Weekly Metrics Dashboard (for free). The 7 key metrics that help you catch cash, churn, hiring, and growth issues before they become expensive. Track the right metrics to get your cash growing: https://t.co/7UhD4wcFl2
GojiberryAI just crossed $300k MRR!
We are growing by 30% per month and will probably hit $6m ARR at the end of the year. Why do most AI startups never make it past $1k MRR... while others scale to millions? After building GojiberryAI, I realized it has very little to do with better features. It comes down to two simple thing. If you're building a startup, pay attention. BTW, Find and contact high intent lead here (free trial included) : https://t.co/FsYsbyEFxN
James Camp@JamesonCampYour brain cannot comprehend how rich a billionaire is.
A Ferrari costs $350K. You can buy one on a good W2 salary. A mega yacht costs $500M. That is 1,400 Ferraris. Renting that yacht for a week costs more than most people make in a year. Owning it costs more than most companies are worth. Ferrari money is entry level rich. And the gap between entry level and the top is so massive your brain literally shuts off trying to process it.
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You don't want to be a billionaire. You want $10M, a paid off house, and freedom to do whatever you want on a Tuesday. That IS the dream. For 99% of people. But you won't believe that because the internet convinced you anything less than a billion is failure.
Indie hackers run boring websites.
They are earning $532,000+ per month. 10 boring websites: 1. Bank Statement Converter This is a web-based tool that converts bank statements in PDF format into organized Excel (XLS) and CSV spreadsheet files. Revenue: $40,000+/m. https://t.co/p1FbHufvps 2. PDFShift A developer tool built to do one unsexy task, which is to convert HTML documents into crisp PDFs via a simple API.
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Revenue: $20,000+/m. https://t.co/Y5vPhlPst1 3. ScreenshotOne An API that generates clean, automated screenshots of web pages for developer pipelines, omitting cookie banners and popups. Revenue: $33,000+/m. https://t.co/6dqlnsZoZf 4. PDFMonkey A cloud-based PDF generation platform and REST API that automates creating professional documents from HTML/Liquid templates and dynamic JSON data. Revenue: $33,000+/m. https://t.co/Gb8kW3YGG9 5. Wavve An online tool that turns audio clips, such as podcasts or music, into engaging, custom-branded videos for social media. Revenue: $150,000+/m. https://t.co/O6kkCeasUj 6. Geocod An API that converts street addresses into latitude and longitude coordinates and coordinates back into readable addresses. Revenue: $80,000+/m. https://t.co/VCG7qeRjEl 7. Floorplanner An online, browser-based tool used to create 2D and 3D floor plans and interior designs without needing complex CAD software. Revenue: $150,000+/m. https://t.co/CS6aHzppwu 8. LightGallery LightGallery is a lightweight, modular JavaScript library used to create responsive image and video gallery lightboxes. Revenue: $10,000+/m. https://t.co/J7N19fdnAU 9. Real Work From Anywhere This is a specialized job board or employment platform where work can be done from anywhere in the world. Revenue: $10,000+/m. https://t.co/qNMuXbZ0Jx 10. SEO Wins It has 150+ SEO / AI SEO strategies that anyone can use to grow their website traffic from Google, Bing, ChatGPT, etc. Revenue: $6,000+/m. https://t.co/w0PMoiOkae That's the end of the thread. Anyway, I can help you in 3 ways: 🔸 SEO Wins Database 🔸 1 on 1 Consultation Call 🔸 AI SEO / SEO Services View Bio/Pin Post to get help...
Watch out
Only use numbers you can show. Rounded-up revenue gets called out in the comments, and one bad number undoes the post.
02Mindset & lifeHabits, confidence, ambition and how to live: lessons anyone can apply to themselves.32%hit top 5%
Why it works
It's about the reader, not your business, so anyone can pass it on without explaining your industry.
The {confidence} you gain when you {say you'll do something and then do it} is insane.
Modern {travel} is {flying 10 hours} to get {the same coffee you have at home}.
You can {brainwash yourself into success}. I've {moved across the world twice} to do it.
{Famous founder} {sold his first company for $300m} at {27}. You actually are behind.
Turning {27} is not that serious. I know {guys who were broke at 30 and millionaires by 32}.The 5 real posts, as they ran
Jay Yang@JayyanginspiresThe amount of confidence you gain when you say you’re going to do something and then you do it is insane.
signüll@signulllmodern travel is increasingly flying 10 hours to experience a slightly different version of the same globally optimized lifestyle.
same third wave coffee. same natural wine bar. same brutalist menu. same sourdough. same beige hotel. same tasteful ceramics. same instagram lighting. what a ridiculous convergence.
James Camp@JamesonCampYou can brainwash yourself into success. I'm dead serious.
Your brain takes in 11 million bits of data per second and filters it down to roughly 50. Your Reticular Activating System decides what makes the cut based on what you tell it matters. Tell it you're going to win and it starts finding proof you will. I've moved across the world twice to reprogram my brain. Both times I surrounded myself with people who had zero idea who I used to be.
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Everyone I met only knew the version of me I decided to be that day. It worked both times. If you're just stuck, if things aren't changing, they're not going to change on their own. How can you expect anything in you to change if you don't change the inputs you're getting? Go. Right now. If you want to be different a year from now, start today. Brainwash yourself.
George Lampropoulos@GeorgeLampro20Elon sold his first company for $300m at 27.
You actually are behind.
Turning 27 is not that serious. You guys are basically writing eulogies for your potential.
I know guys who were broke at 30 and deca millionaires by 32. There's 18 year olds doing better than people who are 35. Is the 35 year old too late, or was the 18 year old too early? Age is irrelevant. It's a personal decision to go make it work, whether you're 16 or 40. https://t.co/L0g0lWs5u5
Watch out
Jay Yang wrote 57 of this topic's 92 top posts. Without him it hits 29%, still above average but by less. Make it one post in five, not your whole feed.
03AI toolsUsing, building with or reacting to one specific AI tool, model or agent.31%hit top 5%
Why it works
Everyone is trying to work out which AI tools are worth their time, and a post that shows one doing a real job answers that in 30 seconds.
I finally cracked {frontend design} with AI, and I'm {not a designer}. Here's how:
My entire {AI stack} is now {cheaper models}. {87%} cheaper, {same revenue}. The swaps:
We gave {an AI tool} {700 leads} and {one job}. In {40 seconds} it {scored every message}.
{9} {Claude} prompts worth trying:
RIP to everyone who {bought a Mac Mini} to {run agents 24/7}. {DigitalOcean} now does it {in the cloud}.The 5 real posts, as they ran
Machina@EXM7777i finally cracked frontend design with AI... without using any skill
frontend needs taste to not look like slop, and i'm more of an engineer than an artist, so i'm genuinely bad at it my way around it: collecting inspirations and modules from other people, building a lego of components resources you can send to your agents: - https://t.co/7CUfh1jSmr - https://t.co/hKiKiyjLd8
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- https://t.co/XMkWlWenQv - https://t.co/k3p8MhfvCj - https://t.co/PTkhqaLgU7 it's VERY easy for agents to edit components once they have the code you send the link, your agent fetches the full list of components, then you ask it to find the best way to integrate them into your frontend foundation the easiest way i found to make your UI/UX drastically better without being a genius designer https://t.co/7RJApYSStw
My entire AI stack is now Chinese 🇨🇳
87% cheaper. same revenue swaps by task: 1. reasoning / backend brain Opus 4.8 → Kimi K2.7 benchmark gap: ~8% · price: ~11x cheaper 2. code generation GPT-5.5 → Qwen 3.7 Max benchmark gap: ~18% · price: ~7x cheaper 3. agent loops + tool calling Sonnet 4.7 → GLM 5.2 benchmark gap: ~3% · price: ~5x cheaper on input
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4. cheap volume / bulk processing GPT-5.5 mini → MiMo V2.5 benchmark gap: ~6% · price: ~12x cheaper 5. image generation GPT-Image-2 → Wan 2.5 benchmark gap: ~5% · price: ~8x cheaper 6. video generation Sora 2 → Kling 3.0 benchmark gap: roughly equal · price: ~6x cheaper [ result after 30 days: ] operating costs dropped 87%, output quality dropped 4% on average, revenue unchanged the most important that these models will be not banned in a month and i can run them locally nobody will steal my data and i can learn them as i need full article drops tomorrow with: > exact routing logic per task type > the 2 cases where I still pay for American > the migration playbook anyone can copy in a weekend VERY IMPORTANT to get migrated now, while it's not too late *IMPORTANT: I MADE A TYPO IN THIS POST 3. agent loops + tool calling Sonnet 4.7 → GLM 5.2 benchmark gap: ~3% · price: ~5x cheaper on input instead of Sonnet 4.7, there should be Opus 4.6 QUICK NOTE #2: Instead of GPT 5.5 mini (it doesn’t exist), there should be Sonnet 4.6 P.S. never do grammar check via Claude -_-
JEV is INSANE.
We gave it 700 high-intent leads and personalised outreach messages. In 40 seconds, it predicted how each message would perform, assigned a confidence score and detected lead-message mismatches. All for just $0.09. JEV can also score leads, analyse buying signals, match each prospect with the best message and identify the campaigns most likely to perform based on data.
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Coming soon to @GojiberryAI+ MCP. Comment “JEV” for early access. Video above is concept preview only, not actual product footage. Try https://t.co/FsYsbyEFxN here free for 7 days to get an early access on the JEV integration!
9 cool GPT 6 Astra prompts worth trying:
1. The bill renegotiator. "Go through my internet, phone, and software bills, jump into each provider's chat support, and negotiate them down or cancel what I'm not using." 2. Turn an agency into software. “Pick one service business in [niche] and reverse-engineer the exact workflow they sell to clients. Break it into steps, tools used, inputs, outputs, human judgment points, and places where the work gets slow or expensive. Then design the simplest AI product that could replace the first version of that service and charge $500-$5,000/month.” 3. Garage sale flipper. "Watch Facebook Marketplace and Craigslist in my city for [cameras / furniture / bikes] listed way under market, and text me the second one's mispriced with the link." 4. Create my 1 person company dashboard. “Look at my docs, notes, Stripe exports, analytics, customer calls, and project list, then build a weekly operator dashboard. I want to know what is making money, what is wasting time, what customers are asking for, what I should stop doing, and the three highest-leverage actions for next week. Be blunt and show your work.” 5. Audit my company for agent opportunities. “Look at how this business works and find the tasks we should give to agents before hiring another person. For each task, estimate the current human time, the cost of mistakes, the tools involved, the difficulty of automating it, and the first safe version we could deploy. Prioritize things that save money or create revenue within 30 days.” 6. Be my browser operator. “Use the browser to complete this workflow: [workflow]. As you go, click through the actual sites, collect the data, fill the forms where appropriate, and keep notes on what broke or slowed you down. When you’re done, give me the output, the repeatable SOP, and the automation plan so this can become an agent.” 7. The whole QA team. "Every night, open my app on a real phone, go through signup, checkout, and the main flows, and screenshot anything that's broken or confusing." 8. The competitor spy. "Sign up for my top 3 competitors, sit inside their product and their emails, and send me a monthly report on every new feature, price change, and thing they do better than us." 9. Make a game people would actually play for 5 minutes as a lead magnet “Build a browser game around this mechanic: [mechanic]. Don’t just make a cute demo; add progression, tension, scoring, failure, polish, and one reason someone would send it to a friend. Then add lead capture (email/sms), it needs to tie into my core product which sells XYZ.”
Vadim@VadimStrizheusRIP to everyone who bought a Mac Mini to run OpenClaw or Hermes Agent 24/7 💀
including myself digitalocean now runs claude code and codex for you in the cloud you can close your laptop and the agent keeps working. the second it goes idle it pauses and you stop paying for compute it wakes back up in ~300ms into the same session on any device the model never even sees your API keys cloud agents are the future
Watch out
Tool news goes stale in days. Lead with what the tool did for you, and keep the launch details for the second half.
04Marketing & growthHow a company got customers: ads, SEO, AI search, content, launches and creative.28%hit top 5%
Why it works
Readers want to know how a specific company got its customers. Every post below names the company, the channel or the number.
Pay attention to what {Tally} is doing in {AI search} right now:
I've watched {4 people} hit {their first million} this year doing the same thing.
We scaled to {$3.5M ARR} in {under a year}. The channel we added at each stage:
I've interviewed {100} of the best {growth leaders}. {Name} is top 3. What I learned:
I started {running ads} {3 months ago} and went from {$25k a month} to {$27k a week}.The 5 real posts, as they ran
Pay attention to what Tally is doing in AI search right now because this might be the best playbook for getting recommended by ChatGPT I've seen:
> AI search is now their #1 acquisition channel > 10,000+ new users every week say they discovered Tally through AI platforms > their tracked ChatGPT registrations jumped 5x overnight in May > they grew from $258K MRR to $422K MRR in 10 months, crossing $5M ARR with just 11 people, $0 funding, against much bigger competitors
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> their comparison hub now has 7 direct competitor pages + 15 more “best”, “alternative” and integration-focused guides > these pages are structured like AI answers: rankings, “best for” labels, pricing, feature tables, reviews, pros/cons and direct recommendations > they’re constantly refreshing these pages > they literally ask new users for the exact prompt they used to discover Tally through AI > they track the prompts people use to find them, their visibility vs competitors and which sources AI platforms actually cite > they've built a database of articles that mention competitors but not Tally to identify distribution gaps > they monitor brand + competitor mentions across Reddit and communities, then route them into a shared inbox and aim to clear all mentions every day > they actively ask customers for reviews through their newsletter + after support interactions, helping them reach 4.8/5 on G2 and 4.9/5 on Product Hunt > they built an entire “AI Info” page specifically for ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini and Perplexity explaining what Tally is, who it’s for and why people use it > that page literally includes “AI assistant guidelines” telling LLMs which strengths, use cases and pricing model to reference > they published an llms.txt mapping out their product, pricing, customers, documentation, API and MCP pages > they even built a 21-tool MCP server + ChatGPT app + Claude connector so Tally can now be used directly inside AI products One thing to keep in mind: Tally didn’t start with some genius AI search strategy. They spent years building a product people genuinely recommended across Reddit, communities, reviews and the wider internet. ChatGPT recommends Tally because the internet does. But now they’re engineering around that signal to make sure it keeps happening. This isn’t luck, it’s possible for you too. Screenshot was taken from https://t.co/CL98c7Z4SE for AI visibility + prompt tracking :) https://t.co/uHiwbCjWGo Btw I’m showing the organic playbook to do this live on 26 August: https://t.co/KeV9n2j6LQ https://t.co/mUBMVpnFu0 https://t.co/humJEQopX5
James Camp@JamesonCampI've watched 4 people hit their first million this year doing the same thing.
They find viral content in their niche, pay a UGC creator $200 to remake it, and run paid behind whatever pops. The whole thing is embarrassingly simple and that's exactly why most people won't do it. They'd rather spend 6 months building something original that nobody sees. Want to see how to reverse engineer exactly how people do this? Ill send out a step by step framework in my newsletter next week https://t.co/w0DpOpHBtk
We scaled to $3.5M ARR in less than 1 year.
No one wants to hear this, but there’s no magic distribution channel. We scalled by testmaxxing every channel depending on our MRR level. €0 → $6k MRR: pure outbound. Cold email plus LinkedIn, using our own early product on ourselves. No brand, no audience, just us reaching out to people showing intent and starting conversations. Ugly, manual, effective.
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$10k → $25k MRR: Reddit. Our first real acquisition breakthrough. We posted educational breakdowns in SaaS subreddits and did 10M+ organic views. The traffic quality wasn't amazing, but the volume was so huge it flooded our trial funnel for months. Cost: basically zero. $25k → $75k MRR: content plus free blueprints. We went all-in on LinkedIn content, YouTube, motion-design videos, and giving away our internal systems as free "blueprints." Content got the reach, the blueprints earned the trust, and a chunk of readers converted. This is where founder-led content started compounding. $75k → $150k MRR: partnerships and X. We added Twitter, B2B influencers, sponsored newsletters, and a lifetime affiliate program that became a major lever. We also joined YC around here, and the intensity went vertical. $150k+ MRR: paid and hiring. Meta ads, Google ads, influencer agencies, and hiring seriously for the first time, growth, sales, engineering, product. None of these stages replaced the last one. They stacked. Outbound never stopped. Content never stopped. We just kept adding the next lever once the current one was clearly working. If you take one thing from this: don't chase five channels at once. Beat one until it works, then add the next. For outbound, i use https://t.co/krllhyN3mc (try it, it's free for 7 days !)
Harry Stebbings@HarryStebbingsI have interviewed 100 of the best growth leaders in the world.
@MattSwulinski is easily top 3. (alongside @alexschultz and Brian Hale) He scaled Wispr Flow to over $100M in ARR and built a UGC machine. He scaled Superhuman from founder personally onboarding every customer to a growth machine with $50M ARR. If you are an early stage founder or growth leader, this will be the best episode you will listen to this year!
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I condensed my biggest lessons from the discussion below: 1. The E-Commerce Playbook Is the Right Playbook for SaaS The e-commerce playbook, where every dollar spent ties directly to a purchase or conversion, is the right model for modern SaaS. With distribution becoming a critical moat in a crowded AI market, SaaS companies should deploy UGC creators, constantly test new creative, and diversify channels to build their brand. 2. Paid Acquisition Is the Fastest Way to Validate PLG Relying solely on organic content and word-of-mouth takes too long to validate product-market fit. Paid acquisition creates the fastest feedback loop for proving a PLG funnel works, allowing teams to test positioning, refine messaging, and optimize conversion within a single week. 3. You Only Need Three Core Channels to Scale to $10M ARR Startups often ruin their acquisition engines by trying to run ten channels poorly at once. Reaching the first $10M in ARR only requires mastering three core channels: video intent on Meta, search intent on Google, and lifecycle retention through email and SMS. 4. Scaling Paid Ads Requires 500 New Creatives Every Single Month On platforms like Meta, creative increasingly acts as the targeting algorithm. Scaling spend without hitting audience fatigue requires 400 to 500 new creative assets every month, produced through UGC revenue-share programs, specialized agencies, and internal teams. 5. How the Best Growth Leaders Test for True Spend Incrementally Blindly increasing ad spend wastes money on conversions that may have happened organically. The best growth leaders measure spend elasticity against ARR growth and run strict holdout tests to determine whether each additional dollar generates genuinely incremental revenue. 6. In Three Years, Companies Will Operate Like a Board of Directors Tech organizations are shifting away from manual execution. Within three years, lean human teams could operate more like boards of directors, spending 20% of their time on strategy while autonomous AI agents handle 80% of operational execution. 7. Fire Your Marketing Team if They Aren’t Systems Thinkers Marketers focused on repetitive manual tasks are becoming increasingly replaceable. High-performing teams need systems thinkers who can break their work into inputs and outputs, then build self-improving AI workflows that multiply their personal leverage by 10x. (links in comments) Spotify 👉https://t.co/CAgPW77Mhp Youtube 👉https://t.co/912A5Cc0g4 Apple Podcasts 👉https://t.co/iwW0GvK8F2
George Lampropoulos@GeorgeLampro20I started running ads 3 months ago and I went from $25k/mo to $27k a week.
Paid ads when done right is a legit money printer. Read everything I've learned in the last 3 months 👇 https://t.co/GVzhrJuYIL
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Marketing is 581 of the 2,297 posts, the most of any topic, and it lands right on the average. Pin it to a company or a number, or it blends in.
05Building a productHow a product gets built: the team, onboarding, design and what to ship first.28%hit top 5%
Why it works
It shows the decisions behind a product, and builders copy those straight into their own.
To build {a great product} now, you only need {two people}:
This {24-year-old} {built an app in 3 days} and grew it to {$25,000 a month}. The {8} things he did:
Here's how to build the best possible {onboarding} for {B2B}:
The {game design} term "{chocolate-covered broccoli}" perfectly describes most {edtech}.
One {onboarding screen} I'm obsessed with lately: {the commitment screen}.The 5 real posts, as they ran
signüll@signulllto build a cool product now, you really only need two ppl:
one dude with exceptional vision & taste who knows what should exist & can provide the right feedback loops for iteration. & one dude who is absolutely relentless about making it real no matter what. that’s it. & sometimes these two are the same.
Alex Olim@alexolim_This 24-year-old vibe-coded an app in 3 days and scaled it to $25,000 a month in revenue;
Mau had never installed TikTok, never worked a real job, and had no marketing background when any of this started He broke down 8 things he did to build and grow Prayer Lock: 1. Know how you will distribute before you write a line of code 2. Validate with content, not with waitlists Mau's validation framework is grounded in a simple principle: if a successful comparable app already exists in your niche, the competition itself confirms that demand is real and you can build and start distributing immediately
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If no comparable app exists, the approach is to create content marketing the product as though it were already live and watch whether people in the comments ask where to download it That organic signal, a stranger asking when they can get your product, is worth more than any email sign-up form will ever tell you 3. Launch with one feature and resist every instinct to add more Prayer Lock launched doing exactly one thing: it locks your phone until you pray That constraint was one of the most important competitive advantages Mau had in the early months, because every additional feature is complexity that makes the marketing harder and slows down the iteration cycle without meaningfully improving the outcome The founders with technical backgrounds face this as the most difficult decision in the entire process, because the engineering instinct consistently pushes toward completeness, and the market rewards clarity over completeness at every stage of early growth 4. Copy the structure of what works, then make it yours When Mau built Prayer Lock's landing page, Touch Grass was going viral on X with a format built around a demo video and a single bold header He replicated the structure directly, added his own colours and personality, and shipped it The same principle applied across his entire distribution approach: identify what is generating results in your niche or an adjacent one, understand the structural reason it works, and apply that understanding to your own product with your own identity layered over it Reverse engineering what works is a learnable skill Copying the surface of it without understanding the mechanism is where most founders waste months 5. The path from zero to $25,000 a month was built in three specific stages, each one unlocking the next Short UGC reaction videos with a product demo took Prayer Lock from zero to $2,000 in monthly revenue A second creator brought it to $3,000 Spark ads placed behind the organic UGC content already holding attention, specifically the videos sitting around 50,000 organic views, pushed revenue from $3,000 to $10,000 monthly Then a single creator who developed an entirely original format, generated 10,000 views immediately, and gave Mau a repeatable creative to amplify through paid ads took the whole system to $25,000 a month at $3 trial starts Every stage was a specific, deliberate bet made with the data available at that moment 6. The viral sense that makes distribution compound can only be built through direct experience Mau copied other creators' content strategies early in the process and generated nothing from it, because replicating the format gives you zero access to the intuition behind why the original worked The hook tension, the pacing, the specific emotional entry point that made someone stop scrolling - none of that transfers through imitation It accumulates through making content yourself, publishing it publicly, studying what the audience actually responds to, and iterating until the pattern becomes instinctive rather than analytical Every founder who automates the creative process before that understanding is built removes the education that makes every subsequent decision more accurate 7. Three million views from an automated YouTube channel produced roughly twenty paying customers Mau ran the fully automated YouTube channel as a deliberate experiment, scraping thousands of videos, attaching a CTA, scheduling them, and checking back three months later to find 50,000 subscribers and a reach number that looked extraordinary on a dashboard The conversion data made the conclusion straightforward: impressive platform metrics without customer revenue are not a distribution strategy, and a system that generates vanity views at scale without generating revenue is an experiment worth running once and then moving past The infrastructure challenge of running automated content without triggering platform suppression is genuinely difficult, and even when it resolves cleanly, the ROI does not justify treating it as a primary growth channel at this stage of the available tools 8. Automation is not what is moving the needle, and the founders building on that assumption are falling behind Mau's current biggest bets are AI agents automating internal business operations like reporting and creator communication, and paid Meta ads running through web funnels, neither of which involves removing the human from the creative process His argument is that the real operational leverage right now lives in the internal workflows that drain founders' time without producing direct output, and that the content itself still requires a founder who has built genuine taste through direct iteration The founders who will build durable apps over the next two years are the ones who obsess over distribution as the primary variable from the very beginning, and who develop that obsession through hands-on experience rather than through automation TLDR: 1. Plan distribution before writing code 2. Validate with content 3. Launch one feature and add nothing else 4. Copy the structure of what works and make it yours 5. Start with UGC, amplify what already gets views with Spark Ads, then scale the format that breaks out 6. Build taste by doing it yourself, and doing it again 7. Platform metrics without revenue aren't a strategy 8. Use automation for the admin work, and keep humans in the creative process The full conversation with Mau is linked below: https://t.co/mjhR4Eyn6O Join 5,000+ App Founders getting weekly emails on organic user acquisition: https://t.co/KZoNuqJV0S
Here is how to build the best possible onboarding experience for B2B
There are two parts to this: the onboarding (getting them to value) and the setup (getting them to real usage). Part 1: Onboarding The goal of a good onboarding is 4 things. 1. Get them to the best possible version of your product with zero effort The best version that's achievable without any effort other than clicking a few buttons. No integrations, no calls, no configuration screens.
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2. Make them feel your product was built for their use case If you serve different industries, you need to surface logos, testimonials, and integrations that are relevant to them. If you serve different use cases, you need to do only show features and integrations for their use case. You know this by getting their website or asking them in the first step. In our case, once the user inputs their website (@postbridge_) so I surfaced @firecrawl , Brevo, Sage, PhotoAI (@levelsio), and Postiz (@wickedguro) because they're the closest match, and Dolby because it's a big name. 3. Teach the user the value of upgrading to a paid plan While they're onboarding, you need to make them choose features they want to use. In our case: integrations, voice, helpdesk, all gated behind a paywall. Show how these features work to make them understand and to make them interested, then make it clear that they get this stuff if they subscribe. 4. Motivate them to take the next step Make them excited and eager to continue the setup. You do this by having a good aha moment while showing some features that take this further. But they have to continue to the next step to get there. The most important thing You need to reach an aha moment as fast and as smooth as possible. And while getting there, get info from the user about what they care about, so you know how to upsell them. You also need to flex your features as they're going through the onboarding. Then you go to the complete setup step to get to the better version, once they're convinced that this will help them. Part 2: Setup After the user reaches a product they can play around with, they probably still need to continue the setup. Integrations, configuring stuff, etc. The goal here is to have the user build something that they will use/go live with and continue using. In our case they need to: add more data sources add more actions connect to the tools they use You're optimizing to have them go live, get the agent deployed on at least one channel. The metric to measure here is usage. A good onboarding flow gets your user to: Understand your product Understand that it was built for them Understand the value of paying Start using your product in production
The game design term "chocolate-covered broccoli" perfectly describes most edtech.
You take something boring, wrap it in something fun, and kids see through it in about five minutes. Meanwhile Factorio teaches supply chain optimization and never has to disguise the learning. The learning IS the game mechanic. If your educational game needs a fun wrapper, the game design is the problem.
One app onboarding screen I'm obsessed with lately: the commitment screen
Say it's a fitness weight loss app "Commit to 60 days to build your dream body" Instead of a button, there's a guy on a bench press Every tap pushes the bar up a little 4 taps and he locks out the rep Two things just happened > They got a tiny dopamine hit from finishing the rep, so the app already feels fun
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> They told you, with their own thumb, that they're committed for 60 days Then they hit the paywall and the math in their head changes "I already said I'm doing this, am I really gonna let $20/mo stand between me and my dream body" Mind games? A little Works though
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Only 82 posts from 19 creators, so treat the rate as direction. Most readers on LinkedIn don't build products, so tie it to a result they care about.
06Startups & fundraisingStarting a company, raising money, startup bets and how startups win.27%hit top 5%
Why it works
Every founder wants to know where the next opening is, so a clear bet with a reason behind it gets passed on.
I can't think of a better risk/reward bet right now than {building a ChatGPT plugin}.
Everyone's sleeping on how good {2026} is to start a company. One person can now:
We went from {0} to {2,200 paying customers} in {under a year} by following {YC}'s {15} rules:
Guy I know {raised $10 million} and {parked it in a savings account}.
{Instagram} copied {Stories} from {Snapchat} and it became {its most used feature}.The 5 real posts, as they ran
I literally can't think of a better risk/reward bet right now than building a ChatGPT plugin and getting in front of their 1.2 billion weekly users.
As of yesterday, ChatGPT recommends plugins in the middle of conversations. Millions of questions get asked every day with no plugin to recommend. Each one is an empty slot. Facebook apps in 2007. iPhone apps in 2008. TikTok in 2019. Every big platform has a few months where distribution is free, and most people miss it.
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I saw this firsthand when I lived in SF building venture backed companies. They are sacred times! If I were starting this week: 1. Find a tool or workflow people already Google for or do by hand every week (PDF to Excel, invoice generator, weekly client reports) 2. Build it as a ChatGPT plugin 3. Write the description using the exact phrases people type into ChatGPT 4. Ship 5 of them and see which ones get picked up 5. Double down on the one with the most traction In 12 months these slots will be crowded but right now they're pretty empty. Most people will realize ChatGPT plugins were the biggest free distribution channel of 2026 sometime in 2027.
Finn Mallery@fin465everyone's sleeping on how absurdly good 2026 is to start a company (even compared to 2024)
one person can now: - ship full apps without engineers (cursor, replit) - design without being a designer (v0, Claude Design) - turn one video into 10 clips (opus, descript) - push those clips to millions (X, Linkedin, TikTok) - replace a support team (chatbase, intercom) - literally watch exactly what their users do (Posthog)
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- find + target perfect leads on autopilot (origami) This is such a rare window. I just can’t imagine it being this easy ever again get your first 10 customers for free https://t.co/Mm21BuHcPz
Pierre-Eliott Lallemant@pierreeliottlalWe went from 0 to 2,200 paying customers in under a year by following @ycombinator's 15 rules:
1/ Do things that don't scale. Get your first 10 customers by hand. 2/ Launch now, not when it's "ready". A mediocre product in front of real users teaches you more in a week than 6 months of polishing in the dark. 3/ Charge from day one. If nobody will pay, you don't have a startup, you have a hobby.
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4/ Talk to users every single day. The roadmap you need is sitting in your customers' heads, and they'll hand it to you for free 5/ Always hunt the 90/10 solution. For almost any feature there's a way to capture 90% of the value with 10% of the effort. 6/ There are only two real jobs: write code and talk to users. Everything else (conferences, press, VC coffees, corp dev calls) is fake work. 7/ You pick your customers as much as they pick you. 10 users who love you beat 1,000 who kind of like you. 8/ Growth is an output, not a strategy. Grow before product market fit and all you're buying is churn. 9/ Do less, really well. Pick one or two metrics and judge every task against them. 10/ Know if you're default alive. Paul Graham's question: on current growth and current burn, do you reach profitability before the money runs out? 11/ Don't hire until it hurts. Headcount is not progress, it's burn. Every great startup was embarrassingly small for embarrassingly long. 12/ Momentum is the only real moat in year one. Ship something every week, even something tiny. 13/ Every great startup is badly broken at some point. The game isn't avoiding fires, it's how fast you put them out. Again. And again 14/ Ignore your competitors. Startups die of suicide, not murder. In year one, the only company that can kill yours is your own 15/ Startups rarely die from running out of money. They die because the founders fall out. Brutal honesty with your cofounder is the cheapest insurance you'll ever buy Good luck !
Mitchell@MitcheIlGuy I know raised $10 million from VCs
He parked it into a high-yield savings account and "hired" a few employees that are just AI agents He's reporting $33k MRR (the interest from the savings account) Paying himself $25k a month VCs are happy because he's actually generating revenue, unlike a lot of their investments He thinks he can just keep doing this for a couple years
James Camp@JamesonCampInstagram straight up copied Stories from Snapchat and it became the most used feature on the platform
Google was the 18th search engine. Zoom launched into a market Skype had owned for a decade. Shopify didn't invent ecommerce. I grew a hearing aid brand 8x in a market that had existed for literally 100 years. Bought media properties that were already profitable. Never invented a single thing. Originality is overrated. The money is in executing better on something people already want.
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This one lands right on the average. It works when the post makes a clear bet, and a summary of the news doesn't.
09 · Topics that rarely win
Rewrite these before you post
- The topic to drop
- What to write instead
Growing an audience → Money
20%34%Sales & outbound → AI tools
20%31%The future of AI → AI tools
22%31%Careers → Mindset
22%32%
| Topic | Hit the top 5% | Write this instead |
|---|---|---|
| Growing an audience | 20% (56 of 277) | What the audience earned you: the client, the deal, the revenue one post brought in (Money, 34%) |
| Sales & outbound | 20% (43 of 213) | The tool or system that books the meetings, with its numbers (AI tools, 31%) |
| Careers & the 9-to-5 | 22% (15 of 68) | The lesson, written so anyone can use it (Mindset, 32%) |
| The future of AI | 22% (11 of 49) | One tool doing one job today (AI tools, 31%) |
| Running a team | 24% (22 of 91) | What a hire, a fire or a process did to revenue (Money, 34%) |
10 · What's next
Write them yourself, or hand them off
Write them yourself. Put your notes through the prompt in section 05, pick the idea it says to write first, and open it with a line from our 50 opening lines.