How AI Startups Can Go from “No Users” to “Users Coming Naturally”
From Zero to Natural Growth: How an AI Startup Solved the Cold Start Problem
Are you building an AI product but struggling to find users?
This deep-dive outlines how one AI startup moved from “no one uses it” to “users come naturally”.
You'll learn cold-start strategies, channel combinations, and user feedback loops — perfect for founders auditing their growth journey and product managers seeking repeatable, data-backed tactics.
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The Consumer AI Cold Start Challenge
For B2C AI products, the toughest problem often isn't the model itself — it's winning the first moment of a user’s attention.
Whether a stranger installs, stays, and pays will determine a startup’s survival.
Key truths:
- Technology isn’t the hardest part for small startups — acquiring users at a sustainable cost is.
- If Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC) exceeds Lifetime Value (LTV), the cycle breaks.
- Many AI tools have low replication barriers — competitors can match features quickly and undercut with lower prices or bigger ad budgets.
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1. Advertising & Paid Acquisition — Fast but Expensive
Paid ads deliver quick installs through:
- ASO (App Store Optimization)
- Facebook / Instagram / TikTok / Douyin ads
Industry data: (Business of Apps)
By 2025:
- Average CPI on Android: \$3
- Average CPI on iOS: \$4.10
Pitfalls:
- AI tools with poor retention churn fast.
- Large ad spend often yields “installs” but not paying users.
Regional notes:
- China: Douyin & Xiaohongshu ads dominate; conversion rates vary wildly.
- Europe/NA: Facebook Ads are common, but costs push upward amid steep competition.
- Japan: Higher CPI, but stable paying habits make it ideal for long-term retention products.
Cold-start funnel tip: Trigger the first “Aha moment” within 60–90 seconds:
- First generated image
- First usable draft
- First automatic fix
Without this, even low CAC will fail.
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2. Content Marketing & Social Virality — The Trust Multiplier
Compared to ads, content marketing and social virality can have lower acquisition costs.
Tactics:
- Invitation rewards
- In-app referral mechanisms
- KOL/Influencer collaborations
China: Bilibili tech reviews; Xiaohongshu experience sharing
Western markets: Long-form YouTube or Medium reviews; design community seeding
Japan: Subtle KOL campaigns — fewer, but more effective
Case study:
Lensa AI’s Magic Avatars (late 2022) built a viral loop via user-generated content posted on social media — no massive ad spend required.
Lesson: If your product’s output is naturally shareable, platforms amplify your acquisition.
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3. In-Product Virality — Users Bring Users
Embedding viral loops in-product is a low-cost acquisition lever.
Examples:
- Freemium + Unlock-by-inviting
- Auto-watermark on shared creations
- Template communities that enable remix chains
Rewards should increase value, not just offer subsidies:
Higher resolution, longer video length, lower latency — instead of cash payoffs.
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Blending Paid, Content, and In-Product Loops
For most teams, resilient growth comes from:
- Paid acquisition for initial traction
- Content/KOL-based trust building
- In-product viral loops for retention and organic spread
Pro tip:
Open-source tools like AiToEarn官网 can help streamline this cycle — covering content generation, cross-platform distribution (Douyin, Kwai, WeChat, Bilibili, Xiaohongshu, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Threads, YouTube, Pinterest, X), analytics, and AI model rankings.
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4. Public Relations & Media Exposure — The Trust Accelerator
Best for high-trust AI verticals (medical, legal, education, productivity).
Channels:
- Media reviews
- Long-form community posts
- Developer conference demos
Advantages:
- Higher LTV than paid ads
- Built-in credibility from early adopters
Challenges:
- Scalability is limited
- Traffic comes in “pulses,” not sustained streams
Pro tip: Align PR pushes and ranking campaigns with major version releases to spike installs organically.
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5. Channel Partnerships & Localization — High Bar, High Reward
Channel partnerships embed your tool within established ecosystems:
- Western: SaaS plugin marketplaces (Notion, Figma)
- China: WeChat, OS-level distribution
- Japan: Carrier or platform integration
Benefits:
Targeted users, low churn, structural CAC decline
Limitations:
High entry requirements, long negotiation cycles, strict stability needs
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Market Differences: Japan, West, China
- Japan: Stable, high-value market — worth consistent updates, excellent support, strong localization.
- 2023 stats: USD $17.9B mobile spend, ~2.5B downloads — 3rd largest globally.
- West: Speed and narrative matter — first-mover advantage during opportunity windows.
- China: Hyper-competitive — paid ads and content marketing are baseline; feature/price wars raise acquisition thresholds.
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Core Metric Pipeline
For any small AI team:
> CPI → Onboarding conversion → 7/30-day retention → Payment/Renewal
Action plan:
- Calculate max sustainable CPI from retention and conversion rates
- Run A/B tests with small ad budgets
- Scale gradually only if profitable
For emotional-retention products: Treat user-AI relationships with care; update safely; avoid incidents that erode trust.
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Three Practical Reminders
- Make outputs shareable
- One-click sharing + subtle watermark = free promotion
- Integrate compliance & stability into marketing
- Scale capacity & incident response before major pushes
- Respect market asymmetry
- Japan = stability
- West = volatility/opportunities
- China = efficiency & speed
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Final Thought
All acquisition channels — ads, content, partnerships — revolve around balancing CAC vs. LTV.
Traffic is the accelerator.
The product is the engine.
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Tool spotlight:
AiToEarn官网 helps AI creators and startup teams generate, publish, and monetize content across multiple platforms — making it easier to execute the strategies above via:
- AI content generation
- Cross-platform publishing
- Analytics
- Global AI model rankings
With AiToEarn’s streamlined workflow, you can align product storytelling, localization, and targeting into a single growth-ready pipeline.
