The storyHow they got there
Mike Doan launched Hercules around 2019 as a strength training tracker and workout logger for Android — not another rigid template app, but one where lifters could build fully customized exercises and programs from scratch.
The first ten customers came from Reddit's r/powerlifting and r/weightroom, where Mike posted and gave free premium access in exchange for feedback. The first hundred came from App Store Optimization and early creator partnerships in the lifting community.
At maturity, the channel mix: ASO for "workout tracker" and "strength tracker" (~50%), TikTok and Instagram in the lifting community (~20%), Reddit communities r/fitness and r/powerlifting (~15%), YouTube partnerships with lifting creators (~10%), and word-of-mouth (~5%). Generic Facebook ads were killed. ASO and niche fitness creators were doubled down on.
Unit economics: CAC around $3–10, ARPU around $5–8/month, LTV around $60–120. Annual subscriptions were strongly preferred over monthly — dramatically improving LTV. The creator insight was counterintuitive: micro-creators with 10–50K followers in specific lifting niches convert 3:1 better than mega-influencers. Specificity of audience beats scale of reach. By report, $50K+ MRR.
Channel MixWhere the growth actually came from
Most case studies hand-wave channels. Here's the rough allocation — not in dollars spent, but in users acquired — across the routes that actually mattered.