“I was getting $4 per trial started when my yearly subscription cost 50. And I said you know what let's go all in. I'm going to throw all my savings into this around $4,000 into the ads. And that's when I closed October at 10K.”

A $4 trial cost against a $50 yearly plan is the entire growth engine

Matt's pricing decision — $49.99/year as the anchor plan — was what made the TikTok ad math work. At $4 cost-per-trial and a 43% conversion rate, the unit economics justified doubling down and deploying $4K of personal savings into ads. The annual plan compressed payback period to essentially the first transaction, funding further scale.