Cluely’s Roy Lee has a message for startup founders: try to be pondering tougher about how one can go viral.
“Typically, if you happen to’re not in deep tech, then you must low-key deep concentrate on distribution,” Lee informed the gang at Disrupt 2025.
However he additionally made it clear that not everybody was reduce out for this type of viral advertising.
“If you happen to’re any good at engineering, you’re most likely not humorous and also you’re most likely not going to be a content material creator since you don’t have it in your blood. Realistically, most of those folks haven’t any likelihood of going viral.”
Cluely’s AI assistant grew well-known this April with a viral declare that its undetectable home windows might “provide help to cheat on something” — a declare that was shortly disproven when a string of proctoring providers confirmed they might, in actual fact, detect use of the AI assistant. However in a matter of months, the corporate had raised $15 million from Andressen Horowitz, changing into probably the most seen merchandise within the crowded AI assistant house.
As Lee frames it, it’s a part of his expertise for going viral, which frequently means making a number of folks very indignant at him. “I believe I’m significantly good at framing myself in a method that’s controversial,” he mentioned onstage. “I do numerous issues which might be completely different. And all the pieces I do this’s completely different, I body it by way of the filter of my voice. And my voice is of course simply very enraging to lots of people.”
For Lee, it’s a part of a broader concept of social media, by which consideration is the one foreign money.
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“Repute is kind of a factor of the previous,” Lee mentioned. “You possibly can attempt to be the New York Instances and guard your ironclad repute, however realistically you’ve bought Sam Altman on the timeline speaking about sizzling guys and also you’ve bought Elon Musk going batshit loopy.”
“You simply have to understand that the world is trending to a special place,” he continued, “the place it’s important to be excessive, it’s important to be genuine and it’s important to be private.”
It’s exhausting to say how properly that technique is working, although. When requested for Cluely’s income numbers or consumer numbers, nevertheless, Lee demurred.
“What I’ve realized is that you need to by no means share income numbers as a result of if you happen to’re doing properly, no person will discuss how properly you’re doing. And if you happen to’re doing poorly, folks will solely discuss how poorly you’re doing,” Lee mentioned.“I’ll say we’re doing higher than I anticipated, however it’s not the quickest rising firm of all time.”
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