Cluely’s Roy Lee on the rage-bait technique for startup advertising and marketing

Cluely’s Roy Lee has a message for startup founders: You ought to be considering more durable about the best way to go viral.

“Typically, if you happen to’re not in deep tech, then you must low-key deep give attention to distribution,” Lee informed the gang at TechCrunch Disrupt 2025.

However he additionally made it clear that not everybody was lower out for this type of viral advertising and marketing.

“In case you’re any good at engineering, you’re in all probability not humorous and also you’re in all probability not going to be a content material creator since you don’t have it in your blood. Realistically, most of those individuals haven’t any probability of going viral.”

Cluely’s AI assistant grew well-known this April with a viral declare that its undetectable home windows may “provide help to cheat on something” — a declare that was rapidly disproven when a string of proctoring providers confirmed they might, in truth, detect use of the AI assistant. However in a matter of months, the corporate had raised $15 million from Andreessen Horowitz, turning into some of the seen merchandise within the crowded AI assistant area.

As Lee frames it, it’s a part of his expertise for going viral, which regularly means making numerous individuals very indignant at him. “I believe I’m significantly good at framing myself in a means that’s controversial,” he mentioned onstage. “I do quite a lot of issues which can be completely different. And the whole lot I try this’s completely different, I body it by 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 principle of social media, wherein consideration is the one forex.

“Repute is kind of a factor of the previous,” Lee mentioned. “You’ll be able to attempt to be the New York Instances and guard your ironclad popularity, however realistically you’ve obtained Sam Altman on the timeline speaking about sizzling guys and also you’ve obtained Elon Musk going bats— loopy.”

“You simply have to appreciate that the world is trending to a special place,” he continued, “the place you must be excessive, you must be genuine, and you must be private.”

It’s laborious to say how nicely that technique is working, although. When requested for Cluely’s income numbers or consumer numbers, Lee demurred.

“What I’ve realized is that it is best to by no means share income numbers as a result of if you happen to’re doing nicely, no person will discuss how nicely you’re doing. And if you happen to’re doing poorly, individuals will solely discuss how poorly you’re doing,” Lee mentioned. “I’ll say we’re doing higher than I anticipated, nevertheless it’s not the quickest rising firm of all time.”