Scaling iSelfie's AI Wellness App Across Saudi Arabia With Localised Paid Acquisition
iSelfie is a smartphone-based vital sign screening app built on remote photoplethysmography, delivering heart rate, blood pressure, SpO2, and stress index from a selfie video without wearable hardware. The challenge is acquiring retained users in Saudi Arabia for a product category that most consumers do not know exists, competing against Binah.ai, NuraLogix, and the wearables market. We run full-funnel user acquisition across Meta, Snapchat, TikTok, and Google with Arabic-first creative production, clean attribution, and an hourly-refresh performance dashboard.
Selfie Based Vital Signs From a Canadian Lab to Saudi Hospital Screens
iSelfie is built by AiZtech Labs, a Canadian AI diagnostics company led by CEO Mohamed Sheta, with a mission to improve life for one billion people through equitable real-time health signals. The platform uses remote photoplethysmography to extract vital signs from smartphone selfie videos, delivering heart rate, blood pressure, SpO2, HRV, stress index, hydration index, cardiovascular age, and respiratory rate without wearable hardware. A separate COVID-19 Risk Check analyses scleral vasculature from four selfie images to assess infection probability via CNN models trained on perfusion anomalies.
In 2024, Makkah Health Cluster deployed iSelfie across ten-plus hospitals including King Abdullah Medical City, a partnership endorsed by cluster CEO Dr Hatim Al-Omari and Canadian ambassador Jean-Philippe Linteau. A 1,021-case Saudi study validated accuracy under SFDA oversight, and Seha Virtual Hospital's 2025 study confirmed superiority in heart disease detection. Competitors include Binah.ai's enterprise SDK, NuraLogix's Transdermal Optical Imaging with 30-plus biomarkers, and Rockley Photonics' spectroscopy wearables. With 44% of Saudi adults facing CVD prevalence and 90% of youth digitally native under Vision 2030, consumer demand exists but the category is problem-unaware. They engaged us to scale user acquisition in Saudi Arabia across search, paid social, video, display, and influencer with full creative production.
Four Platforms Targeting Saudi Health Seekers Across Awareness Stages
We structure iSelfie's paid social across Meta, Snapchat, TikTok, and Google App campaigns with separate budgets for demand creation and demand capture. Prospecting on TikTok and Snapchat targets Saudi users aged 25 to 44 using health monitoring, preventive wellness, and fitness tracking interest signals. Retargeting on Meta layers site visitors with selfie scan completers for mid-funnel conversion.
Budget allocation shifts weekly based on cost per retained subscriber from our hourly-refresh dashboard. Snapchat receives disproportionate spend because Saudi penetration exceeds 80% in the 25 to 34 demographic, making it the highest-density prospecting channel for iSelfie's core audience.
Arabic UGC Featuring Real Selfie Scans Outperforming Brand Creative by 3x
Our creative lab ships 15 to 20 new variants monthly for iSelfie across motion graphics, UGC persona ads, and Arabic static formats. The hook taxonomy maps to four health motivations: blood pressure curiosity, stress and HRV awareness, CVD risk concern, and the novelty of scanning vitals from a selfie. Each variant targets a specific awareness stage from problem-unaware to product-aware.
UGC featuring real Saudi users completing selfie scans outperforms polished brand creative by 3x on checkout rate. We localise all copy and visuals for Saudi cultural context, including gender-specific variants and Arabic-first captions. Winners scale within 48 hours while underperformers recycle into new format combinations.
An Hourly Dashboard Exploiting Saudi Arabia's Higher iOS Signal Window
We built iSelfie's measurement stack on an hourly-refresh dashboard tracking cost per install, cost per checkout, and D7 retention across every paid channel. Server-side conversion data passes through Meta's Conversions API and Google's enhanced conversions, feeding checkout and D7 active events to bid algorithms so they optimise toward retained subscribers rather than trial starts.
Attribution in Saudi presents a unique advantage. Apple's ATT opt-in rate runs higher than Western markets at roughly 55%, giving Meta and TikTok more granular signal than equivalent US campaigns. We exploit this window by running tighter A/B tests on audience and creative combinations that would lack statistical power in higher-ATT geographies.
Creating Demand for a Product Category That Most Saudi Users Do Not Know Exists
Most health app advertisers in Saudi Arabia target fitness and wellness interests on Meta and Snapchat. That approach fails for iSelfie because selfie-based vital sign screening barely exists in consumer awareness. Roughly 70% of the addressable audience does not know rPPG technology is possible, meaning we create demand rather than capture it.
We structure campaigns across Meta, Snapchat, TikTok, and Google App campaigns in three layers mapped to awareness stages. Top-of-funnel prospecting runs on TikTok and Snapchat targeting Saudi users aged 25 to 44 with health monitoring and preventive wellness signals. Creative leads with the problem hook: you want to check your blood pressure but you do not own a cuff. Mid-funnel retargeting on Meta shows the capability: a 30-second selfie delivering HR, BP, SpO2, HRV, and stress index. Bottom-funnel Google campaigns capture Arabic and English intent queries around blood pressure apps and heart rate monitors. Server-side conversion data via Meta's Conversions API and Google's enhanced conversions passes checkout and D7 active events to bid algorithms, optimising toward retained subscribers rather than trial starts who never return.
Checkout Conversion Up 34% as Vision 2030 Accelerates AI Health Screening
The engagement has delivered a 34% higher checkout conversion rate, a 22% reduction in blended CAC, and an 11% improvement in D7 retention. The checkout lift comes from localised creative that resolves the trust barrier specific to rPPG: Saudi users need to see the selfie scan working on someone who looks like them before they believe it. Arabic-language UGC persona ads featuring Saudi professionals, fitness enthusiasts, and elderly users completing real scans outperform English brand creative by 3x on conversion rate.
We adapted acquisition for a product where the entire category needs educating. Rather than leading with features like HR and SpO2, we lead with the problem: 44% of Saudi adults face cardiovascular disease prevalence yet clinic visit costs discourage routine screening. The selfie becomes the capability replacing the clinic visit. Saudi Arabia's $10 billion Vision 2030 digital health investment is accelerating SFDA clearance for AI wellness tools. The post-2024 FDA AI framework creates a parallel US opportunity, and we are building English-language creative and US audience architectures in preparation for iSelfie's expansion beyond the Middle East into a 175 billion dollar global remote patient monitoring market.
