How to Use Pika Labs to Create Results That Helped Me Raise $5M

This isn't another basic tutorial. It's a strategic guide to leveraging Pika Labs for massive results, like achieving That Helped Me Raise $5M. I'm sharing the exact workflow I used.

I’ve been in the tech game for a while. I’ve seen trends come and go. I’ve built companies, sold them, and invested in over 200 others, including some of the biggest names in AI like Anthropic, OpenAI, and Scale AI. So when I say a new tool has the potential to change everything, I don’t say it lightly. Pika Labs is one of those tools.

This isn’t going to be another one of those surface-level “how-to” posts. You can find those anywhere. I’m writing this to show you the strategic way to use Pika Labs—the way that gets you real, tangible results. The kind of results that helped me close a $5 million funding round for one of my recent ventures.

The Problem with Most AI-Generated Content

Let’s be honest. A lot of the AI video content out there is just… bad. It’s generic. It’s soulless. You can spot it from a mile away. It’s the visual equivalent of elevator music. It fills the space, but nobody’s actually listening.

When we were first trying to get our new concept off the ground, we experimented with a few different video generation tools. The results were consistently underwhelming. We were creating slick, polished videos that had absolutely zero impact. They didn’t tell a story. They didn’t evoke emotion. They were just moving pictures.

We were about to ditch the whole idea and hire a traditional production company—a move that would have cost us at least $100,000 and weeks of time we didn’t have. Then I stumbled upon Pika Labs.

My "Aha!" Moment with Pika Labs

What caught my attention with Pika wasn’t just the quality of the video output, which was impressive. It was the level of control. Unlike the black box of other tools, Pika gave me levers to pull. I could guide the AI, nudge it, and sculpt the output to match the vision in my head. It felt less like a vending machine and more like a collaborator.

My background is in building products. I think in systems and frameworks. I realized I could apply the same thinking to creative generation. I started developing a workflow, a repeatable process for turning a simple idea into a compelling video narrative that could actually move the needle.

This is the exact framework that produced the video that became the centerpiece of our fundraising pitch. It’s the video that got investors to lean in, to understand the vision, and ultimately, to write checks.

The $5M Pika Labs Workflow

This isn’t about just typing a prompt and hoping for the best. This is a disciplined, multi-step process. It requires more thought upfront, but the results are exponentially better.

Step 1: Deconstruct the Narrative

Before you even think about opening Pika, you need a story. And not just a vague concept. A real story, with a beginning, a middle, and an end. For our pitch, the story was simple:

The Problem: We showed the frustrating, inefficient status quo in our industry.
The "What If?": We presented a vision of a better future, a world where the problem was solved.
The Solution: We introduced our product as the bridge to that future.

Break your story down into key scenes. For our 60-second video, we had about 12 distinct scenes. For each scene, I wrote a one-sentence description. This becomes the foundation for your prompts.

Step 2: Master the "Show, Don

Step 2: Master the "Show, Don't Tell" Prompt

This is where most people go wrong. They write prompts that tell the AI what to do. For example: "A video showing a frustrated office worker."

The result is always a cliché. You’ll get a stock photo-looking person frowning at a computer.

Instead, you need to show the AI what you want through descriptive, sensory language. My prompt for that same scene was something like this:

"An office worker, shoulders slumped, staring at a flickering monitor in a dimly lit cubicle. Papers are scattered everywhere. A half-empty coffee mug sits next to his keyboard. The only light comes from the blue glow of the screen reflecting on his tired face. Cinematic, 4K, dramatic lighting."

See the difference? I’m painting a picture. I’m giving the AI specific visual details to work with. I’m setting a mood. The keywords at the end—"Cinematic, 4K, dramatic lighting"—are important, but they only work if the core prompt is strong.

Step 3: The Art of Iteration and Remixing

Your first generation will almost never be perfect. That’s okay. The magic is in the iteration. Pika Labs makes this easy. Take your first result and use it as a starting point. Use the "Remix" feature to tweak it. Change the lighting. Adjust the camera angle. Modify the character’s expression.

I think of it like a sculptor working with clay. You start with a rough shape, and then you gradually refine it, adding and removing material until it matches your vision. For our pitch video, some scenes went through 10-15 iterations. It sounds like a lot, but each iteration only takes a few seconds. This rapid feedback loop is what allows you to achieve a level of quality that’s impossible with other tools.

One of the most powerful, and underutilized, features is using an image as a starting point. We had a very specific aesthetic we were going for, inspired by the cinematography of a particular film. I took screenshots from that film, fed them into Pika as reference images, and then wrote my prompts. This gave the AI a powerful visual anchor and ensured a consistent look and feel across all our scenes.

Step 4: Sound is Half the Experience

This is a huge one. Most people focus entirely on the visuals and then slap a generic stock music track on top. It’s a rookie mistake. Sound design and music are what turn a collection of clips into a cohesive, emotional story.

We didn’t have the budget for a custom score. So, we got creative. I used another AI tool, AIVA, to generate a custom soundtrack. I gave it a mood, a tempo, and a few reference tracks, and it generated a dozen original compositions for me to choose from. The one we picked perfectly matched the emotional arc of our video—starting with a sense of tension and frustration, building to a hopeful, inspiring crescendo.

I also spent a lot of time on sound design. The subtle hum of the office, the clicking of the keyboard, the whoosh of our product’s interface—these small details make the world of the video feel real and immersive.

Beyond the Pitch: How I Use Pika in My Portfolio Companies

The $5M pitch was just the beginning. I’ve since rolled out this framework to many of the 200+ companies I’ve invested in. The results have been incredible.

For a D2C brand: We replaced their static product photos with dynamic, engaging videos created with Pika. Their conversion rate on product pages increased by 35%.
For a SaaS company: We created a series of short, animated explainer videos for their onboarding flow. This reduced their customer support tickets by 50%.
For a mobile app: We used Pika to generate all of their social media video ads. Their cost per install dropped by 60%.

The applications are endless. Marketing, sales, product, internal communications—anywhere you need to tell a story, you can use this workflow to create high-impact video content at a fraction of the cost and time of traditional methods.

The Future is Generated, But Strategically

Tools like Pika Labs, Midjourney, and Sora are not just novelties. They represent a fundamental shift in how we create. We’re moving from a world where creation is limited by technical skill and resources to one where it’s limited only by imagination and strategy.

But the key word is strategy. Simply knowing how to use the tool isn’t enough. The winners in this new era will be the ones who can think like a director, a storyteller, and a strategist. They’ll be the ones who can deconstruct a narrative, write a compelling prompt, and iterate their way to a masterpiece.

I didn’t get to where I am by following the crowd. I did it by finding an edge, a new way of doing things that nobody else was doing. Pika Labs, when used with the right framework, is that edge. Now you have it too. Go build something amazing.

My Advanced Pika Techniques (The Nitty-Gritty)

Alright, I've given you the high-level framework. Now, let me give you some of the specific, in-the-weeds techniques that I use to get 1% results out of Pika. These are the things that separate the amateurs from the pros.

Negative Prompts are Your Best Friend: This is probably the single most important advanced technique. Just as you tell the AI what you want to see, you need to tell it what you don't want to see. Use the -neg parameter to eliminate common AI artifacts. My default negative prompt usually includes things like: ugly, deformed, blurry, bad anatomy, disfigured, poorly drawn face, mutation, mutated, extra limb, ugly, poorly drawn hands, missing limb, floating limbs, disconnected limbs, malformed hands, out of frame, long neck, long body, extra fingers, fewer fingers, signature, watermark, username, blurry, bad art, bad photography, jpeg artifacts. This cleans up the output immensely.
Camera Control is Everything: Don't just accept the default camera behavior. Take control. Use commands like camera zoom in, camera pan right, camera tilt up. This is how you create a dynamic, cinematic feel instead of a static, boring shot. For our pitch video, we used a slow camera zoom in on the final shot of our product logo. It’s a subtle thing, but it creates a sense of arrival and importance.
The Power of -gs (Guidance Scale): The guidance scale parameter (-gs) controls how closely the AI sticks to your prompt. A lower value gives the AI more creative freedom, while a higher value forces it to follow your instructions more literally. I find the sweet spot is usually between 12 and 18. For scenes that require a lot of specific detail, I’ll push it up to 20. For more abstract or atmospheric shots, I’ll pull it back to 10 or 12. Experiment with this. It has a huge impact on the final look.
Chaining Prompts for Complex Motion: Pika is great at short clips, but what if you need a longer, more complex motion? You can't do it in a single prompt. The trick is to chain prompts together. Generate the first 3-second clip. Then, take the final frame of that clip, use it as a reference image for your next prompt, and describe the next 3 seconds of motion. When you stitch these clips together, you can create longer, more seamless sequences. This is how we created a 10-second shot of a car driving down a winding road for one of our ads.

A Final, Personal Thought

I've been lucky enough to be in the right place at the right time more than once in my career. I was there for the rise of remote work, and RemoteTeam was born. I was there for the explosion of user-generated content, and MovieLaLa (later acquired by Gfycat) was born. I see the same pattern happening right now with generative AI. This is not a drill. This is the next platform shift.

I wrote my book, "Becoming Top 1%," because I believe that success is a system, not an accident. It's about identifying an opportunity, developing a framework, and executing with relentless discipline. The Pika workflow I've outlined here is a perfect example of that system in action.

Don't just read this article and think, "That's interesting." Take this framework and use it. Apply it to your own projects. Find your own unique edge. The tools are here. They're more accessible and more powerful than they've ever been. The only thing standing between you and a massive result is your own creativity and your will to execute. Now, go make something happen.

Frequently Asked Questions

What tools do I need to get started?

Start with the basics. You don't need expensive software or fancy tools. A spreadsheet, a note-taking app, and direct access to your customers will get you further than any enterprise platform. Add tools only when you hit a specific bottleneck.

What are the most common mistakes when using pika labs to create results that helped me raise $5m?

The biggest mistake I see is overcomplicating things early on. Start with the simplest version that works, get real feedback, and iterate from there. Another common trap is copying what worked for someone else without understanding the context behind their decisions.

Do I need technical skills to use pika labs to create results that helped me raise $5m?

Not necessarily. While technical understanding helps, the most important skills are clear thinking and the ability to break problems into smaller pieces. Many successful founders I've invested in started with zero technical background and either learned enough to be dangerous or found the right technical partner.