So instead of forcing it, I asked my AI to research. Not to write. To research.

15 minutes later, it had scanned Reddit, X, and 30+ web sources and surfaced a pattern I would have missed: the anti-AI backlash in marketing is accelerating fast. And almost nobody in the AI creator space is talking about it.

That research became this article.

Level Up with AI

How I Turned a 20-Minute AI Audit Into Paid Consulting Work

A message popped up in my Substack chat six months ago. A solopreneur running a marketing agency had been reading my newsletter for weeks. She didn’t ask for content tips. She asked: “Can you look at how my team works and tell me where AI would actually help…

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14 days ago · 44 likes · 11 comments · Claudia Faith

The Backlash Is Real

• CNN called 2026 “the year of 100% human marketing.”

• “Slop” was Merriam-Webster’s 2025 word of the year.

• Adweek reported 65% of marketing jobs may not survive AI.

Plus, I scanned what’s trending on Substack. The top posts this month: “10 Claude Prompts That Replace a $500/hour Consultant” (1,300 likes) and “How to run your AI agents while you sleep” (1,700 likes).

Most AI marketing content is genuinely bad. Not because AI can’t write well, but because most people use it the laziest way possible: paste topic, get 800 words, publish, repeat. Readers notice.

The 3 Layers A Lot of People Skip

Most people jump straight to “write me a blog post.” That’s layer zero. And it shows.

Layer 1: Research

Before you write anything, you need to know what’s worth writing about. Most people guess, or copy what competitors posted last week.

AI can scan thousands of conversations across platforms in minutes. This morning, I found a genuine gap and got an article I’m excited about. Instead of another “5 AI tools” list.

Try this now: Open Perplexity or Grok and search “what are people complaining about in [your industry] this week?” That’s layer 1 in 30 seconds.

Layer 2: Connection

MCP (Model Context Protocol) gives AI direct access to your tools. Instead of copying data from your analytics into a chat window, your AI reads it directly.

I use Claude Code with a Puppeteer MCP server. That's how I browsed Substack's trending pages earlier today without leaving my workflow. My AI opened a browser, navigated to Substack, scrolled through posts, and pulled engagement numbers. All from the same conversation where I was writing this article.

Try this now: Search “[your analytics platform] MCP server” and see if one exists. You might be surprised.

Layer 3: Voice

Default AI writing sounds like AI. Readers can sense it.

I built a voice profile for this newsletter: my opening patterns, sentence rhythm, phrases I use, and phrases I never use. When AI writes with this profile, it sounds like me, not like a language model performing “helpful newsletter writer.”

Try this now: Take your 3 best-performing posts. Let AI analyse it - how you opened each one, one phrase you used in all three, and one thing you’d never say. That’s the start of your voice profile.

What This Means

The 65% who won’t survive are at layer zero. The 35% are building AI into their actual operation: research before writing, tools connected for context, voice profiles that sound human.

The backlash will keep growing. But the people using AI this way won’t be part of that conversation. Because their audience won’t be able to tell.

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🚀 Work with me

AIBergStudio is my AI consultancy. I work with business owners, offices and companies in to figure out where AI fits and build the first system that actually runs.

We start with a free call. I look at your business, find the highest-impact workflow, and tell you exactly what I’d do. If it makes sense to work together, we go from there.

Book a free call with me

A little about me

I live for helping people figure out AI without the hype. When I’m not building workflows, I’m adventuring with my rescue dog Mambo, who has zero interest in AI but very strong opinions about what we eat.

P.s. I publish every Wednesday. Subscribe and it lands in your inbox. Free.

Claudia Faith holds a Master of Science in AI. She's a VC-backed founder who's worked with Forbes 100 companies to deploy AI where it actually matters. As a Fractional Chief AI Officer, she handles strategy and implementation, and offers 1:1 coaching for business owners who don't want to be the last in their industry to figure this out. If you want help thinking through your own AI strategy, start here.

I spent 20 minutes walking her through my audit framework on a call. Mapped her workflows. Found 3 places where her team was burning hours on tasks AI could handle in minutes. Sent her a one-page summary with priorities.

She paid for the full implementation the same week.

That was the moment I realized something. The AI skills I’d been sharing for free in this newsletter were worth real money to the right people.

Since then, I’ve turned that 20-minute audit into the foundation of my consulting practice at AI Berg Studio. Today, I’m giving you the exact same framework. The demand for AI consulting is growing so fast that no single person can serve it all. There’s room for everyone who knows what they’re doing.

How I Found My First Clients

Two channels. Both simpler than you’d expect.

• The first was right here, on Substack. I started mentioning my consulting work in articles and in the Substack chat. No hard sell. Just: “This is what I do for companies. If that sounds useful, here’s where to find me.” Three of my first five clients came from readers who’d been following along for months. They already trusted my thinking. The sales conversation was basically done before it started.

• The second was LinkedIn. I found a cold outreach message format that actually worked, adjusted it to my voice, and started reaching out to team leads and operations managers in industries I understood. One of those messages led to a conversation with a healthcare company where doctors were spending way too much time on their discharge letters. For documentation that followed a predictable structure every single time.

That conversation turned into a 6-week implementation sprint.

You don’t need a massive audience. You don’t need a fancy website. You need one framework that delivers a clear result, and two channels to put it in front of the right people.

The 20-Minute AI Audit Framework

This is the exact process I run with every new client. I’ve refined it over dozens of conversations, and it works whether you’re auditing a 3-person startup or a 200-person department.

Four steps.

Step 1: Map the Workflows

Before you touch a single AI tool, you need to understand what people actually do all day.

I use a design-thinking approach here (also because I have a degree in it and absolutely love the methodology). I talk to the teams. I talk to the managers. I ask three questions:

1. Walk me through your typical day. What tasks repeat?

2. Where do you spend the most time on things that feel repetitive?

3. What output do you create that follows a similar structure every time?

Write everything down. Every task, every handoff, every bottleneck.

Most people skip this step. They jump straight to “let’s automate email” without understanding the full system. That’s how you end up with one disconnected workflow that creates more confusion than it saves.

Step 2: Score Each Workflow for AI Readiness

Here’s something important: you should leave most things alone. Seriously.

For each workflow you mapped, score it on three factors:

• Repetitiveness (1-5): How similar is this task each time?

• Volume (1-5): How often does it happen? Daily? Weekly? Once a month?

• Text/Data Intensity (1-5): Does it involve writing, reading, analyzing, or summarizing?

Multiply the three scores. Anything above 60 is a strong AI candidate. Anything below 30, leave it alone for now.

For example:

• A doctor spending 3 hours on a patient letter: Repetitive structure (4), happens multiple times daily (5), pure text work (5). That’s a score of 100. Clear priority.

• A quarterly strategy presentation: Low repetitiveness, low volume, high creativity required. Score of 15. Save that for later.

This scoring system is how you avoid the trap of trying to automate everything. It forces you to focus on what will actually move the needle.

Step 3: Design Human-in-the-Loop Systems

This is where I part ways with most AI consultants. They promise full automation. “AI will handle everything.” That pitch sounds great until the output starts sounding like everyone else’s output.

I build systems where AI does 80% of the work and a human makes the final call. Every time.

Take the doctor’s letters example. AI drafts the letter using patient data, medical history, and the standard template. They add their personal observations, adjust the tone for the specific patient, sign off.

The letter is faster. It’s also still their letter. Still has their judgment in it. Still sounds like them, not like a template factory.

When you design your audit recommendations, always define where the human stays in the workflow. What are they reviewing? What decisions are they making? If you can’t answer that clearly, the system isn’t ready to recommend.

Step 4: Prioritize by Impact

Take your scored workflows and rank them by one formula:

This gives you a “hours saved per week” number that makes the business case impossible to ignore.

How to Package This Into Consulting

You now have the framework. Here’s how to turn it into something people pay for.

What to Call It

“AI Readiness Audit” or “AI Workflow Assessment.” Keep it simple. Clients don’t care about creative branding. They want to know what they’re buying.

How to Price It

Start with a standalone audit at $500 to $1,500. You’re delivering a scored workflow map and a prioritized list of recommendations. That’s a half-day of your time including prep and the summary document.

Once you’ve done 2 or 3 audits, you’ll notice something: clients ask “Can you help us build this?” That’s where the real revenue starts. Workshop days at $3,000 to $5,000. Implementation sprints at $10,000 and up.

I underpriced my first audit. Charged a fraction of what it was worth because I didn’t have proof it worked yet. After three audits with clear results, I raised my rate and nobody pushed back. Your first few are investments in your track record.

What to Deliver

Keep it clean. Four deliverables:

1. A one-page workflow map showing which processes you audited

2. The scored matrix with AI-readiness ratings

3. Top 3 recommendations with estimated time savings

4. A human-in-the-loop design for each recommendation

That’s it. One document. Clients don’t want 40-page decks. They want clarity on what to do next and why.

Where to Find Clients

If you have a newsletter, a LinkedIn presence, or a community, you already have a channel. Start there.

Mention your consulting work in your content. Naturally, not as a pitch. Something like: “I ran this audit for a client last week and found X.” Your audience connects the dots on their own.

On LinkedIn, target team leads and operations managers in industries where you have some domain knowledge. Healthcare, legal, finance, manufacturing is what I am targeting as I have industry knowledge in these areas. Regulated industries are especially hungry for AI guidance because they can’t afford to experiment blindly and get it wrong.

One thoughtful message. Specific to their industry. Offering a concrete outcome, not a vague “let’s chat about AI.”

What I Keep Finding

After running these audits across solopreneurs, mid-size companies, and VCs, the same patterns keep showing up.

People who find me through this newsletter usually want marketing and content automation. Makes sense. They’ve seen my workflows, they want the same setup for their business.

Business clients from LinkedIn want something broader. They want AI integrated into how their company operates. Across departments, across teams, sometimes across multiple portfolio companies.

Everyone comes in thinking AI will replace roles. They leave understanding that AI makes existing roles dramatically more effective. That shift, from replacement to amplification, is often the most valuable thing I deliver in the entire engagement.

And it’s the reason clients keep coming back for the next phase.

TL;DR

1. Map every workflow by talking to the people who actually do the work

2. Score each workflow on repetitiveness × volume × text intensity. Above 60 = AI-ready

3. Design human-in-the-loop systems where AI does 80% and a person makes the final call

4. Prioritize by hours saved per week (time saved × frequency × people affected

5. Package it as a standalone audit at $500 to $1,500. Upsell workshops and implementation sprints from there

6. Find clients through your existing audience and targeted LinkedIn outreach

FAQ

• I don't have consulting experience. Can I still do this?

  Yes. If you've built AI workflows for yourself or helped someone set up a system, you've already done the work. The audit framework gives you a repeatable structure so you're not winging it on every call. Start with one free audit for someone you know, document the results, and use that as your first case study.
  

• How long does the full audit take?
  The call itself takes 20 to 30 minutes. Budget another hour for prep (researching the company, reviewing their current setup) and another hour for writing up the deliverable. Total time: about 2.5 hours for a standalone audit.
  

• What if the client wants implementation too?
  That's the goal. The audit is the entry point. Once they see the scored matrix and the potential hours saved, most clients ask: "Can you help us build this?" That's when you move to workshop pricing ($3,000 to $5,000) or a multi-week sprint ($10,000+).
  

• Do I need to specialize in a specific industry?
  It helps. Regulated industries like healthcare, legal, finance, and manufacturing are willing to pay more because the stakes of getting AI wrong are higher. But the framework works across any industry. If you know a domain well enough to ask the right questions, you can run the audit.
  

• What tools do I need to deliver this?
  None beyond what you already use. A video call for the interview, a spreadsheet or Notion page for the scoring matrix, and a clean one-page document for the final deliverable. Clients care about the recommendations, not the software you used to create them.

Get my full system (Premium)

The free articles show you what I built. Premium gives you everything behind it: the prompts, the templates, the configs, and the stuff I learn from working with companies that I can’t put in a free post.

Same material my consulting clients pay thousands for.

See what’s in it for you when you go premium.

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🚀 Work with me

AIBergStudio is my AI consultancy. I work with business owners, offices and companies in to figure out where AI fits and build the first system that actually runs.

We start with a free call. I look at your business, find the highest-impact workflow, and tell you exactly what I’d do. If it makes sense to work together, we go from there.

Book a free call with me

A little about me

I live for helping people figure out AI without the hype. When I’m not building workflows, I’m adventuring with my rescue dog Mambo, who has zero interest in AI but very strong opinions about what we eat.

P.s. I publish every Wednesday. Subscribe and it lands in your inbox. Free.

Claudia Faith holds a Master of Science in AI. She's a VC-backed founder who's worked with Forbes 100 companies to deploy AI where it actually matters. As a Fractional Chief AI Officer, she handles strategy and implementation, and offers 1:1 coaching for business owners who don't want to be the last in their industry to figure this out. If you want help thinking through your own AI strategy, start here.

The ones succeeding all had the exact same thing in common.

They had stopped trying to produce AI content at scale. Instead, they had picked one real human inside the company and built an entire content engine around that person’s voice.

That is the only playbook that is working right now. And it works for solopreneurs, consultants, and companies the same way.

The marketing economy is still exploding. The middle is not.

Let’s get the 2026 numbers out of the way fast.

The creator economy will hit $43.9 billion in ad spend this year. Beehiiv’s revenue nearly doubled to $28 million. Substack now has more than 50,000 publications earning money and over 50 creators making $1 million or more from subscriptions alone.

The platforms are winning. The top 1% of creators and brands are winning. Everyone else is feeling the squeeze.

Because supply of AI-generated content has gone up 10x. Demand for it has gone down.

That is the real story behind the “AI passive income is dead” posts flooding Reddit right now. The top thread on r/passive_income this month has 146 comments debating exactly this.

The faceless AI model that worked in 2023 stopped converting in 2026.

For businesses, the problem looks identical. Marketing teams are burning budget on automated blog-post farms and AI-generated LinkedIn feeds that produce traffic but not a single qualified lead.

How to do it better: one voice, ten formats

Here is the math that is replacing the B2B content playbook.

One 20-minute recorded interview with a founder, a senior expert, or a client-facing consultant becomes:

• 1 podcast episode

• 1 long-form newsletter or blog post

• 5 LinkedIn posts in that person’s voice

• 3 Substack Notes

• 1 LinkedIn carousel

• 4 short-form video clips

• 1 case study

That is ten content pieces from a single 20-minute conversation. AI handles the transcription, the repurposing, the formatting, and the scheduling. The human shows up for 20 minutes a week.

Production time after the recording: roughly 3 hours with AI. That is what used to take a 5-person content team two weeks.

And it outperforms the automated version, because there is a real person behind it.

Fun fact: I asked 2,140 of you what you actually want

Yesterday I ran a poll in our free community chat. 2,140 people in the room. I asked what would make the space actually useful.

• The top vote: “What Are You Building Wednesday,” a weekly thread where people share what they are working on and get feedback.

• The second top vote: “Consulting Playbook,” turning AI skills into paid client work.

That is exactly the profile of the operators and leaders in 2026.

The 3-Layer AI Operator Stack

Whether you are a solo consultant or running a 50-person marketing team, the stack is the same.

Layer 1: Research (AI does the heavy lifting)

• Deep research agents pull industry data, competitor content, trending angles

• AI analyzes your past content and extracts your actual voice patterns

• AI drafts rough outlines, talking points, and interview questions

• You review. You never let AI generate the original thought.

Layer 2: Production (the human does the human part)

• One recorded interview, voice note, or short video per week

• The human (founder, SME, consultant, creator) says the original thing

• AI cleans transcripts, pulls quotes, identifies the strongest moments

Layer 3: Distribution (AI scales what you already said)

• AI repurposes the core piece into 10 formats

• AI schedules, tests headlines, runs A/B variations

• One voice, ten channels, no content team required

That is the whole system.

What this looks like for a business

A small consulting firm I work with runs this exact stack with one part-time marketer.

The founder records one 20-minute interview a week. Their part-time marketer uses Claude, Descript, and a scheduling tool. That is it. Three tools. One voice. No content agency, no in-house team, no faceless AI garbage.

• Monthly output: 4 podcast episodes, 4 newsletters, 20 LinkedIn posts, 12 Notes, 4 carousels, 16 video clips.

• Monthly cost: the marketer’s hours plus about $80 in AI tool subscriptions.

Qualified inbound leads: up 40% against the previous quarter. Share rate on LinkedIn: doubled.

The founder’s only content task is showing up for 20 minutes a week, in their real voice.

A prompt you can steal today

Run this on your last 5 published pieces (blog posts, LinkedIn posts, newsletter issues, whatever). It extracts the real voice out of your existing content so every future AI-drafted piece sounds like the human behind it.

You are a voice-extraction analyst. I am pasting 5 recent published pieces below.

Extract:
1. The 10 phrases this person uses most often that feel like THEIR writing
2. The 5 sentence structures they default to
3. The 3 topics they return to repeatedly
4. Their typical hook pattern (first 1-2 sentences)
5. Their typical close pattern (last 1-2 sentences)

Return this as a reusable “voice profile” I can paste into future prompts so AI-drafted content sounds like this person, not like generic LLM output.

[PASTE 5 PIECES HERE]

Paste the output into every AI drafting prompt from now on. This single move kills about 80% of the AI-generated style in your content.

FAQ: AI Content For Businesses In 2026

Q: Is faceless AI passive income dead in 2026?

A: The fully-automated, faceless version is. Human-voice-led systems that use AI for research and distribution still work. Every major platform is actively deprioritizing unattributed AI content in 2026.

Q: How can a B2B company use this system without hiring a content team?

A: Pick one person whose voice you want to amplify (founder, senior expert, or client-facing consultant). Record a 20-minute interview each week on one topic. Run the transcript through the 3-layer operator stack. Most businesses do this with one marketer plus a freelance editor, not a full content team.

Q: How many AI tools does a business actually need?

A: Three to five, used daily, in a defined workflow. One research tool, one transcription/editing tool, one scheduling/distribution tool. Operators with 3 well-connected tools consistently outperform companies running 20+ disconnected ones.

Q: What is the ROI of voice-first content vs. automated AI content for businesses?

A: Voice-first content from a real human inside the company consistently outperforms automated AI content on qualified inbound leads and share rate. Automated AI content still has a place for programmatic SEO and long-tail keyword capture, but it no longer converts at 2023 rates.

Q: Who in the company should be the voice?

A: Whoever your ideal customer wants to learn from. For B2B software, that is often the founder or head of product. For consulting, it is the practitioner. For healthcare, it is the expert closest to the patient or outcome. Brand accounts no longer perform.

The system in one line

AI does the research and the distribution. Your human does the voice. The market pays for the person, not the machine.

That is the entire 2026 playbook for solopreneurs and businesses.

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Check this out…

900 million people now get their answers from AI. Not from you. Not from me.

While I was writing my weekly newsletter, half the internet stopped clicking on anything at all. They just ask AI and move on.

So I asked myself the uncomfortable question: if someone can get a better, faster, more personalized answer from Claude or ChatGPT, why would they read my newsletter?

I sat with that for a while. And I realized the answer isn't what I write. It's what I can't be replaced doing.

AI is incredible at giving you information. It's terrible at giving you signal from a real community doing the same work you are.

I'm not going to write a 1,500-word essay about why long essays are dead. That would be ironic and also boring. Instead, I'm experimenting with this newsletters format - making it more visual + interactive with polls. And more personal (this part I’ll still need to figure out).

And this does not only apply for newsletters and content creation. Nopes.

This is also for marketing in general & sales and business.

Every post from now on becomes something you scan, vote on, and actually use. Not something you "save for later" and never open again.

I'd rather give you one visual you screenshot and share than ten paragraphs you skim past.

🧡 It would mean a lot to me, if you let me know what you think about this experiment!

Leave a comment

What I Did When I Was Stuck

I opened Claude and started talking it through.

I told it what I had tried. I told it what felt wrong. I told it what I actually wanted: direct relationships with companies, not an audience of strangers scrolling past my posts. We went back and forth for a while. Claude asked questions. I answered. Somewhere in that conversation, the original plan came back into focus.

→ 1:1 outreach. Stop posting randomly. Start conversations.

Here's the thing about using AI as a thinking partner: it does not tell you what to do. It helps you hear yourself more clearly. I already knew posts were not working. Claude helped me stop pretending otherwise and commit to a different direction.

How I Built the Outreach System

Once the direction was clear, the next question was how.

Claude recommended Waalaxy, an automated LinkedIn outreach tool. I had never used it. I set up the campaign, defined the target audience, and then focused on the part that would make or break the whole thing: the messages.

I did not write generic outreach copy. I went back through my own inbox and pulled examples of LinkedIn outreach that had actually worked on me. Messages where I had bought something, booked a call, or responded. I fed those to Claude with a brief: write outreach messages in this style, for this ICP, for this offer.

Claude gave me variations. I tested language, tightened the sequencing, and loaded the final messages into Waalaxy.

Then I let it run.

What Happened Next

Several calls booked. Three high-ticket proposals sent. All within a couple of weeks.

I am pretty confident I will close one of them next week. If I do, that one client will bring in the equivalent of what I make on Substack in three months.

One conversation. One system that runs without me watching it. A result that changes the shape of my income for the quarter.

I am not sharing this to brag. I am sharing it because six weeks ago I was avoiding LinkedIn entirely.

The Prompt I Used to Get Unstuck

If you are stuck on anything in your business right now, a strategy that is not landing, an offer that is not converting, a platform you keep avoiding, this is where I would start.

Open Claude and use this:

I am trying to [goal]. I have already tried [what you did].
It is not working because [what feels off].
I want to end up at [specific outcome].
Help me figure out what I am missing and what to try differently.

That's all it takes. Fill in the blanks honestly. Do not perform. Do not frame it as if you have it together. Tell it what is actually wrong.

I have used this for LinkedIn strategy. I have used it to rethink my paid Substack offer. I have used it to figure out what to write when I have no idea what to write. Every time, the conversation leads somewhere I would not have reached alone.

Claude does not have your answers. It has a way of asking the questions that surface them.

Where This Goes

I will update you on the proposal close. If it lands, I will write a full breakdown of the exact Waalaxy setup, the message sequences, and what I would do differently in the first week.

For now, the version of this story I want you to take is simple.

Was this helpful? 🧡

If you found this helpful, please share it with someone who’s spending too much time making header images. And if you try it out, please let me know what you think!

Leave a comment

P.S. - Want to go deeper? Join me and over 30 expert creators at Cozora for live Thursday sessions where we build REAL AI systems together.

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Oh, and we are hosting the first Substack LIVE 8-h AI summit ever, check it out here:

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Check Out Drift 🦦

Thing #1: A Claude Code Setup Built For Normal People

Here's the thing. Most Claude Code tutorials are written by developers for developers. Terminal commands, environment variables, PATH configuration. The kind of stuff that makes a non-technical creator close the tab in 45 seconds.

I know because I was that person. When I first opened Terminal on my Mac, I didn't know what a directory was. I had to Google "how to navigate folders in terminal." That was less than a year ago.

So when I built Drift 🦦, I built the setup process I wish I'd had. Not a developer tutorial. A real, step-by-step walkthrough designed for someone who has never opened Terminal before.

Here's exactly what the setup covers:

• Installing Claude Code. Not "go install Node.js and configure your PATH." Actual instructions. Open this. Type this. Press enter. You'll see this. If you see something else, do this instead.

• Getting your API key. One key. From Google's free Gemini tier. I walk through every click, every screen, every "where do I paste this" moment. Takes 4 minutes.

• Your first conversation with Claude. What to type. What to expect back. How to know it's working. How to know it's not.

• Setting up your project folder. Where to put it. What goes inside. Why each file exists.

The whole thing takes about 20 minutes. I've watched people who describe themselves as "not technical at all" get through it on the first try.

Thing #2: My Entire Writing System

When you set up Drift, you're not getting a blank template. You're getting the exact system I use to produce content for three newsletters, twice a week each, with all the Notes, images, SEO, and email subjects that go with them.

Here's what's inside:

• The CLAUDE.md brain file. This is the instruction manual that Claude reads every time you start a session. Mine contains brand routing (it knows which newsletter you're writing for), model routing (it picks the right AI model for each task to save you money), and complete workflow definitions. When you say "write an article," it knows to generate a headline, subtitle, SEO summary, header image, full article, Notes teaser, and three email subject lines. One prompt. Eight outputs.

• Voice Profile Engine. You export your Substack posts. Drift reads them and builds a detailed profile of how you write. Not "be friendly." Your actual hooks. Your sentence rhythm. Your signature phrases. The phrases you never use. Every piece of content it generates is filtered through your voice, not a generic template.

• 20 Viral Note Formats. I analyzed 1000+ Notes from the highest-performing creators on the platform. Creators with 130K to 257K subscribers, Notes that pulled 10,000+ likes. I reverse-engineered the patterns, ranked them by engagement potential, and built them into the system. Drift 🦦 picks the right formats for your topic automatically.

• AI Image Generation. Every article gets a custom header image generated through Google's Imagen API on the free tier. Drift builds the prompt from your brand colors and visual style, runs the script, and saves the image directly into your article folder. No Canva. No Midjourney. No design skills.

• Article-to-Notes Converter. Paste any published article. Drift extracts the five best angles and turns them into ready-to-post Notes. Different formats, different lengths, zero overlap.

• Complete folder organization. Every article gets its own dated folder with the article, image, SEO metadata, Notes teaser, and email subjects. Nothing gets lost. Nothing lives in random files on your desktop.

I'm not holding anything back. The voice rules. The model routing table. The Python scripts. The viral formulas. The folder structure. The CTA templates. It's all there. It's the same system I open every morning when I sit down to write.

Why Two Things Instead of One

Most AI writing tools give you one thing. A chatbot that writes generic text. Or a template library. Or a prompt collection.

I kept hearing the same frustration from writers who tried those tools: "It doesn't sound like me." Or: "I don't even know how to get Claude Code running." Or both.

So Drift 🦦 solves both problems at once. The setup tutorial gets you from zero to running. The writing system gives you something worth running.

What Actually Happens When You Open Drift

1. You jump on a call with me and I guide you through the entire system within 20 minutes. We will install Claude Code, get your API key, create your project folder.

2. You export your Substack posts and drop them into the system. Drift reads your writing and builds your Voice Profile. You review it, tweak anything that feels off. Another 15 minutes.

3. You give Drift your first topic. One sentence. It generates a complete article package in your voice. Full draft, SEO metadata, three email subject lines, a Notes teaser, five promotional Notes, and a header image. All saved to a folder, organized, ready for your edits.

That's the first day. 45 minutes from download to your first complete article package.

From there, the workflow is simple. You write by telling Drift 🦦 what you want to write about. It handles the structure and the busywork. You handle the truth, the real stories, the personal details, the edits that make it yours.

The writers I've shared this with all say the same thing. "I'm spending my time on the writing now. Not the packaging."

Be like them. Get Drift 🦦.

Get Drift 🦦

The results surprised me.

54% of you who want to turn your AI skills into income but need help getting there.

This post is for you.

Actually, no - the publication is for you. As that’s exactly my focus in 2026.

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I co-founded Cozora. It’s THE AI learning community for people who want to know which AI tools are used how right now. Cozora gives you weekly live sessions where experts show their real AI workflows.

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The Opportunity I See for You in 2026

Companies are slow to adopt AI. You’re not.

While they’re sitting in meetings, forming committees, and writing strategy docs that go nowhere, you’ve been in the trenches. Testing tools. Building workflows. Figuring out what actually works.

That knowledge gap between what you’ve learned and what companies desperately need is a massive opportunity.

And it’s not just corporates. Freelancers need better systems. Agencies need to scale. Creators need to package what they know.

You already have skills people will pay for. AI just helps you deliver them faster and better.

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By the way, this happened yesterday:

Gonna share more about my LinkedIn journey here as well targeting companies.

What this newsletter Is Really About

This isn’t another “here are 10 AI tools” newsletter.

It’s about three things:

1. Amplify your expertise — use AI to do more with what you already know

2. Package it — turn your skills into offers people want to buy

3. Sell it — to corporates, clients, or your own audience

Your expertise + AI = your unfair advantage.

The 2026 Calendar

Here’s what we’re covering each month:

• January: Package your expertise into an offer

• February: Find & research your ideal clients

• March: Write pitches & proposals that win

• April: Build your AI-powered workflow

• May: Automate client delivery

• June: Create a signature framework

• July: Best prompts so far (recap)

• August: Build a course or digital product

• September: Research & strategy with AI

• October: Personal productivity stack

• November: Sell & launch with AI

• December: 2027 planning with AI

Every month builds on the last. By December, you’ll have the prompts, the workflows, and the examples to build something that earns.

Want in?

My premium subscribers get:

• Monthly Prompt Packs — steal my workflows

• Monthly Case Studies — how others are actually doing it

• 50% off COZORA — the live AI community ($360/year saved)

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I’m Curious...

Let’s Do This

2026 is the year to start earning from AI.

Whether you want to sell to corporates, land freelance clients, or build your own thing, I’m here to help you figure it out.

I don’t have all the answers yet. But I’m building this in public and sharing everything along the way. The wins, the experiments, the failures.

Come along.

I'm in 🤩

Everyone’s asking if ChatGPT will kill Google.

The data says something weirder.

95% of ChatGPT users still use Google. Every day. Both tools. Different jobs.

But here’s the part no one’s talking about.

ChatGPT sends 10x less traffic than Google. And that might be the best news creators have heard all year.

Let me explain.

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The traffic is smaller. But it’s better.

AI platforms like ChatGPT have about a 2% referral rate compared to Google’s 17-19%.

Sounds terrible.

But look closer:

• Visitors from ChatGPT spend 15 minutes on site (vs 8 from Google)

• They view 12 pages per session (vs 9 from Google)

• They convert at 7% (vs 5% from Google)

When someone clicks through from an AI response, they arrive with clearer intent. They’ve already had a conversation about what they need. They’re not browsing. They’re ready.

The shift we need to understand

The report puts it this way:

“Businesses are no longer just optimizing to appear in search. They are optimizing to be selected.”

Let that sink in.

LLMs don’t just show you options. They recommend. They explain how to choose. They tell users who to trust.

That changes everything about how we create content.

What this means for Substack writers

1. Write content that answers real questions

The average Google search is 3-4 words. The average ChatGPT prompt is 60 words.

People aren’t typing keywords anymore. They’re having conversations. Adding context. Explaining what they actually need.

Your content needs to address those real concerns, not just rank for keywords.

2. Build trust signals everywhere

AI models look for credibility markers. Consistent publishing. Engaged communities. Clear expertise.

Being recommended inside an LLM conversation means being seen as trustworthy.

3. Focus on being mentioned, not just found

This is the big mindset shift. It’s not about ranking #1 on Google anymore. It’s about being the name that comes up when someone asks an AI for recommendations.

4. Quality of audience beats quantity

AI traffic converts better and engages deeper. A smaller but intentional audience might be worth more than a massive but passive one.

The bottom line

AI isn’t replacing search. It’s adding a new layer to how people discover and decide.

We’re using ChatGPT for depth and exploration. Google for quick direction. Both matter.

The creators who win will be the ones who show up in both places.

Your consistency. Your authenticity. Your expertise. That’s what gets you mentioned when someone asks ChatGPT for recommendations in your space.

Keep building. Keep showing up.

The algorithms are watching differently now.

Was this helpful?

As I give this aways for free, it would mean a lot to me if you left a comment.

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If you want more breakdowns like this, I share them every week. 🧡

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P.S. I co-founded Cozora - live, weekly sessions where AI experts share their screen and show you how they really use AI.

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I’ve been watching it for months, and I finally figured out what it is:

We’re in the narrow window where AI is powerful enough to build real things, but not yet commoditized enough that everyone knows how.

Let me explain why this matters more than you think.

The Pattern I Keep Seeing

Every major technology shift has a window. A brief moment in time where the people who move fast get an unfair advantage.

• Early blogging (2005-2008): The people who started blogs then became the voices everyone followed. Tim Ferriss. Seth Godin. Gary Vaynerchuk. They weren’t better writers. They were just early.

• Early YouTube (2009-2012): The creators who figured out YouTube then built audiences that later creators couldn’t catch. Casey Neistat started in 2010. PewDiePie in 2010. They got first-mover advantage that compounded.

• Early podcasting (2014-2017): Same story. Joe Rogan started in 2009. Tim Ferriss in 2014. By the time everyone else realized podcasting mattered, the top spots were taken.

The pattern is always the same:

1. New platform/technology emerges

2. Early adopters experiment and figure it out

3. They build systems, audiences, businesses

4. Everyone else catches on 2-3 years later

5. The game is already over

We’re in Phase 2 of AI right now.

And most people don’t realize it yet.

Why This Moment Is Different

Here’s what makes right now—October 2025—special:

AI tools are finally powerful enough to build real businesses. Not experiments. Not toys. Real revenue-generating systems.

But most people are still in the “playing around” phase. They’re using ChatGPT to write emails. Maybe summarize articles. They see it as a productivity tool.

They’re missing what’s actually happening.

A small group of people are building entire businesses on AI. They’re creating products, automating systems, and moving so fast it’s hard to track.

And the gap between these two groups is growing every single day.

The Three Month Rule

I have a theory about these windows of opportunity:

You have about 90 days to make your move.

After that, the early movers have such a head start that catching up becomes exponentially harder.

Think about it:

• Month 1: You learn the systems while they’re still being figured out

• Month 2: You start implementing and building your first real projects

• Month 3: You’re shipping products while others are still “thinking about it”

By Month 6? You’re in a completely different league.

The people who joined blogging in 2008, YouTube in 2012, or podcasting in 2017 never caught up to the early movers. Not because they weren’t talented. Because compounding advantages are brutal.

We’re at the beginning of Month 1 for serious AI building.

The Cost of Waiting

Let me be brutally honest about what happens if you wait six months:

In March 2026, you’ll finally decide to “get serious about AI.”

You’ll start looking for communities, courses, resources. You’ll find them. You’ll join.

But here’s what will have happened by then:

The people who started in October 2025 will have:

• Shipped 5-10 AI products

• Built systems that 10x their output

• Found co-founders and collaborators

• Established themselves as “the people who know AI”

• Built audiences around their AI expertise

And you’ll be starting from zero, trying to catch up.

It’s not impossible. But it’s so much harder.

I’ve watched this happen in every platform shift. The people who wait always ask the same question: “How did they get so far ahead?”

The answer is always the same: They started when you were still thinking about it.

The Room Where It’s Happening

Six months ago, I was on a Zoom call with Joel Salinas and Michael Simmons.

Joel was building—live, on screen—an AI tool that analyzes successful newsletters. In 30 minutes, he created something most people couldn’t build in 30 days.

Then Michael showed his entire content automation system. Making mistakes. Fixing them. Showing exactly how he turns one piece of content into twenty.

I was frantically taking notes. My mind was racing.

And I realized: These guys aren’t just ahead. They’re in a completely different game.

That’s when we decided to build Cozora.

Not another course. Not another AI tool.

A community where serious builders show their actual work.

What Cozora Actually Is

Cozora is what happens when 13 people who are actually building with AI decide to do it together, in public, and invite others to watch.

Every week:

• Someone shares their screen and builds something live

• They show the prompts, the iterations, the mistakes

• You ask questions in real-time

• You see exactly how they’re building the future

It’s not about learning AI. It’s about building together during the window when it still matters.

The first live session is Thursday, October 30th at 11am ET.

Join Cozora Now

🚀 Exclusive Discount for My Paid Subscribers

As a paid subscriber, you get access to special Cozora discounts (at the end of this article):

• 50% OFF annual membership (Just $360 instead of $720)

• 20% OFF monthly membership (Just $60 instead of $75)

Is it worth it?

Ask yourself: What would being two years ahead in AI be worth to your career? Your business? Your future?

You’re not paying for content. You’re paying for proximity to people who are building the future.

And proximity is the highest ROI investment you can make.

The Two Paths From Here

Path 1:

You close this email. “I’ll think about it.” Maybe join later. Maybe not.

Six months from now, you’re still experimenting with ChatGPT. Still watching tutorials. Still alone. Still wondering how some people got so far ahead so fast.

Path 2:

You join today. You’re in the first session Thursday. You ask questions, make connections, start building.

Six months from now, you’ve shipped multiple AI products. You have collaborators. You have systems that 10x your output. You’re the person others ask: “How did you figure this out so fast?”

You smile. “I was early.”

Both paths are available right now. But only for the next few weeks.

What To Do Next

Join Cozora here

Or get the discount codes, by upgrading to The AI Soloist first.

Subscribe now

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We’re living through one of those rare moments in time, where everything shifts. Where the rules change. Where people who move fast can build something real.

Obviously, I’m talking about AI. And before you roll your eyes 🙄, let me explain.

I’m not here to tell you AI will take your job or that robots are coming. I’m here to tell you that right now, today, you have access to tools that let you build and scale like never before.

And most people are still sitting on the sidelines.

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Upgrade now to get a personalized workflow analysis. I’ll show you exactly where AI can save you the most time. Only available in October. 🔥

The Window Is Open (But It Won’t Stay That Way)

Think about every major tech shift:

• The internet in the 90s - People who built websites early made fortunes

• Social media in the 2000s - Early creators built massive audiences

• Mobile apps in the 2010s - Solo developers created million-dollar businesses

→ AI in 2024-2025 - This is our moment. Right now.

Here’s what’s different this time:

• You don’t need to learn to code (AI writes it for you)

• You don’t need a team (AI is your team)

• You don’t need massive budgets (most AI tools cost $20-40/month)

But: This advantage won’t last forever.

In 12-18 months, big companies will have caught up. The easy wins will be gone. The competition will be fierce.

The people who start now will have an 18-month head start on everyone else.

What “Acting on It” Actually Means

I’m not telling you to quit your job and become an AI entrepreneur (unless you want to).

I’m telling you to start building leverage while everyone else is still watching tutorials.

Here are three paths I’m seeing work:

Path 1: The Side Project Builder

• Spend 5-10 hours/week solving a problem you have

• Build with AI tools (Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor)

• Sell to people like you

• Real example: A teacher built an AI lesson planner, now has 50 schools paying $200/month

Path 2: The AI-Powered Freelancer

• Take what you already do well

• Use AI to 10x your output

• Charge premium rates for faster delivery

• Real example: A copywriter using Claude now charges $500/hour instead of $150

Path 3: The Career Accelerator

• Build AI tools for your current company

• Become the “AI person” everyone asks for help

• Use that reputation to level up

• Real example: A marketing manager built internal AI tools, got promoted to VP in 8 months

None of these require you to be technical. They require you to start.

Why Solo Creators Have the Advantage Right Now

Big companies are slow. You’re not.

What takes a company 3-6 months:

• Committee meetings about AI strategy

• Hiring consultants

• Security reviews

• Budget approvals

• Actually building something

What you can do this weekend:

• Saturday: Identify a problem and build a solution with AI

• Sunday: Get 3 people to test it

• Monday: Launch with payment enabled

I’m not exaggerating. People in my community are doing this every single week.

The solo creator’s superpower isn’t resources. It’s speed.

Real People, Real Results (Because Theory Is Useless)

Let me show you what’s actually happening:

• Mark (accountant): Built an AI expense tool for small businesses → $4.2K/month after 3 months

• Jessica (teacher): Created an AI quiz generator → 120 teachers paying $15/month

• David (sales manager): Made an AI cold email tool → Now at $28K/month

None of them were “technical” when they started.

They just started.

Your Simple Action Plan (This Week)

Forget overwhelming yourself with courses and planning.

Here’s what to do:

• Monday: Pick ONE problem you spend 2+ hours/week on

• Tuesday-Thursday: Open Claude or ChatGPT, describe what you want, let it build it (it will be messy, that’s okay)

• Friday: Show it to 3 people and get feedback

• Weekend: Decide if it’s worth another week

That’s it. No perfect plan needed. Just momentum.

The Only Question That Matters

• Not “Am I technical enough?”

• Not “Is my idea good enough?”

• Not “Is it too late?”

The only question: Will you start this week, or look back in a year wishing you had?

I built my first profitable AI tool while having no clue what I was doing.

The clarity came from building, not from planning.

This is the biggest opportunity most of us will see in our working lives.

Don’t let it pass you by.

Start this week,

Claudia

P.S. If you want step-by-step workflows for building with AI, sign up here.

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Today, I’m happy to share a guest post with you from my friend .

Sam is a poet and professor based in Edinburgh, where he explores how language, creativity, and technology can bring communities together. He runs Slow AI, a newsletter and practice that encourages people to use AI reflectively rather than reactively, helping individuals and organisations build resilience instead of speed.

Ready to get inspired? 🧡 Let’s jump in.

In this post you will:

• Stop rushing AI drafts that look polished but fail to land.

• Start catching hidden assumptions and blind spots early.

• Build deliberate pauses that make your work more resilient.

Most of the time, when people talk about AI, they talk about speed. Faster drafting. Faster workflows. Faster content.

But sometimes, speed is the wrong metric. In my work as a professor and writer, I have found that the most valuable use of AI is not acceleration, but reflection.

A Hard Lesson

I learned this the hard way. At the start of last year, I rushed out an article pitch using AI to help me hit a tight deadline. I sent it off quickly, pleased to have something polished. The reply came back fast too: a rejection, with a sting in the tail: they asked if AI had written it. The truth was not that the tool had failed, but that I had failed to pause. I had skipped reflection, and the result was flat, generic, forgettable.

What I realised in that moment was that speed alone does not guarantee value. A polished draft is useless if it lacks depth. The lesson was simple: I should have treated the tool as a thought partner, not a shortcut. What was missing was the same pause I ask of my students. A moment to step back, test assumptions, and look at the work from another angle. Without that pause, AI only amplified my haste. With it, the same tool could have become something quite different.

Reflection as a Skill

The shift for me was realising that reflection is not an abstract idea, but a practical skill. As an educator, I have built reflection into my practice for years; reviewing what worked in a class, what missed the mark, and what assumptions I carried in with me. If those techniques help me teach better, why not apply the same mindset to my use of AI? The same frameworks that sharpen learning can also sharpen how we work with our tools. That is where simple, repeatable exercises come in.

Reflection in Practice

Here is a simple 3-step exercise you can try the next time you use AI:

Step 1: Ask for assumptions
Take the AI’s answer and push back on it directly. Type: “What assumptions are you making in this response? Whose perspective might be missing?” This forces the tool to uncover the framing it has taken for granted and it shows you where you might be leaning on hidden biases.

Step 2: Reframe the question
Copy your original prompt. Then ask: “Give me three alternative ways to frame this same question.” Compare the results. Notice which angles you had overlooked. This exercise trains you to see blind spots and to recognise that the first way you phrased something is rarely the only way.

Step 3: Hold the pause
Before acting on the answer, resist the urge to run with it. Instead, type: “Generate three follow-up questions I should ask before I decide.” Do not rush to solutions. Let the tool slow you down. The goal is to create a deliberate pause, one that often saves you hours of correction later.

From Productivity Engine to Reflective Partner

These small shifts can completely change the role of AI in your work. Instead of treating it as a machine that churns out faster drafts, you begin to use it as a partner that slows you down, holds up a mirror, and helps you think more clearly. That change matters. Reflection saves you from wasted effort, improves the quality of your decisions, and builds resilience that speed alone cannot provide.

This is the heart of what I explore each week in Slow AI: how to create space for pause, attention, and better choices by working differently with the tools you already have.

Try the 3-step exercise this week on something small: a client email, a content draft, or a decision you are weighing up. Notice what happens when you let AI question you instead of racing ahead.

The advantage for soloists is not just speed, it is sustainability. While others burn out chasing the newest tool, you can build depth, clarity, and trust in the way you work. That is what will keep your business, and your creativity, resilient over the long run.

If you want more posts like these, make sure to subscribe to and also to my publication, The AI Solist. As always, have fun and trust the process. 🙌

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I met both types at a conference last month. The collector cornered me for 20 minutes, explaining how he'd just discovered this "amazing new AI that could revolutionize everything." He pulled out his phone, showed me screenshots of 12 different apps.

"But what do you actually use daily?" I asked.

Silence. Then: "Well, I'm still figuring out the best workflow..."

Two hours later, I sat down with the operator. She didn't mention AI once in our first 10 minutes. Instead, she talked about results. How she'd automated her client onboarding. How her content creation time dropped 70%. How she'd eliminated the bottleneck that used to keep her working weekends.

When I finally asked about her tools. Her answer was straightforward. "Claude for research and thinking. Notion for organization. Loom for client communication. That's it."

Same conference. Same opportunities. Completely different approaches to AI.

And guess which one is making 6 figures while working 30 hours a week?

The Tool Collector Trap

Your browser bookmarks tell a story. Notion AI. ChatGPT. Claude. Perplexity. Jasper. Copy.ai. Writesonic. Gamma. Beautiful.ai. Midjourney. DALL-E. Runway. Luma. The list goes on.

You've watched the demo videos. Joined the Slack communities. Followed the Twitter accounts of AI influencers who breathlessly announce every new release. You've even set up accounts, played around for an hour, maybe written a LinkedIn post about your "game-changing discovery."

It’s very likely that you have never used the majority of these tools ever again.

The tool sits unused while you chase the next shiny object. Because that's what we do, right? We collect. We hoard. We convince ourselves that knowing about the latest AI breakthrough makes us ahead of the curve.

But with this approach you're not ahead. You're stuck in the tool collector trap, and it's costing you more than you realize.

The real cost isn't the $20/month subscriptions adding up (though they are). It's the mental bandwidth. The decision fatigue. The constant context switching. The illusion of progress when you're actually standing still.

While you're busy collecting, someone else is operating. And they're eating your lunch.

The Shift: From Collector to Operator

Here's what I've learned from studying the solopreneurs who actually succeed with AI: They don't collect tools. They operate systems.

The difference is everything.

• Collectors think in features: "This AI can write emails!"

• Operators think in workflows: "How can I reduce my email response time from 30 minutes to 3 minutes while maintaining quality?"

• Collectors get excited by capabilities.

• Operators get excited by outcomes.

• Collectors try everything once.

• Operators master one thing deeply, then systematically expand.

It's all about changing how you think about tools. It's about becoming someone who builds systems that work, rather than someone who knows about systems that could work.

The 3-Step Operator Method

Ready to make the shift? Here's the framework that separates operators from collectors:

Step 1: Audit Your Current Reality

Start with brutal honesty. List your actual daily business tasks. Not the ones you think you should be doing. The ones you actually spend time on.

• Writing content? Responding to emails? Research? Client communication? Administrative work? Social media management?

Now identify the 3 most time-consuming or repetitive tasks on that list. Rate your current efficiency on a scale of 1-10. Be honest. If you're spending 4 hours researching and writing a single newsletter, you're not a 9. You're probably a 4.

This is about establishing a baseline. You can't improve what you don't measure.

Step 2: Map Before You Automate

This is where most people fail. They jump straight to automation without understanding their current process.

Pick ONE task from your audit. Document your current process step-by-step. Every single step. Where do you start? What decisions do you make along the way? What are the exceptions? Where do you get stuck?

For example, if it's content creation:

1. Choose topic

2. Research background information

3. Find relevant examples

4. Create outline

5. Write first draft

6. Edit and revise

7. Format and publish

Now identify the bottleneck. It's usually not where you think it is. Most people assume the bottleneck is writing, but it's often research or decision-making about what to write.

Step 3: Implement, Measure, Optimize

Start with ONE workflow. Not three. Not five. One.

Choose ONE AI tool to help with ONE step in that workflow. Use it to enhance your brain, not replace it. If you're stuck on research, use AI to help you organize information, not to write your content for you.

Track the results.

• How much time did you save? Did quality improve or decline? What worked? What didn't?

Only after you've mastered this one workflow with this one tool do you expand. The operators I know have maybe 3-5 AI tools they use religiously. The collectors have 47 they've forgotten about.

Real Example: Sarah's Content Engine

Let me tell you about Sarah. She runs a marketing consultancy and was spending 6 hours every week researching and writing her newsletter. Six hours. For one piece of content.

She tried everything. Jasper for writing. Perplexity for research. ChatGPT for ideation. Each tool helped a little, but she was context-switching so much she was actually slower than before.

Then she made the shift.

Instead of trying to optimize every step with different tools, she mapped her entire process. She realized her bottleneck wasn't writing. It was organizing her research and deciding what was worth including.

She picked Claude as her single AI partner. Not for writing, but for thinking. She'd dump all her research into Claude and have a conversation about what was most important, what themes emerged, what her audience would find most valuable.

The result: Her 6-hour process became 90 minutes. Same quality. Better focus. Less stress.

Why This Matters More in 2025

AI is moving faster than ever. New tools launch daily.

This creates a dangerous illusion. It feels like you need to keep up with everything.

But the opposite is true. The gap between operators and collectors is widening.

While collectors are distracted by shiny objects, operators are quietly building advantages with boring, consistent execution.

Your attention is your scarcest resource. Every minute spent evaluating the latest AI toy is a minute not spent mastering the system that could transform your business.

The winners in 2025 won't be the people who know about every AI tool. They'll be the people who've built AI-powered systems that compound over time.

Your Next Move

Stop collecting. Start operating.

Pick ONE business process you want to optimize this week. Choose ONE AI tool to master deeply. Document your current workflow before you automate anything.

Be patient. Be systematic. Be an operator.

The collectors will keep collecting. You'll be busy building something that actually works.

Need help or a community that supports you in this? Then join us now ⬇️.

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Last week I stepped onto LinkedIn again (oh boy, I know), and I couldn’t escape the flood of posts claiming:

“I just made $89k/month with this AI workflow. Comment to get my agents.”

The truth is that 90% of that content is old-school marketing clickbait.

The other 10% is more genuine. These are people who use AI to streamline workflows and save time. That makes sense.

The challenge is keeping up with the constant stream of new AI tools released every day. Over the past few weeks, I have been working on a system to handle that.

I call it Core + Explore.

Core + Explore

The pace of AI can feel impossible to keep up with. One week everyone’s talking about ChatGPT, the next it’s Gemini, and suddenly n8n or a new video tool is the “must-have.” The constant stream of tools makes it easy to feel like you’re always behind.

What I’ve learned is that trying to master everything is a trap. You spread yourself thin, never build real skill, and stay stuck at the surface level.

The solution is simple: have a system.

That’s where Core + Explore comes in. It helps you focus on the tools that matter while still leaving space to test what’s new.

Core

Pick 1–2 tools and go deep. These become your foundation. The tools you master and rely on every day.

For me, that’s ChatGPT (writing + workflows) and Gemini (research + coding).

For you, it could look like:

• Claude + MidJourney → creative writing and image generation

• Perplexity + Cursor → research and coding support

• Notion AI + Otter AI → knowledge management and meeting summaries

• Canva AI + Jasper → content creation and marketing copy

• Runway + Descript → video editing and transcription.

Your Core is where you invest real learning. It’s where you stop dabbling and start transforming how you work.

Explore

Exploring new tools keeps you sharp, but it needs boundaries. Without limits, you end up chasing shiny objects and wasting hours. The fix is simple: set aside one hour a week for testing.

In that time, you might:

• Try n8n to see how automations could save you hours.

• Test a new AI video editor to streamline content creation.

• Browse a prompt library and see if it sparks better outputs.

• Play with an AI note-taking tool to capture ideas faster.

• Experiment with a new AI design app to speed up visuals.

Most tools won’t stick and that’s fine. If something proves useful after a few tests, promote it into your Core. If not, let it go guilt-free and move on.

The point of Explore is not to collect tools. It’s to stay curious, test deliberately, and create a steady pipeline of possibilities.

How to Stock Your Explore List

Here are a few places I use to keep my Explore list fresh:

• Futurepedia and There’s an AI for That → directories of tools

• Product Hunt → daily launches

• Conversations with peers → ask them what they actually use

The Shift

Without a system, the flood of AI tools will always leave you feeling behind.

With Core + Explore, you stay grounded, you keep growing, and you avoid overwhelm.

Action step: Write down your 2 Core tools right now. Then list 3 tools to Explore this month. That’s all it takes to move from stressed to in control.

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Want to save hundreds of work hours and make AI a seamless part of your creative process?

I offer 1:1 sessions where we map your workflows, spot the biggest time-wasters, and integrate AI in a way that fits your style.

Send me a message and we’ll set it up.

The good news: You don’t have to use AI to write a single sentence in order for it to help you. You can keep your voice fully intact, your words 100% yours, and still save hours every week.

Today, I’ll show you 5 ways AI can help you create without ever writing for you. Plus, I’ve put together a 3-prompt starter kit so you can try them yourself without wondering what to type.

Ready?

5 Ways AI Can Help Without Writing for You

Read more

But: Most people use AI to create more now.
I use it to run a lean, fast, focused business and do it without a team, without 14 browser tabs open, and without working 12 hours a day.

It gives me back my time, so I can spend it on what actually matters:
Creative work. Reading. Walking my dog. Thinking clearly. Living better.

If that’s what you want, too, let me show you how.

You can find more on building your online business in my last post

I used to use ChatGPT like this:

“Write me a newsletter.”
“Give me 10 social ideas.”
“Help me outline a digital product.”

Sometimes it worked. Sometimes it was junk. Either way, I’d end up rewriting 80% of it. Sound familiar?

If you’re only using ChatGPT as a quick idea machine, you’re barely scratching the surface. That’s how I used it for months until I realized I was treating AI like a clever assistant instead of what it could be:

An operator. A strategist. A system.

Here’s how I use it now and how you can apply this starting today.

The Old Way: Random Prompts. The Better Way: AI as a 3-Person Team

Instead of asking AI to do everything at once, I assign it 3 specific roles:

1. The Researcher

Use this before you build, write, or sell anything.

Prompt to copy:

“Here’s my audience: [describe them]. What are their top 3 frustrations this week in trying to [solve a specific problem]?”

This gives you content angles, product ideas, and language that resonates.

I use this every week before I write a single Note or newsletter.

2. The Outliner

Structure is everything. Stop asking AI to “write”, ask it to help you shape.

Prompt to copy:

“Create a 3-part newsletter outline:

1. Insight or observation

2. Personal example or story

3. Clear takeaway or tip for readers struggling with [insert challenge]. Keep it tight and punchy.”

Use this as your base, then write inside the outline. Your output will double in quality and clarity.

3. The Repurposer

You’re sitting on gold. You just need to reuse it smarter.

Prompt to copy:

“Turn this newsletter into:
– a 118-word Note with a strong hook
– a tweet in 280 characters
– a short CTA paragraph for my next offer
Keep my tone casual but sharp.”

Now your one idea becomes 3 posts + 1 CTA.

I run this after every newsletter now. It gives me 3x reach with 10% of the effort.

Action Step: Try This This Week

Here’s how you can implement this right away:

Start there. You’ll feel the difference immediately.

Why This Works So Much Better

Here’s what changed for me when I stopped using ChatGPT like a Google search:

• I spend 70% less time figuring out what to say

• I launch faster (newsletters, lead magnets, products)

• I actually use what AI gives me instead of rewriting everything

• My content is sharper because it’s rooted in real audience pain points

• I stopped treating AI like a magic trick and started treating it like a system

You Don’t Need More Prompts. You Need a Process.

Here’s mine, feel free to steal it:

1. Start every project with a “Researcher” prompt

2. Outline the structure before writing a single word

3. Repurpose it into 2–3 formats using clear, repeatable prompts

4. Save the best prompts and reuse them every week

I run 90% of my business using just ChatGPT, but now it actually feels like a growth engine instead of a copywriting crutch.

Want My Full AI Business Stack?

I’m putting together a Notion doc with:

• All my weekly prompts

• How I format them by task (content, product, email, repurposing)

• A few workflows that help me run things fast as a one-person team

Want it? Leave a comment and I’ll send you first access.

Let’s build with less guesswork.

Leave a comment

At the time, I had tons of ideas, big dreams, and content was flowing.
But let me be honest with you: one year in, it becomes a bit harder to keep producing inspiring content every week. There are days I stare at the screen and have no clue what to write about.

If I didn’t have the systems I use now, I honestly don’t think I’d still be showing up consistently.

Thankfully, I created a lightweight process that helps me stay consistent.

It uses AI in a smart and simple way, supporting me without taking over.
Everything I publish still sounds like me, but now I have a little assistant who helps me sketch things out before I ever hit “Publish”.

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You’ll get access to me, my community, and support turning your newsletter into a real online business.

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Here's what I use AI for:

1. Hooks
   I give it a topic and get three headline ideas. One of them usually clicks and gives me a clear direction.

2. Outlines
   I get a 4–5 bullet point structure. It helps me avoid staring at a blank page.

3. First Drafts
   It gives me a rough 400 to 600-word draft in my tone. I always edit it, but it gives me a strong starting point.

4. Image Ideas
   I ask for cover image suggestions and create visuals in Midjourney and Canva.

5. Call to Action
   I use it to create closing statements that invite engagement or gently point to something I’m offering.

Here’s a refined version of your prompt that includes everything you mentioned—tone calibration, writing samples, paragraph structure, and style guidelines:

Try it for yourself:

Open ChatGPT (or Claude), then paste this prompt:

---

Newsletter Writing Assistant Prompt

Act as my newsletter writing assistant. When I give you a topic, generate the following:

• 3 strong hooks (no questions, no clickbait, no em dashes)

• 1 clear outline with 4–5 main points

• 1 article draft (400–600 words) using the structure and tone described below

• 2 image ideas

• 1 natural, on-brand call to action

Tone & Style Guidelines:

• Write like you're talking to a smart friend

• Keep it warm, clear, and human

• Use the 1-3-1 rhythm (short opener, 3 fuller body paragraphs, short closer)

• Vary sentence lengths to create natural flow (avoid consistently short, choppy sentences)

• Include at least one smart subtitle to break up the article and guide the reader

• Do not use rhetorical questions

• Do not use em dashes

• Avoid clickbait or overly polished marketing language

• Keep the structure simple, helpful, and easy to read

Before writing, analyze the writer’s voice if samples are provided. Wait for the topic before generating anything.

Then:

1. Add 2–3 links to your best posts (so the model has something to learn from)

2. Paste in your topic

3. Let the assistant guide you from there

You’ll still be in control of the voice, shape, and structure, this just gives you a smart, personalized starting point.

This system brought ease back into my creative process. I spend less time overthinking and more time publishing.

I feel more consistent, more focused, and way less alone in the process. Which is weird, because somehow I am still alone in the process, but I have someone to bounce ideas off and make them better.

Want more like this? 🧡
Become a paid subscriber to get weekly support, access to me and our community, and now: my brand-new digital product creation course is included too.

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But there’s one angle that’s still under the radar: Your knowledge can now become scalable software. No coding needed. No tech team required.

Just you, your expertise, and a platform that turns it into something people can use.

It sounds wild. But that’s exactly where we’re headed.

Let’s jump into that world for a second today.

If you find my work helpful, consider becoming a paid subscriber.

You’ll get access to me, my community, and support turning your newsletter into a real online business.

Subscribe now

You can find more on building your online business in my last post

AI Is Reshaping the Way We Build Businesses

The other day I listened to a fantastic podcast by my friends and .

They talked about something that I found really interesting: How AI isn’t just changing how we work, but it’s changing how we build our businesses.

How we are moving from content creators to tool creators to offering knowledge to offering interactive intelligence.

The Shift From Content to Tools

What’s changing is the form that knowledge takes. It’s no longer something to just consume, it can now become something your audience interacts with.

Platforms like Pickaxe are at the center of this shift. They let you take what you already know — your documents, notes, PDFs, strategies, and personal processes — and turn all of it into usable tools. No code. No developers. Just drag, drop, and build.

You can create your own AI assistants, forms, dashboards, or product helpers that answer questions, walk someone through a process, or help them apply your methods to their own life or business. And these tools evolve with your thinking.

Real Business Applications

This opens up an entirely new layer of value and monetization. Here’s what this might look like:

• Your paid subscribers receive monthly credits to use your tool

• A client plugs their info into your interactive framework and gets a personalized output

• Your course includes an AI assistant that helps apply the lessons

• Your homepage features a free tool that brings in new leads while you sleep

This is where business models are heading.

You create assets that grow smarter over time. You embed them into your offers, your site, your content.

You generate revenue through usage, tiers, or full access — like your own mini SaaS business, powered by your brain.

The Future For Us Writers

You’re not just a writer or a coach anymore. You’re a product builder. A tool creator. A solo founder with leverage.

The opportunity is wide open. And this shift has just begun. The solopreneurs who start building now — who treat their expertise like a scalable product — are going to be light-years ahead.

I’m testing this out myself, and I can already feel the shift. If you’re curious about how to turn your content or coaching into a tool, I’d love to explore it with you.

Want more like this? 🧡
Become a paid subscriber to get weekly support, access to me and our community, and now: my brand-new digital product creation course is included too.

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