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3 Sept 2026 · Business

24 min watch → 3 min

AI is lowering the cost of building software and content, which makes both easier to copy. The stronger opportunity is to build small businesses around niche tools, personal expertise, community, and human experiences that AI cannot replicate.

AI lets one founder build a software-as-a-service business for a niche of 500 to 1,000 customers, work that once needed 10 to 30 developers and millions of dollars

Software and content become commodities as AI makes them cheap, so pair a simple tool with community, training, or events that are harder to copy

A software-as-a-service company sells software on subscription, and AI now lets founders turn their own expertise into a playbook and create an early product for almost no money

Ask AI what software to build from your playbook, and it can generate the product

One company rebuilt its applicant tracking system in about a week after paying tens of thousands of dollars per year for one

An applicant tracking system stores candidates and tracks where they are in the hiring process

The rebuilt system was better because it was bespoke, meaning custom-built for one company's exact workflow instead of designed for a generic market

The same force that makes content and software easier to create also reduces their value

When everyone can produce them without much cost, competition rises and margins fall

Real-world experiences remain more defensible than pure software or pure content

An AI system cannot physically attend an event, host a dinner, or give face-to-face reassurance

Blue Ocean Strategy distinguishes red oceans, crowded markets where competitors look interchangeable, from blue oceans, uncontested markets with room to grow

AI shortens the life of blue oceans because successful ideas can be copied in months instead of years

A social media agency was a blue ocean around 2014, but by 2024 many founders were running agencies and large firms faced margin pressure

Marketing agencies illustrate how AI compresses the window before a new idea becomes crowded

It is easier than ever to build a small successful business with $1 million to $5 million in revenue and about 10 people

But harder than ever to build a large business because AI speeds up disruption and competition

The most defensible business asset in an AI world is personal intellectual property, meaning lived experience, personal playbooks, and stories that only one human can credibly share

Relatable beats impressive in audience building, because people connect more strongly with honest human experience than with status signals such as being a billionaire CEO

Streamers build stronger parasocial relationships, meaning one-sided audience bonds that feel like friendship, because they interact live and share ordinary experiences

They make viewers feel personally included

A financial planner named Matt Pitcher found a unique story in having met 100 British lottery winners through a lottery partnership

A TED talk about that experience reached about half a million views in its first few weeks

AI can help turn personal playbooks into products, but the starting point is still a human's own quantified experiences, methods, triumphs, and failures

AI has data and knowledge but no lived experience

A durable AI-era business is an ecosystem, not one offer

Unique personal knowledge attracts a community, that combination creates a personal brand, and that brand can be productized into multiple products and services