Subscribe here | Unsubscribe here | June 26, 2025 | FIV #82

✅ Today's Checklist:

QUICK LINKS

🧠 Productivity. 7 AI tools to enhance your work life in 2025.

🤖 AI news. Everything you need to know about the latest in AI.

📈 Growth. The death of thoughtful creation (and how to get ahead of everyone else)

🚀 Founder-focused. Thinking about taking the founder's leap? Here's how to prepare for the emotional gauntlet.

💼 Business. How to build a profitable and sustainable business model from day one.

🧠 How I'd Make My First $1M with AI if I Had to Start from Zero

If I woke up tomorrow dead broke—no company, no capital, no connections — just WiFi and a halfway-decent laptop with a cracked screen and a little hope…

You know what I wouldn't do?

I wouldn't write a 40-page business plan. And I wouldn't spend six months in a Notion doc "finding my niche."

I'd open ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Veo 3, and HeyGen—and start cranking.

Because right now, ideas are currency, content is capital, and AI is the intern who works 24/7, never complains, and costs you next to nothing.

The rules have changed. And if you know how to play the new game, you don't need a team or funding—you need a strategy, a stack, and a little bit of audacity.

🚨 We're Living in a Golden Age of Leverage

Individual creators have more leverage than mid-sized media companies had 5 years ago.

Why? Because you can now produce studio-quality video, world-class copy, and full product suites with almost no overhead.

Let me put this in perspective:

Veo 3 lets you generate cinematic video content with a text prompt. A few years ago, this would've required:

Today? You can run this from your kitchen table for free.

HeyGen lets you generate talking head videos with AI avatars in your voice—in multiple languages. This used to cost thousands in studio time, gear, and editing labor. Now? Click, upload, done.

ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini can handle 80% of your writing, research, and concepting needs. That's your scriptwriter, strategist, and copywriter all rolled into one—and none of them complain or go on vacation.

We're not talking about some gimmick here. We're talking about actual, scalable content creation that can be monetized fast.

🤑 How I'd Make My First $1M

If I were starting from zero, here's the playbook:

1. Pick a niche I care about (AI, productivity, finance, biology, health, and fitness—anything I enjoy talking about forever).

2. Use AI to generate 50 video ideas + 50 tweet hooks + 50 blog angles in an afternoon using Claude or ChatGPT.

3. Use Gemini or ChatGPT to script videos and blog content—injecting my voice, style, and punch where needed.

4. Use HeyGen or Veo 3 to generate short-form videos with AI avatars or cinematic edits that don't look like everyone else's TikTok trash.

5. Distribute like hell across TikTok, YouTube Shorts, Instagram Reels, LinkedIn, X, and Facebook. Use Hootsuite to distribute across these platforms with a click.

This is the part most people miss: distribution is built-in. These platforms are literally designed to reward volume. They don't care how small you are—if the content hits, it gets pushed. Period.

And guess what? There's monetization baked into every platform:

That's how the content becomes both the marketing and the product.

You don't need inventory. You don't need a warehouse. You need a Stripe account and something to say.

🔥 Pro Tip: Don't just cross your fingers and hope the algorithm blesses you. Run $5–$50 micro-tests on your best videos to see what actually hooks. Paid ads aren't a cheat code—they're your insurance policy. Algorithms shift. Platforms throttle. You want to test angles, thumbnails, and copy like a scientist, not a gambler. Use paid traffic to buy data, remove luck from the equation, and engineer outcomes.

💰 Real Talk: You Can Monetize 4 Ways on Day One

1. Affiliate Marketing

Promote tools you're already using (e.g., Jasper, Veo 3, Kajabi, Notion templates) and drop your links in video captions and pinned comments.

You could make $5–$500 per sale, with no product of your own.

2. Digital Products

Build an AI cheat sheet, a Notion system, a PDF guide, or even a short course. Create once, sell forever. Use ChatGPT to outline it, and Gumroad to deliver it.

3. Ad Revenue + Sponsorships

You don't need millions of views. A few thousand engaged followers in a money niche can land you $500–$5K per brand deal.

4. Commercials & Ad Creatives for Brands (The Agency Play)

This is where things get really interesting. If you can use Veo 3 or HeyGen to crank out cinematic short-form ads, you can go full AI-powered creative agency—without the bloated headcount.

But here's the key to #4: you've got to sell to the right companies. Target verticals with deep pockets and a history of spending big on commercials—think:

These are the companies that have spent $250K+ on a 30-second spot—and they're actively looking for faster, more affordable creative without sacrificing quality.

With the right prompt and a smart pitch, you can mock up 10 concepts, produce 3 test ads in a weekend, and sell full campaigns for $10,000–$50,000+. And yes, some of these verticals will absolutely spend six figures once you prove you can deliver.

🔥 Pro Tip: I've used Veo 3 a lot, and here's the deal—it's incredible for cinematic visuals, surreal concepts, built-in sound design, and viral-ready content that would've cost $10K+ to produce just a year ago. Want a Bigfoot interview with lightning effects and a custom voiceover? Done. But it's not flawless: character consistency takes deep prompting, and complex physical movements (like running or dancing) can get weird. The key is to build around its strengths—keep movements simple, lean into spectacle, and design scenes that don't rely on realism.

📈 Content Is the Company

You're not just creating content. You're building equity.

Every video, every blog, every Tweet that hits is digital real estate. Some will flop. Some will live forever. But they all compound.

And remember: ideas are the real currency now.

AI handles the grunt work. You just have to decide what the machine should do.

Execution used to be a moat.

Now, distribution and originality are the only moats left.

🔥 Final Thought

If I lost it all tomorrow, I wouldn't rebuild a SaaS or launch another DTC brand. I'd build a media engine powered by AI —fast, nimble, profitable, and fun as hell.

Because we're living in the first era where one person with a laptop can beat a team of 50—if they know what they're doing.

But make no mistake: this isn't a lottery ticket.

It still requires real systems, clear thinking, and getting your math right. You need a content pipeline, a monetization model, and a distribution strategy that compounds. And you've got to treat it like a business. Not a side hustle.

Not a "maybe one day" idea. A business.

Yes, you can go viral.

But even that? Most of the time, it's engineered through storytelling, data, and relentless iteration.

Your success won't be accidental. But with the right tools and execution, it can absolutely be inevitable.

Sean's Pick of The Week

Could This Be the Veo 3 Challenger?

Been seeing a lot of buzz around Hailuo AI lately—and from the early footage, it looks legit.

Cinematic scenes, shockingly good physics, and a real sense of weight to the motion that most gen tools fumble.

I haven't tested it personally yet (Veo 3's still my main squeeze), but I'm planning to dive in soon and do a head-to-head.

If you're experimenting with AI-generated video content, it's worth watching.

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