Meet The Kid Who Made $1M with ChatGPT
Summary
TLDRJoe Populus, a 20-year-old computer science student, shares his journey of building a book brand valued at $930,000 by selling AI-generated books. Starting from a minimum wage job, Joe leveraged GPT3 to create and market ebooks to middle-aged moms on Pinterest. Despite initial challenges, he achieved profitability within months, reaching a 70-80% profit margin. His success story, featured by Starter Story, highlights the power of AI in business and the importance of learning and adapting to achieve financial success.
Takeaways
- 💡 Joe Poplawski, a 20-year-old computer science student, built a book brand valued at $930,000 by using AI to generate books and marketing them on Pinterest.
- 🚀 Joe's business started with a minimum wage job and self-funding, growing to a profitable venture with a profit margin of 70-80%.
- 📚 His initial foray into AI was through working on use cases for GPT-3, which led to charging for advice and eventually to the book business idea.
- 💼 Joe managed to build his business while attending college full-time and working part-time, even dropping two courses to focus on his book brand.
- 📈 The business model involves creating books with AI, with costs as low as $3 per book, and using Pinterest ads for targeted marketing to middle-aged moms.
- 🔑 Joe's success with Pinterest ads started with consideration campaigns to identify niches and then moved to conversion campaigns for optimization.
- 📉 Joe's meticulous approach to proofreading and revising the AI-generated books ensured quality, contributing to customer satisfaction and repeat business.
- 💼 The business is highly sellable, with Joe receiving an initial offer of $930,000 for his entire operation, and he's now selling parts of his business to investors.
- 🎓 Joe advises others interested in AI generative books to learn about AI models, find a niche with traffic and emotional appeal, and understand how to elicit desired outcomes through the product.
- 🎧 Outside of his business, Joe has a passion for making house music under his name, Joe Poplawski, and has songs on Spotify.
- 💼 With his profits, Joe has been cautious, only purchasing a Rolex to preserve value, focusing on reinvesting in his business and avoiding depreciating assets.
Q & A
How did Joe Poplawski make over one million dollars in one year?
-Joe Poplawski made over one million dollars in one year by starting a business selling AI-generated books. He utilized his knowledge of AI and GPT-3 to create ebooks and marketed them effectively, particularly to middle-aged moms on Pinterest.
What was Joe's initial job before starting his business?
-Before starting his business, Joe was a university student working part-time stocking shelves for 11 dollars an hour.
How did Joe come up with the idea of selling AI-generated books?
-Joe came up with the idea after working on use cases for GPT-3 and realizing the potential of integrating AI into business models. His experience with openAI and the publishing industry inspired him to start his own book brand.
What was the turning point for Joe's business?
-The turning point for Joe's business was when he met with a publishing company and saw their revenue from selling books. This eye-opener motivated him to start his own similar venture using AI for book creation.
How did Joe manage to build his business while attending college full-time?
-Joe managed to build his business while attending college by dedicating several hours each night to work on his book brand, even dropping two courses to focus on it. He balanced his time between studying and working on his business.
What was Joe's first profitable day like?
-Joe's first profitable day was on October 3rd, after which his earnings increased significantly. By December 28th, he had his first day with a profit of 1K, which was a significant milestone for him.
How did Joe fund his initial business venture?
-Joe's initial business venture was completely self-funded, using money he made from his minimum wage job. He made several mistakes initially, which could have been avoided with better planning.
What is the typical profit margin for Joe's business?
-The typical profit margin for Joe's business is about 70 to 80 percent. The main expense is the cost of ads, with other costs including premium extension subscriptions and book creation.
How does Joe approach marketing for his AI-generated books?
-Joe primarily uses Pinterest ads for marketing his books. He starts with consideration campaigns to test niches and then moves to conversion campaigns to refine his marketing strategy and improve conversion rates.
What is Joe's strategy for dealing with competition and market saturation?
-Joe is not concerned about competition and market saturation due to his brand's momentum and loyal customer base. He believes there is plenty of room for growth and that saturation will only drive him to provide more value in his products.
How does Joe's business model handle proofreading and quality control?
-Initially, Joe proofread all the books himself. Now, he has a proofreader on retainer to ensure the quality of the AI-generated books. This helps maintain a high standard of content for his customers.
What advice does Joe have for someone interested in starting an AI generative book business?
-Joe advises taking an interest in AI models, learning how they work, and finding the best settings and prompts for optimal output. Additionally, finding a niche with traffic and ambitious people is crucial for emotional connection and effective marketing.
What is Joe's current valuation and profit made from his business?
-Joe's business is currently valued at 930,000 dollars, and he has made a profit of 390,000 dollars.
How does Joe spend his typical day now that he has a successful business?
-Joe spends his mornings ensuring ads are running correctly and checking in with his proofreader. In the afternoons, he works on teaching others how to build their book brands. At night, he pursues his hobby of making house music.
What is Joe's perspective on investing the profits he made from his business?
-Joe has been lean with his spending, choosing to invest the profits back into his business. He has only bought a Rolex as a depreciating asset and plans to invest more in the future for bigger purchases like a car.
What advice would Joe give to his past self when he was starting out with failed business ventures?
-Joe would advise his past self to prioritize learning over earning, focusing on building a strong skill set that would make it almost impossible to fail in future ventures.
Outlines
📚 Teenage AI Entrepreneur's Success Story
Joe, a 20-year-old computer science student, shares his journey of building a book brand valued at $930,000 by using AI to generate books and marketing them on Pinterest. Initially working part-time for minimum wage, Joe discovered the potential of AI in business models and began charging for advice on AI integration. After meeting with a publishing company and realizing the profitability of book sales, he started his own venture. Joe self-funded his business, making his first profit in October and hitting $1,000 in profit by December. His business model relies heavily on advertising, particularly through Pinterest, targeting middle-aged moms with AI-generated content.
💼 Building a Business While Balancing School and Work
Despite attending college full-time and working part-time, Joe managed to build his book brand by dedicating long hours to his business. He dropped two courses to focus on his book brand, spending most of his day on school and then working on his business at night. Joe's business has a profit margin of 70-80%, with the main expense being ads and a premium extension subscription. He initially proofread all his books but now has a proofreader on retainer. Joe's marketing strategy involves using Pinterest ads to target specific niches and optimize conversion campaigns for better results.
🎓 Scaling and Selling a Profitable AI Book Business
Joe's business has grown to a point where he is now mentoring others to build their own book brands. He has a loyal customer base and is not worried about competition or market saturation due to the large market size and his brand's momentum. Joe has received offers to sell his business, with the first offer being $930,000, which he is considering by selling parts of his corporation. His daily routine involves managing ads, working with proofreaders, and teaching others about his business model. In his spare time, Joe creates house music as a hobby, with songs available on Spotify.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡AI-generated books
💡GPT-3
💡Revenue
💡Profit margin
💡Landing page
💡Proofreader
💡Competition
💡Investor
💡Minimum wage job
💡Case studies
Highlights
A university student named Joe Popplus made over one million dollars in one year with an AI-generated book business.
Joe started with a minimum wage job and built his business while attending college full-time.
The business idea originated from Joe's experience with GPT-3 and his interest in integrating AI into business models.
Initially, Joe provided advice on AI and GPT-3, eventually charging for his expertise which led to the book business idea.
Joe's first profitable day with AI books came on October 3rd, marking a significant milestone in his business journey.
He generated 40 AI books by September and reached a daily profit of 1K by December 28th.
The business was entirely self-funded, starting with the money Joe made from his part-time job.
Joe dropped two courses to focus on his book brand, balancing school and business.
The key to starting in AI generative books is understanding AI models and finding a niche with traffic and ambition.
Joe's first book was not successful, leading him to study competitors' books to improve his own.
The business is valued at $930,000, with Joe making $390k in profit with a 70-80% profit margin.
Marketing is primarily done through Pinterest ads, with a focus on niche targeting and conversion campaigns.
Landing pages are crucial for showcasing the book's value, with a professional appearance to avoid high bounce rates.
Despite the low barrier to entry in AI book creation, Joe's brand has significant momentum and a loyal customer base.
Joe is selling parts of his business to investors while continuing to build and sell more book brands.
His daily routine involves managing ads, working with a proofreader, and teaching others to build book brands.
Joe also creates house music as a hobby and has songs on Spotify, hinting at a potential future in AI music.
With his profits, Joe has been conservative, only purchasing a Rolex and focusing on business growth and future investments.
Reflecting on his journey, Joe advises prioritizing learning over immediate earnings to build a strong foundation of skills.
Transcripts
this kid made over one million dollars
in one year with a business idea that
nobody's talking about AI generated
books he invited us into his apartment
in Toronto to show us where he found
this idea how he started on a budget and
how he built it in a few hours a day
while attending College full-time before
the money Joe popplus was just a uni
student stocking shelves for 11 bucks an
hour now he's making a living selling
thousands of ebooks using an
unconventional method with chat gbt
initially this wasn't the way I did it
but this is the best way to do it now
but the craziest part about his business
is actually not how he creates the books
it's how he advertises them the majority
of my money has been made off of dads
the AI Revolution is here and Joe is
living proof I'm Pat walls and this is
starter story
you built an amazing business tell me
about who you are and what you build I'm
Joe I'm a 20 year old computer science
student I've built a book brand that is
now valued at 930 000 I generate all
books with AI and then I Market them on
Pinterest to middle-aged moms how did
you come up with this business idea 2020
was the year when I graduated high
school I started working on a use case
for gpt3 I got a really good idea of how
AI could be integrated into different
business models in 2022 I was like why
don't I just utilize my pre-existing
skill sets AI gpt3 is now out a few
businesses know about it maybe I could
help provide some value to like some
small mid-sized businesses who want to
learn more about AI around that time
that I got that idea people actually
started reaching out to me asking about
my experience at openai I had a kind of
like tab on my LinkedIn that showed that
I had worked on use cases for openai for
the gpt3 beta they started asking me
certain things it got to the point point
where I started charging for the advice
that I was giving in July of 2022 I met
with the Publishing Company where I got
the idea they showed me their stats and
how much money they were making off of
selling books that was a complete
eye-opener for me I didn't realize how
many people bought books per month their
revenue was about two million dollars
which was absolutely insane to me I
thought why can't I just start up
something similar because what they were
doing was so insanely simple that they
were not doing anything AI book related
and when I met with them I told them
nothing about my idea that I had kind of
formulated while we were on the call in
the month of August I generated 10 20
books I generated a few more in
September by the end of September I was
at 40 bucks I generated 40 books with AI
then on October 3rd I hit my first
profitable day and I was like 20 October
4th I was like at forty dollars and then
from there it almost grew X-Men actually
on December 28th I'll never forget this
day that's when I hit my first 1K day
profit and that was crazy that was just
after Christmas and my whole family knew
about it I told all my friends we built
this business from money that you made
for your minimum wage job did you do it
all yourself yeah it was completely
self-funded and if I did it properly the
first time with the stuff that I know
now I could have started it up in under
500 but I just made a bunch of mistakes
yeah it's just a new Venture for me how
did you manage building this business
while you're in school and you had a
part-time job that was probably the
hardest part for me I was fitting in
time for me to work on the book brand
when I was studying for a huge test it
was coming up in school I dropped two
courses to work on my book Brands but I
spent most of the day working on school
and then I would spend five six hours in
the nights working on my book print how
can someone who's watching right now get
into AI generative books the best way to
start off learning is taking an interest
in these gender of AI models and
learning how they work how you can get
the best output out of them with the
correct settings with the correct
prompts then you need to find a niche a
niche that has traffic a niche that has
a lot of ambitious people in it when you
have people like that you can tug on
their emotions more and you can present
the outcome to them that they want to
achieve and the only way to get to that
outcome is through your product your
first AI ebook that you created tell me
about how you did it I literally knew
nothing about books so I was researching
how to actually build a book I knew I
could write it with AI like I knew the
output would be good enough but I had no
knowledge on how I should structure it
what should be included all of that when
I created my first book it was probably
the worst book anybody could ever read
like there was no congruency nothing as
I actually started purchasing my
competitors books and reading through
them I knew exactly what I needed to
include it's not as easy as just putting
into Chachi BT write me a book on
whatever initially this wasn't the way I
did it but this is the best way to do it
now you get Chachi PT to create the book
outline let's say for example you have
five chapters and then per each chapter
there are five topics you are going to
go through each Topic in each chapter
and generate that topic even though I
wasn't super experienced with writing
books people still like them the first
few ebooks that I put out they they
enjoyed what they were reading hey real
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hope you guys enjoy the rest of the
video peace can you break down how much
profit you made and what the business is
valued at today two dates I've made 390k
dollars profit and my current valuation
is nine hundred and thirty thousand
dollars what's the typical profit margin
in a business like this my profit margin
is about 70 to 80 percent the only real
expense that takes away from my profit
is the ads I have my premium extension
subscriptions which is about 200 a month
creating books to create a full book
it's about three dollars with GPT three
and then I have my proofreader just go
through everything I have them on a
retainer but you can just do the
pre-freed ink yourself at the starting
when you started out you proofreaded
everything I did yeah I spent a lot of
time I would basically basically
generate a full book do a rough draft
and then I would meticulously go through
each chapter each subtopic just going
through the book and I just do one
revision of that and then I'd have a
good ready to go book tell me more about
the marketing side of things as I
understand uh you make money with ads
how specifically does that work majority
of my money has been made off of
Pinterest ads when you land on Pinterest
and you start with Pinterest ads you're
going to start off with consideration
campaigns and then you're gonna move
into conversion campaigns consideration
campaigns are going to give you a
general idea of which Niche you should
be selling your product in you're going
to test out different niches with
consideration campaigns then you're
going to go way more granular you're
going to set up your Pinterest tag and
then move into conversion campaigns
where you're really going to dial in
every single stat take a look at
everything your landing page copy
whether people are converting above the
full below the fold all of that tell me
a little bit about how the landing pages
work how do people find the landing
pages and and what's the purpose of them
the landing page is going to give you
room to show the lead value Stacks
what's provided chapter previews
everything it gives you so much more
real estate to sell them on the product
it's almost impossible to sell if you
don't do a landing page a landing page
is also the first touch point where the
lead is going to get a really good idea
of your overall brand image so if your
landing page is really really bad it
doesn't look professional they're gonna
bounce they're gonna bounce right away
and you're going to get a bounce rate of
over 80 percent over 70 percent that's
when you know that you know your landing
page just doesn't look professional with
AI books there's a low barrier to entry
right anybody can write an AI book and
sell it how do you approach competition
and things getting saturated I'm at a
point right now where my brand has so
much momentum when I see new competitors
coming to the space it doesn't scare me
it hasn't affected my profit and I don't
expect it I don't see it affecting my
profit in the future either because I
have such a loyal customer base there is
such a huge Market as as well I'm only
advertising on Pinterest when you take
Google ads Facebook into account there's
so much room for growth I'm sure there's
going to be many many like hundreds of
book Brands popping up but the market is
so huge by the point that I predict or
expect it to get saturated all be well
on my way I think that'll be years down
the line though and saturation just
means more competition it means you need
to be better at what you do provide more
value in your product and I think it's
good for people to stride towards
providing more value how sellable is a
business like this initially I didn't
think it would be super sellable and I
wanted to test the waters and what I did
is actually posted a bunch of the
details just on a few marketplaces I
just wanted to see what investors would
offer for my business the very first
offer I got for the entire business was
nine hundred and thirty thousand dollars
when I saw that number and I got the
email notification that I got an offer I
was like I'm really on to something here
now I'm actually working with an
investor who is purchasing 40 of my book
Brands and I'm able to continue building
up another book rant to then maybe sell
another 40 so it's a completely
repeatable process where you can build a
book brand sell it build another sell it
and it doesn't mean you have to sell
this whole Corporation you can sell just
parts of the corporation like what I'm
doing right now you made all this money
selling AI books uh what does a typical
day look like for you what's your
typical routine all of my mornings are
usually spent on making sure the ads are
running correctly making sure my
proofreader is doing what he needs to do
I'm just checking in with the business
now I'm working a lot and this is mostly
the afternoon I'm working on teaching
people how to build their own book brand
that's been extremely rewarding I've had
some really successful students they've
been absolutely killing it and then in
the night I actually make house music as
a hobby and I actually have a few songs
posted to my Spotify so AI music is that
the next thing yeah it could be it could
be yeah that's amazing what's your DJ
name it's just my name Joe popolis nice
yeah you made a lot of money as a 20
year old uh have you bought anything
cool with the profits I really haven't
bought a lot of things the only thing I
bought is just this Rolex and I know
it's going to keep its value I want to
stay away from depreciating assets as
much as I can for now I just want to
make a huge bag and then in the future
in the near future I'll invest and you
know get a nice car all that kind of
stuff but for now I'm just solely
focused on building businesses I'm very
lean and I want to stay that way for a
while if you could sit on Joe Pablo's
shoulder when you were just starting out
you you had a couple failed business
ventures what would you tell him I would
tell him to prioritize learning over
earning be more focused on learning the
skills building up a huge skill set
instead of being focused on how much I'm
earning it was almost impossible for me
to fail with the book brand because I
had built up so many skills beforehand
thank you Joe yeah follow us advice and
you will make millions with AI books
so yeah did you make house music I do
like house music do you want to hear the
latest songs
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