The Real Opportunity Isn't Selling Artificial Intelligence. It's Using AI to Become More Capable.
When people talk about making money with artificial intelligence, the conversation usually goes in one predictable direction.
Start an AI agency.
Sell AI automation.
Build chatbots.
Become an AI consultant.
Create prompts and sell them.
Those can all be legitimate businesses. But I think we're missing a much bigger opportunity.
You don't have to sell AI to make money from AI.
You can use AI behind the scenes to become more capable.
You can use it to create things you couldn't create before. You can use it to get work done faster. You can learn skills faster. You can research ideas, analyze information, create content, build simple software, organize projects, automate repetitive tasks, and operate more like a small team than one person.
That's the opportunity that interests me.
Sam Altman recently made a comment that got me thinking about this. He talked about how an individual, with an affordable amount of AI usage, could potentially accomplish work that might previously have required an incredibly talented 100-person engineering team.
That's an enormous claim.
I don't take it to mean ChatGPT magically turns one person into 100 employees.
It doesn't.
AI makes mistakes. It misunderstands instructions. It sometimes confidently gives you something completely wrong. Human judgment still matters.
But I think there's a more important idea underneath Altman's statement.
One person can now attempt things that would have been unrealistic for one person to attempt just a few years ago.
That changes how I think about making extra money with AI.
Instead of asking:
“What AI business should I start?”
I'm starting with a different question:
“What can I already do, understand, or create that AI could help me turn into something more valuable?”
That's AI leverage.
And I think it could become one of the most important skills ordinary people learn over the next several years.
What Does AI Leverage Actually Mean?
The word “leverage” gets thrown around a lot.
Let's make it simple.
Leverage means using something to increase what you're capable of accomplishing with the resources you already have.
If you have five hours available every week to work on a side project, you have a limited resource.
Time.
You can't magically turn those five hours into 20.
But what if AI helps you accomplish in five hours what previously took you 10?
That's leverage.
What if you have a great idea for a small software tool but don't know how to program?
Previously, that might stop you.
You'd have to learn programming, hire a developer, find a technical partner, or abandon the idea.
What if AI can help you plan and build a basic version?
That's leverage.
Maybe you're good at your job but you're terrible at creating professional presentations.
AI can help you organize your thinking, create an outline, analyze information, develop the presentation, and improve your writing.
That's leverage.
Maybe you've wanted to start a YouTube channel but don't have enough time to research, script, edit, write descriptions, create social posts, and keep up with everything else.
AI can assist with many of those tasks.
Again, leverage.
AI doesn't have to be the product.
AI can be the tool that helps you create the product.
That's a very different way of thinking about making money with this technology.
The Four Types of AI Leverage
I think there are four major ways AI can give an ordinary person leverage.
1. Time Leverage
This is probably the easiest one to understand.
AI can help you do certain tasks faster.
Let's say it takes you three hours to research and write a detailed article.
With AI helping you research, organize your notes, develop an outline, identify missing information, edit the draft, and create supporting content, maybe the process takes 90 minutes.
You haven't created more hours.
You've increased the value of the hours you already have.
This matters enormously for someone trying to create extra income while working a full-time job.
You might only have five or ten hours each week available.
That means your biggest limitation isn't necessarily ideas.
It's time.
If AI helps you increase what you accomplish during those limited hours, your options expand.
But there's an important warning here.
Doing something faster doesn't automatically make it valuable.
You could use AI to create 100 mediocre articles every week.
Congratulations. You now have 100 articles nobody wants to read.
Speed only becomes valuable when it's connected to something useful.
The goal isn't more output.
The goal is more valuable output per hour.
2. Skill Leverage
This might be even more powerful than time leverage.
AI can help close skill gaps.
That doesn't mean AI instantly makes you an expert.
It means you can potentially attempt projects that previously required skills you didn't have.
Coding is probably the clearest example.
For years, I've had ideas for tools and thought:
“That would be useful.”
Then came the obvious problem.
I didn't know how to build them.
If you don't know how to code, an idea for an application often stops being an idea and becomes a fantasy.
You'd need to hire someone.
You'd need money.
You'd need to explain the project.
You'd need to manage development.
Today, AI coding tools can help ordinary people get much further.
You can describe what you're trying to create.
You can explain what information goes into the application.
You can explain what should happen when someone presses a button.
You can ask AI to help you map the screens.
You can ask questions when you don't understand something.
You can troubleshoot errors.
You can build a prototype.
Will AI turn someone with zero experience into a senior software engineer overnight?
No.
That's where the AI hype train tends to leave the tracks.
But there's a huge difference between:
“I don't know how to do that, so I can't.”
and:
“I don't know how to do that, but AI might help me figure out enough to create the first version.”
That difference creates economic opportunity.
3. Scale Leverage
This is where things get really interesting.
Let's say you provide a service.
Without AI, you can handle five customers.
What happens if AI helps you handle ten without doubling your workload?
That's scale leverage.
Maybe AI helps you prepare reports.
Maybe it handles the first round of research.
Maybe it organizes customer information.
Maybe it turns meeting notes into action items.
Maybe it creates first drafts.
Maybe it helps personalize something that previously had to be created manually.
You're still responsible for quality.
You're still making decisions.
But you're increasing your capacity.
This doesn't only apply to businesses.
Think about content creation.
One podcast interview could become:
- the full podcast episode
- a YouTube video
- several short videos
- a blog post
- an email newsletter
- social media posts
- quotes
- a follow-up article
- clips addressing individual questions
Before AI, producing all of that could require a significant amount of time or multiple people.
AI can help one creator get much more value from the original piece of work.
That's leverage.
The podcast isn't about AI.
The blog post doesn't have to be about AI.
The customer doesn't need to know what AI tool you used.
AI is simply increasing what you can accomplish from the original asset.
4. Asset Leverage
This is the category I'm most interested in for making extra income.
There's a major difference between selling your time and creating something that can continue producing value.
Suppose someone pays you $50 for an hour of work.
You make $50.
If you want another $50, you need another customer and another hour.
That's a perfectly legitimate way to make money.
But your income is directly connected to your available time.
Now imagine spending several hours creating something once.
Maybe it's:
- a template
- a digital guide
- a checklist
- a spreadsheet system
- a small software application
- a calculator
- a course
- a specialized database
- a resource library
- a membership
- a podcast
- a newsletter
- a useful website
You create the asset once and improve it over time.
Multiple people can potentially buy or use it.
That's a different kind of leverage.
And AI lowers the cost of creating many of these assets.
You still need a good idea.
You still need to understand the customer.
You still need quality.
You still need distribution.
AI doesn't magically create demand.
But it can significantly reduce the work required to get from idea to first version.
That is a major change.
Don't Start With “How Can I Make Money With AI?”
I think this is one of the biggest mistakes people make.
They open ChatGPT and type:
“Give me 20 AI side hustles.”
The AI produces a list.
Start an AI agency.
Create AI art.
Write ebooks.
Sell prompts.
Build chatbots.
Create faceless YouTube channels.
Start an AI newsletter.
Then thousands of people receive variations of exactly the same ideas.
That's not necessarily where your advantage is.
Sam Altman made an interesting observation about startup ideas.
His point was that if a fantastic startup opportunity is obvious enough for someone else to simply assign it to you, it's probably obvious to plenty of other people too.
I think that applies to side income.
Your opportunity may be hiding in something boring.
Something you understand because you've dealt with it for years.
Something someone outside your world wouldn't even recognize as a problem.
That's where I'd look.
Start With What You Already Know
Ask yourself:
What do I understand better than the average person?
Don't immediately dismiss your knowledge because it seems ordinary to you.
That's another trap.
When you've done something for years, you forget how confusing it is to someone who hasn't.
Maybe you understand inventory.
Maybe you understand podcast production.
Maybe you're great at organizing youth sports.
Maybe you've spent years working in construction.
Maybe you know landscaping.
Maybe you understand insurance paperwork.
Maybe you understand restaurant operations.
Maybe you repair cars.
Maybe you're great at planning family vacations.
Maybe you've spent 15 years selling houses.
Maybe you understand a particular piece of software everyone in your industry hates using.
Your experience is part of the advantage.
AI doesn't necessarily replace that knowledge.
It can amplify it.
Think of the combination:
Your experience + AI capabilities.
That's much more interesting than AI alone.
Look for Problems People Already Have
Once you've identified what you understand, look for problems.
I particularly like repetitive problems.
Ask:
What do people complain about?
What takes too long?
What do people constantly ask for help with?
What information is difficult to find?
What process is unnecessarily confusing?
What repetitive task does everyone hate?
Where are people still copying information between systems manually?
What spreadsheets are held together with the digital equivalent of duct tape?
What does somebody do every Friday afternoon that makes them question every decision that led them to this moment?
Those are interesting problems.
Because the money isn't necessarily in AI.
The money is in solving the problem.
AI just changes your ability to solve it.
A Simple Example:The Spreadsheet Nobody Wants to Touch
Imagine a small company has an inventory spreadsheet.
It's a mess.
Duplicate items.
Bad descriptions.
Different naming conventions.
Missing information.
Nobody trusts the totals.
You understand inventory.
Someone else might look at that spreadsheet and see random numbers.
You see the problem.
Now AI can potentially help you:
Analyze the structure.
Identify patterns.
Create cleanup rules.
Write formulas.
Help develop scripts.
Create documentation.
Build a repeatable process.
Generate reports.
Maybe even help create a simple application around the process.
You aren't necessarily selling “AI.”
You're solving:
“Our inventory data is a mess and we need it fixed.”
That's the value.
AI allows one person to potentially deliver that solution faster and more professionally.
Another Example:Podcasting
Podcasting is another perfect example.
Someone wants to start a podcast.
They don't necessarily want an “AI podcast service.”
They want a podcast.
There are dozens of jobs involved:
Research.
Guest preparation.
Interview questions.
Recording.
Editing.
Transcription.
Titles.
Show notes.
Thumbnails.
YouTube.
Social posts.
Email.
Promotion.
Analytics.
A solo creator can get overwhelmed quickly.
AI can assist with almost every stage.
That means one person can potentially provide a much more complete service than they could have provided several years ago.
Again, the customer isn't buying artificial intelligence.
They're buying an outcome.
“Help me launch and run my podcast.”
AI is your leverage.
What If AI Helps You Build a Product?
This is where I think the next few years could become fascinating.
Imagine you have a problem you've dealt with repeatedly.
You think:
“There should be a simple tool for this.”
Previously, you'd search online.
If it didn't exist, that was probably the end.
Today you can take the next step.
You can describe the problem to AI.
Ask it to help you map the workflow.
Ask:
Who would use this?
What would they need?
What should the first version do?
What shouldn't it do?
What data would be required?
What could go wrong?
Then you can potentially use AI coding tools to start building a prototype.
Not a giant software company.
Not the next Facebook.
A small useful tool.
That's important.
You don't necessarily need millions of customers.
Imagine a tool solving a very specific problem for a very specific group.
If 100 people are willing to pay $10 a month, that's $1,000 in monthly revenue.
If 500 people eventually pay $10, that's $5,000.
Those numbers aren't guaranteed.
Getting customers is difficult.
Keeping them is difficult.
Software costs money to operate.
Customer support exists because humans inevitably find ways to break things nobody imagined.
But AI can lower the barrier to finding out whether your idea has potential.
Instead of spending $20,000 building something before you know whether anyone wants it, you may be able to build a much smaller prototype and test the idea.
That's leverage.
The One-Person Business Is Becoming More Powerful
I don't think everyone is going to become a one-person company.
But I do think one-person businesses are gaining capabilities they never had before.
Think about all the roles inside a traditional company.
Research.
Marketing.
Writing.
Design.
Software development.
Customer service.
Data analysis.
Project management.
Administration.
Sales support.
Finance.
One person isn't going to become an expert in all of those areas.
But AI can provide assistance across many of them.
That's what makes this interesting.
Instead of hiring someone every time you encounter a skill gap, you may be able to use AI to get through the early stages yourself.
Once the business grows, hiring a specialist might make sense.
That's a good problem to have.
But AI may help you reach that point without needing a large upfront investment.
Your Job Becomes Judgment
There's something important here that gets lost when people talk about AI replacing work.
When AI can generate things easily, generating things becomes less valuable.
Judgment becomes more valuable.
Anyone can ask AI:
“Write me a business plan.”
Getting 20 pages back isn't difficult.
The difficult questions are:
Is this a good idea?
Are these assumptions realistic?
Who would actually buy this?
What is missing?
What should I ignore?
What should I change?
Does this solve the problem?
Would I personally pay for this?
That's judgment.
AI can give you options.
You decide which option matters.
AI can write code.
You decide what the software should do.
AI can create an article.
You decide whether the article says anything worth reading.
AI can create 50 business ideas.
You decide whether any of them solve a real problem.
The human role doesn't disappear.
It changes.
AI Agents Could Increase This Leverage Again
The next stage is AI agents.
Right now, most people still interact with AI by asking it something.
You type a question.
It responds.
You give another instruction.
It responds again.
Agents move toward AI being able to complete multiple steps toward an outcome.
Think about the difference.
Today:
“Help me research this topic.”
Future agent:
“Research this topic, organize the sources, identify the major disagreements, create a summary, and prepare the information I need for tomorrow.”
Or:
“Review my podcast episode and create everything I need to publish it.”
Or:
“Analyze these sales numbers, identify anything unusual, compare them with last month and prepare a report.”
Altman talked about a future where people might have multiple agents working for them simultaneously.
Maybe that's 10.
Maybe it's 100.
Maybe those numbers turn out to be wildly optimistic.
The exact number isn't what interests me.
The direction does.
We're moving from:
AI answers questions
toward:
AI performs work.
For someone trying to build something on the side, that's an enormous distinction.
Don't Automate Something Just Because You Can
There's a temptation once you discover AI automation.
You want to automate everything.
Don't.
Some tasks take longer to automate than they take to perform.
Some tasks need human judgment.
Some involve information that shouldn't be handed to random tools.
Some are important enough that you need to personally verify every result.
The goal isn't:
“How much can I automate?”
The goal is:
“Where can AI give me meaningful leverage?”
Those are different questions.
Start with high-friction, repetitive work.
That's where the easiest opportunities usually appear.
The Five-Hour Test
Here's a simple exercise if you're trying to make extra money using AI.
Imagine you have only five hours every week.
That's it.
You can't quit your job.
You can't spend 40 hours building something.
You can't hire five people.
What could you build or deliver with five hours?
Now ask:
What could AI remove from those five hours?
Could it handle research?
Could it help write?
Could it analyze data?
Could it generate the first draft?
Could it create code?
Could it organize information?
Could it create documentation?
Could it repurpose something you've already created?
Could it automate repetitive steps?
Now maybe those five hours contain the productive output of what previously required ten.
That changes what's possible.
And if you're trying to create extra income without destroying every evening and weekend you have, that matters.
The Better Side-Hustle Question
Instead of:
“What's the hottest AI side hustle?”
Try this:
“What valuable problem can I solve now that AI makes me capable of solving?”
That's a much better question.
Because it puts the focus back where it belongs.
Value.
A customer doesn't care that you spent 14 hours on something.
They care about the result.
If AI helps you create the same or better result in four hours, you have leverage.
That doesn't mean delivering lazy AI-generated work.
Quite the opposite.
AI should give you more time for the parts requiring human judgment.
Checking.
Improving.
Personalizing.
Talking with the customer.
Understanding what they actually need.
Making the final product better.
That's where the human should stay involved.
Create Something Once and Use It More Than Once
This is the direction I'd explore heavily.
Suppose you solve a problem for yourself.
Before moving on, ask:
Could this solution help someone else?
Maybe you built a spreadsheet.
Clean it up.
Add instructions.
Turn it into a template.
Maybe you created a workflow.
Document it.
Maybe you created a checklist.
Turn it into a guide.
Maybe you wrote instructions for solving a difficult problem.
Turn them into a short course.
Maybe you created a small program for yourself.
Could other people use it?
This is how your work becomes an asset.
AI can help turn personal solutions into reusable products.
That's much more scalable than continually starting from zero.
You Don't Need Thousands of Customers
Another internet myth is that every business has to become enormous.
It doesn't.
If you're trying to generate an extra $500, $1,000 or $2,000 a month, you don't necessarily need millions of views.
You need enough people with the right problem.
A $25 product needs 40 monthly sales to produce $1,000 in gross revenue.
A $50 product needs 20.
A $100 service needs 10 customers.
A $250 service needs four.
A $500 project needs two.
That doesn't mean getting those customers will be easy.
But it changes how you think about the goal.
You don't necessarily need to become internet famous.
You need to solve a real problem for a relatively small number of people.
AI can help you create and deliver that solution more efficiently.
Where I Think the Biggest Opportunity Is
I think the biggest AI opportunity for ordinary people is going to sit at the intersection of three things:
1. Something you understand
Your experience.
Your job skills.
Your hobbies.
Your knowledge.
Your mistakes.
Things you've spent years learning.
2. A real problem
Something people want solved badly enough to spend money.
Not an imaginary problem created because AI happens to be capable of doing something.
3. AI leverage
A way AI lets you solve that problem faster, cheaper, at a larger scale, or in a way you previously couldn't.
Put those together:
Knowledge + Problem + AI Leverage = Opportunity
That's the formula I'd pay attention to.
What I Would Do This Week
If you're reading this because you want to use AI to make extra money, don't spend the next week researching another 50 AI tools.
Pick one problem.
Take out a piece of paper.
Write:
Something I know:
What have I learned through work, hobbies, life or experience?
A problem:
What frustrates people in that area?
Current solution:
How are people solving it today?
Why it stinks:
Is it expensive? Slow? Confusing? Repetitive?
AI leverage:
Could AI make any part faster, easier or cheaper?
Possible offer:
Could this become a service, product, template, tool, guide, subscription or piece of content?
Then use AI to help investigate the idea.
Don't immediately build it.
Talk to people.
Search for competitors.
See what already exists.
Find out what people complain about.
See whether they're actually spending money to solve the problem.
Then build the smallest version possible.
You don't need version 10.
You need version 1.
My Biggest Takeaway From Sam Altman's Comment
When I first heard the idea that one person could accomplish what previously required an incredibly talented 100-person engineering team, I thought about the number.
One hundred people.
That's the headline.
But I don't think that's the most useful part.
The more important question is personal.
What can you accomplish today that you couldn't have accomplished five years ago?
Maybe you're not 100 times more capable.
Maybe you're twice as capable.
That's still huge.
Imagine being able to accomplish twice as much during the limited hours you have available.
Or imagine gaining access to one skill that previously prevented you from pursuing an idea.
Maybe coding.
Maybe design.
Maybe research.
Maybe writing.
Maybe data analysis.
Maybe automation.
You don't need AI to make you superhuman.
You need it to remove one important limitation.
Because sometimes one limitation is the only thing standing between an idea and actually doing something with it.
The Goal Isn't to Become an AI Expert
This is where I think a lot of ordinary people get intimidated.
They see people discussing models, benchmarks, APIs, agents, tokens, context windows and whatever new term appeared online 15 minutes ago.
They think:
“I can't keep up with this.”
Neither can most people.
And you don't necessarily need to.
You don't have to become an AI researcher.
You need to become good at identifying where AI helps you.
There's a difference.
Think about electricity.
You don't need to understand electrical engineering to use your microwave.
You don't need to understand cellular infrastructure to use your phone.
You don't need to understand the internal architecture of an AI model to get value from it.
You need to understand what you want to accomplish.
That's the starting point.
Stop Watching. Start Experimenting.
There's endless AI content available right now.
I contribute to it myself.
But at some point you have to stop watching people use AI and start using it yourself.
Pick something you've been putting off.
Something small.
Maybe you've wanted to create a simple website.
Try it.
Maybe you've wanted to organize your finances.
See how AI can help you design the system while keeping sensitive information protected.
Maybe you've wanted to start a podcast.
Create the plan.
Maybe you have an idea for a small application.
Prototype it.
Maybe you want to create a digital product around something you know.
Build the first version.
Don't worry about turning it into a business immediately.
Learn what you're capable of.
Because that might be the biggest shift happening right now.
AI isn't only making existing businesses faster.
It's allowing individuals to discover that they're capable of building things they previously assumed required someone else.
Final Thought
You don't have to sell artificial intelligence to make money from artificial intelligence.
That's the idea I keep coming back to.
AI can sit behind the scenes.
Your customer doesn't need to care.
Your audience doesn't need to care.
What matters is the outcome.
AI can help you save time.
It can help close skill gaps.
It can help you scale your work.
It can help you create assets.
It can help you take an idea from your head and turn it into something real.
But AI isn't the opportunity by itself.
The opportunity is what AI allows you to do.
So don't start by asking:
“How do I make money with AI?”
Ask:
“What valuable thing could I accomplish if AI removed some of the limitations I have today?”
Then look at what you already know.
Find a real problem.
Figure out how AI gives you leverage.
Build something small.
Test it.
Improve it.
And keep your judgment involved every step of the way.
Maybe Sam Altman's 100-person example sounds extreme.
That's okay.
You don't need 100 people's worth of leverage.
If AI helps you turn five hours into the productive equivalent of ten, learn a skill that previously blocked you, or create something you can sell more than once, the economics of what one ordinary person can accomplish have already changed.
And we're probably still very early.
Your experience + a real problem + AI leverage.
That's where I'd start.
Joe Foley
Joe Foley is the creator of AI for Ordinary People. He helps beginners, parents, creators, and small business owners use AI in simple, practical ways. Joe has been podcasting since 2013 and creates plain-English guides, prompts, and workflows for people who want useful help without tech jargon. His goal is to make AI feel less confusing and more useful for real life, real work, and everyday decisions.