I Made $112,000 Selling AI Last Month, And Here's What I Learnt

Last month I made $112,000 selling AI automation services to businesses. And I'm going to tell you today why I think it's the worst career move that you can make as we run into the new year in 2026. Before you click off this video, hear me out. I'm in a very good position to explain this to you because I run three seven figure companies. I run one in the AI space, I run one in the digital marketing arena and I run one in the holiday home industry in the uk. Not only that, I'm in the top one percentile of upwork freelancers globally. So I've implemented and seen quite a lot of things to be able to pass this knowledge on. And the counterintuitive truth about thriving in the AI era is that technical mastery is valuable. Right? Technical mastery is becoming less valuable every single day. The skill sets that we have learned and made a lot of money using over the course of the last 18 months, two years, two and a half years, it's on a quite a heavy, heavy decline as new AI tools become available that do the work for you. Be becoming a strategic visionary that knows how to sell value to businesses is the new way that we're going to be able to make money out of the AI arena. Your experience and hard work is not useless. These flows need building. But the true, the true value is going to rely in being able to consult with a business. Go speak to them and tell them how best to implement AI into their, into their company. It makes complete sense when you think about it. And it's something that I want everybody that follows me and watches my videos to be prepared for. So throughout the end of this, at the end of this video, there's some gold. So you stay with me now when it comes down to the focusing on, on skills, focusing on technical AI skills that everyone is frantically chasing is a losing game because the reality is it's already shifted. It's not going to shift, it's already starting to shift. You'll speak to people, they've already implemented certain AI techniques in their business or they know that they want to do X and Y or X tool that is available, but they don't know how. Well, this presentation and my explanation reveals that crucial shift and why your career depends on it. So the big lie of the AI gold rush, the big lie of the AI gold rush is that if you become an expert in these five AI tools, I don't know chat GPT, you master prompt engineering, mid journey techniques, understanding Claude, understanding these different platforms is going to be what the next 5, 10, 20 years is about. That's the reality is the fact that AI is advancing so quickly that it's automating the automators. So it's automating us in our situation and position. Eventually tools are going to be there where people can type the most basic of prompting and have Google Opal or whatever tool it is, whatever platform they choose, maybe even their own CRM system build them that flow for them. So relying on tool specific knowledge is not going to be enough at that stage. It isn't building your career around a foundation of being a strategist that has huge AI experience and can look at a business objectively from the outside. Consult, find all of their pain points and tell them the best way to fix them and what the value will be. That is how you will win in 2026 and beyond. Every month, every day, every week, a new age, a new, a new AI tool emerges, a new AI feature emerges. You know, the platforms you're mastering today are basically footnotes two weeks from now. There's a different game being played by people like myself and other people in the industry when it comes down to understanding what's happening. And you need to be on the wave of that to keep yourself relevant. And a parable sort of progress to this would be like looking at a photographer's evolution over the years. So if we look at like a photographer over the years in the 1850s, right, history shows us exactly how value shifts when technology advances. We don't need to look anywhere else, we just look at history. History repeats itself. The photography industry offers the perfect blueprint for understanding what our current AI situation is. Because in the 1850s you effectively, you were effectively an alchemist if you were a photographer, right? It required mastering complex dangerous chemicals, glass plates, silver nitrate, dark room chemistry. The barrier was fully 100% technical. You could not do it unless you had experience or were being trained on how to do it right? Then in the 1980s, the technician became value shifted from master, you know, value shifted to mastering film takes dark room techniques, aperture settings, shutter speeds. Technical knowledge was still king at that time, which is where we are now. Technical knowledge was still king, but the danger was, was replaced by precision and craft. Okay, so at that point, this is What I'm referencing, 2010 came around. The dark room disappeared. Value moved to mastering Photoshop and been able to edit imagery using understanding digital workflows, you know, masks, whatever inside of, you know, Adobe, whatever managing file systems. The technical complexity shifted to software like this it's not in, not in time frames like this, but like this. Before you knew it, the career, the business that you'd built would be obsolete from 1980 to 2010. And that is, that's within someone's lifetime. Okay. We're trying to future proof ourselves today. Your smartphone can handle photography, right? This phone that I've got, okay, this phone has more memory than what like consoles had 10 years ago. It is insane how quick things evolve. And AI is no different. In fact, it is the worst, it's the worst case. If you were to look at it from that point of view of what's going to expand the fastest and change, well, it's going to be AI, it's just a fact because it teaches itself and it automates us all. The big corporations you'll have heard in the news about the fight for the big AI career, established business employees effectively. But the big dogs, meta's trying to buy them all, paying them ridiculous salaries. Well, that's because it evolves so fast, there's no time to find anybody else. It's whoever's at the forefront right now is going to be the king. So today, the visionary, the smartphone, the value now lies entirely in your vision. So whatever you, you want to take a photo of and whatever it is you see, that's what you're going to need. Well, that's exactly what businesses are going to be like in the near future. They're going to have all of the tools available to them from an AI perspective, but it's going to flip it on its head and it's going to be overwhelming for them to understand what they should implement inside of their company. And that is where we are strong because we have our backgrounds built on from everything, from wearing all the hats, from building flows from the, from the ground up. Yeah, you know, we've, we've done it all, we've experienced it all week. You know, we have backup, we have proof that we can do it and deliverables. And we go in and we say, hey, like, you know, you're in danger here of over, over automate in your business where you're going to lose quality. Well, I can show you how to do that with acute precision, like literally, you know, on the nose. So every technological advance follows that exact same pattern. It takes what was once difficult and expensive and it becomes, or it was time consuming or whatever. It makes it accessible, affordable and fast. That's exactly where the AI arena is. As the how becomes easier, the what and why become the value. And that's where we need to position ourselves. This is true across all industries. But we are witnessing the greatest shift from tool operators to vision directors in human history right in front of our eyes. And this is going to age like a fine wine because this is exactly what is going to happen. Now. The new framework, prompting like an architect is the way that I've kind of phrased it. So stop giving it a, stop giving AI vague suggestions. You know, stop giving it basic inputs and instructions. That's what businesses will do and it will evolve to a point where they get better, but it will still come down to that. This technical, this, this, this technical framework, start giving it complex blueprints so visionaries communicate with AI systems to achieve extraordinary results in a different way. There is literally this. In the AI space. There is 99% of people here and there are, this is 1% of people here and I'm in this 1%. But I also understand how that number is going to get higher if people are educated. Because it's a simple shift in the mindset of how you propose prompting and, and going through different things. It's, it's of critical importance. So I'll show you. So when it comes down to prompting, and I'm not talking specifically about prompting here in terms of, in terms of LLMs exactly. I'm also wanting to keep the business element in mind, clearly state the end goal and with the why behind it. So we don't just say create a lead booking system, right? We say create a lead qualification system to increase demo bookings by 20% within 30 days for B2B SaaS businesses with 1 million annual recurring revenue. Right? We, we, we've changed the, the whole field, everything has changed in that prompt. The output that you would get is, is drastically different. My most recent video on Nano Banana prompting. Well, my most video about Nana Banana shows the structure of how I structure prompts when I want creative. And it's the same thing, the floor plan. So the logical flow define the step by step process rules and decision points. If lead score exceeds 75, 80, 95, whatever the business requirements you know, need, and the company size is 50 plus employees then route to a senior sales rep within two hours. That two hours wants to be less, it wants to be immediately right. If the score is 60 to 79, assigned to junior rep for booking a demo next business day. This isn't meant to be an example. Obviously you don't leave your leads till the next business day. But the logical flow, and that was my best way of showing it to you. Is like well, if we qualify with a proper prompt and then we actually add filters inside the system we, we can focus on the areas that make the most money which are the ones which exceed the score of 75, 80, 90, whatever. Those are the high quality ones and we can ensure businesses prioritize accordingly. The materials provide key data constraints, brand voice and concrete examples. Include your best performing email templates, your ideal customer profile and data, specific industry terminology and then the revisions. Review the AI's first draft and provide specific targeted corrections. Not make it better, but increase urgency in paragraph two, soften the call to action. Add a case study reference. So that's how you would change a prompt framework to an LLM. And that is exactly the same way you need to change your prompt framework when you're pitching to a business. That's what you need to do. You need to start prompting effectively when you are selling to being the guy who is extremely detailed and as concrete understanding of the actual businesses problems and even problems. Not just a single AI tool or a single AI section like I don't know, inbound sales. And you focus on that and you have this really good tool that's built out. But actually the business suffers when once the sales team receive the inquiry. So what are you doing there? Right. And I actually put together inside of here a example of. Of what, of what I, of what I did. So this was one of the example, I mentioned it a minute ago about Nana Banana. So this is the blueprint in practice, the power of precision. This is what's going to separate you from the pack. You can see the dramatic difference between vague suggestions and architectural blueprints like the one I just explained to you previously. I gave it a picture of a gold day date, right? It was a blank picture with a white background. And I asked one create a luxury image of this watch. And the output was not bad to be honest with you. But it wasn't of anywhere near the quality of the one on the right which is the architect's blueprint. So create a luxury image of this watch produced this. I mean it's got pennies next to it for a start. I, you know, and, but the other one, a luxurious golden Rolex positioned on a polished dark green marble. Soft ambient light in gentle creates gentle reflections in the background. A warm golden sunset over a mountain landscape deliberately blurred to maintain focus on the watch. The composition evokes timeless elegance and achievement. The result from that, a precise art directed image that perfectly matches the creator's vision tells a complete story. On the left, a generic uninspired AI image generators falling in the 99% category of the, of the pack. And that should showcase to you the difference between being a AI generator, struggling freelancer and being somebody who can prompt efficiently. And that technique is exactly going to be the transition. Now soon the businesses are going to know how to do the do more or even just see more availability from an architect standpoint. But we have to be the consultant to glue all that together. So the ultimate advantage is system thinking. Now when it comes to system thinking, you know, a good cook follows recipes step by step, completely dependent on detailed instruction. A master chef, you know, in a Michelin star restaurant understands the fundamental principles of flavors, heat, texture and timing. So he understands exactly how to merge it. It doesn't matter what kitchen you put him in, it doesn't matter what he's got to cook. He understands all of those key and core fundamental things. That is system thinking in action. It's your secret weapon in this current AI economy, right? It's what you know, system, system thinking makes you AI proof. It makes you like, you can't be taken over by AI because it can't think like you can from, from an outside perspective without being prompted because it operates at a level of abstraction. No tool can replicate your, your, you know, your, your thinking. No tool can do that. Understanding why things work, not just how to do them. Why do they work for businesses? That's the key. So we've got a master the kitchen, not the recipe. Don't learn one recipe like building marketing automation for agencies. Learn the universal kitchen system like the, the Michelin star chef does. That applies to every business to keep yourself, you know, in, in the frame. Every business that's ever existed or will ever exist has the same issues. Okay, like on the infographic. Now marketing attract and qualify potential customers. They always need that, the best way to do that. They always need it. They think that they can go out there and get leads. Yes, they can. But how are you writing cold email icebreakers to them? Like how, you know, what about your speed to lead? What about whatever it is? Like you just, you have that. From a, from a, from a marketing and sales perspective, trying to convert interest into commitment is something that every business faces, every single business faces. And they don't know how to change it because they can't sell like people like me and you, hopefully, where, you know, you turn the conversation from a sales perspective into like it's almost exclusive because they're working with somebody with such a high caliber of experience that we have to Qualify whether you fit first. It's not and it's not from a sort of big dig approach. It's just like the fact that we're in a position of having that confidence and that ability. Onboarding deliver initial value and set expectations. It pays dividends to their churn rate. Right? Churn rate starts during your onboarding. If you onboard them properly and deliver initial value and set expectations, businesses won't understand that. Businesses will just understand like they sell them something and then whatever. Like the after sales doesn't exist. But your after sales starts from the second that you've onboarded them. And that is what a lot of businesses miss out on. Delivery. Fulfill promises and exceed expectation. Make sure and you can leverage AI to do so. You don't need to know every single tool in the box. Delivery is. Is key, like for every business. Retention, maintaining relationships and drive expansion. How do you do that? Upsell. How do you do that? You don't do that if everything that you bring through the door is, is canceling and leaving on you, do you? It just doesn't exist. You have to be able to look at this. And I personally feel like these five steps and this knowledge of these five steps is what's going to be critical because it's portable and it's timeless. And you can apply these principles to any single individual business with any technology, in any industry, forever. It doesn't go anywhere. It's been around since the dawn of time. It'll be around long after I'm gone. It's just. It's just exit. It just exists. Others will scramble to learn the latest AI tool. You'll be designing the systems that the tools will implement and that. That's the key. So your roadmap for the new economy is to become the visionary. Like the photographer who sees the perfect shot. Focus on your unique ideas and strategic intent. Stop getting lost in technical implementation details and start becoming a visionary. Direct the build. So use detailed blueprints that you've already made. You've got them already. You don't have to rebuild them. You use those blueprints to translate your vision into clear, actionable instructions that I can execute flawlessly. That you can show the value of to a business in 2026 and effectively become fluent in the language of precision of directness. Like you know exactly what the business problems are because they've been around forever. I've just shown them you all and that's it. And then you own the system. Apply universal business principles to create value that transcends any single tool, any single trend, any single AI based thought or system and build your expertise on foundations that cannot be automated away regardless of what new tool comes in. This isn't a threat to your skills, it's an invitation to operate at a higher, more strategic level for you. Don't be scared of it. The future belongs to those who can think that and direct strategies. If you can think, direct and strategize, you're the, you're, you're the, you're the technical, you know, you're the technical visionary. That is what AI is, is for. There's nothing stronger and left to say. That is where we wrap up the video like subscribe comment because this is a powerful video, one of my favorites that I've made and I, I wanted to share it with you because you need to start making some changes if you're going to survive in the, in the AI arena.