Episode Summary
What if AI isn’t a threat but the biggest business opportunity we’ve seen in decades?
In this game-changing episode, we reframe the fear of artificial intelligence into one of the biggest business opportunities freelance writers and solo marketers have ever seen.
If you’ve been worried about how AI will affect your work, this conversation will help you step into a new mindset. The kind of mindset where you become more valuable, more strategic, and more productive than ever before.
We’re diving into how to reinvent your business model, amplify your impact, and create a competitive advantage that’s nearly impossible to replicate — all by embracing a Human + AI approach that plays to your greatest strengths.
What You’ll Learn
- How to shift from execution-focused freelancer to strategic conductor
- The mindset required to make AI your most powerful creative and business partner
- Techniques for using AI as your intellectual sparring partner
- How to multiply your output (and quality!) without burning out
- A 30-day action plan to start reinventing your business with AI
Key Takeaways
The Writing Market Is Splitting. Which Side Are You On?
- AI is rapidly commoditizing low-value content creation.
- But high-value strategic thinking, creative leadership, and judgment are more valuable than ever.
- The opportunity lies in evolving from order-taker to advisor and conductor. From someone who orchestrates both human and AI resources to deliver better business outcomes.
Using AI as Your Intellectual Sparring Partner
- Don’t just ask AI to write; use it to challenge, debate, and refine your thinking.
- Set up “Socratic dialogues” with AI to pressure-test your ideas and sharpen your message.
- This collaborative thinking accelerates originality and gives you a massive edge in producing world-class content and strategy.
Become a 10X Writer Without Working 10X Harder
- AI can help you eliminate bottlenecks in idea generation, drafting, editing, and repurposing.
- Build workflows that multiply your content from one core idea into email series, blog posts, videos, and tools.
- Done right, this creates a virtuous cycle of authority, visibility, and client opportunities—all at scale.
Build a Competitive Moat AI Can’t Cross
Three elements make you irreplaceable in the age of AI:
- Domain Expertise – Lived experience and niche insights AI can’t replicate.
- Relationship Capital – The trust, empathy, and collaboration clients crave.
- Strategic Judgment – The ability to see the big picture, make smart calls, and tie everything together.
Leverage these with AI to create proprietary workflows and systems clients can’t easily replace.
Your 30-Day Action Plan
- Audit Your Role – Are you mostly executing, or adding unique value AI can’t?
- Run These Experiments:
- Idea Validation – Use AI to stress-test a concept you’re working on.
- Content Multiplication – Take a single piece of content and repurpose it 5 ways.
- Custom AI System – Create a lightweight AI prompt system tailored to one client or use case.
- Communicate the Evolution – Help your clients understand that you’re not just using AI—you’re delivering stronger outcomes, faster and more strategically.
Listener Challenge
Pick one of the three AI experiments above and commit to testing it this week. Then reflect:
- What did you learn?
- What new opportunities did this unlock?
- How could this change how you deliver value to your clients?
Want to Go Deeper?
If this episode sparked something in you and you’re ready to turn AI into your strategic advantage, join me for my upcoming AI Advantage Bootcamp for Writers and Solo Marketers.
This is a hands-on, 4-week program designed to help you harness AI in your creative and business workflows. Whether you’re just getting started or already using AI but want to sharpen your edge, you’ll walk away with systems and results, not just theory.
Spots are limited and this program sells out fast. If it feels like the right next step for you, don’t wait.
Final Thought
The future doesn’t belong to those who fear change. It belongs to those who harness it with purpose.
AI can be the start of your next-level impact.
What are you going to do with that opportunity?
The notes that follow are a very basic, unedited summary of the show. There’s a lot more detail in the audio version. You can listen to the show using the audio player below. Or you can subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, Amazon Music or wherever you listen to podcasts.
High-Income Business Writing with Ed Gandia
#372: The AI Opportunity — Reinventing Your Writing Business for 10X Impact
Key Topics and Bullets:
- Industry upheaval: AI as perceived threat and real opportunity.
- Personal perspective on adapting to technological change.
- Writers’ anxiety over AI replacing jobs.
- Historical context: Tech usually creates new opportunities.
- The need to ask better, more opportunity-oriented questions.
- Using AI to scale creativity and strategic services.
- Discovering and leveraging your unique client value.
- Beyond basic prompts: Collaborating with AI for deeper thinking.
- Using AI personas/scenarios to critique messaging and ideas.
- Strengthening your own critical and strategic thinking.
- Identifying workflow bottlenecks.
- Using AI to multiply output and repurpose content.
- Addressing quality concerns; AI frees up time for higher-level creative work.
- Pitfalls of using AI as a replacement only.
- Future advantage belongs to those who adapt first.
Timestamp Overview:
00:00 Ed– The writing industry is experiencing one of the biggest shakeups we’ve seen in decades. And one of the biggest fears among writers is that AI is going to replace them. And it’s a valid concern. Right? I mean, there’s a lot going on out there. There’s a lot of uncertainty. I don’t think AI is really the biggest factor at least right now, but it certainly feels like it could be.
05:00 Ed– First, what if AI allows you to deliver services at a scale that wasn’t financially possible before? And I’m not just talking about writing faster here. I’m talking about completely new service models that were never feasible when you were the bottleneck as a solo business owner? K. So that’s the first question, first food for thought. Second, how could you reinvent client relationships if execution was no longer your bottleneck? The reality is that when implementation is streamlined, your advisory role, if you take an advisory role or more of an advisory role, that role can expand in ways you might not have even considered. And finally, what if your industry expertise combined with AI creates a whole new set of capabilities and a competitive advantage that no AI only or human only solution can match. This is about building a moat through a unique human and AI partnership. Because here’s the thing, AI does way more than just automate existing work. It also unlocks potential.
07:53 Ed– Number two or the second one, using AI as your intellectual sparring partner. Number three, multiplying your creative output by 10 x. So let’s dive right in. And let’s start with that first one from order taker to becoming more of a strategic conductor. My view here is that the writing market is splitting into two, and it’s happening faster than many of us even expected. So on one side, you have what we could call commodity content creation, The kind of writing that follows predictable formulas, predictable structures. This is increasingly being automated or augmented by AI. And I would argue that this is a segment that’s being commoditized to death.
12:29 Ed– But, just a quick history. I started as a freelance copywriter in ‘02/2003. Three years later, almost three years later, I went full time, as a freelancer. I’ve been self-employed since February. And, I started 02/2008, ‘2 thousand ‘9, ‘2 thousand ’10. I started creating training resources and useful resources for other freelancers. And in 02/2012, that evolved into coaching. I started formally coaching in 2012. I still had my own writing clients, but I started phasing those out. And by 2016, I had just one client left. They got acquired by another company, and then that was really the end of it. And I realized that what I wanted to do was just focus on my coaching work and my coaching business, and that’s what I’ve done since then. I really haven’t written for clients since 2016. But last fall, this is fall of twenty twenty four, I came across an opportunity to help a home services business in my area with some of their marketing strategy. And that was a long story of how that came about. But let’s just say that it was a very serendipitous event that just makes me happy just just thinking about it, how this all kinda came together.
15:54 Ed– And I realized that I suddenly had a powerful tool that could help scale my creativity and productivity by a factor of five, seven, 10 x. And that wasn’t just a minor improvement. It was transformative. I began asking myself a whole new set of questions. It really got me thinking. So for example, I was asking, okay. So what’s now possible that wasn’t possible for me before? What can I now provide clients that I couldn’t or thought I couldn’t before? And how can I amplify my experience and wisdom to deliver five to 10 x the value to this particular client? The revelation wasn’t just about scaling my productivity, although that was huge. Just a few years ago, I couldn’t have taken on this client experiment alongside my coaching business. I I just couldn’t. My coaching business really took all of my time and attention. But now I can easily handle all the work this client needs and more. In fact, this client quickly brought me into their sister business, which is another home services company that also needed help. And now this sister company is a franchise, so we were limited as to what we could create on our own because they do have a marketing department. But it turns out that my client has quite a bit of leeway in terms of what they create. They gotta get things approved, but they do have a lot of leeway in terms of their marketing assets that they can create. And here’s a cool thing.
17:38 Ed– As they kept asking me for more help and I saw other gaps in what they were doing from a marketing standpoint, some of the gaps that they had and some of the things they were overlooking, I saw that I could leverage AI in more creative ways. Using these AI models, I gain access to frameworks and ideas and tools and knowledge and systems that I didn’t previously have at my fingertips. So in other words, I’ll give you an example. I didn’t have fully fleshed out brand, branding guides, for example. And, I mean, I knew what some of the elements were, but I didn’t know what I didn’t know. I didn’t have a full view of the entire branding landscape. But with AI’s help, suddenly, I had access to all kinds of ideas for frameworks. And, of course, it takes someone who knows what they’re doing to see what’s good and what’s not great, what’s really bad.
23:22 Ed– That’s what’s now possible when you move beyond basic prompts to true intellectual collaboration with AI. One technique I found incredibly valuable is setting up Socratic dialogues with AI. So instead of just asking for an answer, I’ll ask an AI to take a specific perspective or a specific role and then engage in back and forth conversation with me about a topic. So for example, with that home services business I mentioned, I use AI to generate multiple stakeholder perspectives on their messaging strategy that I helped them create. I had one AI perspective take the position of a skeptical homeowner. I had another one represent a price sensitive customer. I had another one take the role of a competitor and so on. And then I facilitated a virtual debate, if you will, between these perspectives, challenging the messaging from different angles.
27:50 Ed– So, again, things that I’m not really sure if I would have been able to come up with on my own or how long it would have taken me to even do it even if I did recognize the shortcomings or the gaps. I think you can see why this matters. The ability to rapidly iterate on ideas gives you a massive competitive advantage in developing truly original perspectives. So instead of, again, instead of publishing your first, your first or second draft because you really believe it’s the best version you can produce, you can publish your tenth draft after it’s been challenged, refined, and strengthened through that intellectual debate. And you can do that in the time it may have taken you to produce two or three drafts before. So, I mean, there’s just no comparison. It’s just mind blowing. And here’s the counterintuitive truth about this approach that I just described.
31:30 Ed– I mean, that’s been the tagline of my coaching and training business for years, earning more and less time doing work you love for better clients. If you’ve been listening to the show for a while, you are very familiar with that. Right? And I’ve always meant that. To me, that is the holy grail of freelancing. Well, that’s the massive leverage that makes this whole thing possible. AI makes that kind of leverage not only possible, but it takes it to a scale that I would have never imagined we would have access to. But it requires thinking differently about your creative process. So first, I think we need to identify your current production bottlenecks or you need to do this.
33:03 Ed– But with AI assistance, we can transform that single piece of content into an entire ecosystem, and we can do it very, very easily. So we could extract the key points from each section and create a series of social media posts, for example. We could develop a short email sequence that delivered the guide’s insights over a six week period. That would position the business as a trusted expert. We could turn the major sections into standalone blog posts, and each of them could go into, much more deeply into a specific aspect of home maintenance. Or we could create scripts for short video tutorials based on the guides framework. We could even generate a home maintenance checklist tool that helps homeowners evaluate where they stand on protecting their investment. The ideas I mean, you can see they’re endless.
37:50 Ed– Alright. So far, we’ve talked about transforming your role using AI as a thinking partner. We’ve talked about multiplying your output. But there’s another critical aspect to thriving in the AI era, and that’s building a competitive moat around your business. Now, again, most writers are applying AI incorrectly. That’s my opinion. I see it all the time. They’re using it as a replacement tool rather than a complimentary technology. And they’re asking, how can AI write this for me? Instead, how can AI and I, the two of us jointly as a team, create something together that neither of us could create alone. Now this common mistake creates an opportunity for those of us who understand how to build a true AI enabled competitive advantage. And there are three elements that can create an unbeatable competitive moat in the AI area. So the first is domain expertise that AI can’t replicate. And by this, I’m talking about the deep knowledge of an industry, your deep understanding of an audience or subject matter that comes from years of experience in countless real world interactions. AI can access information, has a ton of training data, but it doesn’t have lived experience. It doesn’t have contextual understanding, especially nuanced information under and understanding and insights about a company, a narrow market segment, how a particular business works and why it works that way, and so on. It’s really the nuance here that matters, and that’s what you have.
41:41 Ed– One powerful way to solidify this advantage is by creating proprietary workflows. So custom AI systems for specific clients or specific industries, for example. I’m not gonna get too deep into this, but I wanna get you thinking in terms of what the possibilities could be. So for example, with my home services client, I created a custom AI system that houses their brand voice or messaging guidelines, historical content. This system becomes more valuable over time as I train it on their specific data, marketing materials that we’re creating, and we optimize it for their particular needs. For me, it’s like having a marketing department in a box. A marketing department that basically helps maintain consistently across their content even when neither of us is directly involved in creating every single piece. And guess what? That marketing department in a box only cost me $20 a month.
46:05 Ed– Be honest with yourself. Next, I’m gonna invite you to run three specific AI experimentation projects. Project number one is what I might call the idea of a validation experiment. So take something you’re working on right now. Let’s say a client project, a piece of content, a new service offering, and use AI to debate and refine it. Create multiple AI personas to challenge your thinking from different angles and user feedback to strengthen your original idea. Project number two, I would call the content multiplication experiment. So take one substantial piece of content that you’ve already created and use AI to help you transform it into at least five different formats for different channels or context.
49:24 Ed– And this is key. You need to help clients understand how your role is changing and why that’s beneficial to them. Here’s what doesn’t work. Saying that I’m using AI now, that immediately raises concerns about value and about pricing. Don’t put yourself in that situation. Instead, focus on the outcomes when you approach clients. So say something like, I’ve developed a new approach that allows me to deliver more comprehensive solutions while maintaining the quality and strategic alignment you expect. Right? That’s kind of the framing you need to use. Demonstrate your new capabilities rather than just talk about them. Show clients examples of how your enhanced approach delivers better results, how it saves time, saves them time, and how it solves problems they didn’t even know they had. So for example, instead of telling clients you’re using AI to help with research, show them an insightful competitive analysis that would have taken weeks to produce manually. Let the results speak for themselves and explain that this took some thoughtful work and experimentation. These aren’t just plug and play systems. Clients need to understand that you still have to know how to work with these tools to get the output you really need. But the key here is to position these changes as an evolution that benefits them, not as a technological shortcut that benefits you. Remember, clients wanna know what’s in it for them.
52:05 Ed– I truly believe that the future belongs to those who adapt first, who see the possibilities instead of the threats, and who use these tools to unlock their full potential rather than trying to maintain the status quo. You have a choice right now. You can resist the wave of change and eventually get swept away by it, or you can ride it to new heights that you never thought possible. I know which option I’m choosing. So one last thing. If today’s conversation sparked something in you, if you’ve been curious about AI and how it can actually help you enhance your creativity instead of stifling it, then I want you to consider joining me in my upcoming AI advantage boot camp for writers and solo marketers. This is a four week hands-on program for both AI beginners and intermediate users. Okay? So even if you’ve just barely dabbled, that’s fine.
53:42 Ed– You can learn more about the boot camp at smarterfreelancing.com, forward slash, g as in gamma, forward slash, AIbootcamp, altogether, all lowercases. Smarterfreelancing.com,forward slash, g as in gamma, forward slash, AIbootcamp. I’ll also put that link in the show notes. But I would say this, you’ll need to hurry, because last time I offered this, it sold out way before the registration deadline, and that deadline’s already coming up soon. So you’re gonna find all the details, again, at that link. Spots are limited. We’re gonna kick off in a couple of weeks, so check it out now if it feels like the right next step for you. Thanks for listening, and I hope you have a wonderful rest of your day.
By the way… whenever you’re ready, here are 4 ways I can help you grow your freelance business:
1. Claim your free book:
Discover the secrets to a thriving writing career in Earn More in Less Time: The Proven Mindset, Strategies and Actions to Prosper as a Freelance Writer. — Download your FREE copy
2. Level up with the ultimate business-building toolkit
Ready to fast-track your freelance success? My comprehensive Business-Building Toolkit equips you with the essential skills to command higher fees, win premium clients, blend AI into your workflow, and build more predictable freelance income. Developed from years of coaching top freelancers, this toolkit is your roadmap to rapid results. — Learn More?
3. Work with me for 90 days
Need a trusted “sparring” partner to tackle your most pressing business challenges? I occasionally offer an intensive 90-day coaching program for freelancers at all income levels. We work together 1-on-1 to identify your most critical business obstacles, come up with innovative solutions and develop a customized, actionable plan. Email me at ed@b2blauncher.com with “90-Day Accelerator” in the subject line to learn more.
4. Banish 6-figure burnout
One of my core specialties is helping 6-figure freelancers earn more in less time with less stress. If you’re at that income level but you’re burning out and want to create a business that actually serves you, let’s connect. Email me at ed@b2blauncher.com and put “Boardroom” in the subject line and I’ll get back to you with more details.
