#182 · how to sell on upwork & get your first AI client for $1,000
I basically look at YouTube comments, see what people are asking, and then make videos about those topics. It’s one of the quickest and easiest ways to create content, and it also makes the audience feel heard.
I already had a couple of ideas. I'm going to create docs new and turn reduction community exclusives. The first thing I want to do is create a straight line path to optimize video outreach: cover camera, microphone, video content, what to talk about, how to annotate, other assets to give people, maybe an example script. I've already covered this stuff in other videos and my channel; I'm organizing it for high perceived value because many people struggle with it. I'll go through comments on the daily updates channel to find big sticking points and add them to my thing, then decide what my videos will be about. I'll scroll through comments to source ideas. Leonardo commented on my stuff; he runs AI Foundry, has 19K subs, his videos go viral; he does banger one-offs, kudos to him.
The best offer to pitch a YouTuber is probably ideation. I say that as somebody who has struggled with ideation. Everything on YouTube now starts with the packaging — the title and the thumbnail. That's just how the game works. People typically come up with titles and thumbnails before they even come up with the video. If you have some trending story that helps, but often evergreen channels will try to find the most insane moment or concept or idea to use in a thumbnail and then build their whole video stack around that. Sounds crazy, but it's true. So if you can help solve the bottleneck of ideation for somebody, they are typically able and willing to pay you a lot of money. I'm solving the bottleneck of ideation for myself and I've basically seen everything in my media business get alleviated as a result. The reality is people usually have more production capacity than they have ideas. So if you go all the way up the funnel and solve the very first step in the big pipeline, you'll usually do far better. I would sell them some sort of ideation system.
The issue with live streaming is that I'd have to schedule my time and couldn't just speak when I have ideas; I'd have to block everything else out. As a creative person, an open schedule is a high-return way to construct my life. I understand the appeal, but my video pipeline is simply recording and dropping into Dropbox, making it live within minutes. I could try Twitch streaming, but I won't become the news; commenters get at this as well, and there's some value in that.
I can approach it with three main content pillars. First, awareness content that covers the latest AI news—anything new, free, or just launched. Second, implementation content that shows how to actually use AI tools, like deep‑seek tutorials, so it’s not just dry theory. Third, no‑code content that demonstrates using AI via APIs with platforms such as n8n or Make.com. I’ll also add a fourth pillar focused on "AI money"—showing how to monetize the tools rather than just how they work. Each piece will include a clear CTA back to my YouTube channel for detailed guides, and I’ll sprinkle short YouTube clips or intro snippets to keep interest high and drive cross‑platform traffic.