Dan Martell - How I’d Make $1M with AI in 2026 (Zero Code)

00:00:00.000 I became a cash millionaire at 27 years old with software.

00:00:03.260 But if I had to go back and make my first million dollars

00:00:05.640 in the next 12 months with AI, this is exactly what I do.

00:00:09.120 It's the same proven process that I took all my AI companies

00:00:12.460 at Martell Ventures through over the last year.

00:00:14.800 And three of those companies are already at a million dollars

00:00:17.300 in revenue in less than 12 months.

00:00:19.620 So if you've been thinking about building an AI company

00:00:22.000 or already have one and want to scale past the million,

00:00:24.940 this video is your blueprint.

00:00:26.540 And if at any point in this video, you think to yourself,

00:00:28.680 I can't do this, you might not be cut out to make a million with AI. But if you're one of the select

00:00:33.460 few that are willing to do the work, this video is for you. Starting with step one, sell before

00:00:38.860 you build. Let me tell you the fastest way to go broke with AI. Spend the next six months building

00:00:45.140 a tool, then find out nobody wants it. You actually got to flip it. You need to sell it first, then

00:00:51.560 build it. I call it pre-selling. Here's how it works. The first thing is we have to find 10

00:00:56.500 potential customers and ask them for advice. I'm going to give you the question to make this really

00:01:00.000 easy because I learned a long time ago, if you talk to a potential customer and ask them for

00:01:03.980 money, they'll just give you advice on why maybe you're not ready. But if you ask for advice,

00:01:08.280 they give you feedback and then they sell themselves into buying from you. So the question

00:01:13.040 you want to ask them is what has been hard about your business that if you could automate with AI,

00:01:17.880 you would love to get that set up for yourself, right? Just ask them those questions. And when

00:01:21.780 they give you the answer, then you create the offer, which brings us to step two. That's usually

00:01:26.760 when people say, well, how much should I charge? My rule is, is whatever you would charge for the

00:01:30.760 year, give them a 50% discount. And the reason you're giving the discount is because you're

00:01:34.900 going to ask them for a case study, but what they're giving you in return is the permission

00:01:38.900 to use their name to then use that when you go talk to other customers. And finally, you have

00:01:44.000 to decrease the first time to value for your customer, meaning you have to build a plan that

00:01:48.160 goes from like they gave you money to they got something as fast as possible. That's pre-selling

00:01:53.140 and it's easier than you think. But now that you understand you have to pre-sell, how do you find

00:01:57.980 the people to sell to? Which brings us to step two, pick a boring market. I have a rule. I don't

00:02:03.800 like to sell to hot, exciting, flash in the pan industries. Things like marketing and technology,

00:02:09.760 right? Crypto, e-com, course selling. And I'm not saying they're an absolute no. The problem is,

00:02:15.640 is that when you get into these shifts and fads,

00:02:18.400 the fad could go away and you build a whole business 0.81

00:02:20.960 against something that won't be there

00:02:22.480 in three or four years.

00:02:23.540 We have to pick a market that's easy to get into

00:02:26.140 that's gonna value innovation.

00:02:27.980 It's like Jeff Bezos.

00:02:29.120 He said, look, I don't care about what's new.

00:02:31.480 I care about what's true.

00:02:32.880 What are customers gonna care about in 10 years, 20 years?

00:02:35.740 It's not gonna change.

00:02:36.840 Because if you can find these boring markets

00:02:38.700 that don't have a lot of competition,

00:02:40.740 those are the ones that typically have high margins

00:02:43.040 and they're ripe for disruption and innovation.

00:02:46.200 So how do you pick a born market?

00:02:48.480 Well, first, ask AI.

00:02:50.440 You can type, show me 20 boring industries

00:02:53.740 with high average deal sizes

00:02:55.600 where operations are still manual, okay?

00:02:58.340 Why?

00:02:58.660 Because AI will help you automate those manual processes.

00:03:02.140 See what I did there?

00:03:02.920 And then the high deal size

00:03:04.640 means that they're gonna pay a lot,

00:03:06.600 not too much, not too low,

00:03:08.080 because people that have money are great to sell to.

00:03:11.760 So once you've got the boring market, how do you actually know what to sell?

00:03:15.520 The second, within that market, we got to find a pain that they actually have.

00:03:19.580 So for an electrician, maybe it's the fact that they have missed calls that they're always

00:03:23.160 getting and they're losing jobs because those calls are coming in after hours.

00:03:26.560 See how that could be painful for somebody to try not to be tied to their work or when

00:03:30.520 they're working, they're actually getting paid and they don't have time to answer a

00:03:32.920 call.

00:03:33.380 The third thing is we have to figure out the benefits that are needed.

00:03:36.480 If the person has these problems, what are the key things that you're going to solve

00:03:41.100 for them?

00:03:41.500 So for example, if it's that they're not available

00:03:44.200 to take calls, then you can use an AI software

00:03:48.360 like your Atlas and actually get paid

00:03:51.360 to set it up for them so that it answer,

00:03:54.320 it qualifies and it schedules calls

00:03:56.040 while they're on a job being an electrician.

00:03:58.240 But you get paid by setting that up for them.

00:04:01.440 See, the cool part is in this world we live in,

00:04:04.000 you can make money using AI tools that other people built,

00:04:08.280 but you're the person in the middle

00:04:09.720 that sets it up for these business owners.

00:04:11.500 by the way i have links to all the tools i'm going to mention in this video below in the

00:04:15.340 description so you can click them if you want to check them out but if i had to make a million

00:04:19.020 dollars with ai this year again i wouldn't start with an idea i would start with the boring market

00:04:24.700 so now that you know the market you want to be in next we have to lock in the math that keeps you

00:04:29.260 rich not just busy step number three pick your high margin model now margin is a weird word a

00:04:35.580 lot of people don't understand it but it's very simple if i sell a product for five dollars and

00:04:40.940 and it cost me a dollar to make, my margin is $4.

00:04:44.340 The challenge is most people focus on revenue

00:04:46.920 and it's a vanity.

00:04:47.940 How much money did you make last year?

00:04:49.500 Oh, I made a hundred grand.

00:04:50.540 Well, if it costs you a million to make a hundred grand,

00:04:53.540 it's not a business you wanna be in.

00:04:55.260 And unfortunately, most people don't understand

00:04:57.820 how to build the business in a way

00:04:59.440 that can make them a lot of profit.

00:05:00.920 And why AI is so powerful for this

00:05:03.020 is that it can take your delivery costs,

00:05:05.020 where in the past you'd have to pay somebody to do it,

00:05:07.160 and bring it down to almost zero

00:05:09.260 because AI can automate it.

00:05:10.760 You want your AI business to feel like that.

00:05:13.880 High price, tiny cost.

00:05:16.240 Charge a lot for what you do, very low cost to deliver.

00:05:19.820 And look, I've done the research for you.

00:05:21.640 So here are the highest margin AI business models for 2026.

00:05:25.460 The lowest one is AI services, around 70% margin.

00:05:28.940 Again, you can Google or search on AI, any one of these.

00:05:32.000 The next level up is AI consulting, around 80% margins.

00:05:35.660 Then we go to AI digital products, around 90% margins.

00:05:39.460 And then the one that I'm in and I love is AI software,

00:05:42.340 a little bit more complicated to do.

00:05:44.040 And they have around 95% margins

00:05:46.360 where I spent personally 93% of my time

00:05:48.900 all week building these companies.

00:05:50.560 If I had to get rich with AI this year,

00:05:53.240 here's what I would do.

00:05:54.320 First, I would start with an AI service or consulting.

00:05:57.180 That way it gets me in the conversation with the customers.

00:06:00.260 I learned the AI to automate,

00:06:02.140 but then I would try to productize it

00:06:04.120 into a light software that takes the workflow

00:06:07.080 that I've documented and systematized

00:06:08.880 and packages it into a software

00:06:11.120 that other people can buy without me even talking to them.

00:06:14.580 That's how we get to 95% margin.

00:06:17.180 So now we've got a boring market figured out

00:06:19.180 and a high margin model so you can make some profit.

00:06:21.940 Now you need to find the right person to sell it to.

00:06:24.620 Step number four, create a high cashflow offer.

00:06:28.460 Most people sell AI.

00:06:30.660 Truth is nobody wants AI.

00:06:32.200 A business wants customers, a business wants productivity,

00:06:35.580 a business wants to reduce its costs.

00:06:37.080 It doesn't care if that's AI or fricking a thousand people,

00:06:40.640 as long as what they're paying

00:06:41.740 and what they're getting, there's an ROI.

00:06:43.540 Just so we're clear, margin is the profit potential.

00:06:47.260 Cashflow is how the money flows through the business.

00:06:49.980 For example, if I sell you a thousand dollar solution

00:06:52.800 that you buy from me,

00:06:54.200 but then I got to put out $500 of my own money

00:06:58.260 because by the time I send you an invoice

00:07:00.360 and then your finance team gets it and they pay it,

00:07:02.820 I got to put money out before I get money back.

00:07:04.900 That's where cashflow is important.

00:07:07.080 These are the four steps to avoid making the mistake

00:07:10.280 of creating a cashflow crunch in your business

00:07:12.720 before you even get started.

00:07:14.380 The first thing we have to do is when we're selling,

00:07:16.960 we have to sell one specific benefit.

00:07:19.400 You can't try to sell anything they want.

00:07:21.640 So for example, if I'm selling to electricians,

00:07:23.900 I'm saying that I can get them 10 more customers per week

00:07:27.320 without answering a single phone call.

00:07:29.120 See how that's one specific result or outcome?

00:07:32.020 The second is we have to package our pricing

00:07:34.760 so that we get paid as much as we can upfront

00:07:37.320 before we incur any costs.

00:07:39.220 So for example, maybe your service you're selling

00:07:41.660 is $1,000 for one month,

00:07:43.460 but you might be willing to give them a discount

00:07:45.640 if they go six months upfront

00:07:47.780 and you give them a discount to 4,000.

00:07:50.020 So that first conversation and transaction

00:07:52.120 is now four times more than the initial for one month,

00:07:55.280 but you've committed for a longer term.

00:07:57.460 The beautiful part of this

00:07:58.500 is it reduce your potential churn,

00:08:00.080 meaning customers that cancel,

00:08:01.340 and it increases the amount of cash

00:08:02.900 in your bank account early and up front,

00:08:05.220 then we have to implement scarcity

00:08:07.120 because the truth is,

00:08:08.440 is we have to give people a reason to buy

00:08:10.280 because if they won't,

00:08:11.140 they'll just put it on to-do list

00:08:12.400 and think about it later.

00:08:13.480 So I like to say that we're opening up 10 founding spots.

00:08:16.980 After that, the price is gonna go up

00:08:18.620 because you say I only got 10 spots.

00:08:20.380 I don't have all the time in the world.

00:08:21.780 It's just me right now.

00:08:22.680 And I only have so much capacity.

00:08:24.380 So you can use that to create scarcity

00:08:26.520 and get the person to make a decision

00:08:28.040 versus them just sitting on their hands and waiting.

00:08:30.660 And lastly, we wanna add a bonus.

00:08:32.460 so that we give them a reason to make a decision today.

00:08:34.900 But the best bonuses kill objections.

00:08:38.040 So for example, maybe they're like,

00:08:39.620 hey, I wanna do this,

00:08:40.600 but I'm worried that my team doesn't have time

00:08:42.220 to actually implement what you're selling.

00:08:44.400 You say, cool.

00:08:45.440 Well, because you're one of our first 10 customers,

00:08:47.660 we actually have a bonus we wanna add

00:08:49.860 where we come in and we train your staff.

00:08:51.580 Normally people are gonna invest

00:08:52.780 five to $10,000 to do that.

00:08:54.860 But because you enrolled at the six month level,

00:08:57.420 we're gonna do that for free.

00:08:58.900 See how it's a bonus that deals with their objection?

00:09:00.900 Do that every time and you will get more deals.

00:09:03.980 If you wanna get rich with AI or business in general,

00:09:06.840 you just can't sell your hours.

00:09:09.220 When you sell the result,

00:09:10.740 then you're motivated to become more effective

00:09:13.120 at getting the result.

00:09:14.720 And anytime you can improve with automation or AI

00:09:17.760 or training your staff better, the improvement you keep.

00:09:21.840 And by the way, I spent years testing and tweaking offers

00:09:25.240 until they converted fast.

00:09:27.100 Then I turned it into a simple plug and play template.

00:09:30.160 If you want my exact offer template

00:09:32.400 that you can copy and paste for your AI business,

00:09:34.980 find me on Instagram and DM me the words YouTube offer,

00:09:38.120 or just click the link below in the description.

00:09:40.040 I'll send that over to you.

00:09:41.340 Cool, so you have an offer.

00:09:43.080 Now what?

00:09:43.760 You need to build your product.

00:09:45.340 Step number five, you have to build your AI MVP.

00:09:49.000 So MVP stands for minimum viable product.

00:09:52.420 Essentially, most people hear product and they think,

00:09:54.540 oh, now I have to go hire a bunch of engineers

00:09:56.780 and developers and build a bunch of stuff.

00:09:58.940 And guess what?

00:09:59.560 you don't there's a bunch of tools you can use to build the product i'm going to teach you about in

00:10:03.800 a second but the idea is for it not to be perfect and not beautiful but for that it just works

00:10:10.280 it's like this guy was talking to an event once he's showing me his product okay fancy beautiful

00:10:16.760 mobile all the bells and whistles and i was like well how did you build things like i hired an

00:10:21.240 agency and it cost me a hundred thousand dollars and i'm like cool is anybody using it customers

00:10:26.120 yet no not yet i'm like you spent all your time on functionality to make it look good but never asked

00:10:32.920 does it actually deliver value for the customer so what i want to share with you is how to build an

00:10:38.360 mvp that actually gets results not just looks good best part is you only have three options

00:10:43.720 the last one's the most advanced but it's where i spend most of my time the first is a no code

00:10:48.120 platform when you look into these tools like a zapier or a make.com or n8n essentially you can

00:10:54.840 take any manual process using AI and automate it. There's even tools like Go High Level that are

00:11:01.360 CRM and funnel builders, or things like Lovable, where you can just type to it and it'll build

00:11:06.360 apps that solve problems for customers. The key is spend the least amount of time

00:11:11.600 configuring your automation so that it gets a result for a customer. If you have to do it

00:11:16.480 manually first, so you just even learn the steps of how it needs to be automated, that's probably

00:11:20.760 a better place to start than to just pay somebody to come in and build you something super custom

00:11:26.020 encoded. The second option is to use an AI assisted code platform. It's called the Gentic

00:11:31.940 programming. Those are tools like Replit or Cursor or Google's anti-gravity platform. It's not as

00:11:38.660 simple as just prompting like a lovable, but it's way more configurable. Every one of my engineers

00:11:44.940 in my venture studio uses one of these platforms to write the code. The third option is to hire an

00:11:50.580 an AI developer to build it for you.

00:11:53.040 Now, most people get burned because they hire somebody.

00:11:56.100 They say they can build the thing,

00:11:57.500 they give them all their money,

00:11:58.820 and then all of a sudden the product they get back

00:12:00.600 is crappy, buggy, or just doesn't work.

00:12:03.180 The best way to test for this

00:12:04.660 is if you're gonna hire a developer,

00:12:06.260 give them a tiny test project first.

00:12:08.160 I like to look on upwork.com or call my local college.

00:12:11.320 The key is the MVP not only has to be simple,

00:12:14.120 but it has to add value.

00:12:16.080 If you don't show it to a customer and they go,

00:12:18.600 oh, that's cool, then it doesn't work yet.

00:12:21.700 So now you have an MVP, your AI system works

00:12:24.360 either through automation or custom code.

00:12:26.460 But the next problem is if you don't automate the delivery

00:12:29.400 after you sell a customer, you will drown in client work.

00:12:32.880 Step number six, automate delivery.

00:12:35.620 The biggest mistake that happens for entrepreneurs

00:12:37.920 is not being prepared for success.

00:12:40.340 One customer, no problem.

00:12:42.180 Three customers, I can get it.

00:12:44.320 Five to 10, now I have to use project management software.

00:12:47.940 have to have a support email maybe a support phone call and if you don't get ahead of it to automate

00:12:53.060 it that pressure can actually take you out of business here's my rule automation can turn your

00:12:58.500 business into a machine one that works while you sleep so here's how you map your four-step delivery

00:13:04.580 system first is the purchase the moment somebody checks out okay so you're probably going to use

00:13:10.020 stripe to accept payment that kicks off a notification the second is once you get that

00:13:14.900 purchase okay and you can do it manually or you can ask them to click a link and buy from you

00:13:18.740 that'll trigger access into your software or even into your community my brother sells houses and

00:13:24.420 as soon as somebody puts a deposit it sends an email to add them to the project management

00:13:29.380 software that the client's going to use to pick all the options for their custom home

00:13:32.980 so it works for any industry the third step is onboarding think i bought something now what

00:13:37.940 happens next well ideally you give them the software you just build or you might give them

00:13:41.940 the ability to schedule some time with you so that they can schedule a review of how the software

00:13:46.660 needs to be set up right and that whole process is automated the fourth step is support think

00:13:51.220 about all the questions that they're going to have for you so if you want to get rich this year you

00:13:55.140 can't be manually onboarding clients over time you have to build a delivery system that feels like a

00:14:01.220 vending machine and it's automated and it works every time so now you've done everything you've

00:14:06.420 got the business model you got the product you get the customers you've automated your system

00:14:09.940 this is how we scale in 2026 but you have to be careful because if you're too greedy or worse not

00:14:15.940 greedy enough it might be all for nothing which takes us to a hidden step that very few people

00:14:21.140 consider step number seven getting long-term greedy a long time ago one of my mentors this

00:14:26.580 guy named steve said there's two types of greed there's short-term greedy and then there's long

00:14:30.740 term greedy short-term greedy might get you what you want today but it stops you from getting what

00:14:35.860 you want long-term what he was trying to say is that i could ask for the investment terms i wanted

00:14:41.220 today and people will pay for it but then i'm going to have investors that i might not need

00:14:45.300 for the long-term journey where he said if i'm long-term greedy then i'm going to give my

00:14:49.380 investors the right terms to capture the right investors so they support me over the long term

00:14:54.500 you can only get rich this year by wanting to build an empire for the next 50 years

00:15:00.180 if you don't fall in love with the idea of making money over a long period of time

00:15:05.780 then your desire to find the flash in the pan will actually be your kryptonite that's why being

00:15:10.660 long-term greedy is always broken down into the three s's of wealth the first s is sell this is

00:15:16.420 the skill you need to develop you get your first client you start to get the machine turning okay

00:15:21.220 the second s is scale once you get dozens of customers then you have to scale it up you have

00:15:26.180 to tighten your systems which stands for save yourself time energy money and stress you raise

00:15:30.900 your prices because you're adding more value you improve your offer you work on your team

00:15:35.860 you get to a place where it almost feels easy but that's where we go to the third s which is stack

00:15:41.460 once you have one machine working really well which every business can get to a place where

00:15:46.580 it's producing cash you can now add other offers or other products on top of your service either

00:15:53.060 through partnerships for things that you like or you build yourself or you could even buy other ai

00:15:58.020 companies to sell into your existing customer base that is the goal is to build an empire

00:16:04.420 it's to create a life of unlimited creation you never have to retire from most people that start

00:16:10.660 businesses are very creative people and they think the bigger i get the harder it's going to be

00:16:15.940 and the opposite actually happens at scale because the bigger you get the more resources you have

00:16:21.860 to invest in really smart people that are going to come in and help you co-create that future with you

00:16:27.060 and make your life easier so here's the deal anybody watching this can do what i just shared

00:16:32.660 it doesn't require any special schooling or a trust fund or anything you just have to talk to

00:16:38.100 customers but what it will teach you along the way is to strive to become your 10.0 self the best

00:16:45.060 version of yourself that is one way of being successful but if you want to live a life of

00:16:49.700 of fulfillment? Yes, 10.0 self is what you're after. But the other side of that is to give

00:16:55.440 yourself away. Share your strategies with the world like I'm doing here. Now, I don't want you

00:17:00.820 to just watch this. I want you to do something with it. So find me on Instagram and DM me the

00:17:06.820 words YouTube offer and grab my template. Build an offer that you can start selling this week.

00:17:14.200 Find the customers, ask the questions, be curious,

00:17:17.580 but I need you to win this year.

00:17:19.600 2026 is your year.

00:17:21.440 AI is still early

00:17:23.100 and the companies are out there waiting for your call.

00:17:26.200 And if you wanna learn the nine high income AI skills

00:17:29.260 you need to get rich,

00:17:30.280 click the link and I'll see you on the other side.

Dan Martell - January 16, 2026

How I’d Make $1M with AI in 2026 (Zero Code)

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