$215M AI CEO: How I’d Build a Profitable AI Startup in 30 Days (2026 Playbook)

1. 0:00 – 1:40

   What This Video Is About: The 2026 AI Startup Playbook

   1. MMMarina Mogilko0:00

      So let's imagine you have to start a company again. Walk me through the first 30 days. What will you do?

   2. YZYoung Zhao0:06

      If I have to start a company again, I think the first thing is-

   3. MMMarina Mogilko0:09

      This is Young, co-founder and CEO of OpusClip, an AI tool that turns long videos into viral short clips. In just two and a half years, he built it into one of the fastest growing AI companies in the world: 50 million users, $215 million valuation. LLMs are advancing so fast, and large companies are releasing better and better products. Do you think there are any niches or problems that are not worth solving anymore?

   4. YZYoung Zhao0:35

      If you asked me, like, three years ago, the answer would be much simpler. I think every AI founder should be somehow AGI-pilled, which means that you can predict what the foundation models can release in the next few weeks or months.

   5. MMMarina Mogilko0:48

      The rules have changed, and most founders don't see it yet. Young breaks down where the opportunities are, what to avoid, and what it takes to win in 2026. This video is sponsored by HubSpot. [upbeat music] Okay, Young, thank you so much for being here. You've built one of the fastest growing AI companies, 12 million users in 12 months, $215 million in valuation. Can you introduce yourself in 60 seconds? What do you do?

   6. YZYoung Zhao1:16

      Thank you for having me, Marina. Um, I'm Young, co-founder and CEO at OpusClip. We build the products that turn long-form, dense information content, like articles, blogs, footage, papers, into engaging contents, like short-form videos, that can attract your audiences worldwide. We have gathered actually more than 50 million users in the past two and a half years.

   7. MMMarina Mogilko1:36

      What?

   8. YZYoung Zhao1:37

      [chuckles]

   9. MMMarina Mogilko1:37

      This is crazy. Wow!

   10. YZYoung Zhao1:39

       Super crazy.

2. 1:40 – 2:51

   The Pivot Story: From a Failing Product to Product–Market Fit

   1. MMMarina Mogilko1:40

      And also, like, your story is fascinating be- 'cause you started during COVID, and you started with all the different features, and only this one stuck. Can you talk to me about this mindset of, like, trying things and seeing them not work and not giving up?

   2. YZYoung Zhao1:53

      Yeah, um, it, it's kind of frustrating, for sure. [chuckles] I think in the early days, like, we are like new founders or early founders, um, it's actually the passion that drove us to continuously try different things. Uh, but, like, probably after half a year or even one year of trying, like, let's say, three to four different things, if you don't still get any early signals of the product-market fit, you will be easily fatigued. Um-

   3. MMMarina Mogilko2:18

      Yeah

   4. YZYoung Zhao2:18

      ... so I think that's the challenge, and we're kind of lucky that we first built a live streaming tool. Um, nobody likes it, but there's only one feature that is like, um, the clipping feature in the live streaming tool, uh, that had somehow early signal of the product-market fit. And also, thanks to the time, which, you know, actually in the same week, ChatGPT was launched by OpenAI. Um-

   5. MMMarina Mogilko2:43

      Mm

   6. YZYoung Zhao2:43

      ... so we quickly married that to this, you know, standalone feature and, mm, pivoted to a new product, which is the Opus, OpusClip

3. 2:51 – 4:47

   Early Validation: Engineering Results Before Building the Full Product

   1. YZYoung Zhao2:51

      right now.

   2. MMMarina Mogilko2:51

      What should people pay attention to when they decide to double down on one particular feature?

   3. YZYoung Zhao2:57

      Good question. So we were not tracking any classic OG, um, AARRR kind of metric. We didn't build a product for OpusClip in the f- in the first day. We actually engineered the result, the final outcome, the final videos, and just emailed them to all of the potential customers.

   4. MMMarina Mogilko3:18

      Oh, so you're, like, manually creating it?

   5. YZYoung Zhao3:19

      Yeah, yeah.

   6. MMMarina Mogilko3:20

      Oh!

   7. YZYoung Zhao3:20

      Well, not manually. [chuckles]

   8. MMMarina Mogilko3:20

      That's how you, that's how you start. [laughing]

   9. YZYoung Zhao3:23

      [laughing] Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, we, we man- uh, we, we work, we worked with the AI to edit all these videos and write and send out to all the, um, potential customers, and I think we got, like, more than 60% of positive feedback.

   10. MMMarina Mogilko3:34

       Mm-hmm.

   11. YZYoung Zhao3:35

       "I love this clip."

   12. MMMarina Mogilko3:36

       Nice.

   13. YZYoung Zhao3:36

       "I want to use it. Like, I just want to tweak one thing, and, you know, I can publish it right away." So those are the very early feedback, and the s- then, like, after a few more weeks, we built the product into a Discord bot. Still no interface, right? So we saved a lot of time building the, you know, UI, UX, and all that, all that kind of stuff, and just focus on deliver- delivering the value, validating the outcome. So we grabbed, you know, hundreds of, uh, thousands of, uh, creators into our Discord channel, and they are playing with the bot. So what we were looking at are basically their retention, right?

   14. MMMarina Mogilko4:08

       Mm-hmm.

   15. YZYoung Zhao4:08

       Their engagement of that tool, and but, but beyond that, we're also looking to the discussions around the content. Like, we saw people: "Hey, how do you get that content? How do you get that piece of, um, the clip?" So I think in the early days, quantitative data are important, but qualitative, um, co- data or feedback is also super important. When we start hearing people, uh, complaining about the queue, complaining about the quota of their data usage, we realize this is the product-market fit moment.

   16. MMMarina Mogilko4:41

       Nice. And was there a metric... Uh, when you said you were tracking how often people were coming back to the bot

4. 4:47 – 5:29

   Strategy & Retention: How to Measure What Actually Matters

   1. MMMarina Mogilko4:47

      in Discord, what's a good number? 'Cause it's not- I feel like it's not something like Google, right?

   2. YZYoung Zhao4:50

      Yeah.

   3. MMMarina Mogilko4:50

      When you're, like, Googling several times a day.

   4. YZYoung Zhao4:52

      Yeah.

   5. MMMarina Mogilko4:53

      But for a feature like yours, what's, what's a good metric?

   6. YZYoung Zhao4:55

      Yeah, the general use case for a content creator, let's say, they would normally have, like, one piece of long-form content, uh, long-form footage, and they want to use our tool to, to generate, like, five to 10 short clips so that they can post to their channels, one clip a day. Um, so I would say the average, uh, frequency of using our tool is, like, on a weekly basis. But when we see people, like, come to use it every day or, you know, multiple times a week, that is a very strong usage-

   7. MMMarina Mogilko5:27

      Yeah

   8. YZYoung Zhao5:27

      ... beyond what we can imagine.

5. 5:29 – 7:35

   Advice for Founders: Build a Real Business, Not a Cool Demo

   1. MMMarina Mogilko5:29

      So based on this story that we just talked about-

   2. YZYoung Zhao5:32

      Mm

   3. MMMarina Mogilko5:32

      ... of you ended up finding this feature, what would be your advice to all the startup founders?

   4. YZYoung Zhao5:37

      Mm.

   5. MMMarina Mogilko5:37

      What would you say is the key learning from that?

   6. YZYoung Zhao5:39

      The key learning is that you should build a real business with a product, not a cool demo, right? Because many people just start with building a very cool demo. Um, they showed it off to the people, and, you know, it looks like magic because the demo really demonstrate the capability.

   7. MMMarina Mogilko5:56

      You, you polish the way it looks, right? [chuckles]

   8. YZYoung Zhao5:58

      Yeah, exactly.

   9. MMMarina Mogilko5:58

      The way it works. Yeah, mm-hmm.

   10. YZYoung Zhao5:59

       Yeah. So the demo shows a very strong capability.... but, um, many founders failed because they didn't find a product-market fit for a real business. What that means is that they are not solving, probably they're not solving a real pain point, a real painful job to be done in the real world. Because before your product, if they- if it is a real painful job to be done, there must be a lot of alternative solutions, like, you know, humans do the job, or they use some internal tools, or they manually just, you know, concatenate a couple of different snippets of the... Or solutions to make it work, right? They spend extra time, effort, or, you know, painful hours to get the job done.

   11. MMMarina Mogilko6:43

       Yeah.

   12. YZYoung Zhao6:43

       So are you really replacing those type of, like, tedious or human-heavy workflows? That is one part of, you know, whether it is a real business. The second thing would be how your customers, uh, understand the values you created, right? If you can tell your product value in just, like, 10 words, maybe, or probably, you're close to a real business. If your product is just cool and all the feedback was like, "This is amazing, this is awesome," but nobody want to give you, uh, their credit card information, nobody want to ask you, "What is the... You know, what is your pricing tier?" It's also not helping you, um, get to the product-market fit as well.

   13. MMMarina Mogilko7:23

       I really like the way you approach this. So you figured out the problem that people are solving manually, and then you created a product manually without any interface, and then you saw early users' feedback. I really like that approach.

6. 7:35 – 9:10

   Passion vs. Problems: What Actually Matters When Starting a Startup

   1. MMMarina Mogilko7:35

      If people want to use that approach, what would you say comes first, passion about particular problem, or the, or the problem itself?

   2. YZYoung Zhao7:42

      Yeah. I would say both of them are super critical. Um, but my first principle for passion is actually not necessarily the passion for solving the problem. I think passion is something more emotional. Um, I think all the entrepreneurs, all the founders need to have the passion to be a problem solver. You need to have the passion to be a builder, to build something that people want, to build something that, you know, ideally change the world. I think that's the passion founders need, right? You don't have to have a passion for, like, video clipping.

   3. MMMarina Mogilko8:16

      [chuckles]

   4. YZYoung Zhao8:16

      You don't have to have a passion for, like, you know, running a restaurant. I think all you need to have for passion is to be a problem solver, be a builder, be a game changer. And rationally speaking, the real painful job to be done is something that is inevitable in your journey. Um, you have to be very rational to figure out this is a real problems to be solved by my passion, right?

   5. MMMarina Mogilko8:43

      Yeah.

   6. YZYoung Zhao8:44

      Um, so the deep understanding about the industry, about the workflow, about the customer profiles, about the use cases, those are all rational. Um, so I think an emotional passion for, like, a bigger picture, um, just, just to be a builder, plus, uh, the rational conviction for solving a concrete problems that you know very well, those are the necessities

7. 9:10 – 10:40

   Building Creator Tools for Companies Like HubSpot

   1. YZYoung Zhao9:10

      for becoming a founder.

   2. MMMarina Mogilko9:11

      My guest, Young, built a tool that creators love, and if you're interested in turning content into a career in 2026, or taking your creator career to the next level, take a look at this new ultimate content creator toolkit from HubSpot in partnership with TikTok. It's packed with resources that help you cut through the noise. What tools you actually need, AI prompts that save hours, and most importantly, how to connect your content to real revenue, not just views. My favorite section is the TikTok breakout, and I love how actionable it is. TikTok Ads Manager doesn't just help you launch ads, it shows you what's already working. I wish I had this tool 10 years ago. You can peek at top-performing ads, see which products are blowing up, track trending sounds and hashtags, and even use TikTok's own AI tools to make your videos stand out. And it's not just about views, it's about turning attention into signups, customers, and recurring income. TikTok users are actually way more likely to sign up, buy, or take action compared to other platforms, and with the HubSpot integration, you can literally see which videos are converting into leads and clients inside your CRM. This toolkit was created by HubSpot in partnership with TikTok, and I'm partnering with them in this video to share it with you, so you're learning directly from the people who see the data every day. Download the toolkit for free in the description below. Honestly, if you're serious about growing as a creator, this is where you start. Let's talk about your new Agent Opus.

   3. YZYoung Zhao10:39

      Mm-hmm.

   4. MMMarina Mogilko10:39

      'Cause

8. 10:40 – 13:35

   Agent Opus: From AI Tool to an AI Creative Director

   1. MMMarina Mogilko10:40

      that was... I, I heard this presentation where you compared, uh, what your tool is- your tool is doing now to human editors, and yes, human editors are slightly better, but when it comes to someone who's just starting out multiple channels, Agent Opus becomes invaluable because it just takes all the content and creates, I guess, all those channels. Can you explain how it works?

   2. YZYoung Zhao11:00

      We kind of have two products, right? The OpusClip product is, like, a very refined workflow, um, or agentic workflow that follows, um, a rigid, um, plan and then execute it. The Agent Opus, on the other side, is more, um, is more agentic. Um, there is no preset workflow, um, and the interaction for users is that you can just drop your, um, drop your idea, your story, or some links, or some, you know, assets, and instruct the agent to do whatever you want them to create.

   3. MMMarina Mogilko11:36

      Oh.

   4. YZYoung Zhao11:36

      So the agent is more... Is playing the role like a director, right? It's not a video editor, it's not a video creator, it's not a video generator, it's not a designer, it is a director. And think about, you know, what- how director works in those, uh, movie studio. They are like a true leader, um, managing and collaborating with multiple different functions. Like, there are designers, producers, um, artists, um, researchers, and script writers, scene writers, right? There are so many sub-agents in Agent Opus-... all reporting to the central director agent. Um, so I think that's the magic part of it, um, because when- well, everyone says, "I'm using AI, I'm building AI," but I think building a team of AI is another level of challenge, but it also unlocks another level of superpower. So when, when we saw that, um, agent, uh, the Agent Opus, the central director agent, um, you know, designing a plan and also orchestrate among the other eight to nine agent, it is a truly end-to-end autonomous experience, where the input is just some article or pieces of news, while the output consists, like, you know, well-written script, polished voiceovers, um, re- photorealistic avatars, real-world assets sourced from the entire internet and also YouTube, plus AI-generated scenes, animations, infographics along the video. So it's a true multi-agent, multimodal agent workflow.

   5. MMMarina Mogilko13:25

      And so- or I can drop my LinkedIn post, right, which is a written post-

   6. YZYoung Zhao13:29

      Yeah

   7. MMMarina Mogilko13:29

      ... and you'll be able to create-

   8. YZYoung Zhao13:31

      Yeah

   9. MMMarina Mogilko13:31

      ... a video out of it?

   10. YZYoung Zhao13:33

       Yeah. Yeah, exactly.

   11. MMMarina Mogilko13:34

       So can

9. 13:35 – 15:07

   Inside Agent Opus: How AI Agents Will Change Content Creation

   1. MMMarina Mogilko13:35

      you show the new AI feature? 'Cause th- this is something that we're doing a lot. We're trying to repurpose whatever is going viral on LinkedIn. This is so funny. I posted myself sitting in the garage on a call-

   2. YZYoung Zhao13:47

      Oh

   3. MMMarina Mogilko13:47

      ... because my kids were going crazy upstairs, and I just couldn't take the call upstairs.

   4. YZYoung Zhao13:51

      [laughs]

   5. MMMarina Mogilko13:51

      And I'm, like, in this messy garage, I'm freezing. Um, and it got 120,000 impressions.

   6. YZYoung Zhao13:57

      Wow. [laughs]

   7. MMMarina Mogilko13:58

      And ideally, I want it to become, you know-

   8. YZYoung Zhao14:00

      Yeah

   9. MMMarina Mogilko14:00

      ... something else I can post, so.

   10. YZYoung Zhao14:02

       For sure.

   11. MMMarina Mogilko14:03

       So copy link, right?

   12. YZYoung Zhao14:04

       Yeah, you copy and paste. Uh, you can just say, like, "Create a video of this LinkedIn post." And, um-

   13. MMMarina Mogilko14:13

       Should I add more prompts, like, uh, m- make it a viral reel, or-

   14. YZYoung Zhao14:18

       Yeah

   15. MMMarina Mogilko14:18

       ... or it should, or is, like, pre-prompted or something?

   16. YZYoung Zhao14:21

       Yeah, it's pre-prompted, but you can always-

   17. MMMarina Mogilko14:23

       Okay

   18. YZYoung Zhao14:23

       ... always add, um-

   19. MMMarina Mogilko14:25

       Yeah

   20. YZYoung Zhao14:25

       ... or you can a- you can add some thought on it. Um, up to you. So, uh, and for voice, you wanna also create your own voice.

   21. MMMarina Mogilko14:32

       Mm.

   22. YZYoung Zhao14:32

       But let's just, like, use a, use our default our voice. Um, okay.

   23. MMMarina Mogilko14:37

       What is the hook?

   24. YZYoung Zhao14:38

       Hook is that you will have different, um, hook templates, like the fast cuts, article highlight. Right now, it's kind of slow, uh, so it probably takes about, like, 30 to 60 minutes, uh-

   25. MMMarina Mogilko14:52

       Oh, 30 to 60 minutes?

   26. YZYoung Zhao14:53

       Yeah, yeah.

   27. MMMarina Mogilko14:53

       Okay.

   28. YZYoung Zhao14:53

       We're optimizing the, the speed. Hopefully, we can get it to, like, 20 minutes, uh, in two months.

   29. MMMarina Mogilko14:58

       I'm gonna show you the result. [laughs]

   30. YZYoung Zhao15:00

       [laughs]
10. 15:07 – 15:47

    The Future of Content Creators: Why Competition Is Getting Harder

    1. SPSpeaker15:07

       chaos.

    2. MMMarina Mogilko15:07

       Okay, so with all of this, what will happen to creators in three years? So, like, in general, creator economy, how do you see it evolving with all the agentic tools?

    3. YZYoung Zhao15:15

       I think the entry barrier to create something is going to dissolve, so that everyone has the superpower to become a creator. Um, that's a brutal fact, um, and it makes the competition much more challenging, to be honest. But the good thing is that, um, everyone now don't have to think about, you know, what tool do I need to use, or what techniques, what, uh, expertise do I need to learn? But now you can focus on figuring out what is your uniqueness. How

11. 15:47 – 16:12

    What to Focus on Instead of Technical Skills: Creativity & Differentiation

    1. YZYoung Zhao15:47

       should you stand out, right? What is your unique narrative your- of your st- uh, story? What is your unique messaging, and what is your unique tone? Um, what sets you apart? Um, so just focus on yourself, focus on your own storytelling, and in, you know, one to two years, no more than three years, AI can just deliver the job for you. They're doing actually the dirty work for you, but you're gonna be the real creative one.

    2. MMMarina Mogilko16:11

       But it's crazy, the

12. 16:12 – 17:32

    Will Personal Branding Become Saturated?

    1. MMMarina Mogilko16:12

       competition is gonna be insane.

    2. YZYoung Zhao16:14

       It is.

    3. MMMarina Mogilko16:14

       Do you think there's less and less time to build a personal brand? [laughs]

    4. YZYoung Zhao16:18

       [laughs]

    5. MMMarina Mogilko16:18

       Because what happens if in three years everyone has access to tools, everyone tells a story, and then we don't have enough eyes to consume all the content? Do you ever worry about it?

    6. YZYoung Zhao16:26

       I don't worry that too much, um, because think about, like, f- 10 years ago, five years ago, when you want to build a personal brand, um, I think most of the time you were, you were wasting is to, um, you know, edit the video scene by scene, right? Is to design, design your colors, design, um, everything, like, page by page. I think that's how you wasted the time. So the analogy is that, uh, is that if you have to spend five months, um, building your personal br- personal branding from zero to Y, but nowadays, it's like you just need a couple weeks-

    7. MMMarina Mogilko16:58

       Yeah

    8. YZYoung Zhao16:58

       ... uh, or maybe days. [chuckles]

    9. MMMarina Mogilko16:59

       My, like, thing, because I started 10 years ago, and I remember editing all the videos-

    10. YZYoung Zhao17:03

        Yeah

    11. MMMarina Mogilko17:04

        ... something that set me apart-

    12. YZYoung Zhao17:05

        Yeah

    13. MMMarina Mogilko17:05

        ... was the willingness to do that.

    14. YZYoung Zhao17:07

        Exactly.

    15. MMMarina Mogilko17:07

        So my content was super mediocre-

    16. YZYoung Zhao17:09

        Mm

    17. MMMarina Mogilko17:09

        ... but because I took the chance of, like, you know, spending six hours to edit a video, I got my followers. It's impossible today. Like, if my content is mediocre, it's not gonna be noticed. That's the thing, right? So your story, uh, either has to be extraordinary or, or that's it. Do you think we still have this opportunity to showcase our personal brands, or because there are so many, we're getting saturated?

13. 17:32 – 18:50

    The Creators Who Will Stand Out in 2026 — and Why

    1. YZYoung Zhao17:32

       The good storyteller, um, or the, the real unique people can still, um, have the advantage. Uh, think about, um, you know, carriage versus cars, right? A hundred years ago, very few people have cars, uh, so it become a privilege to be, you know, one of the fastest people in the world. Nowadays, everyone are able to, to drive a car.

    2. MMMarina Mogilko17:53

       Yeah.

    3. YZYoung Zhao17:53

       Almost everyone are able to drive a car. Um, but there are still Formula 1 drivers. There are still, you know, WDC drivers who are, you know, way faster than the ordinary people. So I think it's probably, you know, 10 years ago, you showed your willingness to be ca- uh, to build your personal branding by, uh, spending extra time, um, writing content, um, polishing your website, editing the videos. But-... I think in the future, you, people who want to stand out should still probably spend the same amount of time on something else.

    4. MMMarina Mogilko18:27

       Mm.

    5. YZYoung Zhao18:27

       Not using the tools, not, you know, building by yourself, but the time should be spent on thinking it through how you should stand out. So I think time spent, probably the same, but the actual work are completely different-

    6. MMMarina Mogilko18:43

       Yeah

    7. YZYoung Zhao18:43

       ... which is more human, actually.

    8. MMMarina Mogilko18:45

       Yeah, yeah. I like that reflect. I like the car analogy, actually.

    9. YZYoung Zhao18:48

       Mm-hmm.

    10. MMMarina Mogilko18:48

        Thank you.

    11. YZYoung Zhao18:49

        Sure.

    12. MMMarina Mogilko18:49

        So

14. 18:50 – 21:40

    Starting an AI Company in 2026: What to Do in Your First 30 Days

    1. MMMarina Mogilko18:50

       let's imagine, uh, you have to start a company again now. Walk me through the first 30 days. What will you do?

    2. YZYoung Zhao18:58

       If I have to start a company again, the first thing is always to figure out what is, what is a real painful job to be done. Um, I want to... So I, I'm the prototype of founder who don't start everything from technology, but from, um, users, from the market. Um, I have to segment my market, uh, to a very clear, very vertical niche that I can clearly understand their existing workflow, their existing pain points, um, their existing alternative solutions. And then, so I think probably I, I would have to spend, you know, the first couple weeks, um, two or three weeks, understanding the real use case, um, the very specific ICP. Um, and the second thing is to just engineer a, you know, prototype or pro- proof of concept. I can do that very easily with all the vibe coding tools right now, right?

    3. MMMarina Mogilko19:53

       What's your favorite?

    4. YZYoung Zhao19:54

       Uh, w- well, I'm, I'm a heavy, um, Cursor user.

    5. MMMarina Mogilko19:59

       Mm-hmm.

    6. YZYoung Zhao19:59

       Um, but I, I tried many other different tools-

    7. MMMarina Mogilko20:01

       Mm

    8. YZYoung Zhao20:01

       ... but Cursor is my go-to, go-to tool.

    9. MMMarina Mogilko20:03

       Nice. Mm-hmm.

    10. YZYoung Zhao20:03

        Yeah.

    11. MMMarina Mogilko20:04

        Mm-hmm.

    12. YZYoung Zhao20:04

        'Cause I came from engineering background, so it's, um-

    13. MMMarina Mogilko20:06

        Yeah

    14. YZYoung Zhao20:06

        ... yeah, more familiar with the IDE. The step two is actually just, um, couple days should be good enough, uh, to have a proof of concept. Uh, and then I go back to share that with, uh, the early users, um, the ICPs, to get, you know, their feedback. Uh, the feedback should not only about, do you like the product, but also, like, what kind of problems am, am I solving for you, and what is the value you perceive? Which means, how much money you are willing to pay for it. Um, right, so that, that process probably is the majority of the early 30 days. But I think on the other side, I'm also- I also need to think it through about what kind of proprietary, proprietary data can I possess along the way, and will that data set grow as the product grow, as the user grow, right? Um, we don't have to build toward a moat, um, or a very clear plan of defensibility, but I think we need to have that idea at least well thought in the first early days. Um, 'cause you have... You, you can't avoid it, right-

    15. MMMarina Mogilko21:14

        Yeah

    16. YZYoung Zhao21:14

        ... when you really launch the product. So it's better to have something in mind, have some idea in mind.

    17. MMMarina Mogilko21:19

        Like what makes you stand out-

    18. YZYoung Zhao21:20

        Yeah, exactly

    19. MMMarina Mogilko21:21

        ... in the market, and what makes people come back?

    20. YZYoung Zhao21:23

        Yeah. And if you ask this question, especially nowadays, especially we are entering 2026-

    21. MMMarina Mogilko21:28

        We're switching between apps like crazy.

    22. YZYoung Zhao21:30

        Yeah.

    23. MMMarina Mogilko21:30

        Like, there's a new shiny app, you install it, you're like, "Oh, I love it now." But the next day, [chuckles] something else comes out, and it's so easy unless you have history with a certain app-

    24. YZYoung Zhao21:38

        Yeah

    25. MMMarina Mogilko21:38

        ... right?

    26. YZYoung Zhao21:39

        Exactly.

15. 21:40 – 22:38

    How to Stand Out in a Crowded AI Market

    1. YZYoung Zhao21:40

       So the last thing I think we should consider is the distribution channel. Um, I think the competition is totally different, uh, yeah, two years ago. Two years ago, you can easily say, "You are the ChatGPT of ABC," right? It's so easy to go by right that time. Nowadays, like, everyone knows AI, everyone has used AI. Um, so figure out a distribution channel will help you better refine your user experience, your onboarding, and also, um, your target ICP as well.

    2. MMMarina Mogilko22:08

       So basically, you started with expertise, it looks like.

    3. YZYoung Zhao22:11

       Yeah.

    4. MMMarina Mogilko22:11

       You need to understand at least one niche to be able to build something. Not like, "Oh, this market looks good-

    5. YZYoung Zhao22:17

       Yeah

    6. MMMarina Mogilko22:17

       ... I'm going to try and build something for it." No, you need to be deep in that market and understand the problem.

    7. YZYoung Zhao22:21

       Exactly, because you asked me a question, uh, the assumption is today, right? AI's been there for, like, more than three years. The LLM has been there for more than three years, right? It's... Because if you asked me, like, three years ago, um, the answer was, would, would be much simpler.

    8. MMMarina Mogilko22:35

       [chuckles]

    9. YZYoung Zhao22:35

       But nowadays-

    10. MMMarina Mogilko22:36

        Just build with AI, right? [laughing]

    11. YZYoung Zhao22:37

        Yeah, yeah.

16. 22:38 – 23:10

    Two Types of Problems AI Founders Should Avoid

    1. MMMarina Mogilko22:38

       Yeah. But now when, you know, LLMs are advancing so fast and large companies are releasing better and better products, do you think there are any niches or problems that are not worth solving anymore just because big companies can take over in, like, a week? [chuckles]

    2. YZYoung Zhao22:53

       I think two major types of problems that a founder should avoid, um, the first one is that you are just building a feature for an existing type of ICP, ideal customer profile, within an existing workflow built by the incumbents.

17. 23:10 – 24:50

    Being “AGI-Pilled”: Predicting the Future of Foundation Models

    1. MMMarina Mogilko23:10

       Mm.

    2. YZYoung Zhao23:10

       So basically, what that means, that, is that, um, the incumbents can easily build a feature that, you know, bundles everything, right? And probably, you won't have your own distribution channel. For example, I think, like, if you want to build a notetaker, think it through, right? Probably find another direction, 'cause it's super easy for Zoom or, you know, Google Meet to have that feature-

    3. MMMarina Mogilko23:33

       Mm

    4. YZYoung Zhao23:33

       ... in their existing workflow. Because you're targeting basically the same ICP, same market, same... Almost, you know, same or adjacent use cases attached to a big workflow, a big platform. I think every AI founder should be somehow AGI-pilled, which means that you can predict, or you should be confident to make some predictions about what the foundation models can release in the next few weeks or month, right? If they are already doing, you know, some job 80% very well, 90% very well, I think it's, you know, in their second- in their next few release, they can probably do that job, like, 99% well, or even 100%, right? So, um, run that test in your internal strategic discussions. If you're just becoming a wrapper with some prompts, then probably you don't have to write any prompts in the second release, in the next release of, um, Gemini or ChatGPT. You need to focus on solving, like, a vertical business problem-... um, by, like, integrating the workflow end to end, right? You need to own the workflow end to end so that, you know, AI is part of the workflow, but it's not all, right?

    5. MMMarina Mogilko24:49

       Mm.

18. 24:50 – 28:20

    Pricing AI Products: Value Creation, Costs, and Unit Economics

    1. YZYoung Zhao24:50

       Instead, like, if you build a wrapper with some prompt engineering, AI is almost the end-to-end workflow itself.

    2. MMMarina Mogilko24:55

       Can you also walk me through, um, the process of coming up with pricing for an AI tool? How do you decide on-

    3. YZYoung Zhao25:01

       Mm-hmm.

    4. MMMarina Mogilko25:01

       'Cause I know you have lower tier, but then you also have, like, a 20K check for, um, bigger companies. How do you come up with a price?

    5. YZYoung Zhao25:09

       Pricing is a, is, is a real science. [chuckles]

    6. MMMarina Mogilko25:12

       [chuckles]

    7. YZYoung Zhao25:12

       So couple of factors we, uh, considered in the first place. For example, first, what is your value creation? How to measure your value creation, right? Um, before using your product, what would y- your users do to achieve the goal, uh, to get the job to be done? Uh, they probably, you know, spent their own time, which there is a price for their own time, right? They probably outsource it to some vendors or, um, yeah, they pay humans to get the job done, or they may, like, use some, like, OG tools, uh, by some professional guys, like, you know, in our use case, professional editors to, to get the job done. So in our industry, like, editing a clip, editing a, [chuckles] like, a viral-ready, high-quality clip, one-minute clip, often takes about one hour or at least 30 minutes, and the price, the market price is about 25 to $50.

    8. MMMarina Mogilko26:10

       Mm.

    9. YZYoung Zhao26:10

       So that's the value creation we are benchmarking against. The second thing is about your unit economy, um, because you have inference cost, um, and that can... Even that can go down in the future, but, um, it's still very pricey in the early days. And also, for videos, another elephant in the room for the cost is the storage. The storage can be just 5% in the early days, but it can become, like, 50% of your total costs, what, after three or five years.

    10. MMMarina Mogilko26:42

        Yeah.

    11. YZYoung Zhao26:43

        So the unit economy, you want to make sure it's healthy, it's, um, sustainable. Third one, I would, I would say, just do as many experiments as possible. We actually sent out, like, thousands of surveys in the first few months, and we tweaked our pricing logic again and again. Well, in the early days, right? You don't want to change drastically in the, in the late stage. But in the early stage, uh, we, we did a lot of survey, customer interview, to understand how much they are willing to pay. Um, because even you have a clear value creation and a well-calculated u- unit economy, can users still perceive that, right? Is your metric clear enough for a user to understand the value creation, you know, to buy in your value creation? That is still relying on your market messaging and also your, um, metric setup. Like, most of the products are using a metric of usage instead of seat. I think that makes sense, especially for solopreneurs. Uh, but the experiment really tell- tells us what price to go, because you don't have to, uh, set up a price that everyone are happy with. You probably have a assumption or hypothesis of what kind of customers you want to target, too, right?

    12. MMMarina Mogilko27:55

        Yeah.

    13. YZYoung Zhao27:55

        All you need to do is to make sure those ICPs are okay, are happy with the price. You probably have to say no to, like, 70% of the early-stage users-

    14. MMMarina Mogilko28:07

        Mm

    15. YZYoung Zhao28:07

        ... but you should be to only focus on your ICP in the, in the early days, and then maybe you can develop other, you know, pricing or even product, um, capabilities for the rest of the users.

    16. MMMarina Mogilko28:18

        Yeah, the, the importance of saying no,

19. 28:20 – 29:17

    Customer Interviews: Why Quality Matters More Than Quantity

    1. MMMarina Mogilko28:20

       right?

    2. YZYoung Zhao28:20

       Yeah.

    3. MMMarina Mogilko28:21

       All the time. When you said you do customer interviews, how many interviews do you need to do in order to land on some kind of a decision?

    4. YZYoung Zhao28:27

       I think the number of customer interviews are not the key, uh, but how you do it is more important. Um, I think we did about 20 to 30, uh, for, on average, for one single, um, critical product decisions. But we set the distribution of the, those 20 to 30, um, customers in a, in a very, um, messy way, where, like, okay, four marketers, you know, five creators, and also they're in different industries. They're- they come with different, um, you know, purchasing power, coming from different geo- geographic locations, backgrounds. You want to make sure they are representative enough-

    5. MMMarina Mogilko29:06

       Yeah

    6. YZYoung Zhao29:06

       ... to help you make a decision.

    7. MMMarina Mogilko29:08

       I love it.

    8. YZYoung Zhao29:08

       Uh, you don't need a lot-

    9. MMMarina Mogilko29:09

       Mm

    10. YZYoung Zhao29:09

        ... but you need to have a clear, concise set of, um, testers.

    11. MMMarina Mogilko29:15

        Yeah, you want to make sure you get, like, a full picture-

20. 29:17 – 30:48

    The #1 AI Skill: Using AI as a Thinking Partner

    1. YZYoung Zhao29:17

       Yeah

    2. MMMarina Mogilko29:17

       ... of the market. That's really helpful for the research and validation phase. Now, once you're in building mode, what about the AI skills? What is the number one AI skill everyone should be, uh, working on right now?

    3. YZYoung Zhao29:29

       The number one AI skill, uh, should actually go for first principle. It doesn't matter, like, if you're using AI for, um, you know, design your poster, um, you know, vibe code your prototype, I think everyone should treat AI as your thinking partner or even thought partner, which means that when you are having a problem of understanding your users, when you are having problem of managing your teams, when you are having problems of, um, figuring out your pricing or, you know, all the critical decisions in your lifetime, uh, when you are a founder, I think traditionally you will just go reach out to your coach or some more senior people, uh, or people with relevant experience, right, to ask for their advice. But I think in this era of AI, you should run through it with your, with, you know, Gemini or ChatGPT. They are actually a very, very senior, very omnipotent thinking partner. Um, just, you know, instead of, like, asking one line of questions, um, through as many contexts as possible, um, and also, you know, do, like, more than 20 rounds of back-and-forth, um, communications.... you will be mind-blowingly enlightened through these conversations. So nowadays, that's how I practice myself.

    4. MMMarina Mogilko30:46

       Do- is there a certain

21. 30:48 – 33:00

    Daily Practice: How to Ask Better Questions and Get Better Answers

    1. MMMarina Mogilko30:48

       daily practice that you have? Uh, I talked to Mustafa Suleyman on this podcast.

    2. YZYoung Zhao30:52

       Yeah.

    3. MMMarina Mogilko30:53

       Uh, he's a CEO of Microsoft AI, and he shared that every single day he would talk to Copilot, and just tell Copilot about what the day has been like, and the decision that he's made, and how those decisions made him feel, so that when in three months he has something, like a similar problem, he still talks to the same thread in Copilot, and Copilot will be like: "Oh, when you made that decision three months ago, you actually regret it, so this time, let's do this."

    4. YZYoung Zhao31:19

       Yeah.

    5. MMMarina Mogilko31:19

       Is there something similar that you have?

    6. YZYoung Zhao31:21

       Yeah.

    7. MMMarina Mogilko31:21

       Yeah.

    8. YZYoung Zhao31:21

       Yeah, exactly. Exactly. 'Cause I think the current, uh, chatbot, uh, memory is so powerful that, uh... So what I, um, like monthly- one of my monthly ritual is that I ask ChatGPT about, um, you know, what are my major decisions in the past month? Um, you know, give me some comment, um, feedback, um, like-

    9. MMMarina Mogilko31:42

       But that, that means you shared every single decision.

    10. YZYoung Zhao31:45

        Yeah, I shared everything. Yeah.

    11. MMMarina Mogilko31:45

        How does it... Like, every night you just say, like, "These are the decisions I made," or?

    12. YZYoung Zhao31:50

        Yeah. Sometimes I, you know, talk to the AI in that way-

    13. MMMarina Mogilko31:53

        Yeah

    14. YZYoung Zhao31:53

        ... and sometimes I would just, um, um, forward my decision, just, um, like I captured, like, a screenshots of our group discussion.

    15. MMMarina Mogilko32:03

        Mm.

    16. YZYoung Zhao32:04

        Um, I s- dropped a link of my- the document of a, of a PRD, of a spec, uh, that kind of thing, too. I, yeah, I, I, I kind of force myself to-

    17. MMMarina Mogilko32:13

        To document.

    18. YZYoung Zhao32:14

        Yeah, to document it.

    19. MMMarina Mogilko32:15

        I love it.

    20. YZYoung Zhao32:15

        Yeah.

    21. MMMarina Mogilko32:15

        Uh, is- so you said Gemini is the best for it, or?

    22. YZYoung Zhao32:18

        Yeah, I'm, um, I'm, I'm, I'm happy using both Gemini and ChatGPT.

    23. MMMarina Mogilko32:22

        Okay.

    24. YZYoung Zhao32:22

        Yeah. But I think recently I realized they really memorize almost everything I talk to them. So now I can start a new question like, "What is the biggest mistake I've made in the past six month? Uh, what is one thing you, you want to suggest in me, uh, if you could three months ago?" I think this becomes super powerful right now.

    25. MMMarina Mogilko32:44

        I love these questions. Let- uh, everyone, go, go to your [chuckles] favorite app and ask those questions. I'm going to do this right after the interview.

    26. YZYoung Zhao32:51

        Yeah.

    27. MMMarina Mogilko32:52

        It's a good, like, end-of-the-year practice [chuckles] to see what's, what's going on. Love it!

    28. YZYoung Zhao32:56

        Absolutely.

    29. MMMarina Mogilko32:57

        Do you have any top three AI business ideas you would

22. 33:00 – 35:50

    Top 3 Principles for Starting an AI Business in 2026

    1. MMMarina Mogilko33:00

       start if you hadn't had OpusClip?

    2. YZYoung Zhao33:02

       It's hard to name, like, three ideas, uh, 'cause I'm not an investor. I, I, I don't meet as many founders as possible. Um, but I think the general first principle, uh, for now, right, the question is to start a business, like, in 2026.

    3. MMMarina Mogilko33:20

       Yeah.

    4. YZYoung Zhao33:20

       As we discussed, the market is becoming super competitive, and there are, like... For most of the markets or industries, uh, there are, like, more than 20, 50 AI tools out there already. Um, so the first principle I would say is to find a really niche business. Oftentimes, many people don't really understand what is a niche. For example, is restaurant business a niche? No. Is Chinese restaurant n- a niche? No. Is, um, Cantonese Chinese restaurant business a niche? Still no. Um, you have to drill down. Uh, there are, you know, so many different types of Cantonese food. Um, and even for one specific vertical, um, are you going to target to be like the, um, the Chanel of Cantonese restaurant or the Zara of or Uniqlo of, of Cantonese restaurant, right? So a different pricing will ma- match to different, um, markets, different ICPS as well. So pick a really, really, really small niche that you cannot further segment it to start with. Um, that's-

    5. MMMarina Mogilko34:23

       Wow, that's, that's a good one. Yeah.

    6. YZYoung Zhao34:25

       Yeah.

    7. MMMarina Mogilko34:25

       Mm.

    8. YZYoung Zhao34:26

       You have to ruthlessly, um, segment your niche.

    9. MMMarina Mogilko34:28

       Yeah.

    10. YZYoung Zhao34:28

        The second thing is, ideally pick something that's boring. Because the non-boring, the cool ones, are definitely 10x or even a more 100x more competitive. You probably don't want to work in those areas. That's why I mentioned earlier that the passion for building, the passion for problem-solving, is more important, because your passion for a specific business is most likely not a viable business, right? So you need to have a passion to build something for a boring industry, but you solve a really big problem. And furthermore, ideally, there are a lot of existing services. I think we are actually, you know, changing from... We're redefining the term SaaS, and previously it was, like, software as a service. Nowadays, it's becoming service as a software. So in that specific market niche, boring market niche, are there existing services, um, done by, like, agencies, um, by freelancers, um, or some internal tools, or some hacky solutions, imperfect hacky solutions? Um, that is your opportunity to tackle. Um, so go through some boring test, go through some niche test, and go through some service test. Um, so these are the my first principles to find a new business in 2026.

    11. MMMarina Mogilko35:48

        That's great. That's great. That's amazing.

23. 35:50 – 38:48

    Final Advice: One Principle Every Founder Should Learn in Their 20s

    1. MMMarina Mogilko35:50

       Okay, and for young viewers who are watching, what is one principle that you wish you understood when you were 20 that would save you years?

    2. YZYoung Zhao36:00

       Damn. [chuckles]

    3. MMMarina Mogilko36:01

       It's like me talking to your internal- [chuckles]

    4. YZYoung Zhao36:04

       Yeah

    5. MMMarina Mogilko36:04

       ... Gemini ChatGPT. [chuckles]

    6. YZYoung Zhao36:06

       I really wish I can travel back to my 20s, but, um, I think the first principle is to be as disciplined as possible. Um, I've been following, um, Cristiano Ronaldo and LeBron James for two decades. They are at their 40s, and they're still one of the best players in their fields. The, the reasons are they are super disciplined in their early 20s. Uh, you can't change your behavior when you are over 30 or 40. It's, it's just, well, impossible. Um, but if you are, like, in your early 20s or even younger, um-... make sure that you use time effectively. Make sure you can plan things accordingly. Make sure you push yourself to your, to your boundary. Make sure you are okay with, you know, suffers, um, you can recover fast. Uh, make sure you have clear mission and you are well aligned with your mission, you work toward the mission every day. I think, you know, I can list a few different behaviors, but the key principle is to be super disciplined if you want to be a successful founder, uh, later on. And also, be disciplined to your own health, right? Like, how many hours you should log to sleep, um, what you should eat or not, um, what kind of exercise you should do, you should do every day. Like, I start- I, I, I saw many people started to develop these, um, patterns, these behaviors, in their 30s, but not in their early 20s.

    7. MMMarina Mogilko37:37

       It's hard-

    8. YZYoung Zhao37:38

       Yeah

    9. MMMarina Mogilko37:38

       ... in your 30s. I love that, and also that brings you to say no to different things, and it's also a great skill.

    10. YZYoung Zhao37:45

        Yeah. Yeah.

    11. MMMarina Mogilko37:46

        Yeah, this is something I've been hearing a lot when I'm talking to people who are building something amazing. Like, yeah, discipline.

    12. YZYoung Zhao37:53

        Yeah.

    13. MMMarina Mogilko37:53

        Um, I think Priscilla Chan just shared that she only has work and family. Parties don't exist in her life.

    14. YZYoung Zhao38:00

        Not exist anymore, right.

    15. MMMarina Mogilko38:01

        Yeah, and this is what you hear a lot from successful people here in the US, they work like crazy.

    16. YZYoung Zhao38:06

        Yeah.

    17. MMMarina Mogilko38:06

        I'm, I'm trying to learn. Like, I think I'm disciplined, but, like, that level of discipline, oh, my God. [laughs]

    18. YZYoung Zhao38:12

        Yeah, exactly. Because with a super high level of discipline, you can, just like Elon Musk said, right, you can segment your, your time into f- you know, mm, buckets of five minutes. You can easily... You can easily get super focused and also switch contexts to focus on something else. That is the ultimate result of discipline. I saw many people, like, find really hard to switch contexts to focus for a longer time. That is because you are lacking the discipline from day one.

    19. MMMarina Mogilko38:42

        This is something I'll be teaching my kids. [laughs] Thank you so much, Young, it was amazing.

    20. YZYoung Zhao38:47

        Thank you. Thank you for having me.

Episode duration: 38:48