From Zero to $28,697 in 6 Weeks (With Just One Hour Per Day)

September 2025.

I had a problem.

Actually, I had the same problem twice.

April: I walked away from a multiple 7-figure company. CEO role. 30+ person team. The works.

Because I was trapped.

Revenue looked great on paper.

But I was drowning in complexity. Managing people. Stuck in meetings. Building systems to manage systems.

The opposite of freedom.

So I left…

Started building AwesomeCRM.com.

September: I was doing it again.

Building a team. Adding complexity. Managing people. Slipping back into the exact same trap that made me walk away in the first place.

(Seriously. Twice. What's that saying about doing the same thing and expecting different results!?)

That's when I made a decision.

Go all-in on my personal brand.

Build it as a solo operation. Zero employees. Just me and AI.

Prove the thesis: One person + AI + systems = million-dollar business.

Problem was, I only had one hour per day to work on it.

Still managing the SaaS company. Still dealing with all that complexity.

One hour per day to build a brand from scratch.

Building offers. Training AI specialists. Running experiments. Creating content.

All of it.

Most people would say that's impossible.

Turns out, it's not.

Six weeks later: $28,697.60.

From a 418-person email list.

Zero ads. Zero team. Zero "content calendar."

Just a system.

Here's exactly how I did it.

Here's what one hour per day forces you to do:

Get ruthlessly efficient.

(Or fail.)

No time for "content calendars" or "engagement strategies" or any of that stuff.

No time to spend 3 hours designing a graphic in Canva.

No time to write and rewrite and polish a post for 90 minutes.

One hour. That's it.

So I had to build a system.

Not a "workflow." A system.

Something that could take me from idea to published content in 15 minutes or less.

That meant AI had to do the heavy lifting.

But here's the thing...

I'd already spent over $20,000 on AI tools over the previous 2 years.

My monthly subscription costs were over $1,200.

And most of it wasn't working the way I needed it to.

Generic ChatGPT prompts gave me generic content.

AI-generated graphics looked like everyone else's.

Nothing sounded like me.

Yeah, I wasted twenty grand like a complete idiot chasing shiny objects.

Every new AI tool that launched, I bought it. Tested it. Subscribed to it.

Most of it ended up being noise.

So I started experimenting.

Not with more tools, but with a different approach.

October 21, 2025.

I'm sitting on my couch. Talking into my phone. Creating a post about building a solo business.

My AI specialist is writing it as I speak.

I hit publish.

And then I wait.

Because honestly, I had no idea if this would work.

I'd been training these AI specialists for weeks. Feeding them my voice. My stories. My frameworks.

But this was the first real test.

First post goes live.

Within an hour: 20 comments.

By end of day: Over 60 comments.

In 3 days, 93 comments, requesting my strategy.

Holy sh!t.

It actually worked.

That post was created using what I now call AI Specialists.

Not generic "ChatGPT."

Not out-of-the-box "Claude."

Specialists.

Trained on my voice. My stories. My frameworks. My brand.

Here's the difference:

AI Tool: You paste a prompt. You get generic output. You edit for 90 minutes to make it sound human.

AI Specialist: You talk to it like a team member. It knows your voice. It creates content that sounds like you. You "smack it around" for 5 minutes. Done.

That's the breakthrough.

And once I figured that out, everything changed.

Let me show you what I'm talking about.

A few weeks ago, I created a Facebook post. On vacation. By talking into my phone.

My AI specialist wrote it as I spoke.

When I was done, I handed it to my graphic design specialist. Told it to read the post and create an on-brand image to go with it.

Two minutes later: Scroll-stopping graphic that looked like my brand. Not generic AI art. My actual aesthetic.

10 minutes total. Done.

That's one specialist.

Here are the others I use daily:

Content Specialist. I told it: "Write a post about expensive prisons in my voice." Five minutes later, I had a draft that sounded like me. Not "generic thought leader voice." My actual voice. The way I talk. The rhythm of my sentences. The stories I tell.

Graphics Specialist. I told it: "Create an image for my post about expensive prisons." Two minutes later: On-brand visual. Scroll-stopping. Professional. Something I used to pay a designer $200 for.

Video Specialist. Creates videos for my courses. Soon for social media and YouTube. Videos so good my mom can't tell they're not me. (Seriously, this tech is improving by the day.)

App Builder Specialist. Live, during a recent event I did a demo. I told it: "Build me an event session timer I can use for the attendees and speakers." 3 minutes later: Working web app, published and live, with different colors/themes that can be used for any virtual event.

Offer Specialist. I told it: "Take this idea and turn it into a complete offer." It drafted the positioning. The promise. The deliverables. The pricing structure. Then another specialist wrote the long-form sales copy. Then my email specialist created entire sequences. Then another specialist built the complete sales letter with my brand design.

Idea to launch in half a day.

Ad Creation Specialist. Takes my sales letter and creates dozens of ads in my brand. Uses a library of 200+ proven hooks I've gathered over the years. Something I used to pay a media buyer thousands for.

All of this used to require a team of 30+ people.

Today it's just me.

When I resigned as CEO early last year, I committed to building a million-dollar brand as a solo creator.

Zero employees.

Just me and my AI specialists.

So far it's working.

Here's what I built over those 6 weeks.

This is the part everyone wants to skip.

Don't.

I tried skipping it. Three times. Got generic content every time.

Finally did the work. Everything changed.

The Story File (45 minutes, one time):

Raw brain dump into AI.

Your stories. Your frameworks. Your voice patterns. How you structure arguments. The rhythm of your sentences.

This teaches AI to sound like you, not like "content creator voice."

I covered this in detail a few weeks ago. If you missed it, go read it.

The Brand DNA (60 minutes, one time):

What you stand for. Your positioning.

What you stand against. Your guardrails.

Your core frameworks. How you solve problems.

Your audience. Who you serve. Who you don't.

Formatted so AI can use it.

The AI Specialist Training (30 minutes, one time):

This is where you train each specialist.

Content Specialist learns your voice.

Graphics Specialist learns your brand aesthetic.

Platform Specialists learn how to adapt for each channel.

You do this once. Then you have a team.

A team that costs 10% of what a real team would cost.

Once the foundation is built, here's the daily system:

Minutes 1-5: Brainstorm, hook, outline, draft.

Usually while making coffee.

Just talk. Don't write.

Your Content Specialist captures it in your voice.

Minutes 6-10: Platform adaptation

AI creates versions for Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, X, Threads.

Same core idea, optimized for each platform.

Not copy-paste. Actual adaptation.

Minutes 11-13: "Smack it around" editing

Make it less cavalier.

Swap in better stories.

Cut the overpromising.

(AI loves to overhype. Had to slap that out of it.)

Minutes 14-15: Graphics + Audit

Graphics Specialist creates on-brand visual.

Run the 90-second audit. Deposit Test. Friend Test. Voice Test.

(Covered this in previously. If you missed it, go back and read it.)

Publish or delete. No middle ground.

15 minutes. One core idea. 3-5 platform-specific posts. Done.

Remember, I was spending $1,200/month on AI subscriptions.

Wasting most of it.

Now I'm canceling or downgrading almost all of them.

Because I figured out how to do 90%+ of what I need with just a couple of platforms.

That's 10% of the cost.

Same output. Better results.

Marketing team: Replaced.

Tech team: Replaced.

Operations team: Replaced.

Design team: Replaced.

Copywriting team: Replaced.

All replaced with AI Specialists that cost a fraction of what those teams would cost.

And work faster.

And don't need management.

And don't create complexity.

October 21: First post.

November: System refinement. First sales.

December: 6 weeks. $28,697.60.

Here’s proof.

From a 418-person email list.

Zero ads.

Zero team.

Just me and my AI Specialists.

Here are the metrics that actually matter:

Conversion rate: 4x higher than paid ads.

Lifetime value: 8-9x higher than paid leads.

Time investment: 15 minutes per day. Sometimes less.

Cost: 10% of what I was paying before.

2026 is the year AI replaces entire teams.

Not might.

Will.

Someone using AI properly will outproduce you 10x.

Maybe 20x.

And they'll do it in half the time. Or less. Much less.

I don't care how you feel about AI.

I don't care if you think it's overhyped or whatever.

The math is simple.

The skill that matters in 2026 isn't coding. Or design. Or even copywriting.

It's directing AI specialists.

Being the director of a team that 10x's your output.

That's the game now.

By December 2026, there will be two types of solopreneurs:

Type 1: Still spending 10+ hours per week creating content. Still getting mediocre results. Still "trying to figure it out." Still debating whether AI is "good" or "ethical" or whatever.

Type 2: Using this system. 15 minutes per day. Converting at 4x the rate. Building six-figure solo businesses. Directing AI specialists while everyone else is still trying to "do it all themselves."

The tools are the same.

The system is different.

And the gap is about to get massive.

Here's the reality...

It was never possible before for a solopreneur to build a million-dollar company without specialized skills.

But today you can simply be the director of a team of specialists that 10x your output.

Or more.

You don't need to be a designer. A copywriter. A developer. A video editor.

You just need to know how to direct your AI team.

If you're not learning this skill right now, you're going to get left behind.

Not by other people.

By people who figured out how to leverage AI while you were still debating whether it's worth it.

After that first post on October 21st, I created a free lead magnet.

The first version of the Magnetic Brand System.

People loved it.

But over the last few months, I've added serious meat on the bone.

Tested everything. Refined the system. Documented every step.

(After spending $20K+ learning what doesn't work, I figured out what does.)

Now I'm launching the comprehensive paid version.

The complete system:

The 45-minute Story File process. The Brand DNA extraction. The AI Specialist training. The 15-minute content workflow. The graphics generation system. The 90-second audit checklist. The platform adaptation templates. The complete prompt library.

Every specialist I've trained. Every system I've built.

This is the exact system that generated $28,697 in 6 weeks.

With one hour per day.

While managing a SaaS company.

Monday, January 13th, 2026.

12PM Eastern.

$27 for the first 100 people.

After that, the price goes up.

Here's why it's $27 for the first 100...

Because I want implementers, not course collectors.

People who see $27 and think "that's a no-brainer" and then actually do the work.

That's my filter.

And here's why the price goes up after...

Because I'm building a case study.

I want 100 people to implement this and get results.

Then I'll have 100 proof points that this works for more than just me.

The first 100 get the early-bird price for being fast.

After that, it goes to full price.

This is your 2026 playbook.

The exact system that generated $28,697 in 6 weeks. Replaced a 30+ person team. Content creation in 15 minutes a day. 10% of what I was spending on AI tools.

A complete, implementable system.

If you want in, details coming Monday.

If not, no worries.

Until next time,

—Tim Erway

P.S. This is the first newsletter of 2026. You're at a decision point. You can spend this year the same way you spent last year. Or you can implement a system that actually works. Your call.

P.P.S. Fair warning: This requires work. About 3 hours of foundation work. Then 15 minutes per day. If you're looking for "push-button," this isn't it. If you're willing to do the foundation work once, then leverage it forever, this is your system.

P.P.P.S. I wasted $20K on AI tools that didn't work. You're getting the shortcut that does. Monday at noon.