Happy Thanksgiving ! This email sat in my outbox, and I forgot to hit send before the Canadian Thanksgiving break - whoops! Anyway, I’ve been deep in the AI trenches, and here’s what’s happening in todays issue:

• AI in SaaS: What’s really happening in saas rn

• Vertical LLMs: Touted as the next big opportunity. Get firsthand insights, experience, and tips

• LLMs can’t reason! Apple’s latest research sparks debate

• Ecommerce Battle: YouTube vs TikTok Shop in a new showdown in SE Asia

• Interesting Linkage: From marine conservation to AI sidekicks for kids, and much much more

Thanks for being here. Let’s go!

Featured

🔸 How to Approach AI inside your SaaS Startup

If building saas, or building an automation/ai agency, this is for you…

Here are my takeaways:

• Expectations are sky high. The big tech giants are operating lean (super fit), efficient, and backed by smart leadership driving advancements in AI. While it's much tougher to break in now, opportunities still exist. The key is to start small—focus on one product, make it successful, then expand to a second and third. Essentially, you need to deliver much more value to customers with fewer resources… Provide more value, and charge less for it.

• If you want a glimpse of the future, look at the top leaders in customer support (especially product companies) and take their product tours. This is where the rest of the industry will be in 12-24 months. (Sales, marketing, design, etc)

• Customer Support Products today are completely different from what they were 18-24 months ago. Assume today’s product is already obsolete. For example, a basic help desk solution from 24 months ago is unsellable and unacceptable today.

• If you have a product with $5-10M ARR or more, start working on a second product immediately. Find a way to make it happen.

🔸 Why Vertical LLM Agents Are The New $1 Billion SaaS Opportunities

It’s time to go beyond a simple GPT wrapper. If you're building AI SaaS, agents, or B2B2C AI, check out the video and note from Peter below

Peter Liu shared this insight on X yesterday, and it's worth your attention. It aligns with the theme discussed in the Vertical LLM Agents video.

Key takeaways: focus on creating unique experiences to your ideal customer (in your niche), not just another chat box, leverage your own data and research, onboarding should be near instant (or done for them), and remember…it’s still early.

🔸 LLMs can't reason, According to a Recent Paper by an Apple Research Scientist

Sharing the good and the potential bad. Who knows where we're headed, but this paper has been making the rounds today. The key takeaway is that all models rely on pattern matching rather than true reasoning, which could spark some controversy. The report includes evidence that challenges the major LLMs. I've attached a few screenshots highlighting the inconsistencies.

My 35 60 Day Sprint

🔸 Week 05 and 06 Updates

Much customer development and throwing away code. Much learning.

I'm making solid progress on my goal of experimenting with code co-pilots and have advanced on all builds. I'll share a more detailed update, along with a video, in the next issue.

Office Hours - Let’s Connect

Looking to collab, co-market, or want to explore funding opportunities for something I'm working on? I’m currently taking on new clients and special projects. Whether you’re looking for a collaborator, need a hand on a specific task, or are interested in supporting a unique idea, let’s chat! Hit reply or schedule a time.

Ecommerce

🔸 YouTube is Fighting Back

YouTube is stepping up its competition with TikTok Shop by launching two key partnerships: one with Shopify for North America and another with Shopee in Southeast Asia (Indonesia to start). Both of them appear to lean into affiliate marketing, which makes me question the future of online retailers (those that resell multiple brands).

Other

🔸 Interesting Links

• Canada has designated the country’s largest marine protected zone off the coast of Vancouver, as it moves to shield a 1/3rd of its oceans by the end of the decade. It’s a huge move! [Link]

• The fans are lit. This just popped up on my feed, and I might be late to the disc golf pro scene, but I had no idea how much I needed this in my life. [Link]

• Visual stories like comics, but with voices and sound effects. Imagine taking a book, your blog post, or essay and auto generating a story. [Link]

• For better or worse, Genie, a conversational AI sidekick for kids, has early traction. “Create adventurous stories, play games, and chat with your AI friend”. [Link]

• AI personal shopper for interior design [Link]

• swsh - a photo sharing social network with polls and games just launched an AI filter to remove alcohol and red cups from photos. [Link]

• Have dinner with strangers. [Link]

• How bots, mercenaries, and table scalpers have turned the restaurant reservation system inside out. [Link]

• Kelly Slater, the GOAT of surfing, retired earlier this year at the age of 52! His mother always said “If you ever get cocky, I’ll beat your ass”. Watch the recap of his legendary 40-year career. [Link]

Qs or Quotes Bouncing in My Brain

Personal Camera Roll

Wrap Up

Happy building season. Bye for now

Kenny

P.S. Whenever you're ready, there are 2 ways I can help you:

1. Ready to grow your startup from 0 to 1 in less time? Let's chat. >> Schedule a call with me.

2. Want an extra pair of eyes on your product or pitch deck?

Newsletter Vibecheck

How'd I do? Slam dunk or airball? Lmk your thoughts on this issue so I can level up future content.

About

Hi there! I help B2B2C startups go from 0 to 1 with resources, consulting, advisory, and writing, spanning product, marketing, team formation, frontier technology, and the good life. Prev helped 50+ startups and launched 20+ digital products. Although my perspective is universal, I mainly cover the frontier of North America and Southeast Asia.

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