Chances are, you’ve got skills, ideas, and even ambition around artificial intelligence (AI). But somewhere between your vision and your bank account, you’re drowning in productivity hacks, tip-toeing through tech stacks, and Googling “how to make money with AI” like it’s 2023.
Well, the problem is that you’ve been taught to hustle, not leverage. But now, you stand to change your life when you know how to play the AI game right.
Why AI is the ultimate money multiplier
In short, AI increases your output across every part of your workflow. One prompt can write a sales page, generate platform-ready content, and automate the follow-up process.
Vishen, the founder and CEO of Mindvalley, would know. “We were struggling for a year to build the right quiz for our funnel,” he opens up in Amplify with AI, a new program available on Mindvalley. “ChatGPT analyzed our website and built the perfect one in minutes.”
Researchers have been on the trail of this shift. A study published by Beijing Jiaotong University’s School of Economics and Management showed that every 1% increase in AI adoption drove a 14.2% rise in productivity.
And where productivity reigns, abundance comes in. Just ask Vishen.
“When we launched [AI Mastery] in August 2023, it rapidly became the best-selling program in the 20-year history of Mindvalley,” he shares. “It blew us away because of how powerful AI is at saving time.”
He’s spot on. With every hour it frees and every task it scales, AI can expand your capacity to earn, build, and create at a level most people are still underestimating.
Global markets aren’t underestimating this evolution. According to a PwC report, AI is expected to contribute $15.7 trillion to the world economy by 2030, with a whopping $6.6 trillion to come from productivity gains. This estimation alone makes it one of the largest commercial opportunities in human history.
So, the case for financial incentives that come with AI mastery is obvious. The tools are here, the leverage is real… and the only variable left is how you use it.
How to make money with AI in 2025: 5 ideas to try
Learning how to learn AI is one thing. Turning that knowledge into income is another.
And there’s no better time to do so than now. For one, the creator economy is expected to boom to $848 billion by 2032, with much of that surge driven by AI-powered tools and virtual creators.
So, if you’re curious to hop on the bandwagon and explore ways to build income with AI this year, dip your toes in any of these five unique business ideas:
1. A custom GPT that solves a niche problem
Here’s the thing: people will pay to save time.
This is where a custom GPT (a.k.a., your own AI assistant fine-tuned on specific content or context) comes in. With the expert knowledge or niche insights it’s trained on, you’d end up providing a valuable solution that solves multiple problems for your clients, fast.
Just like Vishen and his team did. “It used to take us eight hours to do one of these sales presentations, webinars, scripting,” he reveals in Amplify with AI. “Now it’s 30 minutes… And with every event, it gets smarter and smarter.”
The lesson from this? You don’t need to sell your own product to do this. Instead, pick a niche, and feed the GPT with public content, like frequently asked questions (FAQs), expert blogs, and case studies. This way, you train it to answer real questions or deliver outputs that people actually need.
Once your service is proven useful, charge for access, sell outputs, or license the bot. That’s how you turn code into one of the best passive income ideas to exist.
2. AI-powered content services
AI is changing how creative work gets done, without changing what makes it valuable.
According to Vishen, writers, designers, and marketers are using tools like ChatGPT, Midjourney, and ElevenLabs to triple their output and cut production time in half. They’re turning outlines into full content suites, client briefs into campaigns, and voice notes into polished marketing assets.
All in a day’s work, you can say.
On top of that, according to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), using AI tools like ChatGPT has been shown to boost productivity by 40% and improve output quality by 18% for knowledge workers everywhere.
What’s even more awesome? You don’t even need polished prompts to kickstart this streak.
“AI has become so good already that in most cases,” says Vykintas Glodenis, an applied AI and no-code expert and the chief AI transformation officer at Mindvalley. “Just this messy stream of thoughts describing your context… will be enough to deliver great-quality results.”
So, if you’re already offering creative services, let AI turn them into scalable systems that take care of the repetitive stuff, so you stay in your zone of genius.
3. Digital products
Solopreneurship is on the rise this decade. A 2024 study, for instance, found that 94% of new businesses in Europe, for instance, launched as solo ventures, and most of those founders stayed solo for at least five years.
And the fastest-growing solopreneurs aren’t scaling teams. They’re scaling their income streams… through templates, micro-courses, or GPT-powered learning tools.
If you’ve solved a problem people keep fumbling (like pricing, client comms, workflow setup), you can turn it into a digital product in a weekend flat using AI.
Besides custom GPTs, here are other ideas to get you started:
- Productivity planner tools,
- How-to guides in PDF format,
- Simple email templates,
- Mini video lessons, and
- Printable checklists.
Then plug any of them into a Notion dashboard, a Gumroad landing page, or a newsletter flow. This makes it easy for your audience to find, buy, and use.
And just like that, your product becomes a living system that works in the background while you build what’s next. What’s more, you only have to do something once to sell it forever… and join the rising league of solopreneurs making passive income with AI.
4. AI integration-as-a-service
Right now, nearly 76% of small businesses are exploring ways to integrate AI. But most don’t know where to begin, or who to trust with the setup.
Well… here’s where you can come in. Business owners don’t want another tool. They want results: less manual work, faster output, cleaner workflows.
You can deliver that through done-for-you “AI for business” systems. Think:
- Automating client intake forms,
- Setting up follow-up email triggers, or
- Building lead tracking flows or inventory updates.
All done using no-code tools, from ChatGPT to automation platforms like Zapier or Make. With them, you can package a system, install it, train the team, and offer optional monthly support. That’s a high-ticket, B2B-ready offer, priced anywhere from, say, $500 to $2,500 per client.
Now, while digital products sell in volume, this model thrives on value per engagement. One setup, one transformation, and, best of all, recurring revenue if you position your product right.
5. A lean AI studio solving problems at breakneck speed
It’s now possible to run lean and solve fast, so long as you build smart. And that starts with AI agents.
“An AI agent is not just a tool,” says Mehreen Omer, an AI-first product marketing manager at Mindvalley. “It’s your silent co-founder. You don’t use it; you collaborate with it.”
These agents can handle workflows while you sleep. Think automated research, follow-ups, personalization, and insight generation running quietly behind the scenes.
Because ultimately, momentum is the name of the game. “You don’t need to code,” she adds. “You just need imagination. And you need to ship fast.”
This ethos aligns with how Vykintas operates, too. As he shares in Amplify with AI, the goal isn’t to build massive systems. “Think in terms of one three-step workflow you’re doing on a daily basis.”
Once you spot a bottleneck, name it, automate a workflow around it, then stack the solutions. This way, you get to sharpen the solution, week by week.
“If you improve your work just by 3% weekly,” Vykintas adds, “you’ll be 4.5x more productive by year’s end.”
Your step-by-step launch plan
Knowing how to learn AI is a game-changer, but it’s not the endgame. The ultimate goal here is to turn that knowledge into income.
Thankfully, it’s never been easier to do so. We’re in a no-code AI era valued at $3.8 billion in 2024 that’s expected to grow nearly 30% through 2033. And this means you don’t always need a tech team or deep coding skills to build something useful. But what you do is a clear process that helps you move from idea to output in the nick of time.
So, here are four steps that thousands are already using to build income, momentum, and leverage with AI:
1. Get started with a solid AI course
Courses work when they walk you through actual builds, not just dish out surface-level hacks.
Thankfully, Mindvalley’s ecosystem gives you three clear ways to sharpen your skills and start using AI with intent:
- Amplify with AI. This 21-day program teaches you how to solve real problems using ChatGPT, Midjourney, Suno, and Make. You’ll build assistants, automate tasks, and apply what you learn directly to your business or career.
- AI Mastery. This premium path takes you further down the AI metaverse. You’ll train AI assistants, set up custom workflows, and apply automation across strategy, content, and team operations without needing to write code.
- 3 Days to Mastering ChatGPT. Led by Andri Peetso, the co-founder of Conturata-AI and Whomesome, this course on all the ways AI helps with productivity. It’s perfect for anyone who wants to stop “winging it” at ChatGPT and start specializing in it.
As a Mindvalley member, you can access all three programs on the Mindvalley app.
2. Stack up the right tools
You don’t need a bloated tech stack to run fast. A small handful that work in your favor is enough. What’s important is that you stick to them.
“You want to build a relationship with your stack the way a coder builds muscle memory with their keyboard,” explains Vykintas.
The best creators and operators stack their go-to tools like Lego blocks. They build workflows that scale their output, not their stress.
- ChatGPT: Your creative brain that gets you to generate ideas, write drafts, plan workflows, and solve problems.
- Zapier: The behind-the-scenes connector. Automate busywork between apps like email, forms, spreadsheets, and calendars.
- Notion AI: Think of this tool as your control tower. Organize tasks, capture insights, and track everything in one place.
- Make (formerly Integromat): For more complex flows. Helps you build logic-based automations across your whole system.
- Suno: Generate custom music or sound. Great for content creators, podcasters, or vibe-driven brands.
- Midjourney: Turn text prompts into scroll-stopping visuals. Want to learn how to make money with AI art? This is where digital prints, brand kits, and custom commissions start.
Of course, your roster of tools is only as good as the workflows you’ve established. So start simple: map one repeatable task, automate the inputs, and document how your system performs.
Eventually, your AI stack will handle the grunt work without glitches, freeing you up to focus on what grows your income in your AI entrepreneurship.
You want to build a relationship with your stack the way a coder builds muscle memory with their keyboard.
— Vykintas Glodenis, chief AI transformation officer at Mindvalley
3. Join an AI-embracing community
AI moves fast, and trying to keep up alone slows you down.
The people making the biggest leaps know this, which is why they’re not learning in silos. Instead, they associate themselves with communities that build, ship, and turn ideas into actions through feedback.
And it goes a long way. A 2025 review of AI-powered learning environments found that people learn better when they’re part of shared, collaborative systems. This means the impact of AI tools stretches further than private docs and individual prompts to peer-to-peer insights.
So, you can be a solopreneur and still build alongside others. Community, after all, gives you a sounding board, a support system, and a steady stream of insights that sharpen your work.
When you surround yourself with people who are experimenting and sharing just like you, your momentum and drive just multiply from here.
4. Build in public
Visibility is leverage. When you show what you’re building to the world, even before it’s perfect, you open the door to trust, traction, and many more opportunities.
Here’s your cue to not be afraid of talking about your process. Share your workflow breakdowns and AI experiences on LinkedIn or wherever your target audiences hang out.
Ultimately, this is the fastest way to discover if your business works or not, and what and where to improve.
“You will understand how to improve your work when you can look at it from the outside,” shares Vykintas. “It doesn’t happen while it’s in your head. It happens the moment you try to explain it to someone.”
5 common challenges of making money with AI and how to overcome them
Every life-optimizing tool comes with a tradeoff, and AI is no exception. The speed, ease, and scale it offers can also backfire, especially if you rush past the details.
Here are the most common pitfalls people face when mastering how to make money with AI, along with some tips for nipping them in the bud.
1. Overreliance and under-checking
AI can get you results faster than ever. But relying on it blindly can make you slower in ways that matter.
Let’s say you ask ChatGPT to write your sales pitch. It spits out something slick, you hit send, and move on. But what if the tone’s off? What if the facts are skewed? What if it misses what makes your offer unique?
Here, you stop thinking critically because the output “sounds right”, and that’s a trap. Turns out, research on AI assistants found that it’s far too easy to trust the tech’s output without verifying.
Over time, this can dull the decision-making and critical thinking skills you’re supposed to sharpen with AI in the first place.
What you can do:
- Use AI as your second brain, not your first instinct.
- Always check every piece of content for nuance, accuracy, and relevance.
- Be prepared to rewrite anything that’s off-tangent with clarity and intent.
Remember, AI is supposed to speed you up, not replace your point of view altogether.
2. Low margins
AI can save time. But when everyone’s using the same tools, the market quickly gets crowded.
Take GPT-generated content. Thousands of people are building digital products, selling templates, or launching AI-powered services that all start to feel… the same.
When sameness sets in, prices drop. That’s when profit margins shrink, and standout value disappears.
It’s a trend every builder should be tracking, since AI commoditization has been underway in creative and service-based markets since 2021. Tools like ChatGPT, DALL·E, and Midjourney lower the barrier to entry, but they also blur differentiation if you’re not careful.
As these tools become more standardized, creative markets tend to shift toward cost competition instead of innovation.
What you can do:
- Specialize in a niche that solves urgent or costly business problems.
- Add human layers—stories, strategy, personal context—AI can’t fake.
- Train a custom GPT with your frameworks, use cases, or industry data.
The thing is, margins follow depth. “Everyone is playing with the same tools,” Vykintas points out. “The only way to differentiate is how you use them, and what real-world insight you add.”
So when you go deeper than the surface prompts, people pay more to work with you.
3. Legal risks
AI lets you scale with speed, but unfortunately, its path is not always legally sound.
In 2023, Getty Images sued Stability AI for scraping its content without permission to train generative models. Meanwhile, Disney and Universal filed a lawsuit against Midjourney for using their characters to generate lookalike images without a license.
Both cases make one thing clear: if you’re remixing copyrighted content, training on unapproved data, or selling AI-generated assets without checking your sources, you’re playing with fire. And the legal world is catching up fast.
What you can do:
- Use data, images, and content you own or that you have the rights to.
- Don’t plug sensitive or client-specific info into public AI tools.
- Keep a simple log of where your inputs came from (just in case).
- Choose tools that spell out their privacy and usage terms.
A little diligence upfront saves you the cost, credibility, and chaos of a takedown later. Build like everyone’s reading the fine print because soon, they will be.
4. Ethics
Using AI to write testimonials, tweak bios, or simulate voices might sound like clever hacks. But they can quickly cross the line into manipulation.
In a world where brands are increasingly using AI to stretch the truth in marketing and personal branding, trust is your biggest asset. Because the thing about fake reviews, polished bios, or testimonials written by bots? Once audiences sense something’s off, they lose trust in them and completely tune out.
As Vishen establishes in Amplify with AI: ”Trust is everything now.”
What you can do:
- Be upfront when any piece of displayed information is AI-assisted or co-created.
- Skip the fake proof and fake tricks. Instead, build trust through real-life accounts.
- Before posting any AI-assisted content, ask: “Would I be proud to explain how I made this?”
Rather than trying to sound flawless, build your craft around truth.
5. Privacy
As AI tools help you do more, they secretly collect more data from you than you realize. And as of now, 40% of users don’t even know they’re sharing private data with models that do not guarantee secure handling.
Free platforms, especially, tend to log everything you feed them. That means when you paste in a contract, a pitch deck, or a personal note, you might be giving more than you’re getting.
So, being privacy-conscious is key in the age of normalized AI income frameworks.
What you can do:
- Stick to tools with clear data and privacy policies.
- Use private mode or encrypted platforms for sensitive content.
- Never input client info, financials, or anything legally binding into public models.
- When in doubt, anonymize or keep it offline.
There’s no issue with moving fast; just don’t move blind. Your data trail tells a story, so make sure it’s one you control.
When in doubt? “Treat [the AI space] like a public forum,” says Vykintas. “Because it is.”
4 ways Mindvalley students made money with AI
From startup founders in China to solopreneurs in Mexico City, a new class of creators is using AI insights they learned on Mindvalley to transform their purpose into profit.
Here’s how they turned those into money-making machines, with this radical tech as the engine:
1. From vision paralysis to brand clarity
Ryan Craven, a project manager, didn’t start with dreams of scaling a business. He just wanted to help his partner bring her dream brand to life.
And for years, they both sat on the idea. But AI took them out of the years-long rut. What felt overwhelming now feels achievable.
Through the program, we’ve started turning her vision into something tangible—developing a clear brand, creating authentic audio, crafting content strategies, and automating workflows.
— Ryan Craven, Mindvalley member
Step by step, they’re able to turn “a ‘someday’ idea” into today’s work.
2. When burnout turns into breakthrough
On the outside, Fernanda Barcenas was running a successful one-woman business. But the reality no one could see? She was struggling with long days, bloated workflows, and endless to-do lists.
But then, things took an upturn the day she discovered ChatGPT. Within weeks, she’d optimized 60% of her operations, fired her accountant, and cut her workday in half.
For the first time, I could see myself as a solopreneur. I had time to dream again—and space to act on it.
— Fernanda Barcenas, Mindvalley member
The clarity she gained from her dalliance with AI paid off. She eventually landed two major pharmaceutical clients and began teaching other businesses how to integrate AI with trust, empathy, and results.
3. The agentic move redefining entrepreneurship
Once upon a time in Singapore, Nikki Taylor, a marketing executive, had just been laid off. She had no backup plan, no team to turn to or bring with her… but plenty of angst and fire.
Instead of backing down in defeat, she decided to launch a solo consultancy overnight. Her source of inspiration? The tips and tricks she learned in Mindvalley’s AI Mastery program to build a full-stack marketing team out of thin air.
Yep, this woman was mastering how to make money with AI agents. All it took was a combination of smart tools, smart prompts, and sharper focus.
What would’ve taken weeks, or a full team, was suddenly manageable.
— Nikki Taylor, Mindvalley member
That solo hustle landed her a leadership role at a high-growth startup. And when the CEO raised concerns about her flying solo? She got to say, “I already automated the team.”
She now spends her time strategizing full-time, while her AI agents run everything else.
4. Breaking the daily grind with automation
In Hangzhou, Justin Ong was doing what many founders do: holding the business together with sheer willpower. Every day was a loop of firefighting tasks, managing operations, and racing deadlines.
But the bigger vision? It kept getting sidelined.
That changed when Justin reframed how he saw his role. With what he learned through Mindvalley, he built smarter workflows, made better decisions faster, and structured his business for real growth. Today, he runs above the business, instead of running it.
I leaned into AI to take myself out of the bottleneck. And that’s when everything shifted.
— Justin Ong, Mindvalley member
Awaken your unstoppable
You’ve seen the strategies, heard the stories, and you now know that the work doesn’t stop at learning AI. Mastered right, it can help you reshape how you earn, build, and live.
The next move from here? Start doing.
Amplify with AI on Mindvalley can get you building right away. You’ll train GPTs, design automations, and build real tools that solve real problems.
And if you’re still unsure? The first lesson’s free, so you can try it for yourself before deciding to commit.
The program’s your portal to:
- Crafting automations that save days of work
- Building with tools like ChatGPT, Suno, and Midjourney—without code.
- Discovering exactly how AI can sharpen your edge in work and life.
As Vishen says in the program, “We’re not just learning AI. We’re building with it. And this is just the beginning.”
You know you’ve got the fire. Now, it’s time to take the step and build your next chapter with leverage that’s nothing like what history has ever seen before.
Welcome in.
