#853 AI Is Useful. Now What?
Tropical MBA: Entrepreneurship & Founder Lifestyle
Dan Andrews; Ian Schoen
4.9 • 527 Ratings
🗓️ 9 April 2026
⏱️ 29 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Dan and Ian break down the real use cases they’re seeing inside DC companies right now — not theory, not hype, but the actual workflows founders are using to make and save money.
They cover:
● The difference between sidecar AI, AI-first companies, and AI-native businesses
● Real-time dashboards, CRM systems, financial intelligence, and onboarding workflows
● Why founders can suddenly revisit old projects, landing pages, pricing, and customer journeys
● The biggest question every founder needs to answer in 2026: what are we actually going to do with this thing?
Tropical MBA is a podcast for entrepreneurs building location-independent businesses.
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Links:
How A.I. Helped One Man (and His Brother) Build a $1.8 Billion Company
Hang out exclusively with 7+ figure founders in DC BLACK
Our sponsor, Bento - Email marketing for bootstrapped founders
CHAPTERS
(00:00:00) “Every Business Needs an AI Implementation”
(00:05:23) Why “Sidecar AI” Is No Longer Enough
(00:08:00) What an AI-First Business Actually Looks Like
(00:10:49) The Future: AI-Native Companies
(00:12:58) Real-Time Dashboards, Reports, and Scoreboards
(00:15:36) CRM, Campaigns, and Customer Data
(00:18:32) Why Financial Intelligence Matters More Than Ever
(00:21:44) Building Landing Pages Without Developers
“These are revenue experiments, growth experiments.”
(00:24:23) The First Workflows Founders Should Rebuild
CONNECT:
Dan@tropicalmba.com
Ian@tropicalmba.com
Past guests on TMBA include Cal Newport, David Heinemeier Hannson, Seth Godin, Ricardo Semler, Noah Kagan, Rob Walling, Jay Clouse, Einar Vollset, Sam Dogan, Gino Wickam, James Clear, Jodie Cook, Mark Webster, Steph Smith, Taylor Pearson, Justin Tan, Matt Gartland, Ayman Al-Abdullah, Lucy Bella.
PLAYLIST:
The $10K Projects You Never Do (AI Just Changed That)
How to Build a 6-Figure Digital Business with Claude Code
We Got Claude-Pilled
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | every business in the world needs an AI implementation right now. |
| 0:06.0 | The door started slamming shut on it around the turn of the year. |
| 0:10.2 | You're simply asking the AI how much they're using the AI and you know the answer right away. |
| 0:16.0 | Perhaps AI native companies sell to other AIs. |
| 0:20.9 | It just feels like that switched to like 20% setting the table and 80% executing. |
| 0:43.8 | Today's episode is brought to you by Bento, the email marketing platform for bootstrappers and marketers that are serious about integrating AI and their marketing efforts. |
| 0:48.4 | To learn more, head on over to bentonow.com slash TMBA. |
| 0:54.0 | All right, happy Thursday morning, everybody. |
| 0:55.7 | Welcome back to the podcast. |
| 0:56.9 | Welcome back to the podcast, Ian. |
| 0:58.1 | How are you done? |
| 0:58.7 | Yo, what's up? |
| 1:00.4 | All right. |
| 1:01.1 | Holiday weekend. |
| 1:02.6 | And we're back. |
| 1:04.3 | Refreshed. |
| 1:05.3 | Somehow the kids are still off school, though. |
| 1:07.0 | That's what I don't understand about this whole thing. |
| 1:09.2 | But good for them. |
| 1:11.5 | Four day weekend. |
| 1:14.5 | Today we are talking about, we all agree that AI is useful, but the question for today's |
| 1:19.0 | episode is what are we actually doing with it? |
... |
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