hey Reader,
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I'm on holiday right now -

and one of my favorite things during time off is to step back, listen to podcasts, and think creatively about my business.

Today I listened to a recent Diary of a CEO episode and I believe its message is worth sharing with you all:

Small expertise businesses are having their moment.

Good news that made me happy. And not just for me. If you're on my list, I suppose you're either building one such business or considering it. (right? 🤓)

Here's what stood out from the conversation:

→ AI collapsed the cost of building software. What used to take 18 months and $500K can now be done in a week. SaaS is no longer reserved for the elite.

→ But the same access that creates the opportunity erodes its value. So please don't fall into the "make money now with AI through SaaS" talk.

→ The lifestyle business that offers freedom and is built with purpose around your expertise is now one of the most resilient models available.

→ What AI made more valuable: physical presence, real connection, lived experience. "An AI can explain menopause, but it can't describe its own experience of going through it."

→ "Personal playbooks" (your specific lived expertise) are the raw material for products and services. Combined with a defined, engaged audience (even a small one), that's what forms a powerful, profitable brand.

→ Relatable beats impressive. Content that builds a real relationship outperforms content that just informs.

→ Blue oceans used to last a decade. AI compresses that window to months. The time to establish yourself is now.

→ Some fields are being repriced fast: legal, copywriting, translation, financial planning, bookkeeping, graphic design. Legacy legal tech lost roughly 20% of its value in 2026 alone.

So if you're building an expertise business or seriously considering it: this is validation. And I wanted to encourage you.
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🍀 Still the best model on many levels. The least risky. The most fulfilling and purpose-driven, as long as you do your vision and offer work right.

The fields that need to adapt the most can still adapt, because the expertise-based model is flexible enough to shift fast.

But the simplistic answer of "add community, live events, and the human touch" needs more honesty than it's getting.

Running events and facilitating cohorts are different skills from building the product. If you don't know how to do them, they become their own bottleneck. And leaning into personal playbooks assumes a comfort with visibility that not every operator has.

The goal is a business that serves your life. If your "human layer" requires constant presence, you've rebuilt the cage.

The good news: there are ways to integrate the live piece, keep the freedom, and keep your business values aligned. Curated AI carrying the operational weight, so the human element has space. Designed for depth, not volume.

That's what I help clients build inside Quiet AI.

If you haven't been happy at work, or you know AI is repricing your field, and you have expertise others could benefit from:

start now.
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Start with vision. Then your offer. Build your audience. Use AI strategically to accelerate what you already know works.

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Rooting for you and what you're building,

Diana 🩵

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P.S. I started my own expertise business after a long break. If I'd done my vision work earlier, I would have come back to it sooner. It saves you more detours and traps than you'd expect.

Link to the episode- here.​