Building AI into your software (without the hype)

We’re building a multi-million dollar education business with just two and a half people—powered by AI and automation. I break down the real principles, code, and prompts that let us scale fast without adding headcount.

Follow me:
Twitter:   / aarondfrancis  
LinkedIn:   / aarondfrancis  
Website: https://aaronfrancis.com - find articles, podcasts, courses, and more.

Our education products:
High Performance SQLite: https://highperformancesqlite.com
Mastering Postgres: https://masteringpostgres.com
High Leverage Rails: https://highleveragerails.com
Screencasting: https://screencasting.com

Chapters:
00:00 - Using AI to scale a traditional business
00:36 - Overview of our education products
01:11 - Where AI fits into our workflow
02:00 - Let computers do what computers are good at
03:13 - Principles for working with AI
03:57 - How we transcode and deliver video
04:59 - Using AI to write deterministic scripts
06:04 - Leveraging domain knowledge with AI
06:32 - Breaking down the publish workflow
07:00 - Automating transcription and captions
08:59 - Creating markdown transcripts from captions
10:08 - Building a modular, fault-tolerant system
11:59 - Syncing Cloudflare R2 with our database
13:37 - Handling transcription with 11Labs
16:01 - Generating VTT caption files
18:46 - Creating markdown transcripts with OpenAI
21:08 - Generating descriptions and snippets automatically
23:20 - Why small discrete steps matter
24:50 - Key principles for scaling with AI and programming
26:34 - Final thoughts on scaling without scaling headcount