Hi everyone! Thanks for your patience as I've been MIA for the last month+. Some of you may know, I had surgery and I've been recovering. Thanks to everyone who has provided me positive thoughts and well wishes! They've all made me want to get back on my feet ASAP. Now that I had some time off, I've been able to both physically and mentally heal. It's brought clarity into the direction I want to take Studio Spark next. The biggest change - Studio Spark's new mission is to teach 10,000 small businesses how to master AI Strategy. This goal of mine has been shaped by a lot of things: 1. A lot of clients I've been working with have noted a TON of AI tool overwhelm 2. A lot of clients also don't actually need highly-optimized, expensive automations that do everything everywhere all at once. They just need a simple agent that takes some load off their plate. 3. A lot of mom-and-pop places seem to be getting ignored. So, my goal is to do a lot more tailored education on the AI that actually gives them some real ROI. What this means - 1. We’re relocating our community home. Skool’s been great for testing ideas, but at $99/mo it’s not exactly friendly to the mom-and-pop shops we’re trying to serve. Substack is free, lets us post lessons, run discussions, and deliver everything straight to your inbox—no paywall, no extra log-ins. Win-win for everyone’s budget. 2. Expect a few emails as we make the move. I’ll migrate the best Skool threads, share fresh AI-Strategy walkthroughs, and send simple “click-here-to-join” links. You might see three-or-four messages over the next week; after that, it smooths out to our regular cadence. If something feels spammy, hit reply and let me know. Feedback keeps me honest. 3. Same mission, clearer focus. Everything I publish will answer one question: “How can a small business owner get real ROI from AI without drowning in tools or hype?” Think bite-sized playbooks, case studies, and live AMAs. The goal remains teaching 10,000 businesses (first 1,000 in the next 12 months) the exact strategies larger firms pay big bucks for.

Sorry everyone. Canclelling today’s coffee chat. In the hospital and I’ll be good in 2-3 days. . Looking forward to talking with everyone again soon!

The AI-Avatar Experiment (and Exit): Last week I went full-Frankenstein: - Filmed a two-minute, well-lit 1080p clip for HeyGen’s avatar generator. Their tutorial promised a lifelike talking head if I didn’t move and stared down the lens – so I did exactly that. - Cloned my voice in ElevenLabs. I fed it ten minutes of raw narration; credits drained fast but we built up 200,000 credits since I forgot to cancel my subscription. - Merged the pieces in CapCut. HeyGen spits out an MP4; I layered B-roll, captions, and hooks there (no watermark once I paid their $30 Creator tier). - Posted 2 avatar TikToks. The views, likes, and watch-time matched my face-to-camera clips one-for-one. Why I pulled the plug: Even with decent metrics, the whole thing felt like sending a mannequin to a coffee chat. The work I do hinges on trust; a synthetic Andy undercuts that. Lesson learned: speed matters, but showing up as myself matters more. Here's the link to the avatar - what do you think? TikTok HeyGen AI Avatar Week 2 Videos Now Live in Skool Week 2 was messy, caffeinated, and wildly productive. If you’d rather watch than read, every daily build session is waiting for you in the Skool classroom. Here’s the short tour: - Core-Offer Page Built: I ditched sales calls and spun up a pay-then-book funnel with Typeform → Calendly → Stripe. Visitors see the price first, pay, then grab a slot—no tire-kicker chats required. - Email Nurture Designed: Sketched a five-day “give, give, ask” sequence that nudges new subscribers back into the community and hands out quick-win prompts and automations. - Content Audit: My top-performing TikToks share one concrete tactic in under 40 seconds. Fluffless demos win attention; the avatar test confirmed message > messenger. - Lead Capture Automation: Wired Leadpages to Airtable so every opt-in gets a thank-you email instantly. - Avatar Workflow (and goodbye): Documented the HeyGen + ElevenLabs setup and why I ultimately went back to my front-facing camera.

Week 1 went really well! We accomplished: - Creating the actual 4 Day Founder Framework - Strategizing my version for my business - Creating the top end of the sales funnel - Creating the content strategy and making a ton of batch content for TikTok - Creating and publishing the first newsletter! All Raw and Unedited. Watch me succeed or fail at rebuilding my business. Check it out in the Builder's Vault under Classroom here: https://www.skool.com/studiospark/classroom/55cf5aae?md=f252074be19c40049263135f536b0804