I Built a $1M AI App [No Code]
Starter Story
Feb 11, 2024
This is the breakdown of how David Bressler went from working a full-time job to building an AI app valued at over $1M in just over 1 year.
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This
is
David
he
built
an
AI
app
that
is
now
valued
at
over
a
million
dollars
And
the
crazy
part
is
he
built
it
all
with
no
code
He
invited
us
into
his
house
to
show
us
exactly
how
he
built
this
thing
with
a
family
a
full
time
job
and
just
working
a
couple
hours
a
day
It
really
took
me
just
a
couple
weeks
Came
down
to
learning
all
of
his
content
mostly
through
YouTube
David
launched
his
product
using
a
viral
marketing
strategy
that
got
him
thousands
of
users
in
just
a
few
days
But
what
goes
up
must
come
down
I
blew
through
like
5
000
in
days
I
had
a
decision
to
make
right
It's
either
shut
it
down
or
keep
going
In
this
video
he
breaks
down
how
he
bounced
back
how
he
made
his
first
dollar
and
how
he
plans
to
build
a
business
that
won't
be
replaced
by
ChatGPT
My
vision
moving
forward
is
to
build
something
that
cannot
be
replicated
both
in
ChatGPT
as
well
as
by
yourself
This
is
the
breakdown
on
how
a
normal
guy
turned
one
idea
into
a
million
dollar
business
on
just
a
few
hours
a
day
I'm
Pat
Walls
and
this
is
Starter
Story
David
thanks
for
having
me
Thanks
for
coming
on
over
I
love
your
story
Tell
me
a
little
about
who
you
are
and
what
you
built
Sure
Dave
Bressler
built
what
was
called
XL4RealBot
Now
it's
just
called
4RealBot
Microsoft
gave
me
a
cease
and
desist
a
few
months
ago
or
so
a
software
that
really
helps
people
work
faster
and
smarter
with
data
There's
really
three
main
products
AI
and
spreadsheets
where
it's
kind
of
like
ChatGPT
inside
both
Excel
and
Google
Sheets
Formula
generators
that
translates
text
into
formulas
with
the
help
of
AI
And
then
the
last
product
where
a
lot
of
my
time
and
resources
have
gone
into
is
called
the
Data
Analyzer
where
it's
kind
of
like
Zapier
You
can
upload
your
data
and
then
through
natural
language
get
answers
analysis
charts
modeling
all
done
by
just
typing
in
some
words
The
application
has
been
around
for
about
a
year
and
a
half
And
during
that
time
there's
now
roughly
about
750
000
users
And
of
those
750
000
there's
about
5
000
people
that
pay
for
unlimited
access
to
the
tool
And
during
that
time
it's
reached
about
26
000
a
monthly
recurring
As
I
understand
you
started
FormulaBot
while
you
had
a
full
time
job
Tell
me
a
little
bit
more
about
that
story
It
was
July
of
2022
I
had
this
opportunity
And
the
opportunity
was
my
youngest
one
was
about
to
be
born
And
so
I
knew
I
was
going
to
have
about
six
weeks
to
do
something
And
I've
been
working
a
full
time
job
since
I
graduated
college
2011
And
I've
always
kind
of
had
that
entrepreneurial
net
Basically
I
said
OK
I've
got
six
weeks
Let's
build
something
People
always
say
scratch
your
own
itch
right
Solve
Solve
your
own
problem
And
my
problem
was
I
was
getting
so
bogged
down
with
all
of
these
junior
adults
They'd
come
knocking
on
my
office
door
like
hey
can
you
help
me
with
this
formula
Can
you
help
me
with
that
I
kind
of
thought
OK
my
itch
is
helping
people
with
Excel
While
ChatGPT
wasn't
around
then
the
actual
technology
was
I
actually
asked
the
OpenAI
application
I
said
hey
I'm
thinking
about
building
this
app
What's
a
good
name
for
it
One
of
the
names
it
suggested
was
Excel
Formula
Bot
The
thing
you
do
of
course
is
you
go
to
GoDaddy
It
was
available
And
then
I
was
like
let
me
just
see
if
someone's
built
this
yet
And
I
scoured
the
internet
for
hours
Couldn't
find
it
I'm
like
this
is
it
I'm
on
to
something
special
It
was
tough
trying
to
find
that
balance
between
personal
life
I
can't
help
but
to
a
certain
extent
stay
on
the
grid
for
my
full
time
job
especially
in
the
senior
position
that
I
was
in
So
while
it
wasn't
working
I
still
had
access
to
my
phone
People
were
still
asking
me
questions
here
and
there
But
then
in
the
back
of
my
mind
I'm
like
I've
got
this
idea
that
I
have
to
execute
on
I
tried
to
spend
as
much
time
with
the
family
especially
early
on
But
I
couldn't
help
but
find
myself
kind
of
stepping
away
for
a
little
bit
Go
to
coffee
shops
wherever
it
might
be
and
just
kind
of
put
my
head
down
and
execute
And
there
were
definitely
a
lot
of
nights
where
I
only
got
a
couple
hours
of
sleep
My
wife
at
that
time
thought
I
was
crazy
especially
because
I
didn't
really
have
a
clear
path
I
just
knew
I
wanted
to
build
this
thing
So
from
what
I
understand
you
have
no
experience
coding
How
did
you
build
and
launch
something
like
this
I'm
not
a
coder
by
any
means
If
I
see
it
I
kind
of
know
okay
that's
JavaScript
that's
HTML
And
I
knew
for
what
I
wanted
to
build
as
an
MVP
it
would
take
a
pretty
significant
time
to
build
it
with
code
And
I
at
that
time
wasn't
making
any
money
I
didn't
want
to
hire
anyone
because
I
just
had
an
idea
And
so
that's
where
I
was
really
exposed
to
the
no
code
industry
I
was
exposed
to
Bubble
io
That
was
really
the
only
application
that
I
really
dove
into
to
build
because
it
was
the
most
well
known
And
based
on
the
research
that
I
had
done
the
easiest
of
all
the
no
code
solutions
The
first
place
I
went
was
the
Bubble
official
website
for
just
kind
of
reading
some
documentation
But
there's
so
much
documentation
out
there
which
is
a
good
thing
Kind
of
where
I
got
hung
up
was
very
isolated
issues
that
I
was
trying
to
solve
But
that's
really
where
YouTube
University
came
in
There
are
some
awesome
Bubble
developers
out
there
that
produce
such
high
quality
content
on
YouTube
and
it's
all
free
At
that
time
the
whole
app
was
in
Bubble
It
was
100
no
code
Probably
up
until
maybe
four
or
five
months
ago
it
went
from
100
no
code
to
now
it's
about
I
would
say
like
5
or
As
you
get
more
experience
with
no
code
you
start
to
understand
some
of
the
limitations
There's
not
a
lot
but
there
are
some
limitations
David
is
the
perfect
example
of
how
someone
with
zero
experience
turned
one
idea
into
hundreds
of
thousands
of
dollars
But
that
comes
with
knowing
the
right
information
and
finding
the
right
problems
to
solve
Now
imagine
there's
a
place
that
gave
you
all
this
The
problems
to
solve
the
blueprints
to
solve
them
and
the
strategies
that
turn
simple
ideas
into
million
dollar
businesses
Well
at
Starter
Story
we
have
a
library
of
over
4
000
case
studies
and
business
idea
breakdowns
where
you
can
access
this
all
backed
by
data
from
real
entrepreneurs
So
if
you're
serious
about
building
a
profitable
side
project
and
joining
a
tight
knit
community
of
founders
head
to
the
first
link
in
the
description
and
we're
going
to
give
you
52
micro
SaaS
ideas
just
like
David's
so
you
can
get
started
on
your
journey
Much
love
Enjoy
the
rest
of
the
video
Peace
All
right
so
you
have
this
MVP
that
you
built
from
scratch
How
do
you
get
your
first
customer
and
how
do
you
get
a
ton
of
people
to
use
it
The
first
people
I
told
were
the
people
that
were
at
my
full
time
job
at
that
time
and
they're
like
oh
my
god
this
is
amazing
They
thought
it
took
me
months
to
build
this
thing
Really
it
took
me
just
a
couple
weeks
and
that
really
kind
of
speaks
to
the
power
of
no
code
because
if
you
were
to
code
it
it
didn't
take
much
longer
And
so
my
next
step
was
I
need
to
tell
more
people
about
this
tool
And
so
naturally
the
next
place
I
went
was
Reddit
Went
to
the
Excel
subreddit
where
there's
probably
several
hundred
people
that
follow
it
Reddit
title
was
AI
Excel
Formula
Generator
I
think
I
mentioned
it
was
free
And
it
was
just
a
title
and
the
description
was
just
a
link
Minutes
later
it
was
like
the
top
post
of
the
day
turned
into
the
top
post
of
the
week
It
blew
up
as
much
as
like
something
can
blow
up
within
the
Excel
community
A
couple
of
days
after
that
someone
in
the
comment
section
said
you
should
post
this
on
the
Internet
is
beautiful
subreddit
And
so
I
posted
it
there
That
was
like
the
thing
that
put
the
app
over
the
edge
and
made
it
go
viral
for
months
And
so
I
posted
it
there
It
got
some
10
000
upvotes
thousands
of
comments
I
got
thousands
and
thousands
of
people
visiting
the
site
using
the
app
All
right
so
you
have
thousands
of
users
How
do
you
start
making
actual
money
from
this
The
next
thing
I
did
was
I
went
to
the
OpenAI
website
Went
to
the
billing
section
I
was
just
like
oh
God
I
blew
through
like
5
000
in
OpenAI
API
costs
in
days
I
had
a
decision
to
make
right
It's
either
shut
it
down
or
keep
going
And
so
I
accrued
this
huge
bill
over
that
time
I
recouped
some
of
it
back
I
put
up
a
link
like
a
Stripe
link
where
it's
just
like
hey
my
name's
David
I
built
this
app
It
went
viral
Give
me
a
deal
Feel
free
to
donate
So
I
made
a
few
thousand
dollars
back
I
was
super
scrappy
of
like
trying
to
make
something
back
at
that
time
It
was
pretty
poetic
especially
probably
at
its
peak
of
virality
The
host
from
the
eSports
ESPN
Excel
competition
I
didn't
say
it
correctly
but
something
like
that
It's
basically
like
extreme
sports
but
it's
for
Excel
The
host
reached
out
to
me
and
said
hey
we
have
our
competition
on
ESPN
in
a
couple
of
weeks
Can
we
run
a
beta
ad
I'm
like
sure
I'm
like
and
at
that
time
I
was
like
maybe
that's
how
I'm
before
I
even
thought
about
subscriptions
I'm
like
maybe
that's
how
I
could
make
money
at
least
in
the
interim
is
just
running
ads
So
I
ran
some
Google
ads
made
a
few
bucks
here
and
there
It
just
it
definitely
wasn't
worth
the
hassle
hassle
But
I
ran
an
ad
for
ESPN
for
like
a
week
and
it
drove
a
ton
of
clicks
And
it
was
actually
pretty
funny
because
the
guy
asked
me
to
design
the
creative
I'm
like
look
dude
like
you've
seen
the
website
especially
at
that
time
it
was
a
single
page
piece
of
crap
It
wasn't
creative
at
all
but
I
mocked
something
up
for
him
He
said
OK
works
for
me
And
so
some
of
the
donations
that
came
in
a
couple
of
sponsorships
gave
me
the
motivation
to
kind
of
keep
going
and
not
just
completely
shut
this
thing
down
And
so
then
a
few
months
later
launched
with
a
paywall
logins
and
the
whole
nine
yards
Let's
talk
about
product
talking
to
customers
How
have
you
figured
out
what
features
to
build
Early
on
just
kind
of
scratched
my
own
itch
and
what
would
bring
me
value
And
what
started
off
as
just
an
Excel
formula
generator
turned
into
different
generators
I
was
really
just
the
first
product
It
was
actually
interesting
because
at
that
time
my
site
was
blowing
up
and
I
took
a
few
phone
calls
with
VCs
They
would
ask
me
you
know
what's
your
vision
What's
your
broader
vision
And
I
would
just
say
more
generators
And
they're
like
OK
I
never
got
called
back
I
didn't
have
a
broader
vision
That's
where
I
started
talking
to
people
that
I
work
with
who
it's
required
to
work
with
data
and
spreadsheets
started
asking
them
and
see
what
they
liked
what
they
didn't
like
But
occasionally
and
this
is
where
I
think
I
would
get
the
most
value
talking
with
customers
A
lot
of
them
email
me
basic
Excel
questions
that
couldn't
necessarily
be
answered
through
an
Excel
formula
generator
They
would
literally
email
me
their
Excel
files
They're
like
hey
your
Excel
formula
generator
couldn't
do
this
Can
you
help
me
with
this
And
it
wasn't
even
to
like
build
a
formula
It
was
to
like
build
a
report
where
I
have
no
domain
knowledge
of
what
they're
trying
to
accomplish
I
would
probably
get
one
email
a
week
of
someone
just
sending
me
a
file
And
so
I
thought
OK
you
know
what
Even
if
they're
not
a
paying
customer
I'm
going
to
take
this
But
guess
what
I'm
going
to
do
it
with
you
on
a
phone
call
and
I'll
do
your
work
for
you
But
every
time
I
do
it
they
have
to
hop
on
a
call
with
me
and
they
have
to
ask
questions
about
what
they
like
and
what
they
don't
like
about
the
product
as
well
as
some
ideas
that
they
have
And
so
the
culmination
of
kind
of
scratching
my
own
itch
leaning
on
my
network
and
having
these
kind
of
impromptu
phone
calls
kind
of
revolutionized
the
product
away
from
just
being
an
Excel
formula
generator
to
just
kind
of
being
this
all
in
platform
for
anything
that
you
do
with
data
analytics
Building
a
SaaS
product
software
product
there's
probably
going
to
be
a
lot
of
competitors
coming
in
Tell
me
about
how
that
works
for
you
Took
me
a
few
weeks
to
build
this
app
And
a
few
weeks
after
that
I
think
there
was
probably
10
other
Excel
formula
generator
sites
And
the
frustrating
part
was
they
all
sounded
the
same
right
At
that
time
Excel
Formula
Bot
Excel
Formula
Generator
and
another
one
was
called
Excel
Formulator
They
all
sounded
the
same
And
when
you'd
go
to
Google
and
you'd
search
mine
you'd
see
the
other
couple
ones
right
there
So
at
that
point
it
was
really
a
race
to
the
bottom
And
my
prices
especially
early
on
it
was
3
I
was
getting
pretty
frustrated
Just
all
of
the
competition
that
was
coming
in
and
literally
like
carbon
copying
my
exact
application
not
only
like
what
it
does
but
also
the
front
end
the
name
And
then
I
just
kind
of
reached
a
point
where
I
knew
I
was
going
to
have
to
build
something
that
isn't
just
this
simple
input
output
box
A
few
months
later
Excel
Formula
Bot
was
gaining
more
and
more
popularity
Microsoft
actually
reached
out
to
me
They
reached
out
to
me
twice
One
for
a
system
business
And
the
other
one
it
was
someone
that
was
on
their
add
ons
team
Excel
has
thousands
and
thousands
of
partners
that
they
work
with
To
build
an
add
on
that
supplements
what
you
can
do
with
Excel
They
reached
out
to
me
and
said
Hey
we
want
to
take
your
Excel
Formula
Bot
and
add
it
within
our
add
on
store
Let
us
build
it
for
you
I
was
like
sure
How
much
does
it
cost
They're
like
we'll
do
it
for
free
I'm
like
this
is
awesome
And
then
as
they
were
building
it
I
was
like
wait
a
second
They're
just
going
to
hijack
this
idea
and
build
it
as
one
of
the
many
features
in
their
suite
A
couple
of
weeks
after
that
they
had
announced
their
partnership
with
OpenAI
Everyone's
so
excited
for
AI
being
integrated
in
the
office
suite
And
I'm
like
I
am
so
bruised
And
so
that's
where
it
kind
of
went
back
to
me
being
my
own
competition
Where
I
had
to
really
take
a
step
back
and
think
through
what
is
this
product
going
to
be
Once
Microsoft
embeds
this
product
within
their
suite
I've
even
talked
about
ChatGPT
ChatGPT
especially
at
this
time
as
well
it
was
free
And
it
still
is
free
for
unlimited
usage
At
that
time
you
had
to
pay
2
99
Now
you
got
to
pay
9
It's
got
to
work
its
way
up
2
99
to
6
99
to
9
And
you
have
to
pay
for
unlimited
usage
whereas
ChatGPT
has
always
been
free
And
so
I
have
about
5
churn
10
of
the
reason
as
to
why
people
churn
is
because
of
ChatGPT
And
so
early
on
before
a
lot
of
the
newer
products
especially
the
data
analyzer
where
you
can
upload
your
data
and
talk
with
it
The
competitive
advantage
I
had
over
ChatGPT
was
really
convenience
Generate
formulas
within
Excel
You
don't
have
to
leave
your
spreadsheets
You
don't
have
to
open
up
your
browser
You
don't
have
to
open
up
ChatGPT
and
write
this
long
prompt
You
can
do
it
all
there
Convenience
and
customization
When
you
sign
up
you
can
put
in
your
language
your
speaking
language
You
can
put
in
your
language
for
what
you
prefer
for
Excel
because
there's
a
lot
of
people
out
there
that
speak
in
Spanish
but
they
prefer
the
Spanish
version
of
Excel
and
then
also
vice
versa
Again
Excel
is
used
by
a
billion
people
in
the
world
Excel
Formula
Bot
is
used
by
every
single
country
in
thousands
of
languages
So
early
on
it
really
was
convenience
and
customization
but
that
can
only
take
you
so
far
And
so
more
so
recently
with
the
addition
of
the
new
features
and
new
products
it's
moved
from
that
to
you
can
no
longer
do
that
in
ChatGPT
And
eventually
when
Microsoft
really
just
this
past
week
built
AI
into
their
own
tool
right
now
my
vision
moving
forward
is
to
build
something
that
cannot
be
replicated
both
in
ChatGPT
as
well
as
Microsoft
Hey
Pat
from
Starter
Story
here
Thank
you
guys
so
much
for
watching
I
really
hope
David's
story
inspires
and
motivates
some
of
you
to
get
started
on
your
own
thing
If
you're
curious
about
doing
something
similar
but
you're
still
looking
for
an
idea
well
right
now
you
can
download
our
Deep
Dive
SaaS
report
for
free
It
breaks
down
52
different
micro
SaaS
ideas
and
tons
of
other
stuff
you'd
want
to
know
Just
click
the
first
link
in
the
description
And
if
you're
serious
about
building
it
then
consider
joining
Starter
Story
and
we'll
help
you
do
that
Much
love
and
I'll
see
you
guys
in
the
next
one
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