The Million Dollar AI Lesson I Learned From Dan Martell

Going into 2026, the biggest AI opportunity is owned by the people who are actually showing up and putting AI to work in their business. Last week I got five lessons on exactly how to do that from my coach Dan Martell. I'm going to share each one, why it matters, and exactly what to do about it so you can use AI to create your best year ever.

Quick context. I'm part of Dan Martell's Elite Coaching Program. We get weekly calls, and occasionally you get the chance to ask Dan a question. Going in, I decided I was going to ask a window question instead of a mirror question.

A mirror question is one where you bake in the answer you want. You are really just looking for validation. A window question is one where you leverage the coach's expertise and perspective to show you what you are not seeing on your own. That distinction alone is worth millions.

So I walked Dan through what I have going on. AI keynotes. Team workshops. Just launched my product high service, The Unlimited Method, inside my group program. Then I asked, "Based on what you are seeing in the market plus my positioning, any thoughts on what I am not seeing right now?"

We ended up talking for five minutes, and five gold nuggets came out of it. Here they are, and here is how each one applies to you.

Why are so few businesses actually using AI in 2026?

Very few businesses are using AI right now, and that is a massive opportunity, not a problem. No matter where you are with ChatGPT or AI integration, you are not late. You are early.

If you feel like you are behind, I want to throw a little ding ding ding at you. You are not late. The people who are all in on AI make a lot of noise because we are seeing a lot of growth with AI. That visibility creates the illusion that everyone else is already way ahead of you. They are not.

I recently cold called a digital marketing agency in Sarasota and asked if they were using ChatGPT and AI in their work. They said no. Then they pushed me away and told me to talk to them in a month. A digital marketing agency. The gap between what leaders in your industry are doing with AI and what most companies are actually doing is wider than most people assume.

So here is the reframe. Stop thinking "I don't want to get left behind" or "I'm just scratching the surface." Start thinking like a leader in the AI era. This has nothing to do with tech skills or loving AI. This is about taking ownership of your path and leading. Let's not over-dramatize what it takes to actually succeed with AI. This is growth mindset 101.

Same opportunity, three years running. About to be for the next decade too. The only question is how many times you need to hear this before it becomes a priority in your business and in your life.

What to do this week: Stop measuring yourself from the gap between where you are and the top of the market. Measure from where you were six months ago to where you are right now. That is the gain, and that is the signal you need to keep going.

Is training teams on AI really a $100 billion opportunity?

Yes. Dan Martell called it out directly. Training teams on AI is a $100 billion market. The more important lesson for every business owner is that using AI to think and dream bigger is the real capacity play.

This one lit me up like a Christmas tree. The biggest opportunity in any emerging market is always at the beginning. Take the gold rush analogy. I don't want to be the one digging for gold. I want to sell everybody the shovels so they can go dig. That is where the compounding happens.

Here is how this applies to you on a practical level, even if you never train a single team on AI. The biggest skill you can develop right now is your ability to think and dream big. Capacity. In 2025 the word I told my clients more than any other word was capacity, because I wanted them to grow the size of what they believe is possible. AI can help fill in the execution gap on any vision you can name. If you want to go deeper on this, I wrote about the capacity problem nobody is naming in AI.

I like to say it this way. ChatGPT can help you write an email or build you a rocket ship to the moon. Which level do you want to play at? I want to play at the big level. I hope you do too.

What to do this week: Write down a vision that feels a size too big for you right now. Then ask ChatGPT to help you map the first three moves to get there. You will be surprised how much capacity was already inside of you.

How should you market your business in the AI era?

Teach what you are already doing with the people who are already paying you. Like attracts like, so when your marketing reflects the work you are actually doing with clients, you attract more people like those clients.

This is marketing 101, and it also happens to be the most authentic thing you can do. If in your marketing you are sharing the things you are doing with your clients, you are way more likely to attract more clients just like them. The language matches. The problem matches. The solution matches.

A principle I teach in The Unlimited Method is that everything you need is already inside of you. This is a cousin of that. You do not need to invent new content or chase new positioning. The content is already in the conversations you are having with clients every single day. I go deeper on how to operationalize this in how to turn everything you do into client IP.

I am living this as I write. I sent the lesson from Dan Martell out as my Monday newsletter. I recorded it as a podcast episode. I am turning it into this blog post. One conversation, three distribution channels, all tied to the work I am actually doing with paying clients.

On the authenticity side of this, there is also a trust play. In the AI market, everyone is wondering, is this just another guru slinging prompts who has not done the work? Show your receipts. Show the actual work. It is hard to create a podcast about a conversation with Dan Martell if you never had one.

What to do this week: Look at your last five client conversations. What words did they use? What problems did they describe? What questions did they ask? Take that language and put it into your next email, post, or piece of content. Match what they are saying to what you are saying.

Why does consistency beat polish when you are growing with AI?

You do not have to be fancy, you just have to be consistent. Process over polish. Stacking ones over zeros is the fix for feeling behind in the AI era.

One of the things limiting people in the AI era is self-limiting beliefs. I don't have an AI background. I don't have a tech background. I'm overwhelmed. I don't have enough time. Look at all those tools. I feel so far behind.

If you are a reader, you have read Benjamin Hardy and Dan Sullivan's book The Gap and The Gain. The gap is what you feel when you compare yourself to the vision of what you see at the top of the market. The gain is what you feel when you measure where you started to where you are right now. Most people measure from the gap. They feel bad. They stop.

Stacking ones over zeros is the fix. One post. One email. One AI experiment. One conversation. Over and over. When you focus on consistency, you are in action more. When you are in action more, you grow. The same preparation mindset that wins with AI is just this simple rhythm applied every day.

If I was back in the day teaching somebody how to launch a podcast, I would give them one rule. Process over polish. So many people love the idea of being a perfectionist. It makes me want to puke. Shift to work next. Ship the one. Stack another one. Let the compound interest do what it does.

What to do this week: Pick one AI use case. One. Use it every day for seven days. Do not optimize it, do not polish it, do not wait until it is perfect. Stack seven ones. Then come back and look at what happened.

Why is authenticity your unfair advantage in the AI era?

Authenticity is the one thing ChatGPT cannot replicate. Every time you share a story only you could tell, you create value no AI content farm can copy.

Everybody is about to outsource everything to AI and the robots. Jump on LinkedIn right now and it feels almost like politics. You have the camp that loves and uses AI. You have the camp that says "I can tell you wrote that with ChatGPT, I can see your em dashes, I can see the formatting." It is polarizing.

The deeper problem is that people are outsourcing their authenticity because they think they can do it faster, cheaper, and easier, and still get the same results. They will not. The thing that actually connects, converts, and compounds is the stuff ChatGPT cannot make up. This is one of the foundations inside the undeniable way to win in the AI era.

I saw a story today about marketing agencies starting to hire people who were writing professionally before ChatGPT existed. Kids coming out of college right now barely know how to write without it. I am lucky. I came up in a writing background. I ran a sports blog for a decade. My dreams were always on the other side of being a creator, which meant podcasting, video, live streaming, speaking from stage, and writing. So for me, authenticity is not something I have to fake.

Here is the opportunity for you. ChatGPT cannot share a story from your bachelor or bachelorette party. It cannot share the feeling you had at your kid's first birthday. It cannot share the moment a client hit a huge milestone because of something you built together. That is where your unfair advantage lives.

What to do this week: In your next piece of content, tell one true story only you could tell. Not a polished version of your bio. A real moment. Watch what happens to how people respond.

Where do you start with AI in 2026?

Pick the lesson that landed hardest and take one action on it this week. Do not try to implement all five. Stack one over zero and let that momentum pull the rest forward.

Let's wrap a bow on this. Dan Martell is operating at the top of the food chain running an AI venture studio, so when he names what he is seeing in the market, it is worth listening to. Put all five of these in the blender:

• Few businesses are actually using AI, which means the opportunity is still massive
• Training teams on AI is a $100 billion market, and the deeper play is using AI to dream at a level you could not before
• Teach what you are already doing with paying clients and let authenticity do the marketing work
• Process over polish, stack ones over zeros, let consistency compound
• Authenticity is the asset nobody can take from you, so put it into everything you create

My encouragement for you. I am not romantic about AI. I do not have an AI background. I do not have a tech background. I do not particularly care about AI in a nerdy way even though I'm all in on it, speaking from stage and leading teams and entrepreneurs. I care about what AI can do for your vision. It accelerates you toward who you want to become and what you want to build. That is the whole game. If you want to see what that looks like at an elite level, read what separates high performers who use AI from everyone else.

Which of these five landed the hardest for you? Take one action on it this week. That is where you start.

---

Ready to Go From AI Curious to AI Dangerous?

The Unlimited Method is my productized AI roadmap that takes you from dabbling with ChatGPT to building with it like a leader in the AI era. It is the same framework I use with my coaching clients, and the same one I am living as I build everything in this post. If you want to be in the top 1% of AI users, check it out at RobCressy.com/the-unlimited-method.

This post is adapted from Episode 686 of The Undeniable Leader podcast. Listen to the full episode here.