10 ways to make actual money with AI
Real offers people are charging for right now. What each one is, who buys it, and roughly what it goes for.
By Abi Odedeyi · CodeFreeIQ
Most "make money with AI" advice is either vague or a scam. This isn't. These are 10 offers real businesses are selling, grouped from easiest-to-start to highest-leverage. Prices are typical market ranges, not promises, what you charge depends on your niche, your proof, and your positioning. The ⭐ marks my top picks.
Sources: DigitalApplied 2026 (68%), Salesforce SMB Trends (91%), JP Morgan Chase Institute, Dec 2025 (17.7%).
The pattern is simple: everyone knows they should use AI, almost nobody knows how. If you can bridge that gap for a specific kind of business, that's the offer.
Start here: sell your time, smarter
AI training & workshops for teams
Run a half-day or full-day session teaching a business how to actually use AI in their work, not theory, hands-on with their real tasks. The demand is enormous because most teams "have ChatGPT" but nobody knows how to use it well. Lowest barrier to start: you need to know more than the room, which you likely do.
AI audit & roadmap
A paid diagnostic: you review how a business runs, find the highest-ROI places AI fits, and hand them a prioritised plan. Sells because owners are overwhelmed by options and want someone to tell them where to start. Often becomes the front door to a bigger build.
"Done-with-you" implementation
Sit alongside the client and build one working system together in a session, they leave with it running and know how to use it. Higher value than a workshop because they walk away with a real asset, not just knowledge. (This is exactly the model behind my Cowork Masterclass.)
See the other 7 (the higher-leverage ones)
The three above are the easy start. Offers 4 to 10, the ones that actually scale, plus the 3 to avoid, are just below. Pop your name and email in to unlock them.
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Build & sell: productise a system
AI lead-qualification agent (build & sell)
Build an AI agent that qualifies inbound leads, scores them against a client's ICP, and routes the good ones. Then sell it as a setup + monthly retainer. Service businesses pay well for this because a missed lead costs real money. Repeatable across clients once you've built it once.
AI customer-support agent (build & sell)
An AI that handles repetitive customer questions, books calls, and hands off to a human when it matters. Sell the build plus ongoing management. Every business with an inbox or DMs is a prospect, and it visibly saves them hours a week.
Done-for-you content systems
Set up a system that turns one idea into a week of platform-native content in the client's voice. Charge for the setup, then a monthly retainer to run it. Coaches and consultants who "know they should post" but never do will pay to make it just happen.
Outbound / lead-gen systems
Build a system that finds qualified prospects and sends personalised outreach that references a real signal, so it sounds human, not templated. Sell it as a managed service. This is the offer most agencies quietly run on, because it directly generates pipeline.
Leverage: sell it once, sell it many times
Sell a Claude skill or template pack
Package a workflow you've built, a proposal generator, an invoice tool, an onboarding system, as a one-off digital product. Low price, infinite copies, no delivery cost. Great for building an audience and an email list that later buys your higher-ticket work.
A self-paced course or masterclass
Record yourself building something valuable once, sell the replay forever. Teaching people to build AND sell AI systems is itself one of the most bought AI offers right now. Scales without your time.
Productised "agent-in-a-box" (retainer)
The endgame: turn your best build into a repeatable product you deploy for client after client on a monthly fee. You've done the hard thinking once; each new client is mostly configuration. This is where service revenue turns into something that compounds.
3 I'd avoid
Want the two I'd start with, built and ready to sell?
Offers 04 and 05, the lead-qualification and customer-support agents, are exactly what my Build & Sell courses walk you through, step by step.
See the Build & Sell courses →Or book a call and I'll help you pick the offer that fits your business.