Many founders give up on AI voice just before it starts to work.
Practical advice for AI voice and podcasting teams: focus on one thing, keep it simple, favour speed over perfection, measure everything and talk to users.
What I've Learned From 88 Companies
A few patterns in AI voice come up again and again.
The founders who handle AI voice well understand that simplicity beats complexity every time.
The Counterintuitive Truth
In AI voice, the best practitioners often do less, not more.
The lesson: simplicity beats complexity every time. It sounds simple. It's incredibly hard to execute.
Real Talk: What Actually Matters
Here is what actually matters in AI voice.
First, execution speed beats perfection. Every time. Companies rarely fail because they moved too fast on AI voice. Many fail because they moved too slowly.
Second, measure everything. If you can't measure it, you can't improve it. Set up tracking from day one, even if it's basic.
Third, talk to your users. It sounds obvious, but many founders make decisions about AI voice in a vacuum. Get out of the building. Talk to real people.
This connects to broader themes around AI voice cloning, AI podcasting, text-to-speech, conversational AI that I've been thinking about a lot lately.
What's Next
Best practice in AI voice is changing fast. What worked last year might not work next year. That's both the challenge and the opportunity.
My advice: stay curious, stay humble, and stay close to the people who are actually doing the work. Read less thought leadership and do more experiments. Talk to fewer consultants and more practitioners.
If you're building in this space, the best time to get AI voice right is before you need to. Don't wait for a crisis to force your hand.
I'll keep sharing what I learn. This stuff matters too much to keep to myself.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q:How can I apply this thinking to my own situation?
Start by identifying the core principle behind the opinion, not the specific example. Then ask yourself: does this principle apply to my context? If yes, test it in a small, low-risk way before going all in.
Q:Do all experts agree with this view?
No, and that's fine. The best ideas in business are often contrarian. I share my perspective based on my experience and data, but I encourage you to seek out opposing viewpoints and form your own conclusions.
Q:What experience informs this perspective?
This perspective comes from over a decade of building companies in Silicon Valley, two successful exits (RemoteTeam to Gusto, MovieLaLa to Gfycat), and investing in 234 startups including Anthropic, OpenAI, and Scale AI. I write about what I've lived.
Q:What's the most common pushback you get on this?
People often push back by citing exceptions or edge cases. And they're usually right that exceptions exist. But building a strategy around exceptions rather than patterns is a losing game for most founders.