Some people say that in the AI boom, only those who sell computing power and sell courses make money.
There is some truth to this statement. AI application developers are working for the platform, the platform is working for the graphics card factory, and finally the money goes to NVIDIA.
Many AI startups with valuations of hundreds of millions of dollars have almost zero revenue.
There is an AI painting company abroad that closed down after 4 months of establishment. Before closing, the founder said bitterly: this thing can't make any money at all.
There are also many AI entrepreneurs in China who work hard to develop applications, but when it comes to making money, they are killed by a person who sells AI courses.
If you pay attention to technology or AI, you will most likely have swiped Li Yizhou on Douyin.
Li Yizhou can be called the "ceiling" of self-employed people who sell classes. There was a record of earning tens of millions of yuan a month by selling classes.
He currently has 3.25 million followers on Douyin. Now I advertise and sell classes in the circle of friends. Is this the beginning of a monetization journey in a new position?
-1-
Ph.D. from Tsinghua Academy of Fine Arts, he earned tens of millions of dollars by selling courses
In the past year or so, there has been a wave of selling AI courses on short video platforms. A big V who claims to be a doctor from Tsinghua University, Li Yizhou, launched an AI course of 199 yuan, which has attracted millions of fans on Douyin.
Recently, Li Yizhou began to advertise in WeChat Moments again. This time, what he wants to sell is an AI class with an original price of 999 yuan and a current price of 199 yuan.
The gimmick is still as usual, "Dr. Tsinghua teaches you an artificial intelligence class that you can understand". And the method of hunger marketing is used, "limited to the top 200 students, 1 million computing power units per person".
In the past two years, there have been many Internet celebrity lecturers in the field of knowledge payment. Li Yizhou is a category that has sprung up, and has long dominated the list of sales of classes.
Friends who often brush Douyin are estimated to occasionally brush Li Yizhou and vigorously promote his AI class.
In terms of personal perception, Li Yizhou's most eye-catching labels are Tsinghua University's Ph.D. and artificial intelligence.
When it comes to Tsinghua people, everyone has the impression of being pragmatic, low-key, and technical idealists...... In the tide of AI entrepreneurship in China, Tsinghua people often play the role of "leading the way".
When the labels of Dr. Tsinghua and AI were superimposed, Dr. Li Yizhou's character instantly became taller.
However, Li Yizhou's major can't compete with the AI eight poles.
Li Yizhou, a native of Changsha, Hunan Province, graduated from Tsinghua Academy of Fine Arts with a Ph.D. in Industrial Design and Design Innovation Methods, Design Strategy and Prototype Innovation.
Unlike many Tsinghua people, Li Yizhou studied at the School of Design and Art of Hunan University for his bachelor's and master's degrees.
As early as 2012, Li Yizhou appeared on the stage of "You Must Belong", and in the show, the boss group was coaxed by many companies and became the "strongest job seeker", and has been famous since then.
Later, Li Yizhou's entrepreneurship was repeatedly unsuccessful, until he switched to Douyin to teach people to start a business from the media, and began to mix.
Tsinghua doctor, eloquence, and talent. Such a person is simply the chosen one to do self-media.
At the end of 2021, Li Yizhou seized the Douyin traffic outlet, spent 3 months to output entrepreneurial knowledge, and accumulated more than 100,000 fans.
Later, the number of accounts began to increase in size. Li Yizhou took advantage of the trend to transform and start his journey of knowledge payment.
With the Douyin entrepreneurship mentor persona, the Douyin entrepreneurship course "One Boat One Lesson" was a big hit, and once rushed to the top of the sales list of Douyin entrepreneurship courses. has won a record of 2300W in 4 months, and his fans have grown to more than one million.
At the beginning of 2023, ChatGPT's traffic came like a tsunami, and Li Yizhou decisively gave up the "last hope for ordinary people to turn over: Douyin", which has a monthly sales of 2 million, and turned around to launch "an artificial intelligence course that a family of three must learn".
In less than a month, a set of 199 GPT courses sold 200,000 copies, with sales revenue of more than 40 million yuan.
Instantly switched from "Douyin Master" to "AI Master", and from "Business Consultant of Multiple 100-million-level Enterprises" to "Artificial Intelligence Consultant of Multiple 100-million-level Enterprises", I have to admire Li Yizhou's ability to grasp the outlet.
-2-
Li Yizhou's self-media take-off road
On the road of knowledge payment, Li Yizhou is definitely the head anchor. Some people describe him as a "self-media genius".
Li Yizhou has an almost perfect personality: a doctor from Tsinghua University, the founder of three technology companies, tens of millions of financing, a professional manager, good at solving AI, business models, knowledge IP and traffic problems......
It can be said that it almost satisfies everyone's imagination of Tsinghua University, high education, high knowledge, making money, and traffic.
At the beginning, Li Yizhou's self-media road was not so smooth. For a long time, it was tepid.
Until February 14, 2021, he posted a piece of content that was different from the previous direction, with the title: After the age of 35, how many friends feel the same way as me?
This video has more than 40,000 views just one hour after it was released. Li Yizhou decisively streamed this video, and the next morning, the number of video views became 200,000, and the number of fans increased greatly.
Li Yizhou judged that this content direction may be what Douyin wants. So he made several similar videos. For example, "how do the poor counterattack" and "how do ordinary people become rich"......
Not surprisingly, one of these videos has become popular again, and the momentum is even stronger than the first one.
In two days, Li Yizhou posted 8 videos, 2 of which became popular, with nearly 100,000 followers.
In order to seize this wave of traffic, Li Yizhou directly started the live broadcast in the car, and the live broadcast lasted for 5 hours, answering various questions from fans, and the number of fans directly exceeded 100,000 after the broadcast.
Since then, the gears of fate have also begun to spin at an accelerated pace.
After the successful start, Li Yizhou officially started the journey of knowledge payment.
From selling classes to the present, there have always been people scolding him, cutting leeks, no bottom line, poor quality of courses, etc.
But I have to admit that Li Yizhou has a good grasp of the target group and the rules of the game.
In Li Yizhou's live broadcast room, he has mentioned many times that he is a completely zero-based student, which is very suitable for learning his course.
His fan portrait is a middle-aged man around 35 years old, some are full-time mothers at home, and some are small bosses with a little money...... They all have one thing in common: they're a little smart, but not much.
No matter how low-level and low-level the class seems, as long as someone is willing to pay for it, it means that it can solve the pain points of some people.
At the same time, it also tells us a truth: the product is only one of the links, and the rules of the game are also very important.
Li Yizhou's promise to users of "One Boat One Lesson": I will teach you a lesson every week. This commitment makes users feel like they're entering knowledge, which is paramount.
Starting from September 2022, Li Yizhou has been broadcasting for 3 hours almost every day, and at the craziest time, he will broadcast for 8 hours a day, which has also changed the number of people who have been to the live broadcast room from 10,000 to 100,000.
In addition, Li Yizhou's ability to grasp the wind outlet is also worth learning from ordinary people. The AI tuyere is coming, and the artificial AI course is directly sold, just do it.
-3-
In 2024, it's worth investing in AI
But avoid being "cut leeks"
In this carnival of traffic, Dr. Li Yizhou lost the thin face of a literati and had a pair of businessman's armor on his body.
His success proves once again that those who sell water, maps, and shovels to gold diggers make more money than those who go into the water to pan for gold.
Soon after the beginning of 2023, ChatGPT exploded, with the number of global users exceeding 100 million in two months, and the knowledge payment industry, which has the keenest sense of smell, has also sharpened its sickle in a month.
A teacher named Crane is a class seller, who used to teach people to do investment, and quickly all in AI classes. His "Artificial Intelligence Enlightenment Course for Everyone" is sought after by 14 million followers.
A Douyin account called "Poetry Child AI Learning", and its "AI New Human Business Course" on the shelves also made a lot of profits.
However, users have mixed reviews for these courses. Some users bluntly said that "a horse of water" and "a very small white level", and some people themselves are "leeks".
Like the previous big data, blockchain, and metaverse boom, after ChatGPT became popular, batches of "AI tutors" emerged on major content platforms such as Douyin, Kuaishou, and Knowledge Planet, and there were countless related "courses".
The routines of these AI "mentors" remain unchanged for thousands of years. First set up a persona, then chase hot spots, then instill anxiety, and then point out the path to get rich overnight - buy classes, which are interlocking and smooth.
In recent years, Douyin has produced many myths of wealth creation, in addition to Li Yizhou, there are also big blue, sea cucumbers, and transparent sugar. Whether it is selling courses or live broadcasting, hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars are earned.
It is necessary to acknowledge the capabilities and impact of current AI products, and there is no doubt about the entrepreneurial opportunities brought by AI products.
It's just that the vast majority of the so-called "AI courses" may not be able to give students any help at all.
In order to keep costs down, tutors often use very low-quality teaching materials, which may come from free sources on the Internet, simple tutorials written by themselves, or even simple "patchwork".
Someone once attacked Li Yizhou twice, the first time saying that he had not really started a business, but he taught everyone to start a business, and the second time he said that he was an art student at Tsinghua University but taught everyone artificial intelligence.
Although various attacks on the Internet have come and gone, they still can't stop the rhythm of Li Yizhou's selling classes to monetize.
Any course or content will be opposed and attacked.
For some people, Li Yizhou's course may be useful, while for others, his course may be too simple, and it is inevitable that he will feel like he has been "cut leeks".
In any case, AI large model technology has gradually entered everyone's daily life.
In 2024, it is also worth investing some time in AI learning, or spending some money to find some reliable people to learn AI classes.