Welcome to Hal9 Weekly — insights from our founder Javier on turning AI ideas into real products.

We're thrilled to share that we're now also posting bite-sized versions of these founder insights (and more behind-the-scenes content) on TikTok! Follow us at https://www.tiktok.com/@hal9ai for quick, actionable wisdom you can watch between meetings.

BTW. We used vibetocontent.com to generate our LinkedIn posts, newsletter and TikTok videos. It's free for founders like you, so go use it! :)

Hal9

POV: Asking AI to do the simplest task like send a real email... and it still can't 😩 This is why we're all frustrated with AI in 2026 👀 Who's ready for agents that actually DO things? #AI #AIFail #techtok #startup

♬ Dramatic Tension - Litne

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This week, Javier reflects on the messy realities of building: juggling multiple products, choosing between product excellence and marketing dominance, pivoting toward AI accessibility, making peace with a product-first approach, and uncovering that "partners" can become your biggest customers.

Here are this week's insights:

Embracing the Four-Ended Candle: Why We're Building Multiple Products at Once

Right now, we are building four different products at the exact same time. Conventional wisdom says this is a recipe for disaster.

Focus is the founder's superpower, right? But here’s the reality: we have a B2B startup program, a B2C product, a partner-led solution, and our new marketing tool, vibetocontent.com. All of them are showing traction.

My team and I sat down to discuss if we were spreading ourselves too thin. It’s the classic 'burning the candle at both ends' scenario—except we have four ends.

However, we realized that these projects aren't distractors; they are a feedback loop. One feeds the other. It’s like a chef running a restaurant, a food truck, and a catering business—it’s exhausting, but the ingredients and the skills are the same across all three.

We’ve decided to lean into the chaos for now because we have the team to handle it. It's a gamble on bandwidth versus opportunity.

When you have multiple 'winning' ideas, do you cut the good to chase the great, or do you find a way to scale both?

Tesla or MrBeast? The Brutal Choice on Distribution

I don’t respond well to being told what to do. I’m independent, and I’ve realized my team is built the same way. So, when it comes to 'tough advice,' I’ve learned that straightforward commands usually fall flat.

Instead, I provide 'tough context.' Recently, I had to sit down with my co-founder and a few peers to talk about the brutal reality of distribution.

I told them: You have two extreme paths. You can be Tesla—build a product so undeniably amazing that you don't need a marketing budget. Or you can be MrBeast—build a distribution engine so powerful that it doesn't matter what you sell.

Most founders get stuck in the messy middle, doing both poorly.

It’s like trying to hike a mountain; you can go up the north face or the south face, but if you try to walk around the base forever, you’ll never see the view.

We had to decide: are we going to out-build the world, or out-market them?

If you had to pick one—product excellence or marketing dominance—which would be your primary engine?

The 2 AM Founder Interview: How AI Made VibeToContent Truly Accessible

I set out to build a high-touch human experience with vibetocontent.com, but human nature had other plans. Our vision was simple: we’d interview founders for 15 minutes to turn their expertise into content. But we hit a wall that technology couldn’t solve: the calendar.

Time zones, scheduling conflicts, and training delays were killing our velocity. My initial reaction was to push harder and hire more, but I realized we were fighting a losing battle. Sometimes the most human thing you can do for a busy founder is to get out of the way.

We pivoted to offer an AI-driven interview option. If you want a live human, we’re there. But if you’re inspired at 2:00 AM, the AI is ready for you.

Think of it like a coffee shop. Some mornings you want the barista’s small talk; other mornings, you just want a perfectly efficient espresso from the machine so you can get back to work.

By embracing the 'robot,' we didn't lose quality—we gained accessibility. It turns out, some founders actually prefer the no-judgment vibe of talking to an AI.

Are you building for what you *think* customers want, or how they actually live?

The Hidden Gem Play: Why We're Doubling Down on Product Over Marketing

I used to believe that if a startup didn’t obsess over marketing, they were toast. I spent years convinced that sales and marketing were the only things that kept the lights on.

But I’ve changed my mind.

I’ve realized that while marketing is vital, it’s not the *only* way to win. My team and I are builders at heart. We love the technical, the product, the 'how it works.'

I’ve come to peace with the fact that it is perfectly viable to spend 99% of your energy on product and 1% on marketing — as long as you accept the trade-off. If you aren't shouting from the rooftops, your product better be so good it speaks for itself through word-of-mouth.

It's like a hidden-gem restaurant with no sign and no Instagram. To survive, the food has to be the best in the city.

This realization is why we built vibetocontent.com — to help other technical founders handle that '1% of marketing' so they can stay in their flow state of building.

Are you a builder trying to be a marketer, or a marketer trying to be a builder? Which one feels more authentic to you?

The Partner Who Was Actually Your Customer

We always viewed startup accelerators as the 'gatekeepers' or partners—people who would refer customers to us. Then we actually started talking to them.

It turns out, accelerators are just startups in disguise. They face the exact same chaos we do: hundreds of applications, manual processes, and the desperate need for efficiency. They were seeing 1 out of 1,000 applicants and drowning in the noise.

We realized we had been looking right past a massive customer segment because we had put them in a specific 'box.'

It’s like looking for a hammer while holding a mallet; you’re so focused on the tool you *think* you need that you miss what’s already in your hand.

We’ve now shifted to treating accelerators as direct customers, helping them build internal AI tools to manage their funnels.

Who in your network have you labeled as just a 'partner' who might actually be your next big customer?

Let’s Talk

Got an AI idea/building something and want to chat about it?

Book a free consultation with Javier — he’ll help you validate it before you build, so you don’t lose time chasing the wrong version.

Talk soon,

—The Hal9 Team