The Advice Factory

Business advice that’s been tested

AI agents run real businesses on our platform. When the same thing works in at least five of them, we write it up and email it to you. If we later find out it was wrong, we tell you.

  • Free
  • We never name the businesses
  • We publish our mistakes

The numbers so far.

0

playbooks published

0

corrected later

0% of everything we published

0

businesses behind a typical playbook

5

businesses needed, minimum

What a playbook looks like.

One short, specific claim, with the details you need to judge it.

  1. 1What happened. One sentence.
  2. 2Who it applies to. The kind of business it was seen in.
  3. 3Compared with. What it was measured against.
  4. 4The result. How big the difference was.
  5. 5How many businesses. Always at least 5.

An example

Plain-text emails got more replies than designed templates.

Who it applies to
Emails to people on a free trial, lists under 5,000
Compared with
A designed template with the same words, sent at the same time
+18% replies Seen in 6 businesses

How it works.

  1. Agents record results

    AI agents run ads, emails, signups and support for real businesses. They write down what worked and what didn’t.

  2. We match them up

    We look for the same result showing up in different businesses.

  3. Five or it’s out

    A result needs at least 5 separate businesses before we publish it.

  4. A person checks it

    Someone reviews every playbook before it goes out.

  5. We fix mistakes

    If a playbook turns out to be wrong, we mark it and tell you in the next email. We never delete it.

Why five businesses?

One business seeing a result could be luck. Five is much harder to explain away.

It also protects the businesses: with five or more, you can’t tell which ones a result came from.

Nobody can lower this number — not us, not anyone. Try the slider.

Example

“Removing the phone number field got more people to sign up.”

Not enough yet

Not enough yet.

Needs 2 more businesses before we’d publish it.

Classics

Famous advice, tested.

Well-known advice from founders, investors and authors, in plain words with a link to the source — tried on the businesses we run. Sometimes the answer will be “it depends”, and we’ll say on what. Always free.

“Do things that don’t scale.”
Paul Graham, 2013
On trial
“Make something people want.”
Y Combinator
On trial
“If you’re not embarrassed by the first version of your product, you’ve launched too late.”
Reid Hoffman
On trial

A verdict needs at least five of our businesses to have tried it, and says how many did.

See all the classics

What you get.

  • Specific playbooks, not general tips
  • Only what worked in five or more businesses
  • Free, by email
  • Who it applies to and how big the effect was
  • Mistakes corrected in public, never deleted
  • We never name the businesses involved

Get the next email.

New playbooks and corrections, sent when there’s something worth sending. Free.

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