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- Business Ideas #322: Instant Talent, Psychedelics...
Business Ideas #322: Instant Talent, Psychedelics...
Plus From $0 to an 8-Figure Exit in 2 Years

Welcome to Half Baked, the newsletter serving up business ideas as entertaining as LeBron and Stephen A. Smith’s feud 🏀
Here’s what we’ve got for you today:
Business Idea💡: Solving the “last mile“ problem…but not in logistics
Drunk Business Idea 🍻: Adding some extra danger to a popular game
Just The Tip 📈: An emerging industry worth keeping in mind
The Moneyshot 🤑: From $0 to an 8-figure exit in 2 years
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Let’s get into it.
BUSINESS IDEA | STARTUP
Instant Freelancing Platform ⏲️
The gig is up
Available Domain: asaptasks.com
💡 TLDR: A real-time freelancing platform that connects clients with available talent for last-minute, deadline-driven projects
1. Problem/Opportunity❓
The Problem/Opportunity: You can hire a freelancer for anything these days. Want to get your ex back? There’s a freelancer for that. Looking to rent a friend? Hire this guy. You can even hire people to telepathically communicate with your pet. And no, we’re not kidding…

But while you can get a freelancer for anything these days, it’s not easy to get one any time you need one. Businesses today operate in real time and yet, when a team needs a designer today, a developer by tomorrow, or a copywriter yesterday, freelance platforms fall short. Which is where we see a gap in the market. Here’s what we’re thinking.
Market Size: The global freelance market is worth $1.5 trillion. If you assume 5% of freelance jobs are last-minute then you get a $75bn - $150bn TAM
2. Solution ✅
The Idea: A real-time freelancing platform that connects clients with available talent for last-minute, deadline-driven projects
How it Works:
Clients post urgent gigs detailing what they need and the deadline they’re up against
Freelancers with availability can opt-in to be “on-call” for these instant gigs and AI matches clients to these instantly available freelancers based on their skillset, deadline, and rating.
Escrow-based payments are handled upfront, and the client can message and work with the freelancer instantly and in real time
Once the job is complete the funds are released to the freelancer
Go-to-market: Start with a single vertical, say designers, and create an invite-only beta to test the market. Expand from there.
Business Model: Transaction fee (15–20%) on each gig
Startup Costs: You could start this for a few thousand dollars. The hard part is simultaneously building both sides of the marketplace.
3. How You’ll Get Rich 💰
Exit Strategy: Get acquired by an existing freelancing platform like Fiverr or Upwork
Exit Multiple: Freelancer marketplaces have historically exited or IPO'd at 3x–10x revenue, depending on growth and margins. They don’t trade at great multiples now though…
TOGETHER WITH AUTOMATIONLINKS
Pennies per Click

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X Ads (or Twitter Ads if you’re old school) are where the underpriced attention is today, and AutomationLinks knows exactly how to unlock this attention for you.
With lower ad costs and high engagement, you can get in front of your audience without breaking the bank.
Download their FREE X Advertising Blueprint today to supercharge your business’ growth.
DRUNK BUSINESS IDEA
Danger Darts
Enjoy playing darts? Looking to add an extra element of danger to your games?
Say hello to Danger Darts, the only game where eye contact and eye injuries are just inches apart.
Want to really test your friendships? Stick your buddy’s head through a dartboard and start throwing. Or for even more fun…play with your enemies.
Note: Our lawyers have told us to say we legally advise you not to play this game. But also…don’t be a wimp and give it a try.

Vote
JUST THE TIP
Trend 📈: Psychedelics for Mental Health
Over 1 billion people worldwide suffer from a mental health disorder, with depression now the leading cause of disability, costing the global economy over $1 trillion annually in lost productivity.
But mental health conditions are notoriously difficult to treat, but there’s a promising new avenue for treatments emerging…psychedelics.
Psychedelics like psilocybin, ketamine and MDMA are showing strong potential in clinical trials for treating depression, PTSD, and anxiety. These substances may enhance brain plasticity, helping patients break out of rigid thought patterns.
This is a market that’s just in its infancy, but you can bet it will explode in the coming years.

Business Ideas
Psychedelic Policy Intelligence Platform: SaaS tool for investors, clinics, and advocates to track psychedelic legalization, clinical trial results, and emerging regulations globally.
White-Label Software for Psychedelic Clinics: Build a white-labeled EMR (electronic medical record) or client management software tailored to psychedelic-assisted therapy practices.
TOGETHER WITH RYSE
They Laughed at Ring…Until Amazon Paid $1.2 Billion
RYSE is disrupting smart home tech with patented smart shades that automate any window, no costly replacements.
With $10M+ in revenue, a 200% growth rate, and big-box partnerships, this could be your chance to invest before a billion-dollar buyout and earn up to 25% in bonus shares.
Don’t make the same mistake the Sharks did.
THE MONEYSHOT
From $0 to an 8-Figure Exit in 2 Years
You can accomplish an extraordinary amount in a short period of time.
Just ask this guy who went from building a side project to an 8-figure acquisition by Notion in just two years.
This is his story.

Raphael Schaad is obsessed with design.
The Swiss-born designer and developer previously worked in UI/UX at Intercom and built early prototypes of iOS and macOS apps in his spare time.
But during his day-to-day workflows something kept bothering Raphael. His calendar. Despite the crowded market of calendar tools (Google Calendar, Outlook, Fantastical, and countless others), none of them felt right. They were all clunky, overloaded with features, or simply not enjoyable to use. So he decided to build his own.
So in 2020 while the world was basically on fire (shout out COVID) Raphael quietly began building a fast, minimal, and beautiful calendar from scratch, designing it for power users who live by their calendars. Think founders, product managers, engineers.
And by late 2020 it was ready.
He founded Cron.

Raphael positioned Cron as a luxury software product, launching in closed beta with a waitlist. Word spread quickly among the productivity-obsessed corners of Twitter and soon everyone was trying to get a spot on the waitlist. Through ingenious positioning Raphael turned using his product into a status symbol.
Cron was bootstrapped at first, but its buzz soon attracted top-tier investors when Raphael joined Y Combinator in 2020 and went on to raise $3.5 million in seed funding from elite angels, giving the product even more visibility.
Through it all, Cron stayed focused though. It didn’t try to be everything to everyone. It was laser-focused on being the best possible calendar for power users.
Then in June 2022, just two years after Raphael wrote his first lines of code, Notion acquired Cron. The price wasn’t publicly disclosed, but estimates range between $10m and $30m.
For Notion, the acquisition made strategic sense, a natural extension to its all-in-one workspace offering. For Raphael, it was the reward for building a great product. He didn’t reinvent the calendar. He just made it more beautiful.
And truthfully this is a fantastic way to generate business ideas… the “X, but beautiful” framework. With that framing you simply find old, outdated software and make the experience 10x better, exactly like Raphael did.
And who knows, just like Raphael you too could change your life in a short period of time.
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