425: AI Best Practices for Bootstrappers (That Actually Save You Money)

AI systems change constantly. Models get deprecated, APIs shift, and what works today might fail tomorrow. Instead of trying to keep up with everything, I've built my systems for permanent adaptability. That means migration patterns that let me run old and new prompts side by side, using OpenAI's hidden Flex tier to cut costs by 50%, front-loading repeated data in prompts to maximize cache savings, and implementing circuit breakers so runaway AI costs can't blow up my bill. These aren't optimizations — they're how you run AI in production without losing your mind or your money. I'm running a time-limited Black Friday sale of The Bootstrapper's Bundle: all my books, all my courses, all formats, for $25 instead of $100+. Grab it here: This episode of The Bootstraped Founder is sponsored by Paddle.com You'll find the Black Friday Guide here: The blog post: The podcast episode: Check out Podscan, the Podcast database that transcribes every podcast episode out there minutes after it gets released: Send me a voicemail on Podline: You'll find my weekly article on my blog: Podcast: Newsletter: My book Zero to Sold: My book The Embedded Entrepreneur: My course Find Your Following: Here are a few tools I use. Using my affiliate links will support my work at no additional cost to you. - Notion (which I use to organize, write, coordinate, and archive my podcast + newsletter): - Riverside.fm (that's what I recorded this episode with): - TweetHunter (for speedy scheduling and writing Tweets): - HypeFury (for massive Twitter analytics and scheduling): - AudioPen (for taking voice notes and getting amazing summaries): - Descript (for word-based video editing, subtitles, and clips): - ConvertKit (for email lists, newsletters, even finding sponsors):

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425: AI Best Practices for Bootstrappers (That Actually Save You Money) is an episode from The Bootstrapped Founder by Arvid Kahl.

This episode is 22:35 long.

This episode was published on Nov 28, 2025.

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