EA Hired, AI Broke the Store & Build vs. Buy the Eternal Debate

About this episode

Matt and Michael discuss recent developments in their business, including AI impacts, hiring, and marketing strategies.

Matt opens with his head already in 2027 — two of the largest projects in Develop's history landed back to back, and now the focus is making sure the sales pipeline is ready to sustain that momentum after the current wave clears. Michael is back from the Toolpath Manufacturing Summit, where he spoke on a panel and came home with renewed clarity on where the business needs to go — and a snowboarding edge sharpening that made him feel like a beginner again. On the marketing side, Develop's website traffic has nearly doubled in a month with no clear explanation — knowledge base pages quietly gaining traction, possibly AI-driven. Michael, meanwhile, shares a costly AI mistake: a Shopify MCP server accidentally deleted product variants from the tumble blast listings, quietly costing an estimated $15–20K in lost revenue over three weeks before anyone noticed. He also breaks down how firing his marketing agency and replacing everything with Claude-connected ad analysis nearly doubled return on ad spend — and how he's now converting five-figure orders directly through the web store. Engineering covers Develop hiring a third mechanical engineer off a shortlist from a previous hiring…

People in this episode

Host: Matt

Guest: Michael

Topics covered

• AI in business
• marketing strategies
• hiring practices
• revenue loss
• sales pipeline
• engineering roles
• business growth

Keywords

• AI mistake
• revenue loss
• marketing agency
• mechanical engineer
• sales pipeline
• website traffic
• business growth

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Develop, Shopify, Toolpath Manufacturing Summit

Products: Claude

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