Saturday Trendspotting Special

Welcome back, Superhuman

Today’s email is a very special email. For the past decade, my career has been guided by one big question: What’s the next big thing?

The answers to that question led me to find AI early and start this newsletter. Today, this newsletter has almost a million readers and generates millions in revenue. It’s also helped me build another startup that’s valued at 8 figures. But I continue to ask myself the same question: What’s the next big thing?

So, it’s with ginormous excitement that I’m writing my first Trendspotting Special. My promise to you is simple: this email will help you find the biggest trends and opportunities early, so you can leverage them to get ahead in your life and career.

Ready to find your next big idea? Let’s get started.

P.S. If you like this email and want me to continue it, let me know in the poll at the bottom of this email.

TECHNOLOGY

People are turning to AI therapists to meet their mental health needs

The Trend: Mental health is an increasingly growing problem worldwide. According to a Harvard report, 36% of all Americans — including 61% of young adults — feel “serious loneliness.” The trend has only accelerated since the pandemic.

No wonder so many young people are turning to AI-powered chatbot platforms like Character AI for their mental health needs. According to a BBC report, over 78 million messages have been sent to the Psychologist chatbot on Character AI’s platform. Online searches for “AI mental health“ and “AI therapist“ are also peaking (see chart above).

The Opportunity: According to multiple forecasts, the global mental health market is set to exceed $500B by 2030, with North America accounting for almost 40% of the market. According to Grand View Research, the market for AI in mental health already exceeds $1B and will cross $5B by 2030.

With mental health services out of financial reach for many around the world, there’s a sizeable opportunity to build mental health-focused AI apps that cost considerably less.

But be careful. Mental health is no joke — people’s lives could be at stake. Many AI chatbots and apps have already been called out for providing harmful advice to users. If you plan on building an AI-powered product or service for mental health, you have to take into consideration both ethical and legal requirements.

Where To Start: If you’re not technical and want to learn how to build apps, we recently interviewed Blake Anderson, who taught himself how to build a $5M revenue app with ChatGPT and no prior coding skills.

MEDIA

Faceless YouTube channels are the next big side hustle

The Trend: Faceless YouTube channels — those that deliver content without featuring the creator's face — are rapidly gaining traction among creators. Take HowToBasic, for example, which has amassed over 17 million subscribers, or Lofi Girl, which streams music to 14 million subscribers. Both channels are likely generating 6-7 figures in annual revenue from ads.

The Opportunity: According to Emarketer, YouTube is paying an average of around $15 CPMs to creators in the US. That means creators earn about $15 per thousand views on a video. However, for some high-value niches on YouTube, CPMs can be more than twice that.

It’s clear why the idea is so appealing. With a growing number of AI apps handling video editing, voiceovers, and content generation, creating videos is now easier than it’s ever been. Just ask Devon Canup, who claims to have generated over $1.5 million from multiple faceless YouTube channels.

Considerations: Just because it’s getting easier to create video content doesn’t mean it’s getting easier to build a revenue-generating YouTube channel. You have to pick a profitable niche and create high-value original content that stands out from the rest.

Where To Start: You can use tools like Claude and ChatGPT to generate video scripts, and Veed IO to generate videos with voiceovers.

HEALTH

Air quality is the next big health trend you should be paying attention to

The Trend: If mental health and sleep wellness were the two big health trends of the 2010s, air quality seems to be on track to be the biggest health trend of the 2020s. No wonder — according to The State of Global Air Report, air pollution causes over 8 million deaths annually across the globe.

The Opportunity: The global market for air quality monitors is currently estimated to be around $5.8B and is expected to grow over the coming years. A simple search on Amazon will yield several air quality-related products with 10,000+ reviews averaging 4/5 stars or above, a sign that the air quality product category has traction.

But it’s not just air quality monitors. Several adjacent product categories like humidifiers and air filters are also seeing a surge in interest. Even within these categories, you’ll find sub-categories of products that are racking up purchases. A search for air purifiers on Amazon shows specific sub-categories of purifiers such as allergen purifiers and smoke filters, along with general-purpose air purifiers.

Where To Start: If you’re looking to find new opportunities in the space, a good place to start would be the r/AirQuality and r/AirPurifiers subreddits. If you see a repeating pattern of problems that people can’t find solutions for, that might be your opening to build a product or service that meets those needs. The people in the subreddits asking these questions would also make for great early customers.

Your opinion matters!

You’re the reason our team spends hundreds of hours every week researching and writing this email. Please let us know what you thought of today’s email to help us create better emails for you.

Until next time,

Zain and the Superhuman AI team