Greg Isenberg

CEO of Late Checkout, a holding company for community-based businesses

I'm the CEO/Co-Founder of Late Checkout, a holding company with a portfolio of internet businesses. 

Previously, I was the Head of Product Strategy at WeWork, an Advisor at TikTok and an Advisor at Reddit. I was the Founder/CEO of Islands, a messaging/community app that was acquired by WeWork.  I was the Founder/CEO of 5by, a leading video discovery app which got acquired by StumbleUpon.  I helped build one of the internet's most popular financial education communities Wall Street Survivor (acquired). 

I've helped build communities and technology products for brands like Microsoft, FedEX, NASCAR, TechCrunch and Wordpress. 

I've been featured on places like Vanity Fair, Forbes, Mashable, Fortune Magazine, L.A Times and have won Webby Awards.

I share my thoughts on Twitter @gregisenberg (say hello).

LINKS to some of my companies in my holdco🔗

gregisenberg.com (my guides, podcast, sign up to my weekly newsletter for updates)
latecheckout.agency (product design agency that works with executives from Dropbox to Nike to Shopify)
boringmarketing.com (agency to get you ranked on google)
boringads.com (agency that creates profitable ad campaigns)

CEO & Co-Founder 

Late Checkout is a holding company that builds, acquires and incubates cash-flowing businesses that are powered by internet audiences and communities.

Learn more about our businesses at https://latecheckout.studio and work with us.

Apple JUST quietly announced something that’s a lot BIGGER than it looks: "the Mini Apps Partner Program"

Apple is admitting that the future of software is embedded, lightweight, vertical mini-apps distributed inside bigger app

For founders who want to make $$ building apps:

1. Apple just legitimized the “superapp” model for the West.

China has WeChat mini-programs. India has PhonePe Switch. The West has… nothing. Apple just opened the door. You can now run HTML/JS mini-apps inside a native host and earn 85% on qualifying purchases. That’s Apple-sanctioned platform piggybacking.

2. Distribution arbitrage becomes real again.

You don’t need to convince users to download your app. Just partner with a host app and drop in a mini-app. This is a cheat code for early traction. Think: travel apps hosting niche tools, fitness apps hosting mini workouts, marketplaces hosting micro-utilities.

3. Apple is creating a new economy layer: “embedded SaaS.”

Imagine: CRM mini-apps inside vertical tools. Math solver mini-apps inside education apps. Calendar mini-apps inside productivity apps. The TAM for tools that don’t need standalone installs just went vertical.

4. Developers get an 85% revenue share.

This is Apple basically saying: “We want this ecosystem to grow, and we’re willing to cut our take rate.” When Apple lowers its cut, I pay attention because they see a platform shift coming.

5. AI makes this 10× more important.

LLM-powered micro-apps (calculators, planners, agents, coaches, niche utilities) are tiny by design. They’re perfect mini-apps. Apple just created infrastructure for AI-native micro utilities to live inside bigger apps with built-in commerce.

6. Host apps become new “distribution landlords.”

If you own an app with traffic, you become a platform. You can host mini-apps, take a cut, and build a developer ecosystem around you.

 It’s a new monetization model for existing apps with audiences.

7. This unlocks a wave of second-order opportunities.

- Agencies helping apps become mini-app hosts
- Mini-app dev shops
- “Shopify for mini-apps” toolkits
- Mini-app marketplaces
- Analytics for mini-app performance
- Discovery engines for mini-apps
- For more startup ideas/trends... sign up to https://ideabrowser.com 

TLDR;

Apple just turned every high-traffic app into a potential superapp and every indie developer into a potential platform partner.

The App Store is becoming modular, composable, and layered. The next decade of consumer apps will look less like standalone products and more like ecosystems stitched together with mini-apps.

This is quietly one of the biggest distribution unlocks in years.

CEO of Late Checkout, a portfolio of internet companies

2026 AI predictions

1. SaaS and agents merge completely in 2026. Every SaaS product becomes an agent platform, and every agent platform builds SaaS features. The ones that don't adapt die or get bought for pennies. 

2.  Google continues to crush in 2026. OpenAI feels the heat. Doubles down into becoming a social company, lots of features that you'd think a Meta would create

3. Infinite-context entertainment kills pilot season. Netflix lets you continue cancelled shows just for yourself. AI generates new episodes of The Office or Friends dynamically based on your mood.

4. Micro-companies explode in volume and weirdness. Tiny AI-augmented businesses serving tiny online tribes become a real career path.

5. Personalized nutrient cocktails created by generative AI replace traditional OTC wellness. 

6. AI agents get their own wallets. Agents transact with each other using crypto for data, API calls, and compute. T

7. The return of the invite-only web. To escape the bot-flooded “dead internet,” the best platforms become gated and reputation-scored. T

8. Search is replaced by answer synthesis. Browsers read 50 sources and give you the conclusion. 

9. Hardware returns with a vengeance. Browser-based AI feels limiting, so AI pins, earbuds, and ambient devices take off. The smartphone’s decline becomes visible.

10. Google, Apple, and OpenAI accidentally build the new internet. Instead of browsing websites, people live inside model environments.

11. Personalized education unbundles the university. 

12. The first agent-driven media companies appear. Daily shows, newsletters, and entire channels run autonomously, with one human editor.

13. Local LLMs become the new privacy shield. A major hack scares the world and everyone shifts to on-device models that never touch the cloud.

14. The rise of analog status. “Analog” becomes the ultimate flex. Film cameras, handwritten notes, and acoustic instruments explode in value

15. Prediction markets replace user research. Companies test product ideas on 10,000 AI personas/know the outcome before writing code.

16. Software becomes disposable. Apps are generated, used for 72 hours, and deleted. 

17. A major university drops its computer science degree. It’s replaced by “agent systems,” “model psychology,” and “human interface architecture.”

18. Infinite apps replace the App Store. Micro-apps are generated inside ChatGPT or Gemini and traditional downloads collapse.

19. The first sovereign AI trade war begins. Nations ban the export of foundation models and treat foreign AI use as espionage.

20. Blue-collar trades become safe havens. Electricians, plumbers, and HVAC techs see wages skyrocket as white-collar automation accelerates.

21. The fastest wealth creation path in 2026 is spotting assets mispriced because people underestimate AI’s speed. 

22. 2026 should be an interesting year for AI. What do you think?

Note: grab a startup idea, a trend, and some prompts from ideabrowser.com and happy building.

dear founders,

build like the clock’s running out. the window is open but it won’t stay. for the first time in history, you have free distribution from social platforms and infinite leverage from AI tools. you can reach millions without permission.

the internet is handing out unfair advantages to anyone bold enough to use them so...

ship before you understand it. launch "ugly". talk to users every day. build what you wish existed. best ideas are the most obvious painful. go niche. no, go superniche. vertical is your moat.

clarity comes from commits. half your roadmap might be ego, delete it. make ugly things until they work. share prototypes that break.

kill what doesn’t grow. use AI as leverage, not decoration. test ten things before breakfast. delete your roadmap. double down on what works. design for clarity, not cleverness. brand before code. write daily. post your lessons.

find your first hundred users manually. distribution is the new product. attention is the new funding. taste is the new code. build small cults. scale later. automate boring things. keep the human parts human. study why things spread. study why things die. 

pricing is positioning. aesthetics are trust. make people feel something. ignore haters. build in weird corners of the internet. break things publicly. pivot loudly. consistency compounds. only raise VC if you dream of going IPO one day. otherwise, cash-flow is your BFF.

your network is distribution. your story is marketing. your design is psychology. ship like it’s day one. iterate like you’re behind. stay obsessed. learn faster. think longer. risk embarrassment. make noise. build the thing that keeps you up at night. money follows obsession. stay in motion. stay loud. stay building. distribution is an art form now.
 
AI makes it easy to make things; the hard part is making things that matter. build like the world’s ending in a year but your idea has to outlive it 

we’re living in a window of maximum leverage and minimum permission

im rooting for you.

best,

greg isenberg

just another founder rooting for you

note: find startup ideas at ideabrowser.com to get your creative juices flowing

We’re about to see the largest boom in micro-companies in history. 

1 person to 10-people businesses that generate real cash, serve tiny but passionate communities, and operate with leverage (organic social, AI etc) that used to require mega teams

Once people realize they can earn a meaningful living by building something tiny and strange that fits a community they actually understand, everything shifts like ambition, lifestyle, career arcs, even how people think about “success.”

Some people will build two or three of these.
Some will build twenty.
Some will build one that accidentally becomes big.

You can literally feel the shift happening.

Just an increasing number of people quietly opting out of the traditional paths and choosing to build a life around small companies that actually work.

There’s a whole new generation of founders who are going to buy businesses and turn them into holding companies with software and AI: 

how they’ll do it:

step 1: acquire niche business at an attractive price
step 2: create internet distribution to scale customer base
step 3: build AI-assisted software to increase margins/make product more attractive 
step 4: recycle cash-flow to buy more businesses

HOW TO WIN IN THE AI AGE 

You are competing against people who copy what exists and let AI remake it.

Most design, writing and product work comes from AI copying existing references in generic mode, which is why the internet feels like an endless conveyor belt of bland.

The moment you push past that baseline and force the model to do something uncomfortable, you separate yourself from the entire curve. Giving it original ideas + references outside your niche. 

The people who win are the ones who insist on originality in a world that keeps asking for “good enough.” 

The reason this matters is because default effort produces default outcomes, and default outcomes disappear instantly in a feed that never stops moving. 

I bet these default startups have more and more friction standing out going further as AI makes startup making more like a machine.

People can FEEL the difference between something generated and something directed, between something assembled and something authored. AI will happily produce the average case forever, but it will never choose to take the creative risk that changes how something feels. And that's where the alpha is!!!

Anyone can generate. Almost no one curates, edits, reworks, reshapes, interrogates, or pushes until the thing becomes unmistakably theirs. 

The edge is in the taste you bring to the model, the choices you make that the average user will never even see, and the willingness to throw away nine versions to get to the tenth that feels alive.

In a world where everyone has access to the same tools, the only real advantage is the person who refuses to behave like a default setting.

These 15 techniques pretty much 10x the quality/output of ANYTHING you vibe code with Gemini 3 etc

Daniel Markovits

LinkedIn

Creator & Community Manager - EMEA

Grishin Robotics

Targeting Pre-Seed, Seed, Series A investments in the US and UK.

Grishin Robotics has invested in several category-defining companies including Ring (acquired by Amazon for $1B), Spin (personal mobility, acquired by Ford), Zipline (last-mile drone delivery), Starship (last-mile robot delivery), and Eero (smart home wi-fi system, acquired by Amazon).

Reach out if you're a stellar founder looking to gain traction!

Venture Scout

Minute Media

Enhanced new and existing traffic from social, organic, and referral sources. Developed and implemented tools and frameworks to drive growth. Proactively participated in design and execution of strategic partnerships outreach. Optimized quality and retention of the brand’s users, while improving monetisation margins.

• Boosted monetization margins from 10 to 30%.
• Executed partnership campaigns across 14 markets globally, including joint ventures and cross-content deals.
• Played an integral role in growing SEO/organic numbers from 5% to 30%.
• Ensuring the tools & frameworks to deliver our growth plans are in place both internally and externally.
• Cross-functional collaboration with the BI, product, legal, tech and commercial teams.

Head of Growth & Community

Managed brand’s Latin America growth and business development across all properties. Served as in charge of the brand’s content strategy on Facebook. Coordinated with the commercial and editorial team regarding the execution of campaigns.

• Boosted brand’s Latin America unique users by 500% to 15M a month.
• Developed and maintained relationship with BI, legal, product, tech, and commercial teams.

Latin America Growth and Partnerships Manager

• Assembled our influencer network from the ground up, onboarding 2000+ partners and reaching 1B+ digital impressions.
• Manage, support, and nurture strategic creators. Help these creators ramp up their sharing and audience growth while improving content quality.

Creator and Influencer Manager Lead

Created, edited, and organized engaging content for 90min’s social networks and mobile app. Developed and directed LatAm content team in Minute Media's flagship brand. Created content strategy and worked on actual deliverables. Ensured timely delivery on traffic targets set by management.

• Developed 2000+ pieces of content with over 100M reads.
• Served as in charge of initiating and defining process to administer strategic partnership efforts.

Content Manager

Adgorithms LTD

Directed a portfolio of over 30 clients across gaming and tech industries. Held the overall responsibilities for training and on-boarding of new clients. Delivered effective assistance to clients in developing and optimizing campaign strategies.

•	Boosted portfolio revenue by 50% to $5M ARR.
•	Reduced 20% churn by cultivating strong relationships.

Sr. Account Manager

Creators + Community + Sports @ LinkedIn | Venture Scout | I help CEOs, execs, VCs, athletes & brands stand out and build authority

I’m a community builder and strategist with a background in scaling creator programs, executing partnerships, and shaping content ecosystems across sports, finance, media, and tech.

At LinkedIn, I’ve been part of the editorial and product team shaping how top athletes, execs, creators, and brands show up on the platform. From onboarding Lewis Hamilton to launching scaled video programs and amplifying executives' voices through editorial campaigns, I’ve helped over 500+ high-impact members grow their audience and influence. I’ve also supported major product rollouts like collaborative articles and the new immersive video tab, bringing feedback from the community directly into product decisions.

Before LinkedIn, I led growth and partnerships at Minute Media across global markets — building out their influencer network from scratch (2000+ creators, 1B+ impressions), driving user growth across LatAm, and boosting monetization through SEO and cross-platform deals.

I didn’t start out planning this path. I just kept following what made me curious: how communities form, how content spreads, and how creators (and now athletes and execs) shape culture. That curiosity has led me across continents — from Tel Aviv to London — and through roles that have mixed editorial instinct, product feedback, talent strategy, and partnership growth.

I'm especially passionate about helping people show up more authentically online — not just for the algorithm, but for their community. If it sits at the intersection of storytelling, strategy, and real human connection, I’m probably already in it.

In short: I help people build a presence and a community that opens doors.

Co-Founder

Club created to serve as a continuous bond between the diaspora community and the State of Israel.

• Successful crowdfunding campaign & world wide media coverage
• 150+ players from 25 different countries 
• Currently in Liga Gimel (5th division) of the Israeli Football League

Dani Markovits

🚨 JUST IN: The streaming wars just ended

Netflix announced this morning it's acquiring Warner Bros., HBO, and HBO Max for $82.7 billion. 

What Netflix gets:
1/ Century of IP: Friends, The Sopranos,Game of Thrones, Harry Potter, the entire DC Universe (Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman) and much more...
2/ HBO's prestige brand
3/ Physical production capacity at WBD's global studio facilities

Potential implications: 
1/ Netflix just became a licensing monopoly
2/ The “Netflix is a tech company” era ends
3/ Streaming bundling becomes inevitable

Bank of America called it succinctly: 'If Netflix acquires Warner Bros., the streaming wars are effectively over'

One thing is certain: If regulators approve, Hollywood will never look the same.

CCO @ Shake Content | Ex LinkedIn | I help CEOs, execs, VCs & brands stand out and build authority on LinkedIn

After 4 years at LinkedIn and working with hundreds of executives, CEOs, and industry experts, I've heard the same fear over and over:

'I don't want to come across as promotional or cringy'

So they don't post. They don't share. They stay silent.

Here's what I've learned: The best LinkedIn content isn't promotional at all.
It's:
1/ The lessons you learned from a project that failed
2/ The counterintuitive insight from 10 years in your industry
3/ The question everyone's thinking but nobody's asking
4/ The honest take on where your field is heading

You don't need to talk about your product. You don't need to humble-brag. 
You just need to say something worth reading.

The executives with the biggest followings? 
They teach more than they sell
They share more than they pitch
They add value first.

But here's the thing...

If you DO want to occasionally post about your company, your product, or that award you just won? Do it anyway.

One promotional post among ten valuable ones isn't cringy.

We're allowed to be proud of our work. We're allowed to celebrate wins.

F*** it... You earned those medals.

This is Rony 🙌 

We met on LinkedIn two years ago. Last week I got the chance to visit her at Google's Tel Aviv office.

LinkedIn gets a bad rep for being transactional. But I believe this is one of the few places where you can build genuine relationships with people you'd never meet otherwise.

This platform isn't just for deals and job posts. It's for finding amazing people.

Shoutout to Rony for the invite... and to LinkedIn for making the world feel smaller.

Life hack: always start a presentation with a meme.

Not only does it instantly break the ice, but it completely flips the energy in the room. 

And for the session I ran yesterday, it helped set the tone that business, fundraising and brand-building don’t have to be stiff, corporate, or intimidating.

I spoke at 'Beyond the Pitch: Getting Noticed by Investors & Media' hosted by Startup Grind London – a brilliant night designed to help early-stage founders cut through the noise and build visibility.

Huge thank you to Elinor for bringing me in and hosting such a great event. I was joined by an excellent lineup: David Soffer, Jordan Mulvaney, Josh Hart, Isabelle O'Keeffe, Maria Markusjan, and 🤖Chloe Hall.

Some takeaways I shared with the group:
1/ Visibility is a proxy for credibility. Most investors don't have time to deep-dive every deck.. but they notice founders who consistently show up.
2/ You don’t need authority to get attention. You need clarity, confidence, and a perspective worth following.
3/ Storytelling isn’t a “nice to have”. It’s a commercial asset that drives intros, hires, partnerships, and demand.
4/ The founders who communicate early build momentum early. 

The meme was a joke - but the message wasn’t.

If you’re waiting for the perfect moment to start showing up on LinkedIn, you’re already late.

strongly held belief:

who follows you matters more than how many follow you

be known well, not well-known

Hot take: Content is now as important as code.

Balaji said it best on the Andreessen Horowitz podcast:

'The founding engineer is the how. The founding creator is the why'

In 2026, every company will (should) have:
1/ A founding engineer 
2/ A founding operator 
3/ And a founding creator (even if that 'role' isn't titled yet)

I am a bit biased but this is where LinkedIn comes in. It’s where founders build trust, distribution, and demand long before the product ships.

And this is exactly why we built Shake Content.

We’re helping founders become the leading voices in their categories.. turning their expertise, their story, and their point of view into visibility,  authority, and  momentum.

The companies that win won’t just have great products. They’ll have founders who can lead the conversation.

Most of us use AI wrong.

We ask for answers (outputs) when we should be asking for questions (inputs).

Asking AI for answers is like having someone lift the weights for you. 

(it looks productive.. but builds zero strength).

Questions > answers

Vegamour just created a role that didn't exist 6 months ago.

Chief LinkedIn Advisor

I've been tracking interesting roles popping up on LinkedIn lately. This one def. stand out. 

A beauty brand is investing executive-level resources into a single platform. They're not spreading thin across TikTok, Instagram, and Twitter. They're going all-in on LinkedIn.

VEGAMOUR hired Iryna Kremin, a longevity expert, to create 'science-backed conversations' for their community. They're treating LinkedIn like a media channel where credibility compounds.

Here's what this signals:
• LinkedIn is becoming a primary business channel, not a secondary one
• Companies are realising that trust-building happens in feeds, not just in ads
• Executive attention is shifting from 'we should post more' to 'we need a strategy here'

The brands/companies winning on LinkedIn in 2025 won't be the ones posting occasionally. They'll be the ones treating it like the business asset it is.

If a hair care company is hiring a Chief LinkedIn Advisor, what does that say about where your industry is heading?

The Big Shift for 2026

Brand building is no longer the job of the marketing team. It’s the job of every employee.

I just read an interesting NYT article that confirms what many of us are starting to see: the era of outsourcing brand credibility is ending.

Companies like Delta Air Lines, the LEGO Group, and DHL aren't just featuring their social media teams anymore. They're empowering engineers, maintenance techs, couriers, and designers to build the brand.

But here's what the article missed, and what I think is the real story for 2026:
LinkedIn is where this movement matters most.

While TikTok and Instagram get the viral moments, LinkedIn is where trust is built. When your software engineer shares insights about your product development process, when your customer service lead posts about solving a complex client challenge, when your logistics coordinator explains your supply chain innovations. 

People trust people more than logos.

Why this matters now:
→ B2B buyers are doing their research on LinkedIn, looking for authentic voices, not polished marketing 
→ Top talent evaluates companies based on employee voices, not career pages

The companies winning in 2026 won't be the ones with the best marketing team. They'll be the ones who've empowered every employee to share their expertise, their day-to-day realities, and their genuine enthusiasm for the work.

I don't think this isn’t just a trend. It’s a shift in how brands grow.

The best communities in the next decade won't be measured by member counts or engagement metrics.

They'll be measured by how people feel when they leave the room.

Hampton gets this. They just posted a job for a Retreat Manager.

Someone who maps dependencies, researches facilitators, scouts venues throughout the year, and designs run-of-shows with intention.

The specificity of the role is a huge signal 
(this is not the usual 'events manager' position)

For a decade, we chased (digital) scale. More members. Bigger Slack channels. Zoom calls with hundreds of faces nobody remembers.

The pendulum is swinging back... big time.

This role isn't about logistics. It's about creating the conditions where something actually happens between people.

You can't automate serendipity. 

Kudos to Anna (Cogswell) Kolwicz and the Hampton team.

Couldn’t be happier for my friend David Walsh and the entire Limelight team 🚀

They’re building the best B2B creator platform in the game... and this new funding round + product launch is just more proof of that momentum.

As a user, I can’t recommend Limelight enough. What they’re building is genuinely changing how brands understand influence and content-driven revenue.

Huge congrats to the whole team. I know they are just getting started.

Founder & CEO @ Limelight | B2B Creator Marketplace | 3x Founder | MBA Mentor

Today I’m announcing our $2,100,000 funding round 🎉💰
And a HUGE NEW PRODUCT LAUNCH!! ...

Our brand new AI agent for Social Listening is live.

It can:

→ Research your company
→ Precisely define your ICP
→ Identify all of your competitors

Then automatically surface buyer intent from social content and turn it into sales pipeline. 

Early users are raving about it already!!

And just a few weeks ago,
We won the Global Pitch Competition!
On stage at SaaStock (€1M prize money)

THIS. IS. WHAT. MOMENTUM. LOOKS. LIKE.

Here’s why investors are loving Limelight

👇🏼👇🏼

Everyone is talking about personality-led marketing.

- Niche B2B creators are stealing trust.
- Employees are becoming mini media brands.
- Buyers follow PEOPLE, not 40-page whitepapers.

But the problem - up until now?

Everyone KNOWS influence drives revenue.

Yet nobody can measure it.

So budgets have stayed trapped in paid ads & cold outbound.

Limelight SOLVES this problem.

We’re showing brands - how CONTENT drives REVENUE.

We are making influence marketing performance-based.

So brands can track:

🔎 Which post led to $142,000 in pipeline
🔎 Which creator drove 237 product signups
🔎 Which campaign closed $1.9M new business.

(All REAL Limelight case studies! 📈)

We’re turning B2B influence from a “nice-to-have branding play” into a scalable revenue engine.

Big SHOUT out to our new investors for believing in us

Amit at SNR (led the round!) 
Eran at Savyon Ventures 
Kenneth at BackFuture
Kaan at First Degree 
Josh at OpenSky 
Kirby at Ascend

And many others like Ran Makavy, Gert Lanckriet, Suhit Gupta, Amir Ashkenazi, Mike Head, Eli Schwartz, Tom Waddington, Dan Murray🧠, Garrett Scott, Michel Lieben 🧠 & Alex Vacca 🧠🛠️.

A group of incredible operators/investors who know personality-led growth will define the next decade of GTM.

What’s next?

Goal remains the same:
→ Hit $10M ARR with a team of 10.

This funding round lets us:

⚡ Build even faster
⚡ Hire a few elite engineers + AMs
⚡ Push deeper into creator-based attribution
⚡ Power influencer programs for every GTM org

Huge gratitude to my tiny but might team Youngjae JI, Demir Capan, Blas C. and Janine Bulao. 

And most importantly...

The creators and brands (HubSpot, Webflow, Clay + 100s more) who are building this category WITH us 💪🏼

THIS IS JUST THE START.

PS. if you sign up as a new customer in the next 48 hours you get your 2nd month free! (DM me and I will do it for you)

taplio

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The Battle

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Dani Markovits

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Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Greg Isenberg's LinkedIn Performance

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