In this episode of BizBlend, host Sana talks with Mykyta Chernenko, founder of AIWriteBook, about building an AI platform that helps people plan, write, and finish full length books, all while holding down a full time tech career. Mykyta shares why he and his co-founder moved from a profitable but uninspiring AI romance book business into building tools for authors, the pricing mistakes that taught them who their real customers were, and how a patient, year-long SEO strategy, not paid ads, grew the platform to more than fourteen thousand people starting a book on the platform. The conversation also digs into what AI can and cannot replace in creative writing, and how to build a bootstrapped startup alongside a demanding day job.

About the Guest:

Mykyta Chernenko is a tech co-founder, AI practitioner, and author of two books, based in Oslo, Norway. He is the founder of Odd Problems, the small team behind AIWriteBook, an AI platform that helps authors plan, write, and finish full length fiction and nonfiction books end to end. More than 240 million words and around 4,500 published manuscripts have come through the platform so far. Odd Problems has also built other consumer products including Nemlys, a relationship app that reached 300,000-plus users organically before being acquired, and NanoReads, an AI fiction platform.

Key Takeaways:

• AI can now write fiction that is largely indistinguishable from human-authored text, but the best results still come from heavy human steering of structure, character arcs, and creative decisions.
• A pricing experiment that targeted lower-intent, lower-paying customers actually decreased revenue. Chasing a broader audience with a cheaper price point attracted buyers who were not truly committed to the problem being solved.
• Pricing higher for a smaller, more committed audience, such as ghost writers or small publishing houses, can be easier to sustain than chasing many low-value monthly subscribers.
• SEO growth takes real time. It took close to a year of consistent work on content quality, domain rating, and backlinks before results compounded.
• Talking directly to users and understanding their full workflow, not just the core writing step, was a key differentiator against competitors who built in a vacuum.
• Running a startup alongside a full time job works best when it is genuinely enjoyable rather than treated as an obligatory second job.

Connect With Mykyta Chernenko:

LinkedIn: Mykyta Chernenko

Company: oddproblems.com

Product: aiwritebook.com

Chapters:

00:00 Cold open: 14,000 people started a book with zero paid ads

00:25 Welcome and guest introduction

02:04 Why Mykyta built an AI platform for authors

08:13 Quality gaps, pushback, and where AI still needs human steering

11:54 Pricing mistakes: chasing the wrong audience with a lower price

16:00 Why pricing higher can mean an easier business

16:39 The real SEO playbook behind 14,000-plus book starts

20:00 Why SEO takes patience most bootstrapped founders do not have

21:42 Balancing a startup with a full time tech career

23:25 Advice for founders building alongside a day job

24:34 Where to connect with Mykyta and AIWriteBook

25:32 Closing thoughts

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