How I Beat McKinsey as a One-Person Shop

<p>How do you compete with McKinsey and BCG when you&#39;re a one-person consulting shop? Yogesh Chavda spent five years floundering between enterprise giants and contractor pricing until generative AI cracked the game wide open.</p><p>In this episode, Yogesh (founder of Y2S Consulting, co-founder of Yogi AI, former marketing &amp; insights leader at Pinterest and Spotify) breaks down the exact 3-year playbook he used to build a reputation, land partnerships, and turn a stuck consultancy into a productized AI business with 40+ tools.</p><p>🎯 What you&#39;ll learn:</p><ul><li>How to stay 6 months ahead of every AI trend (the signal-spotting system)</li><li>Why TikTok and 100+ newsletters beat traditional B2B research</li><li>The 3-part trust formula: give first, build relationships, over-deliver</li><li>How to pivot from selling hours to selling products</li><li>Why &quot;strategy consulting&quot; is a trap for solo operators</li><li>How a single breakfast meeting led to funding for Yogi AI</li></ul><p>⏱️ Chapters:00:00 Intro — Breaking through the noise01:08 The McKinsey vs. contractor trap02:36 Picking your AI swim lane03:43 How to stay 6 months ahead05:21 The TikTok algorithm hack for B2B07:44 The 3-part trust formula11:24 Why services don&#39;t scale (and products do)16:36 Industry recognition and awards17:35 Building a podcast and newsletter from scratch21:36 The breakfast that launched Yogi AI23:39 Authentic networking that actually works25:32 Final advice for solo founders</p><p>🔑 Key topics: AI consulting, solo entrepreneurship, personal branding, agentic AI, marketing insights, synthetic data, productized services, thought leadership, LinkedIn growth</p><p>👤 Guest: Yogesh Chavda — Founder, Y2S Consulting | Co-founder, Yogi AI | Top 250 Global Consumer Insights Leader (SOMAR)</p><p>🎙️ Host: Catherine Jelinek</p><p>#AIConsulting #SoloEntrepreneur #AIMarketing #PersonalBrand #ThoughtLeadership #AgenticAI #ConsultingBusiness #StartupStory</p>