Last year, I met Hasan online. I was impressed by what he had achieved - growing a community of over 500k followers (Linkedin + X + Newsletter) in just a few months.
That kind of growth doesn’t happen by chance, it takes both talent and strategy.
What struck me even more was his kindness, and humility. That’s when I knew I wanted to collaborate with him.
Hasan Toor profile
The birth of an Idea
When you’re looking to build something—whether it’s a side hustle or a full-time business—it’s important to identify a gap or a need. For Hasan, his community was deeply passionate about AI and productivity hacks.
As for me, I use Google Sheets every day to manage data, workflows, and tasks.
That’s when the idea hit us: What if we combined AI with Google Sheets?
At first glance, it might not seem revolutionary, but the best ideas often aren’t. They’re simply about making something people already use more efficient, more intuitive, or more powerful.
In our case, we realized that people spend countless hours on Google Sheets, and by integrating AI, we could help them save time, automate tedious tasks, and unlock new ways to handle data.
Here’s the first lesson for anyone building a business: It’s not always about inventing something completely new. Often, it’s about improving or transforming something people already rely on. That’s exactly what we aimed to do with Cortexsheet.