BA
Use cases / Research
Bagel Bot
Researches and desks a local newsletter. You still edit and send.
Author names, descriptions and prompts are preserved as published. Need a starting point? Read the bot selection guide →
The story behind this use case
Billy Howell sends the Arlington Bagel to 6,000 Arlingtonians every Thursday. His cousin Marshall used to research it, assemble it, edit it, and man the email desk. Marshall left for a summer camp with no internet. The paper now runs on six Grok Bots: a chief of staff, research, sales, a Beehiiv specialist, a social lead, and an inbox monitor. Billy sets direction and approves the work. Payroll is the Grok Bot bill.
Greg Isenberg wrote the setup up for the Startup Ideas Podcast. The sequence is the point. Hire a chief of staff first, point it at Notion, Slack, and Gmail, and ask which three seats drive revenue. Run those seats for a week before you hire more. Promote a job only after the chief of staff has done it once and you have reviewed it. Cut the seats that idle. Manage by a five-line end-of-day report, not a document.
Sales is where the paper made the money back. The inbox Bot watched Gmail and surfaced a local bagel shop owner Billy had missed. He and his wife went over the next morning, ate free bagels, and talked sponsorship. The sales Bot priced every ad slot against the market and built a sheet he could hand to a local business. Outbound stays tiny on purpose: five prospects on Monday, three custom packages, drafts only. Nothing goes out on its own. Sales asks chief of staff; chief of staff brings it to Billy; Billy edits in Gmail and sends.
One company, one shared computer, one human with judgment. He spent days in the weeds before the routines carried the load. Autonomy came later.
Source: Greg Isenberg / Startup Ideas Podcast article on X, Aug 21, 2026, about Billy Howell's Arlington Bagel.
Screenshots & demos
Prompt
This reference prompt was supplied by its author. Review it before giving it to your agent.
Walk me through connecting Gmail, Notion, Slack, and the newsletter platform (Beehiiv or equivalent) on this shared computer. Then save yourself as Chief of Staff for this one company. Take stock of the business from those sources and name the top three Bots we should create first to drive revenue. I approve the roster before anyone else is hired. Standing jobs once the seats exist: - Inbox monitor: watch Gmail for inbound that looks like a sponsor, advertiser, or partnership. Surface it with a suggested slot. Do not reply. - Sales: price our existing ad slots against the market and our growth, keep a sales sheet, and draft outbound. Monday only: add five prospects, pick the top three, build a custom package, draft the email. Hand the draft to me through Chief of Staff. - Research: fill Notion cards from the source list. Do not publish the issue. - Beehiiv specialist: platform questions only. - Social lead: graphics and the content calendar, then a five-line end-of-day report. Every Bot files a five-line report: what you made, what is new, what blocks you. Chief of Staff rolls that into one view. Longer reports are a token bill. Hard stop: do not send email, post, enroll anyone, change prices live, or publish the newsletter. Drafts go to Chief of Staff, then to me. I edit in Gmail and I send. If an inbound is ambiguous, ask. After the first clean week, save the sales draft loop as a skill and offer a Monday prospects routine that stops at the review list.