Text.ai

What do they actually do

Text.ai is a lightweight AI you add as a phone contact or chat bot to your existing group and 1:1 threads. It works in SMS (US/Canada), WhatsApp, and Telegram, so there’s nothing new to install or sign up for—save the vCard, add it to a chat, and start texting. In chat, it answers questions, runs slash-style commands, and can step in when it thinks a group needs help. Common uses today include settling debates and recommendations (e.g., restaurants), setting group reminders, quick factual Q&A, and creating/editing images in the thread. The site also links to a Yelp/reservations flow for restaurant suggestions and booking handoff (site FAQ).

It supports explicit commands like /image, /reminder, /nickname, /invite, /reset, /help, /personalize, and /feedback, and it tries to behave “ambiently” in groups—offering help without being @-mentioned when appropriate. The free tier caps usage at up to 7 messages per 12 hours. Text.ai reports “thousands” of users, 6M+ messages exchanged, and 60,000+ images created (site FAQ).

The team’s roadmap is to move from answers to actions: letting the bot complete tasks from inside the chat (restaurant reservations, purchases, calendar booking), and to build group-first intelligence that adapts to each member’s preferences. They already expose a Purchase/Stripe link and call out upcoming integrations for bookings, calendars, and payments (YC site).

Who are their target customer(s)

• Friends deciding plans in group chats: Long back-and-forths when picking restaurants or activities; need neutral suggestions and a way to lock a decision (ideally reserve) without leaving the chat.
• Family organizers (parents coordinating schedules): Hard to track who’s coming, tasks, and timelines; need reminders and simple RSVP/sharing inside the family chat to keep everyone on track.
• Small social organizers (book clubs, rec sports, roommates): Juggle availability, split payments, and tasks across many people; need low-effort polls, reminders, and commitment collection in one place.
• International or dispersed friend groups on WhatsApp/Telegram: Timezone friction and local info gaps; need localized suggestions and scheduling that respect different time zones and contexts.
• People who won’t install another app or create new accounts: Avoid app bloat and privacy risk; prefer a contact/bot that works directly in existing SMS/WhatsApp/Telegram threads.

How would they acquire their first 10, 50, and 100 customers

• First 10: Use founders’ own family and friend groups to add the vCard, sit in on chats, waive limits, and provide hands-on support. Capture logs and do 1:1 feedback calls to fix issues that block decisions (e.g., picking and booking a restaurant).
• First 50: Seed tight communities that already run on chat (dorms, local parent groups, sports teams, meetup organizers). Run small guided pilots with a short how-to and a promo for the group’s first booking; add a simple referral ask to add Text.ai to one more chat.
• First 100: Showcase working reservation/RSVP flows via a few local restaurant/venue and club/meetup partnerships. Turn pilots into short case studies and self-serve invite templates so group admins can add the bot and invite members without founder involvement.

What is the rough total addressable market

Top-down context:

Text.ai sits where social planning already happens—group chats on SMS (US/CA), WhatsApp, and Telegram (FAQ). Incumbents are adding assistants directly into chat surfaces (e.g., Meta AI in WhatsApp; Gemini in Google Messages), which suggests chat-native AI is a mainstream user behavior, not a niche (Meta AI overview Google support: Gemini in Messages).

Bottom-up calculation:

Illustrative scenario: if the product monetizes at roughly $6/month per active group (one payer covers a group) and ultimately reaches 1.5 million paying groups globally, that’s ~$108M in ARR. A nearer-term wedge could be 20,000 paying groups across a handful of metros (e.g., 200,000 active groups with a 10% conversion) for ~$1.4M ARR.

Assumptions:

• Pricing is a simple subscription near $6/month per paying group; one payer unlocks usage for the whole chat.
• There are tens of millions of recurring planning-oriented group chats across WhatsApp/Telegram/SMS; 1.5M is a plausible long-run paying subset.
• Conversion improves as the bot moves from recommendations to completing actions (booking, payments) inside chat.

Who are some of their notable competitors

• Meta AI (in WhatsApp/Instagram/Messenger): Free, built-in assistant you can prompt inside WhatsApp, Instagram, and Facebook Messenger; users can chat with it or invoke it in chats with friends (overview).
• Google Gemini in Google Messages: Users can chat with Gemini directly in Google Messages to draft, brainstorm, and plan; Google is rolling it out widely with RCS support (Google support).
• Snapchat My AI: A GPT-powered assistant embedded in Snapchat that users (especially younger demographics) interact with in 1:1 and group contexts (coverage).
• Telegram Bots Platform: Official bot framework for Telegram; thousands of third-party GPT-style bots operate in 1:1 and group chats on the same surface where Text.ai competes.
• Doodle (polls and scheduling): Widely used group polling/scheduling tool for plans and meetings; not chat-native, but competes for the same decision-making moments by moving groups out of chat into a shared poll.