Why I built LetterlAIne

I’m Lucas Freitag, and my professional work focuses on digital products, requirements engineering and AI applications. LetterlAIne did not begin as a theoretical product idea or as an attempt to build the broadest possible portfolio project. It began with my own job search.

I realised that writing a single cover letter was not the real problem. The harder part was keeping the context together: What does a particular role actually require? Which of my experiences fits? Which statement can I support? What have I already prepared, sent or learned in a conversation?

At first, like many people, I used documents, notes, spreadsheets and separate AI chats. That was manageable for one application. With several parallel processes, however, information was soon duplicated or scattered across different places. Good wording was hard to find again, and some AI suggestions sounded convincing even though they were not connected to a specific experience.

LetterlAIne grew from that need. The centre of the product is not an empty text field but the specific role. The application organises requirements from the posting, connects them with relevant experience and helps prepare a coherent application. AI can organise, compare and suggest wording. The user still decides what is actually used.

The first version of LetterlAIne tried to show many things at once. Alongside role analysis and application preparation, it put the pipeline, follow-ups, interview practice, offer comparison, different AI services and technical safeguards front and centre. Every function had a reason to exist. Together, however, they made the core of the product harder to understand.

Feedback from testers was especially valuable for that reason. It showed me that the product needed a clearer priority, not more explanation. The public story now focuses on three steps: understanding the role, matching your experience and preparing the application. Other functions remain part of the product but appear when they become relevant in the application process.

My work on the product has changed as well. Quick individual ideas have become clearer workflows. Changes are now judged more directly by whether they make the application process easier to understand. I use LetterlAIne myself, collect feedback from the closed beta and revise functions wherever they are still unnecessarily complicated in everyday use.

LetterlAIne is therefore neither a finished mass-market product nor merely a design concept. It is an active product project in which I am turning a real problem of my own into a useful application, step by step.

The next step is not to add as many new functions as possible. What matters more is making the core more reliable, understandable and helpful.