Together Digital Power Lounge, Women in Digital with Power to Share

How To Leverage AI In Marketing

Chief Empowerment Officer, Amy Vaughan

Welcome to The Power Lounge! Today, dive into artificial intelligence in marketing with guest Pam Didner, a B2B consultant and author. Explore how companies like Google and Amazon use AI for recommendation engines and search optimization. Learn about generative AI tools like ChatGPT in creative fields such as copywriting. Pam shares insights on optimizing AI prompts for marketing, blending AI with human expertise. Discover the potential of AI agents in automating tasks, focusing on data quality and analyzing data for insights. Whether you're an AI enthusiast or a marketer, this episode offers practical insights for navigating AI and marketing.

Connect with Pam:

Guest LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/pamdidner/

Guest Instagram: Instagram (@pam_didner)

Guest Website: Pam Didner B2B Speaker and Consultant

Episode Timestamps:

00:00 - Introduction

00:52 - Skill and Gift Exploration for Success

10:05 - Navigating Digital Tech: Pros and Cons

15:43 - Task Efficiency: AI Agents for Automation

18:51 - Empowering Education: Women and AI Knowledge

22:34 - Crafting Headlines: Unveiling Essentials

29:31 - Controversial OpenAI Public Offering

32:23 - Vision of Tomorrow: Easing Today's Turmoil

38:31 - Data for Enhanced Customer Engagement

46:31 - Tailored Communication with Targeted Audiences

52:08 - Human Touch: AI and Experienced Marketers

53:59 - CrewAI: Enhancing Tech Company Functions

01:02:40 - Outro

Quote of the Episode:

"Combine human creativity with AI precision for effective email subject lines."- Pam Didner

"Avoid generic prompts; place it in the right context for meaningful impact."  - Pam Didner

Support the show

Speaker 1:

Hello everyone and welcome to our weekly Power Lounge. This is your place to hear authentic conversation from those who have power to share. My name is Amy Vaughn and I am the owner and chief empowerment officer of Together Digital, a diverse and collaborative community of women who work in digital and choose to share their knowledge, power and connections. You can join the movement at togetherindigitalcom and today I'm thrilled to introduce all of you and to have joined with us for this next hour, an hour of insight, inspiration and empowerment. We are going to dive into a topic that's pretty much on every marketer's mind right now, and that is how to leverage AI in what we do In a world where AI is rapidly evolving. It's not about replacement, ladies and gents. It is about enhancement, where we're here today to explore how you can harness the power of AI to supercharge your marketing strategies and drive better results.

Speaker 1:

Our special guest today, pam Diener, is a B2B consultant, speaker and author with a wealth of experience in strategic planning, account-based marketing and sales enablement. Pam has written not one, not two, not three, but five business books. She just, you know, does all the things and then, in her spare time, writes all the books, including, very recently, the Modern AI Marketer in the GPT era. So we are in for a treat. It is definitely something worth checking out and grabbing. It is a great tool and resource. It's not going to take you forever to read. It is going to be something easy. It's not going to take you forever to read. It is going to be something easy and quick to digest, with some fantastic prompts, something that you can take and start to put into action right away. So over the next hour, we're going to unpack AI's role in marketing, dispel some of those myths about job replacement I know it's a crazy market out there right now and we're having to shift and change and embrace a lot and we're going to discuss how you can adapt your approach to AI for maximum impact.

Speaker 1:

All right, remember, folks, we've got our live listening audience here with us today. We love it that you are here with us. You keep us all honest and you keep us all authentic as we have our conversation here today. So, live listening audience, please feel free to use the chat, ask us questions, let us know how you're feeling. We are all on this ride along together, so let's listen and learn and grow with one another. Pam, welcome to the Power Lounge. We're excited to have you here with us today.

Speaker 2:

Amy, thank you so much for having me. I'm so excited to be here. It's wonderful, it's live.

Speaker 1:

Yes, for having me. I'm so excited to be here. It's wonderful, it's live. Yes, I know right, we're going right for it. Going right for it, and you know for those who don't know you maybe as well as I do you have had an impressive career as a b2b consultant, speaker and author, and I would love for those who are listening to hear a little bit more about you and your career journey so far, to hear a little bit more about you and your career journey so far.

Speaker 2:

Yeah Well, I'm not a typical B2B marketing person.

Speaker 2:

I'm actually have, kind of like a twist of fate, career change, if you will. So I'm actually was a CPA and I went to a dark side to become a marketer Yep, so I work in a big corporation for a long period of time, and way back then they actually encouraged us to move around and I was, very fortunate, started with the finance and accounting and then moved to operations and then supply chain management, purchasing, and somehow landed a job doing event operations because I'm very good at operations. So that manager hired me to actually do event operations and somehow that led to trade showing events, which I did for four years. So if any one of you are doing trade showing events, salute. It's a hard job and, amy, you know pretty well if you do the event, you know exactly what I'm talking about.

Speaker 2:

And then from there, I made a transition to doing marketing strategy as part of the COVID marketing team and set up a direction marketing direction and campaign direction for the regional marketing team. So and I left that job. It was great, but I left in 2014. And in the past 10 years I've been on my own.

Speaker 1:

I love it. I love asking this first question because it really, again, every episode reemphasizes the nonlinear direction that every successful woman's career takes. I think for those who are early in their career, mid career, in a career crisis, it might feel look at your collective experience, all of your skills are transferable, and I love how your company encouraged that, because I know not all companies do.

Speaker 2:

I was very lucky yeah.

Speaker 1:

That's fantastic and I love. I love hearing that background because sometimes you learn things, even people that you know. You're like, oh didn't know CPA. But then broadening those skills and taking, taking, taking and embracing all of your abilities and all of your gifts. And you know, running with that usually lands you where you are absolutely meant to be. All right, let's talk about.

Speaker 1:

Let's talk about the books you know, the, the the modern marketing, the modern AI marketer guide to gen AI prompts that you have beautifully displayed there behind you. For those of you who like to see the books, yay, go check it out. Kaylee, so amazing, has also dropped that into the chat for our live listeners to take a look at those who are viewing after listening afterwards, be sure to check it out in the show notes as well. You say that mastering AI prompting is no longer optional. I think a lot of us listening would have to agree, and those of us who are listening or aren't there yet will soon be convinced. When did you realize that this shift was happening in the marketing world?

Speaker 2:

I think I started talking about AI back in 2019.

Speaker 2:

So I just want to put things in perspective. Chatgpt was launched on November 30th 2022. Yeah, and within five days five days it hit 1 million users. 1 million, and when I found out it hit 1 million users, I was like, wow, I need to check this out. Yeah, and then, of course, within less than two months, it hit 100 million users. So everybody was going to chat GPT, which is kind of starting up this Jan AI, you know revolution if you will. And then they just stop asking questions. Why chat GPT is captivating is it gives you one answer One, if you do. You know it's kind of like Google search, right, you're asking Google for questions, for answers as well, but you have to sift through. You know many articles. You have to read it. Do you know how much work that is? So much work?

Speaker 1:

And then we know we're getting sold to right to because, like the first page, is all sponsored anymore. What are you?

Speaker 2:

doing Right. So everybody was like asking questions and I was like, oh my god, there's an answer. You can ask pretty much any questions. You can relate a coding question, you can ask him about IDA, your birthday party. You can ask anything marketing related. You get answered. The answer is good or bad. You know, you need to be a judge, you need to make a judgment call, but one answer is that instant gratification, oh yeah.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, it's like the marketer's magic eight ball.

Speaker 2:

That's right. Yeah, it is Because I was saying. I was saying, like you know what this is all BFF.

Speaker 1:

Uh-huh, yeah, yeah, and I mean as early as 2019, that's really interesting that you kind of caught on that early and was like, okay, this is something we need to be paying attention to. Was there any initial fear for you in that, or are you kind of one of those people that you're like, ah no no, actually.

Speaker 2:

Um, that's a great question, to be honest, and a lot of things, or a lot of research. I started doing that's because I have event organizers, so people, clients, that come to me and say, hey, can you look into this? So I actually have an event organizer come to me and say, hey, can you look into this? So I actually have an event organizer come to me and say, can you talk about AI? And I was like sure, no problem. And I turned around I was like I don't know what I'm going to say, I just don't know.

Speaker 2:

But you know, then I started doing research and way back then you know, it's not I don't, I call it like the chat GPT kind of launch the consumerization of AI. But way before them that people can actually use the algorithm or use a large language model to actually take advantage of AI is big companies like Google, like Amazon, you know, like, for example, the great example of ai is when you buy something on amazon, they have the recommendation. You like this. Therefore, you will like these two and I'll check it out right. So the the ai usage model I was using is more kind of like enterprise applications, yep and uh, less on kind of like how the marketer can apply to it. Okay, and then, of course, uh, after chat, gbt generative, the whole world changed.

Speaker 1:

Generative yeah, I think generative really lit the spark. I think a lot of us kind of didn't really understand what ai was and how much it was actually like in the background of our lives as marketers and being leveraged as a tool, I mean even in like creative applications and, you know, like image editing and things like that. Yeah, we don't realize how much it was in the background. But then we think ai and it's like all generative, it's our all lmlm and it's like um large language models and it's not so much in the space of you know, other technologies. I think oftentimes we forget We've become so consumed with just that, we kind of take it for granted.

Speaker 2:

We do For a long time. The AI is really behind the scenes. It's something that you cannot touch, you cannot smell, but it is working there for a long period of time. It is, for example, the Google search. I mean, google continuously optimized the Google search mechanism. Yeah, the machine learning, before you have to type the whole sentence.

Speaker 1:

Now you just have two words and, yes, the predictive text exactly, and that's, that's ai in the work it is, it is and I think it does a lot too for the sake of like, personalization and just like creating efficiencies and things like that. I mean, we get into and break down a whole mess of things as to like how it's helpful but how it's harmful, but at the end of the day it's. I think you know, again, I'm like a digital gal, sort of through and through. So for me, I think a lot of it was like this odd fascination that probably a lot of people felt when, like in the sixties, when we were trying to go to the moon, you know, it's like wow, where will this take us? What will?

Speaker 1:

this mean and it wasn't really for me even being like a background, like my background's copywriting, and I mean that's straight what AI? Generative? You know, generative AI is coming for it's like it's those who write, but then I'm also looking at it going okay. But now people who aren't by trade writers now have the ability to actually storytell you know I don't.

Speaker 2:

I do agree with that. I do agree with that and um. So if you are a copywriter, I definitely feel there is a threat and the entrance of like ai can write faster and quicker. That doesn't mean you know AI can write better Agreed, and you need to be. You need to understand your brand, you need to understand your product. You also need to understand your audience, yes, and you know what tone and manner will make them click. And you have that knowledge. Ai doesn't. The only way AI can have that knowledge is through prompts, through your direction of guiding them. So it's still coming from your expertise. So I cannot generate anything magically. Yeah, it can, but you still have to give them that direction, the guidance.

Speaker 1:

It's going to be very vanilla otherwise, which leads beautifully into the next question that I have for you is you know, in your book you've included over 75 prompts in 12 sales and marketing categories. Yeah, there it is again. Great product placement, I love it. Can you share all of those 75? Because we don't want to give them all away. We're not giving them all away for free here today, folks. Can you share one with one prompt that you think would make that every marketer should have in their toolkit?

Speaker 2:

I think if you are using, I would say, the AI prompts right now a lot of you are using for, like, you do a social media post and you're going to write something and then you're going to ask, like a chat, gpt or AI prompt to rewrite it, you know, just to make sure that it's grammatically correct or there's another way to say it better. So I think the one that everybody tends to use right now, as far as I can tell, and you can tell me otherwise, is um, social media posting, right, so it's just like rewrite it and then make it better and honestly, you don't like on linkedin, you don't even have to get out to chat gbt, you don't.

Speaker 2:

Yeah they built it in and say rewrite with ai and actually try that. I don't think it was that good, but anyway, that's just me, okay, thank you.

Speaker 1:

So you are the copywriter and you validated my point of view.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and um so um. I think the writing part of it is probably where majority of people or the marketers are using that for like writing a blog or whatnot, and by I do actually have a point of view.

Speaker 2:

There's a lot of things you can do. Like I said I created this is only 50 pages, not, you know, you can. I can tell you, just go to chapter three. Yeah, that's great, I love it. All the comments and it's like divided by uh 12 sales and marketing categories, and I write basically like, for example, I need a social media post for my organization, you talk about your company name and that's public. Write a post for you know, social media platform, which one on this topic? For that topic you should give a little bit more detail. Yes, in a specific number of character. That's assumed that you only have to use. You know, like uh 228 characters or less. You can provide that specific instruction. Write it in some sort of tone, in conversational. A blog writing, formal, business writing, right, in certain tone, right, so you can specify that. Include a call to action in the end, and then you specify code of action yep, so. So the way I write every single prompt is um, it's kind of like a paraphrase, yeah, or paragraph. I love that.

Speaker 1:

You can replace and add additional information to it, yeah, and the more specific you can get, the better. And what I've done is I've begun to just kind of keep those like saved and paste it and just to kind of like plop them back in, because I'm going to use the same sort of prompts sort of over and over and over again. And I've definitely found that, like you know, you can train your AI and we'll get into this at some point too. I've got a guest coming soon talking about AI agents, which I'm not sure if you're super familiar with AI agents yet.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I'm familiar with it. You can actually create an AI agent and, yes, to do that. The bottom line is, amy, can I take over what you just said?

Speaker 1:

Elaborate a little more. Yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 2:

Like, for example, amy has this beautiful live, you know podcasting. And then she, every single time she does this podcast, she has to come up with the title. And then she, every single time she does this podcast, she has to come up with the title, she has to come with the meta description, right, and these are like repetitive tasks for every single episode. So there is a problem that has been written for you know to come up with a better title, to come up with metadata and a description, so that description or that prompt doesn't change. You can actually create a customized agent or customize a personal system that just focus on these two tasks. So when you just have to change, maybe you know the title and or give a little bit information about this specific episode and then that agent will create same the, the topic for you, because it's repetitive tasks and you build an agi, a ai agent for it. So you kind of automate, if you think about it, that specific process yep, I was like, oh my god, this is so good.

Speaker 1:

It is so good. Well, because it's, it's like that next phase, right, it's that next step. So many of us are kind of. It's maybe a little hard to get your head around, but I love the way you just explained it so much, pam, and it's like it's also I'd like to explain it as like a toolkit right, like you wouldn't grab a hammer out of a toolbox to tighten a screw, right Thanks. Box to tighten a screw right, thanks, thumbs up. You would. You want to grab, you know, a screwdriver to do that and you're not going to, you know, grab, build a tool to do that, to screw in the screw every time, the screwdriver. You're going to want to just have the tool already built, you know. So it's like that's what an agent is. It's like literally having a screwdriver already set and already made.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, because you are using that same screw, you know, every single time. So that's built, that's ultimately that process to make it easier. So, amy, doesn't have to think all the time like, oh, my god, I'm talking to pam, about ai. So what should the title be right and the same problems over and over.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and it's so great too, because once you've like and I mean you know you've got processes out there too that will help you kind of build and create your. And I've seen this too I was at a black tech week here in Cincinnati a couple months ago and there was a guy there talking about like building out and programming agents for doing even like financial reporting and finance work, talking to a CPA here. So like there's a lot of stuff not just marketing tasks, even now that can actually be automated and done to a certain degree.

Speaker 1:

Obviously, you have to keep what they call like the human in the loop to check for like error and processing, and management Because, as these agents like there's again, not to break anybody's brain, here we're getting a little off topic, but I start to nerd out these agents can actually like work across, like collaborate and work with each other and actually oversight with one another to some degree, apparently, within some technologies and platforms I'm hearing about and seeing which again, not to break anybody's brain, but here's the thing. It's like it's important for us to hear, see and learn about these things because, at the end of the day, this is just how our work is evolving. Right, and if you think about it, it used to be that you know generations before we built cars and things by hand and then there came a time when we got out of the assembly line and machines started being the things Thinking over Yep, it's kind of that same revolution. You know what I'm saying? It is, it absolutely is. So, all of the work that you're doing, I love that you're creating content for folks that feels digestible and specific and actionable, and so when you were talking about creating these books and sharing them and I got my hands on them, I was like we have to have her on the podcast because I know this is such a big topic for a lot of our women out there that are members, and then those who are listening to the podcast and it's.

Speaker 1:

It can feel overwhelming and it can feel daunting, because maybe you aren't as big of a nerd about this as maybe you and me, and that's totally fine and you don't have to be. But, like, how can we empower you with a little bit more education and information so that you can, um, kind of get your your hands on to the stuff so that you can move forward as well? Let's talk about a little bit more of about prompting and how your book emphasizes the importance of building, because we're kind of still on that topic of prompting and building sequences of AI prompts. Talk us a little bit through, because agents kind of fall into that space too right? Could you talk us through an example of how the sequential approach works in practice? Maybe?

Speaker 1:

building even off the social media, one if you want, or give another example, whichever so in this book, especially uh especially I did talk about.

Speaker 2:

They are a different uh prompting technique.

Speaker 2:

This is actually on page 10. So there's a chain of thought prompting which is you have a specific thought and so you build a question kind of ask like hey, what is commercial banking? And then the next question is like what is you know? Then they will give you a lot of information and then one of them is line of credit. And then you move on, say what is line of credit? And then then maybe next one, you say how can I apply? You know, it's the chain of thought, right. And then the other one is called treat of thought. It's basically it's expansion on the chain of thought prompting by asking the model to generate multiple potential steps, like line of credit. So how do I apply? Like, can you give me the steps? What do I need to do? Right? And so there are many different type of prompting techniques. It's kind, even though I this is more kind of like I provided the technique options, but set this aside. Just put that away.

Speaker 2:

The thing about the chat, gbt or any kind of GAN AI at this time is you can carry conversations. That's how you need to think about it. Don't think about any kind of the. You know the technique option I mentioned. It's no use, that's academia. So you think about it. When they build a sequence you don't really have to like. Oh my God, let me think about it first. What I need to talk to AI? No, it's not. It's more or less like you have this specific question. The AI is not answering the way you want it. Yeah, okay, now you have to think about it. How can I write it a little bit differently?

Speaker 2:

or and or they are answering this and it's like it's not really that. I don't know. I I need to write it. What is this? Or can you explain a little bit more? You know those like very conversational type of uh text, yeah, or how we communicate with the real humans. You can write those and carry that conversation forward Like that's, for example, just like you said, the social media posts, for example. So you write a social media post but you're like I don't know. Then there are certain things you need to. You can say rewrite you know the two sentences. Or you can say no, I need sentences. Or you can say no and you change my code of action to this make it stronger. So that is the sequencing I'm talking about. You can carry the conversation forward right and help them understand a little bit more and they keep forward yeah, I think one one.

Speaker 1:

I don't know if this would count as sequencing per se and you can tell me if it is or not, but like I will do it to help generate um, because, gosh, as a copywriter it's got thrown on me all the time as a junior copywriter, and those of you who are out there listening that are in that space you'll empathize. They're like write me a hundred headlines because you know, I know it won't be, we won't come up with a good one unless you write a hundred.

Speaker 1:

And I'm like I've written for so long now I know a good headline when I see one. Okay, and I used to have one like chief creative officer. I used to like he'd always be like you won't get to the good one until it's like a hundred. And so I used to like take my first headline and put it at the bottom because I knew it was the best and the right headline and that's the one I wanted anyways, and that's how I got those guys. I'm going to choose the one I wanted. Pick up on that is, I'm going to pick up on that. But yeah, now I use AI as my little, my little junior copywriter be and my listen, you write me 10. I'm not as demanding. I'm like write me 10 headlines in my sequences. Then I'm like okay, given that this is my audience and that this is my objective, which of these headlines do you think will be the most effective?

Speaker 2:

And I have it analyze itself. That's a sequencing, because I have done that as well, so it's very interesting to see how AI analyzing yeah it's fun. Some of that I was like oh my God, okay, I get that, you know. They were like well, this is actually more benefit driven and the other one is more conversion. Yeah, and that one you know, it's like, yeah, analyzing, I was like oh my God, it's so fun.

Speaker 1:

It's so fun to watch it analyze itself. And then what I'll do is I'll throw it into a subject line tester and I'll get the scoring, and I'll get the recommendations from a subject line tester and I'll take that feedback, throw it into the chat GPT and I'll have chat GPT fix it.

Speaker 2:

See, now you talk about a process of using two different tools. I love it. Yeah, it's fun. I love it. Yeah, I love it. So you kind of asking the question and you find out and get the best out of AI for the time being right, and then you do using a knowledge tool to test it and validate it and then come back and make it even better. Yep, amy, you can do a pretty good job of it you're funny.

Speaker 1:

well then I felt like I felt like super awesome because then I got like a 100, which I, honestly, in all my years of writing not going to lie friends I mean I've gotten like a 95 writing my own, but I've never tested. I've thrown it into a tester and got the 100. I was like screenshotting that shit. I'm like I'm saving this forever. It was me and ChatGPT.

Speaker 2:

We worked together on this. You know what I help AI to be successful. Right, I am so good at it we're a great team, me and AI.

Speaker 1:

Oh my gosh, so funny. I love it, but yeah, I think it's just. It's again. I mean, it's just. I'm a collaborative person, so even whether it's a person or a bot, i'm'm down for it. I'm down for it.

Speaker 2:

You are like equality inclusion it's all good.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I mean because, again, at the end of the day, you know what I've got. Like you said earlier, I've got the insights, the human insights. I have got the empathy, you know, and I've got like the final say and judgment on those things. You know, it wouldn't have got there without me. It wouldn't have got there without me. It wouldn't have got there without me that's.

Speaker 2:

that's where humans still provide. Humans still provide value. I don't know how that will evolve, that the AI becomes so smart and because they are learning fast, they are learning every day.

Speaker 1:

Well, that was my next question is how you see the role of human expertise evolving as AI prompting becomes more sophisticated. Like what does our role begin to look like?

Speaker 2:

You know that's actually a $64,000 question. I don't know, I don't want to be a pundit. Every time I predict something, it's always wrong, I'm the first one to tell you You're funny, it's like, okay, like don't want to be a pundit. Every time I predict something is always wrong, I'm the first one to tell you're funny, like, okay, like, if you want to put money actually on what Pam said you should, because you're gonna win, you're obviously gonna win. Um, I, I think about that often in terms of you know that ai becomes super smart, and I mean, like several weeks ago, that the open ai basically said the chat gpt will have reasoning capability. Okay, but who defines reasoning? Right, what is their definition of reasoning? So do they have a cognizant capability? You know, but they said it's going to. Obviously, when you prompt something, maybe they will provide certain kind of logic behind this. So they are going to give you even better and uh, answer that tailor for you. I don't know what that means.

Speaker 1:

Yeah um, I know people that can't reason. So yeah, sorry, sorry.

Speaker 2:

I don't know, like how far that I can do, but you also have to bear in mind AI at this point, that working with us, they are software, they are algorithm embedded into devices or embedded into a software. Imagine one day they house that with a form, with a robot. So, in a way, whatever we are doing right now, we collectively, as a human race, are building the brain of AI, because eventually you're going to host it. That's how I see it, yeah, yeah. It just makes you wonder how does that, how does that, how does that help us in the long run? I don't know, I cannot tell you and I, I we have seen enough.

Speaker 2:

I guess hollywood horror films, like in terms of, like the terminator is probably the best example or even data from the next, uh, the star trek, the next generation, yeah, um, yeah, that they do actually kind of have that, the human capability, yeah, and it's obviously you know. You can also said will they eventually have a conscious? Yeah, and how they will treat us? I don't have an answer for it, but I can only tell you is, at this time, they are still just part of the machine, yeah, or part of the algorithm, yeah, and what can you do to make the best out of it yeah, yeah, I agree with you there.

Speaker 1:

I think it is a more to me personally. I think it's of like. I think there's going to be a leveling out a little bit to some degree, just based on, like certain, you know, I think, saber fighting Are we going to just do saber fighting with AI? No, no, I think it's going to be more of like the. I think it's going to level out because of corporate greed and money. You know they're going to go public or they're already gone, or they have not already gone public or not.

Speaker 1:

People not walking out now because they're talking about going public. I mean, I'm going to be getting my like headlines and stories confused. But like open AI is, is is kind of going to be going public soon and you know the guys who helped to start that don't want that. They wanted it to be an open resource for people. But the problem also with that is at the other end. It's like collective intelligence. When you kind of throw in all the collective intelligence, like gosh, we're not collectively not always that smart, right, because it's like you know, garbage in, garbage out, we talk about that a lot within this space, right, we know not all data is good data.

Speaker 1:

We know there's a lot of biases within some of this stuff that's being fed into the machine. So just because it has, you know, because it has input, doesn't mean that the output is good right, but I 100% agree.

Speaker 2:

So, depending on the data they pull that information from Exactly that provided you the answer yes, exactly.

Speaker 1:

So for me right now, I think the most critical human role is, you know, really, responsibility, accountability, making sure that you know bias and errors, are still something that we're very much focused on. I think conversations about, like regulation and democratization because I really do see AI as something that can help small businesses work, you know, more effectively, more efficiently but then you see big companies and corporations using it to make excuses to reduce and minimize headcount and things like that because they see it as an opportunity.

Speaker 2:

That's the saddest part. That's the one I fear the most for the next generation.

Speaker 1:

But to me it's going to be like a pendulum, Pam. I think it's going to be like how they go off and they offshore, not to like totally go off track and then you're like this is not working and they got fired people.

Speaker 1:

Yes, that's kind of my prediction and again, like I mean, I don't know, I don't want to be proven wrong in that I wouldn't mind that pendulum to swing back the other way. Where it's like the offshore jobs, they're like wait, that didn't work, we got to bring it back stateside, and they do, so it might be, yeah, okay, well, let's all go in. On AI, we're going to be able to reduce headcount and create efficiencies and save our bottom line and pay our C-suite more and our shareholders.

Speaker 1:

And then, oh crap, no, we're actually creating marketing campaigns that have bias and errors and that aren't effective. We need to bring humans back in. That's kind of my hope, but who knows, we'll see.

Speaker 2:

I guess we'll have to wait and see. We'll like come back to this episode in five years. It is, it is we are, it's. It's kind of like a um, a blessing and a curse at the same time. It is that we are witness, we literally just witnessing here we are, how the ai is going to evolve I think it's absolutely amazing?

Speaker 1:

yeah, it is. It's really an interesting time and I like to also just fast forward in my head and think about that, like in the history books, what is this time going to look like? And right now it feels such like madness and crisis. But somehow fast forwarding in my head makes it feel a little less chaotic and be like you know what. It was just a time and a place and an era, and that's, I think, sometimes why equating it to that assembly line and moving towards more machines and things like that kind of makes it feel. I don't want to try to minimize it at all, but it gives it perspective.

Speaker 2:

Honestly, amy, it's going to be chaotic, no matter what.

Speaker 1:

Sure it is.

Speaker 2:

I don't think that. You know. I think it's going to continue because it's morphing and evolving and some people will like the direction we are going, but you always find people who don't like that direction, don't want to move it and they want to disrupt it. So I personally think that chaos will continue to stay. I don't think it will ever go away. Yeah, because we are humans, we just love to like. You know what I disagree with you? I ever go away. Yeah, because we are humans, we just love to like. You know what I disagree with you.

Speaker 1:

I see you differently. Yeah, definitely yeah, you've got people that are going to jump on board and move along with it and others who are going to drag their feet. Yep, let's dig in a little bit more to some more areas of marketing that you cover in your book, because you definitely talk about seo, email marketing as well as social media. Are there any other areas that you think um? Which areas do you think um has the most untapped potential for ai?

Speaker 2:

prompting data analytics talk about that a little bit really. So you know, like content, you can always like okay, write us a post. And you can even say, okay, create a demand. Right, you can give a very specific prompt and, just like you asking the questions, analyze this, right. So is that analytics part of it? I think we can explore a whole lot more. Yes, and analyze this and tell me what's good and bad about it. That's data analytics.

Speaker 2:

Or you input certain kind of data in that and say, hey, I actually have this opening rate for this kind of subject line I'm just using, kind of take the copywriting, elaborate a little bit more. Kind of take the copywriting, elaborate a little bit more. And here is 50 subject lines for the past 50 email campaigns and each one of them have average of the open rate associated with it. And can you analyze this for me and then tell me which one, which subject line, perform better? Yes, and then, of course, the sequencing why is better? Yep. Then the next sequence is like I have this email, I want to push it out next month. What, based on all your analysis, what are your five proposed subject line? I love it.

Speaker 2:

It's that analysis part that we need to tap into a whole lot more. Yeah, that requires all of us to think a little bit differently. Right? So because you're a copywriter, the first thing you say is okay, email, perfect, I'll write it, I'll write a subject line, or just like you said, you have AI to write a subject line and you test it, and then that's the next step to move on. But how can we leveraging past information to train AI and see how that information can be utilized? And then we have data more data driven type of insight moving forward, data-driven type of insight moving forward. I think that is one part I need to do better. Honestly, I think all of us can do better. It's that analytics part.

Speaker 1:

A hundred percent and surprisingly honestly, pam, this is where I thought I would see more of it, even though my background is writing, as many of you know, who listened to the podcast historically in past episodes, you've probably heard me share this example. I was working at an agency. It was kind of like early days of social listening and they were talking about oh, we've got all this data and again a big data right, all this data and marketing. We're like look at all this wealth of information that we're sitting on. But it's like what?

Speaker 2:

are we gonna do?

Speaker 1:

about it. What in the hell are we doing with it? And I even wrote an article um back then. I think it was in 2010. I think it's like what are we going to do about it? What in the hell are we doing with it? And I even wrote an article back then I think it was in 2010. I think it's probably still living on my LinkedIn talking about like the tension and the balance of like big data and the creative gut that was in the post and it was like I love it because I think data is important.

Speaker 1:

I'm married to an applied mathematician. He was like a PhD at the time. He was at a university and he does the creative side and, yeah, he's the opposite, although he's very creative too. I will argue he's very creative too and he does mathematical modeling and computer science as well. And so in mathematical modeling, it is taking a lot of big data and it's analyzing. It's leveraging essentially machine learning AI effectively and modeling, so computing and creating and shaping and analyzing. It's leveraging essentially machine learning AI effectively and modeling, so computing and creating and shaping and showing you know, with a ton of data, what might happen within a clinical research environment and setting without actually having to do testing on like animals or people.

Speaker 1:

And so I'm watching at this. You know company, this agency. They're like oh, look at us, we've got all this sentiment analysis and we're going to have a model that we've created to show what that looks like. And I knew they were just pulling it out of their asses, really. And I went home to him and I was like listen, what you're doing? We've got all this data but really, like computing is the way and I didn't know AI was a thing and like, but I knew what he was doing. I was like that's, that's how we analyze like for human brains. We can't process all that information. We can't scour all of that data and find the nuance or model right and put it in, visualize that information in a way that allows the human eye brain to process and go oh, there's the pattern, that's what I need to pay attention to, right, that's what I need to look for. And so now that's a lot of what he's doing. So you said you came to the dark side now he's on the dark side.

Speaker 1:

I'm doing that for an AI company as well and I think it's just really awesome, because I again 100% agree with you. I think that's been a big problem for marketers is that we do. We have a half ton of data and it's fantastic, but it's like what are you doing with it? How are you using it? How are you making customers' lives easier? How are you solving problems? How are you really finding insights and creating innovations that aren't just shiny objects but actually making people's lives better, easier, you know, at the end of the day, versus just adding a feature or a function because you think it's just going to, you know, be the next big thing and it's like I don't know, and that's I agree.

Speaker 1:

I am very, very, I'm so glad that was your answer, as you can tell very excited about data analytics and what AI can really do for that space as well. For sure, For sure, and I get Gen AI is like kind of where it's all at right now, but I really think to me, the next, the next phase is, is that where people need to be paying attention. So if you're not using it in your data analytics, start doing it, folks. All right, can you share a little bit of an example of before and after scenario where a well-crafted prompt significantly improved a marketing outcome yeah.

Speaker 2:

So, uh, this is the way I would look in at the before and after it's. Unfortunately, it's more or less kind of like compare human versus AI to some extent okay. Like, for example, um, if I the before and after using AI, I always kind of using myself as an example. So before I use AI, what are the things I usually do and what is the outcome of that? And the other one is do and what is the outcome of that, and the other one is after using AI, what is the outcome of it? So let's just use the email marketing as an example. Yeah, same thing, right, so, before, before and after.

Speaker 2:

Before you use AI, you create a subject line, and then then we use the same process, amy, that you talk about. In terms of that, you are asking AI to actually create a five subject line, do an analysis, you run into the testing to test the subject line and you come back and have them do better. So the way I would see a lot of time. You need to have a point of view or benchmark in terms of how AI is doing or making an impact on the job that you do, and that's assuming it's email marketing. So you should have a subject line that's 100% created by human, you also should have a subject line 100% created by AI. Can you do A B testing? Yeah, oh, I love that. Yeah, that's to me, it's before and after, and then you have data to support it. Like you know what, for this round, human one ai zero.

Speaker 2:

But for next round might be you know one and one who knows right, but I think it's very important, uh-huh, it's very important that once you are using ai, but you still need to demonstrate your value add, yes, like the example I'm sharing with you the example I'm sharing with you that give you some data.

Speaker 2:

If the AI is performing better, ok, so be it, great. That's a data point. But that's assumed that the human subject lines perform better. That's a data point that you can, you know, speak loud and proud, yeah Right. So that's what I see in terms of you need to kind of quantify ai's impact as well. A lot of time we are using it as we are using it. We just said, okay, they come a pretty good post I just posted, right. So is it possible you can look at a couple samples and I have a point of view which one performs better? If ai performs better, we'll make a note of that. You don't have to promote it loud and clear, but if you are doing better, you know what you should let people know. So that's how I see in terms of before and after. I don't know if that's why you have in mind, but, um, no, that's a great example like um.

Speaker 2:

You know it's a it. It's not human versus AI race. Maybe it is to some extent, but you need to have a point of view.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, no, I love that and I love that you're like championing and asking people to remember to truly advocate for themselves, and just keep constantly reminding folks that AI is the tool People are still doing. You're still doing the work. You're still doing the work. It's like AI is not prompting itself.

Speaker 2:

Like dude, when not yet. No, that's maybe. I don't know. I don't know how that happens. I don't know one day well it's not now, I don't even know how that happens.

Speaker 1:

That would be creepy that would be absolutely creepy okay, so your book is, uh, definitely aimed at more of maybe the well, your book is aimed at various roles in both sales and marketing. How do you see AI prompting differently, benefiting, say, a content marketer versus maybe a sales or an enablement marketer? Yeah, or manager, sorry, no, it's totally okay.

Speaker 2:

It's totally fine. Fine, um, it doesn't matter what. When I was writing this, 75 plus prompts and for different marketing roles, because I categorizing it 12 and sales and marketing categories, if you will. So you have to think in terms of when you do your job, I'm going to give a generic answer and I will give a specific answer. So, when you are doing your job, I'm going to give a generic answer and I will give a specific answer. So, when you are doing your job, it doesn't matter what job email marketing, event marketing, community managers and even, you know, salesperson or sales enablement managers there's always a problem you can ride, like to ask AI, for example, on the sales enablement.

Speaker 2:

I need to create a pricing guide for my sales manager for these three products and compare with these three competitive products. Can you pull the information from my pricing? You enter information and also pull the pricing information from their website, pricing information from their website. You provide specific information and then create a table that compare uh product a, b, c and d and with the competitors product c, d and e. Right, so you can actually do a very specific uh a prompt for that. And, by the way, when you say create a table, the, the, the chat, gpt can actually do that nice and uh.

Speaker 2:

So that's kind of what I see is look at your own job, the job that you are doing on a regular basis, and then you are thinking, you know, you think about it and say, okay, I am thinking hard about this specific question or the challenges. Can I just write a prompt and ask AI about it? Yeah, okay, so that's one way you should turn around in terms of how you think that helpful. So focus on your job, what you do, and then see if AI can provide value. Yep, yep.

Speaker 2:

Then of course, specific job, like if you are doing a content, if you are content marketing, if you are a content marketer, sorry and if you are creating content, of course using AI, and provide a very specific guidance and create long form content or short form content. Yes, that's definitely given, and we've been talking about those examples plenty in this podcast.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, I mean, it's just amazing like the amount of content, planning and strategy and outlining you can crank out in such a short amount of time. Right, you know, it's just it's wonderful and, like I said it, just when you are a small business and you've got limited tools and resources, it's like ah, it's amazing. And I love this idea of like the competitor, like the analysis, the table, the pricing. I know I've definitely used it too for like writing or just helping me get started on writing, like those emails for sales.

Speaker 1:

Because, sometimes I feel so like forced, even when I'm trying to write them myself.

Speaker 1:

Hot tip, here I will go and I will find like their bio or any personal information about them, and I'll put that into the prompt as well and ask AI to make sure that it includes some sort of personal, like kind of detailed to them, so that it really like actually was using it more for, like press releases and trying to reach out to the press about our upcoming conference, and I really wanted it to speak to again because I'm like I want to grab their attention. Like they report on specific aspects about our community, so I really want it to tie to what they are reporting on and so it's like making sure that it hits those points. This is also great for job seekers too. We do a job seekers peer group every Thursday for Together Digital members and we were talking a lot about this. How much AI is a great tool for job seekers right now, because when you need to craft, you know cover letters and resumes and every single one has to be very specific.

Speaker 2:

It has to be tailored and customized.

Speaker 1:

Yes, yeah, ai can be such a fantastic way to really help you kind of get a great start on making sure that you're hitting all the right notes. You know, again, obviously you've got to kind of do the work and go through and make sure everything is right there and accurate.

Speaker 2:

Exactly, exactly, but it really does help ahead. That's what. Sorry, I apologize to interrupt. No, you're fine. Sorry, but you hit the core. You still have to do that, that job, the last 20 miles. Yeah, even though they had created a draft for you, you're the one still needs to read it and you have to proofread it you cannot just take it blindly, and I think that's very important yeah, you've got to add the finishing touches and the color as well, because I just I can't again.

Speaker 1:

I it's coming from a writer, right, it's especially when it's coming from me I just feel like there's just certain words and I mean I will tell it over and over again. I'm like stop saying this specific word. Like nobody says yes, I will tell, I'll yell at it, I'll be like nobody says this word. You know, and I don't know why, I can't think of any of them right now, but it'll like. There's certain words It'll just say over and over again. I'm like please stop saying that in the digital world, in the digital landscape, I'm like nobody says that, oh yeah, and unleash.

Speaker 2:

Unleash. Yes, oh my God.

Speaker 1:

Like you asked him power. Yeah, I 100 agree with you banning these words from your, from your vernacular. Ai, I love it, but yeah, you really need to kind of make sure you bring in the language that's truly used so it sounds authentically you. Yeah, all right, let's talk about so. On that note, I think this is a great segue as well, like what are some common mistakes that you see marketers making when it comes to crafting AI prompts or even just leveraging AI in general.

Speaker 2:

It is just too generic. It's like you cannot say create a marketing plan for me, I'm not like you know, it's not, it's, that's not going to happen. No, so you, you, you, you. You have to put into your thoughts in terms of your prompts, like create a marketing plan for this type of company, for this type of products. Our challenges for our marketing plans so far are blah, blah, blah blah, and we've been creating marketing plan. You can even upload your marketing plan and our target audience is this, but so far we have not been able to meet our kpi, which is the following so you provide all that information, so you have to do prep in a way. You have to know your products pretty well. You have to know stuff right. So how do you convey that knowledge of yours into part of the prompt writing? So, to brief the AI bot, they can spit out the information that you want.

Speaker 2:

Don't make it generic and also put put into the right context. To me, those two are very, very important. That means sometimes you just have to write a bunch and then check it out and again do the sequencing, like amy indicated. Yeah, I think the the common mistake is really, first of all, too generic and second thing is also be patient, like I you know how many times I write a problem. Oh my god, this is not what I want and I have to walk away. I was like ai, you are not performing today. I'm really disappointed in you. You know what I'm saying, and then you have to freaking walk away, yeah, and so you have to be patient definitely definitely well, and I, I, I, as you were speaking of him, it really just occurred to me too.

Speaker 1:

For those of you that are listening that are non marketers, I think you have to be careful, like, do not think AI will replace your marketers, and I think a really good analogy is there is a gentleman I'm not going to remember his last name right now, gosh and I feel bad because I want to give him some credit so you guys can follow him on LinkedIn right now. His name's Terry and he does beautiful food photography with AI, like complimentary food photography with AI, where he puts together both real life photography, sometimes with AI backgrounds, and AI integration. And the reason why Terry is so brilliant at what he does is because he has been doing food photography, lighting, set design and everything for 30 years.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, exactly the tribal knowledge, the tribal knowledge A hundred percent.

Speaker 1:

Your marketers know what to ask, they know what dials to turn, they know what to tweak, they know what to ask for, they know when what chat DPT puts out is wrong. And so it's like if you are totally not well-versed in marketing and you think that you can just go in and say, give me a marketing plan, no, like you can't, like you don't. What you're going to get out is total BS and it's not going to be accurate, it's not going to be right. Don't think that AI can replace your marketers. Please, please, please, please, please. And when you have people in AI using you, know marketing for marketing, make sure that they are marketers themselves. Because, again, I think that's the. That's the beauty of what Terry does is because he's a photographer first and foremost and he's still very much champions doing the art that he does, but knows now, really understands AI well and also still has that legacy knowledge, obviously, of photography, and he couldn't do one without the other.

Speaker 2:

So I just wanted to say that it's also your expertise, right? I mean you need to be able to judge what AI's responses are. You have to call it out. It's like oh, this is a BS response, yes, or oh, this is very, very good, 100% that that kind of judgment call comes from your expertise.

Speaker 1:

Yes, Agreed, agreed, yeah, because I was even looking at some of his stuff and he had like croissants with like the layers and like crumbs, and I'm like, oh, and I used to do food photography for like Conagra and some other food brands and I was just, I was just blown away, I, you know, and I've seen other stuff and I'm like, yeah, no, like that's the lighting is really wonky Like you can just tell things aren't right.

Speaker 1:

But you know it's it's hard. It's hard to prove what's real and what's AI with Terry's work. All right, courtney, I see you've got a question here from our live listening audience, so thank you, courtney. She's calling out the fact that I mentioned earlier that in some cases, different AI agents can work collaboratively with each other. Can you provide some examples of that and how these use cases might be valuable to marketers? We'll get into this probably more. I've got, hopefully, an upcoming guest from Verve, sarah, who works with them. There will maybe get more into this with us too. And the case that I was sharing in that example they're more of a tech company. They're called, I think, crew AI, if I remember correctly, so you can look them up and they're a multi-agent platform and they definitely look at it from like a multidisciplinary role in the sense of you might have, you know, a like a C, like a running a reports type of a thing, like a financial reports person running something who might then do a run in a check of um, like financial reports, then running a check through.

Speaker 1:

I'm trying to think of the other agent that he created. He also created an agent that was like the cmo who maybe ran marketing reports. You know, um. Thank you, kaylee. Of course she found it really quickly and drafted into the chat. I love it, you're so awesome.

Speaker 1:

Um, so you can kind of take a look at there and at those, and so what they would do from a collaborative standpoint is actually a cross reference. So you could basically, um create commands and prompts so that whatever each agent is creating reports on that, um that they would then collaborate in the sense of creating an additional cross-reference report so that marketing might feed into the financial reports. So you wouldn't have your CMO create the marketing report and how everything performed from a KPI standpoint, right, what the spend was, that would feed into the financial report. The financial person wouldn't have all that information and data. So it's more like they're kind of talking to one another. How that might work for a marketer I don't know exactly yet. Like I said, this is like kind of newish territory, but I don't know, pam, if you've got some examples too of how other agents and how maybe you've seen them or used them in the past too might work for marketers if you have a multi-agent tool that is just marketing or for marketers.

Speaker 2:

I don't have the multi-agent tools that I'm using at all and each agent that I use tend to perform on its own and is more task-driven. But I can totally see that each agent talks to each other. So the analogy I would like to use on top of viewers think of the each agent talk to themselves like a data flow, like you have like, for example, you have the data from like marketing automation tool that that data needs to float into CIM for you to track, kind of like you know, mql to marketing, qualified leads to sql, sales qualified lead. So the way that you need to think about how agents talk to each other, think of those agents still as a software. They are all our softwares. Well, the the technical part of it in terms of how they talk to each other, that's going to let the technical person figure it out, but you have to think it's a data flow from one place to another. If you think from that perspective, then it's not confusing. It's pretty clear to you. Yeah, true, software, they just need to talk to each other.

Speaker 1:

I think that's a great example. Yeah, yeah, I love it. That's very helpful. Thank you, I know it's gonna be so. I think that kind of stuff is super interesting because I mean I already like I love automation as well. That could could be like a whole other conversation Also love it All right, cool. Well, if anybody else has any other questions, we've got a few minutes left. Looking ahead, Pam, how do you think AI prompting skills will impact career advancement and marketing and sales?

Speaker 2:

I think this from a perspective of hard skills and soft skills. I think to be able to prompt is a hard skills you need to have. Everybody should have that skill set. Okay, the soft skills on the prompt is like you need to have a point of view what the prompting can do and cannot do for you. Yes, that is going to be up to you to articulate. Well, that is a soft skill. Yep, right, so that to me, is understand.

Speaker 2:

Once you understand and, by the way, the prompting will continue to evolve and ai might take on more and more, uh, the stuff that are off your plate. So that soft skill of explaining what ai can do, cannot do, will continue to evolve as well, and that having that point of view will also guide your career development. Absolutely, you're like, oh, my God, you know what AI is kind of like in my category right now territories. Right now, maybe I need to look at my job differently or I need to change job. So, from my perspective, is be able to articulate so well, yeah, in terms of what I can do for you, it's super critical, I agree I love it.

Speaker 1:

Take it, embrace it, own it, be the thought leader on it. I love that. Yeah, be the one who's like, has a point of view on it. Yeah, be the educator. I think maybe you know, pam, like you just did pick it up and write a book on it. Damn it. And Courtney's like. So helpful, wonderful discussion. I'm getting Pam's books Awesome. All right, we're at our our fun, fun time. We're down to the last minute, so we're going to go through our power round of questions, which are fun, our little lightning round of questions. So what is one AI tool that you can't live without?

Speaker 2:

One is obviously chat GPT or something called magi. This, the tool, actually had created the interface that was like a Gemini copilot, you know, claude and chat GPT, and you can pick and choose which one you want to use Instead of going to a different platform I like that one m-a-g-a-i opus clip yep. And, for example, I create a video and I have ai to cut a different shorts and I kind of like that. Yeah, it's fantastic. Yeah, I'm not always successful. You still have to you still have to do the work post-production yeah, I agree, but opus is amazing.

Speaker 1:

I 100 agree, biggest ai failure you've experienced or witnessed my own book.

Speaker 2:

I actually do not want to write this book. I want ai to take all the credit. I want to say created by ai. Oh, that's so funny. So I actually hired developer and worked with me to write not just the prompts but code. I have this person uh input and the writer code to actually read my blog post library and also read all the videos I have created, so to understand my tone and manner. And I also created a table of content, detailed table contents with a subchapter and also the description for each chapter. So so I got the tone and manner down, I got the skeleton of the outline down and I tried to provide as much information as possible.

Speaker 2:

It failed miserably. How dare you, ai, how dare you? I failed and it failed miserably. And the thing is, when they write the 20,000 words and you will understand this every single sentence sounds beautiful's, very flowery, but when you read it carefully, there's no substance underneath it, none uh-huh. And I was like god damn it, I have to write a book now. This is not acceptable, ai. So here I am. I ended up writing the whole book. That's hilarious. If you actually do a certain paragraph, like you have, ai rewrite certain paragraph. They do a pretty good job, but if you are looking for AI to run just like from page one to page 100, no, not there yet Good to know.

Speaker 2:

Oh my gosh, I love that so much you know what, Maybe you know what, Amy, you might have a better success than me. I was. I feel miserably. I was so sad, I was crying.

Speaker 1:

Well, you know what, pam? It's okay. That's how we learn, right? That's how we grow, and I love that you're willing to share that. That's what it's all about, because Nobody got to success without screwing up at some point. This was so much fun. All right, we're just past time. So, folks, you know if you've got, if you've got questions if you want to reach out to Pam.

Speaker 1:

We will include all of the ways you can follow her, learn more about her website. Her books will be in the show notes live listeners those are also in the chat, so make sure you grab those before we close out here in a second. Pam, thank you so much. I knew this would be a blast, so it was wonderful to bring you in and introduce you to our amazing listeners and our Together Digital community. Thank you so much for all the awesome work you're doing.

Speaker 1:

This is a blast Thank you so much for having me. I mean wonderful Anytime, All right, everyone. Well, thank you for joining us on this Friday. Hope you all are staying safe and enjoying the rest of your Friday and we'll see you all next week. Until then, keep asking, keep giving and keep growing. See you all soon. Take care. Bye-bye.

Speaker 2:

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