AI Literacy for Entrepreneurs

🌟 Welcome to The 4am Report, with me, Susan Diaz, your host and an AI optimist. Let’s talk about innovative ways small businesses can use artificial intelligence RIGHT NOW, beyond the basics. Today, I'm going to debunk a common myth about AI; and share six unique ways to use AI in your content marketing that go beyond writing blog articles.

On the episode I cover:

✍️ Expanding AI Use Beyond Blog Writing: Many perceive AI as a tool just for generating text-based content, but it’s so much more! I’ll introduce you to advanced, practical applications that can transform your business operations.

6️⃣ Six Innovative AI Use Cases for Small Businesses: From breaking down video content to enhancing your sales processes, these tried-and-tested strategies from our Marketing Power Circle (member-only AI implementation mastermind) will open your eyes to new possibilities.

In-Depth Topics:

📹 Video Content Utilization: How to transform existing video material into multiple content pieces for varied marketing channels.

💵 Enhanced Sales Processes: Utilize AI like ChatGPT and Claude to streamline your sales drafts and follow-ups, making your outreach efforts more efficient and personalized.

🎙️ Simplifying Guest Interviews with Myshowrunner.com: A free tool that eases the podcast interview process by streamlining guest research and question formulation.

♻️ Revitalizing Existing Content: Use AI to update old articles or reports with new insights, SEO enhancements, and user-friendly formats.

🔎 Efficient Summarization for Client Research: Employ AI tools to quickly summarize extensive research materials, saving valuable time and effort.

💻 Optimizing Workshop Summaries: How AI can help you efficiently repurpose past workshop and training content for new audiences or formats.

⭕ Special Invitation: If you’re interested in learning how to implement these AI strategies effectively in your business, consider joining our Marketing Power Circle. Drop me an email or LinkedIn DM and I'll send you more details about our AI implementation mastermind, designed specifically for small businesses looking to scale and innovate.

AI is not a futuristic concept but a practical tool that can dramatically enhance the way small businesses operate today. By adopting a broader view of AI’s capabilities and integrating these technologies into various aspects of your business, you can unlock significant growth and efficiency.

🌟 Keep listening for more insights from upcoming guests who are using AI in groundbreaking ways, and join us next time for more AI literacy discussions on The 4am Report!

Connect with me - Susan Diaz on LinkedIn: Entrepreneur, podcast host, and passionate advocate for using AI to enhance small business marketing and sustainability.

Welcome to The 4am Report, where talk AI literacy for founder-led brands with me, your host, Susan Diaz. Today I will be exploring what it means to think exponentially in the age of artificial intelligence and how this mindset can drastically shift your business landscape.

On this podcast, we no longer do intros and outro on audio, so here’s a short note on who I am. I am Susan Diaz, lifetime marketer with over 20 years of experience spanning startups to government sectors. I am the founder of a content marketing firm, and I am focused on how artificial intelligence can turbocharge small business operations.

In this episode you should expect to hear about:

🚀 Thinking Exponentially: How adopting a 100x mindset, with the support of AI, can lead to significant growth and innovation in your business.

💡 The True Power of AI: Exploring how artificial intelligence can be a game changer, not just a productivity tool but a strategic partner in your business.

In-depth Topics Covered:

I love a good metaphor to help me learn and remember. And I hugely value the experts who give me that. And I try to do the same as I speak to, and train, various audiences.

Inside this episode I give you an interesting analogy on how technology evolves and becomes mainstream, relating it to how refrigeration technology, initially developed for preserving life-saving drugs, evolved to widespread uses - including ‘skincare fridge’.

You’ll also learn the three key mindsets for leveraging AI to grow exponentially:

🤖 Strategic Partner, Not Just a Task Manager: Viewing AI as a co-thinker and brainstorming tool, not just as an automator of mundane tasks.

🔍 Workflow Visualization: Importance of understanding current processes clearly before integrating AI, bringing clarity to how AI can fit into and optimize these processes.

🌱 Focused Implementation: The significance of starting with one tool or process, mastering it, and then scaling to avoid overwhelming change and to grow sustainably.

Thinking about implementing AI in your small business?

For hands-on help, consider joining our Marketing Power Circle ⭕ an AI implementation mastermind group that meets twice a month. Together, we focus on automating one business workflow every 90 days, turning your quantum possibilities into actions that will move you far ahead of the curve. Join Here

Connect with me, Susan Diaz on LinkedIn to gain AI literacy insights in real time.

As you hit play, please leave us a 5 star rating ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

It goes far in helping us bring AI implementation strategies to more small businesses.

Attention thirsty readers everywhere! Do you have a story that's got you absolutely parched? A news item, a marketing hit or miss, something from the world of entertainment and pop culture? We're now taking story submissions. Hit reply and let us know your take on a story that caught your attention this week. We may even ask you to join us on our weekly Linkedin Live chat show, #ThirstyThursday. Happy Diwali to those celebrating! This week Susan is joined by Shelagh Cummins, founder and CEO of The Road to Seven. Apple x BBC podcast subscription service This week Apple is in the news for its subscription podcast service. They are partnering with BBC studios to bring exclusive content to North America - a channel that will give listeners access to shows that were previously only available in the UK. Generally the big companies are wary of putting a price on something that’s so readily available and free so we’re interested to see how this plays out. It comes down to knowing the purpose of your podcast - if your podcast is made for lead generation, you don’t want to create a barrier to the listener. Or maybe the actual podcast subscription is the goal itself, so really think about where your podcast fits into your funnel. It could be a low cost way of delivering a very intimate experience to your audience. Remember the flywheel - always take it up to the next level! Oprah is one of our favourite things This time of year is Oprah territory - the Favourite Things list for 2021 . This year has not let us down with a delicious list of awesome things, categorized by the type of gift and, for the first time, presented by Amazon. So while this isn’t really helping the small business owner, good on Amazon for stepping in and creating that partnership. Sometimes you have to knock on the doors of the big guys - take a chance and see where you get! Putting lipstick on a pig? We wouldn’t want to spare Shelagh some Facebook talk! The big announcement last week was the rebranding of Facebook to the new name Meta, and the new all-in approach to the Metaverse. They have also decided to shut down facial recognition program, which many of us didn’t even know about. Something that we feel should have been switched up is the leadership. Out with Zuck! Mark Zuckerberg has broken our trust over and over and should no longer be the face of the company. Facebook has forgotten that they are in business because of people and they have been putting dollars ahead of the people that support their platform. Microsoft jumps on the Metaverse bandwagon Microsoft making moves in the metaverse direction - Microsoft Teams is now including avatars. Shelagh wonders if this trend is based on new technology or simply laziness. Her thought is that anyone masking a part of themselves - be it a different background covering up a messy office or leaving your camera off because you’re not appropriately dressed for the meeting - is just hiding. This undermines the purpose of the meeting if it is to create connection with another human being. If you’re choosing to connect “face to face”, why not give them the true you? Disney Diversity Disney’s new holiday ad is out and continues the story of Lola's granddaughter Nicole from last year’s ad as a grownup. It’s a very realistic and relatable story in our society, and discusses the integration of a stepdad into his new family, which happens to be biracial. This stepdad has to find his place within old and new traditions. We love that Disney has made some decisions to be front facing with the diversity in the ad but we want to make sure they’re also looking behind the scenes, following up, and making sure that there is also diversity on their leadership team and backing up their message. Black Wall Street Market The new Black Wall Street Market in Stonecrest, Georgia has opened up in an homage to the righting of wrongs that occurred when the original market in Tulsa, Oklahoma was destroyed by white mobs 100 years ago. People travelled miles and miles to show support and celebrate the moment. Wares ranged from books to clothes to arts to food with over 10,000 people showing up for the incredibly successful grand opening. **** For these stories and more including Netflix Mobile games and P...

What makes someone actually get brave enough to rant about something? And if the something you're ranting about is the workplace approach to diversity, does it get even more loaded as a subject? Nita Tandon, Founder of Dalcini Stainless, award-winning sustainable housewares, is here for the inaugural issue of 'Founders Rant'. What keeps her up at night is the one dimensional approach to diversity. Does the media equate 'diversity' with color? Are employers, in an attempt to “do good”, hoping to just hire BIPOC, pat themselves on the back and say they are a “diverse and inclusive” employer? What made Nita say, "Okay, this is a rant, and I want to tell you about it." When you encounter racism or racist microgressions, you know it clearly. When you are denied something, because of your colour, or because of your gender, you know that it's because of those things! So when someone tells you, 'No, you're just seeing it wrong', it's frustrating. (psst: At the risk of calling it out brutally, if you tell me that I'm, if I'm not feeling what I'm feeling, that's what you call gaslighting. )

Here's a fun look into the mind of a social impact founder

It’s another edition of the 4 AM Report, but instead of asking fellow marketers what keeps them up at night – we want to ask this:

Have you been having some hard chats with yourselves during this bizarrely uncertain (and frankly scary!) time?

🔥🔥🔥 If you haven’t – the time to start that is NOW. 🔥🔥🔥

Let's face it, we all have to market, large or little. It's harder than ever to stand out in a cluttered space of one size fits all and copycat marketing moves.

But while Covid-19 is stealthily spreading around the globe, our marketing worlds have to change:

🦠 Understand that things can - and will - change on a dime.

🦠 Accept that you’ll need to have systems in place to allow you to pivot

🦠 READ THE ROOM!!

🦠 Tone deaf is not the voice you want to be sharing these days

🦠 And yes, it’s time to stop automating your social postings

Our guest this week is Martin Waxman – and he basically does it all! He specializes in Digital and Social Media Strategy, is a LinkedIn Learning Author, a Social Media Professor, conducts research into AI, and leads custom-tailored social media and communications workshops and training for organizations.

Trust us. He knows how to deal with marketing in the time of Covid-19! We’re super excited to have him on to share his expertise with everyone, so have a listen.

Or, if you want a few quick tips, read on – it’s like taking a masterclass without leaving the house. Wait. That’s kind of perfect, isn’t it? #socialdistancing

Relationships Are Everything: Don’t Add to the Noise

“Relationships are long term, ultimately, and it's important for us to remember that, that it's all the different steps we take over time that affects our reputation, how people outside of our organization or our employees are perceiving us. So, if we're committed to doing the right thing if we're committed to helping if we're committed to going above and beyond as much as we can – because there's still that balance between making sure we do what we need to do to keep our organizations running, to keep our employees informed, and hopefully working. All of that is important. And I think it ties into the notion of communicating and really being open in your communications, and possibly increasing your communications but only when you have something to say....really ask, ‘Is this message absolutely necessary in these times, or will it just add to the noise?’ Just make sure that you're not adding to the noise pollution out there, that whatever bit of communications you put out is helpful and is essential in these times.”

Check Tone and Overall Content

“For like maybe the last 10 days or so most people are starting to pick up on the tone or ‘read the room’ thing a little bit. And, you know, there's been a lot of improvement. However, I think some people are actually falling down on the automation, while maybe most social and you know, ads have been checked for tone, one of the things I'm finding is email is quite bad – there’s this perception that they need to be going out to people at this time all the time. And they're continuing to go out and a whole bunch of people I know on social are also the picking on these things and pointing out the tone deafness of it....You know, I am on an email list for a retail clothing outlet that I like, and I shop at all the time. And every day, I'm still getting an email from them 60% off, you know, it's like, ‘Okay, right now, I'm not looking to buy clothes, I don't really need clothes.’ That's not an essential.”

Don’t Be Afraid to Use Humour – But Keep it Simple!

“What humour does is it serves as a little bit of a distraction. And it's a way just to help us forget the situation for a moment. You know, think about something else, get a laugh, maybe relax a bit. I mean, humour is a great tension release. Yesterday, I saw on Twitter, I thought this was this a great thing, that was shared and of course, went viral – Neil Diamond - you know, his song Sweet Caroline is pretty famous. What he did is he recorded a short video from his home so you could see him in front of his fireplace talking, singing Sweet Caroline just him and his guitar. And he changed the words to be appropriate. So instead of ‘hands touching hands’, he said, ‘hands, washing hands’, and that was just so great. And it, you know, it gives you a break. And that's what you need. Now, that said, if your brand is a very, very serious brand and have never dabbled in humor ever, ever, ever, now is maybe not the time to start because people won't be expecting it from you. They won't know how to take it, especially if it's something that's a little sarcastic or satirical, so you have to be careful with that. And I would say if you are thinking of using humor, that's great, but look to your overall brand - brand values, brand character.”

We hope you enjoyed this episode ...