Cindy Keyes: All right, welcome back to Matrix Method. I am Cindy here with Justin and our resident guest, Dan Grams. Today is going to be a very exciting topic because it appears that with the influx of AI, we are now in a stage where marketing is really done by AI with other AIs. So you have AIs reaching out for leads. connecting with companies and then you have AI and companies responding to these leads. so what does that really look like for us in the future? Are we just going to be in a place where computers are talking to each other and humans are completely left out of it? Or is there a place in for humans in this whole marketing, customer service space? So we're gonna talk to Dan today to see what med spas and medical providers and can do to make sure that they are actually reaching out to the right customers and how how can they do that and ⁓ what the technologies that's in place to help them get there. So welcome Dan back to our Matrix of Method podcast.
Dan: Thanks, Cindy. I'm glad to be back.
Cindy Keyes: So you know, one thing that we we talked about earlier is the fact that computers are talking to other computers. So kind of walk us through like how is that working right now? Because I think everyone wants to be the ones to take advantage of AI and use it in their business to save them time. But if everybody's doing that, then where is the human in this whole process?
Dan: Exactly. That's a problem a lot of my customers are facing now. We get their and their AEO and their GEO dialed in ⁓ they get a lot more visibility. But that visibility ⁓ to potential customers, but it's also to ⁓ all marketing bots that are out there that now find their contact forms and they come in like they're a lead and they're really coming in to be a customer. They're coming in to set up time for a salesperson. To waste your time with their pitch. So it becomes a really difficult thing to get time to go through all of these leads, and it just shows that okay, you've got your top of funnel working, but now you've got kind of a leaky funnel because once gets down and you get the lead in, are you inundated with them? Do you have the resources within your company to respond to everybody? And more to look through and qualify the leads. To know which ones to call back first and to which ones you should ignore. So that's really where the human element is super important to be able to kind of have that pattern recognition to say, you know what, this is obviously marketing bot that's trying to waste our time. And this one's obviously a person that we should call back ⁓ same day and not wait a week before we contact them back. So ⁓ definitely where a lot of brands struggle. And there are good ways to kind of that for them if they're aware that that's an issue.
Justin: Yeah, ar aren't we concerned that maybe people will I mean I've already found people have kind of stopped answering their phone almost always unless we're already friends and we already mutually interested in something. You know, we are we running the you know, maybe it's more of a philosophical question philosophical question, but like are we are we running the risk of like You know, when we when ⁓ when we mean to make a human to human call, like should we say, Hey, it's justin a human? know you're super interested in our product, just ⁓ give me a call back when you get a chance. Again, I'm a human and this is my human number. Like I don't know like
Cindy Keyes: Ha ha.
Dan: Yeah. The problem with that though, the robots will start saying they're humans just as much as the humans are. So it really comes down to somebody reaches out to me on LinkedIn, for instance, I'm v less likely to respond to anyone that I haven't met in real life that I know is a real person because, like you said, do we stop answering the phone because we're afraid a telemarketer might be on the other end? Absolutely. And if that telemarketer gets through, your number goes into another database. an engaged database. The database that they know these are the the hot leads that this person's gonna answer the phone maybe they'll say no the first ten times, but maybe that eleventh time we're gonna trick and gonna get through and we're gonna give them the pitch that wins. So then your phone starts ringing off the hook. So you really have to be really careful how much you engage just because it puts a on your back if you engage too much.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah, I don't don't know how I set this up, but apparently on my work phone it actually asks the caller what they're calling for. I didn't realize it did that until somebody mentioned to me and I was like, Well, I don't know how to change that, but I'm definitely keeping it because I think
Justin: Interesting.
Dan: That's an iPhone setting and I have it on mine as well and it's absolutely great. But again, some of the new encoders sound so much like real people that they're getting around that too, where you say, this sounds like a person and then again, as soon as you answer it for one, they will bombard you. And yeah, absolutely unbelievable.
Cindy Keyes: Okay. And well, it's interesting because the use of AI was kind of, you know, it's skyrocketing and we are seeing now going back, right? So much writing, so many graphics are being generated by AI that now people are wanting to go back to actual actually creating things themselves. You know, I found myself now. using Canva myself a little bit more often to put together graphics instead of having AI generate something because they all are starting to look the same. ⁓ you can see it right away. And if you're online, you can see that people are looking at AI generated material in a negative light, that it is showing laziness the part ⁓ of it's a company or provider. ⁓
Justin: Mm-hmm.
Dan: Yes.
Cindy Keyes: instead of actually putting it together. And I think because a lot of people are not prompting with AI. So it is all coming out very generic chat GPT style instead of a very clear prompt and where you're putting in specific information and you're asking A to help you put it together. But sometimes need that human creativity as well.
Dan: Absolutely. And we also need to be aware that there are tools that will help you spot the AI generated slop you can use those tools even if you are building things kind of in your favor. So you can run things through GPT or you can run things through Grammarly and say, Does this have the common hallmarks of AI? And then in and do a little bit of copy editing. And get rid of those things that are the huge red flags that will turn people against your brand quickly. And it maybe won't turn everybody against your brand, but it seems like a lot of people really that puts a sour impression about your brand if they ⁓ that they're just leaning on AI, they're not putting any effort into this, and they're just turning out product to turn out product and feeding a slop. And nobody wants that. So Yeah, you still have to figure out how to engage with your customer and the tools will not figure that out for you. You have to know your customer and then you can again use the tool to help get you eighty percent of the way there, but you still have to put in a little bit of effort at the end to make sure your brand voice is solid, to make sure that you're putting out something that just i immediately spotable as
Cindy Keyes: Mm-hmm.
Dan: ⁓ this person put in zero effort and that's how much they care about me as a customer. I'll go to somebody who will engage with me on a more human level give me a better experience because people all still want that ⁓ unique that a real brand and a good company will provide.
Cindy Keyes: Very true. I could see Justin thinking.
Justin: Wonderful. Well, I've been I've been replaying this scenario in my head. so I I was scheduled to see my dermatologist, like just for like a a follow-up, you know, not for any work thing, right? And something up I needed to reschedule and they sent me they have an automated system that sent me like a hey reminder your appointment is tomorrow morning ⁓ and you know, text confirm. And I was like, actually I do need to reschedule. So I hit the button for that. And it was like, okay, here are some times. Like I got like a prompt back that was like, please pick a time to reschedule. And I picked. evidently ⁓ it like register that. Like I was like, sure, okay, like, you know, one month from now, beep, you know, let's go. And then when I when I didn't show up for the appointment the next day, I started getting automated calls. And it was from an AI agent. And then I got a text and it was like, hey, this is Valerie, the AI or the yeah, it said like I'm a virtual assistant or something. And I was like, yo, I you know, I rescheduled or whatever. And it was like, I'm sorry, I don't understand this. I was like, you know, like I don't know why we had to go through all of this, ⁓ but wonder. You how much that is going on like inside of people's practices and they assume that it's getting handled, but it's and and they're assume they're assuming that this is so much more efficient and maybe saving them money. But in reality, like if I would have got just like one regular call or text like I would have in the past, I probably would have just nailed it. Like we would have just nailed it in one shot. You know, so I wonder like how much of this is going on and then And then if you're, you know, and this is a big dermatology group that's owned by big PE now, right? Like they all are. Then they're analyzing, know, whatever analytics they're looking at. Is is is program going to be honest with them about their retention? You know, like like they're they're say ⁓
Cindy Keyes: Yeah.
Dan: Well the assumption there is they're actually looking at the analytics, because most companies don't. they just kind of think that, well, we bought the tools, the tools are doing their jobs. But if the tools are integrated with each other and making that you don't have a problem like you just faced, then the tools are ⁓ actually working you and you don't even know it.
Justin: Right. So, you know, and knowing groups like that, then they're gonna start to see their their patient numbers dwindling and they're gonna start, you know, cutting humans. Right? ⁓ and then go, what happened here? And it's like, well, you kinda I think you over technologized your business a little bit, right? I'm not I'm not I'm not trying to be a Luddite here, but you know, we made it a little more confusing and complicated than we needed to.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah.
Dan: Exactly.
Cindy Keyes: Well, I think it goes back to you really do need people who understand what they're doing the end of the day. People like Dan. And I mean, it took a while for us to for me to meet Dan. And I told you I was like, my AI level maybe not be like the top of the top, but I think it was more than most people. And so when I met people and I talked to them, I was like, okay, no, I don't need your help. Right. Like I could do that myself. I don't but when I met Dan, I was like, Okay. Yes, this guy knows what he's doing. And I think that's what's happening. First of all, you have companies using AI and they think they're using it the right way. Right. Like you don't use it to make big company decisions and strategies. I mean, and there's companies doing that. or they're hiring the people who know maybe ten percent of what Dan can do. But they're very they're good at marketing or they're on social. They're saying I'm this, I'm that. I'm gonna get your your company to here and there and whatever. And so they're hiring these people and they're assuming that they're doing what they think that they're doing. but again, ⁓ back, you have to find people who are experts who have done it, who have experience, especially in your industry, right? Somebody who's been doing, you know, SEO. for a, you know, autobodies shop, whatever, wants to do that for Med Spa, it's you have to understand the industry. You have to understand the business and how it functions.
Dan: Absolutely. And that's what's always given me an edge is before AI existed, I got my career started as a network engineer for excite.com back in the first dot com bubble. And then when that faded out, I decided, okay, let's go into marketing and e commerce. And as an effective operator so many different fronts, now that these tools have come out, I'm a little bit more able to use the tools in smarter way because I think about How would I have done this myself before these tools existed? And where can I make them more effective and not just at it from let's say a private equity standpoint of how can I use these tools to ⁓ less and give ⁓ whatever experience to the customer that they can get? Like they don't care at the end of the day. Private equity is just notorious for saying, let's just make ⁓ and let's cut much fat as we can. And if we can cut ten people out of the workforce, who cares? At the end of the day, my bonus is gonna be bigger. ⁓ where even as a consumer, when I go to the veterinarian office with my cat, I made sure that I I went through several when I was making the phone calls and I did the research and I would check out, okay, who actually owns this practice until I found one that the doctor who I speak to when I go in is the doctor who owns that practice. He doesn't take money from private equity. He's not in somebody's pocket to try to sell me something that I don't need. He's going to be kind of more honest and upfront with me. So that's where I decide to spend my money and give my business to. even down to car mechanics. I do the same thing there. I just had ⁓ major service done to my vehicle where the the independent shop that I was dealing with wasn't so independent and turns out their prices were the same as the dealership. So then I did a little bit more research I was able to save about two thousand dollars on the service by finding somebody new that again was independent and was willing to tell me like, i the y the car brand that you have, these parts are actually made by this OEM ⁓ and if we them direct from that company They're the same things. They're made out of the same parts, they're the same factory, just the stamp on it is different, but they're exactly the same. And you're gonna save about fifty cents on the dollar because you don't have that middleman markup. So one of those things where if you go back and you do the research and you make sure that you're dealing with actual humans that are looking out for you, you can be a better consumer. So yeah, it every front, it's kind of good to do your research, use the tools, but don't rely on the tools. They're not gonna do everything for you. Know the questions to ask and get to the end result that you need.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah, you know, and I think in our industry, consumers, patients, clients, providers, they are all knowledgeable about lot of things in this industry, right? So whether it's a service or it's a product. And so ⁓ now their buying patterns are particular. ⁓ the market is very saturated. You know, there's so many options. you I think people are trying to find a way to stand out, trying to ⁓ simplify using using ways to market. But You know, I I feel like we're we're all trying to do the same thing at the same time. Does that feel right? It it's almost like, you know, whenever everything is is busy and there's a lot going on, it's like people are just seeing what somebody else is doing and just copying what they're doing. And then you just end up getting like it's like a it's a it's a block, I guess, you know. And people are not
Dan: Absolutely.
Cindy Keyes: stepping out and looking at different ways to adapt their business. You know, from your standpoint, how are you, ⁓ what would you advise, right? to a med spa or a physician provider that's coming in and to you and says, hey, I don't, I don't want to do what everybody else is doing. What can do and how can I do this so that my practice stands out? Because in a one mile radius, there's probably five other ⁓ practices. all doing the same services, selling the same product as I am. How can I stand out?
Dan: It's all about the just basics of marketing. You have to look at your sales funnel and where do your leads come in? How do you service those leads? if you really figure out, okay, I wanna stand out and be the number one when people are going into Google and searching or asking the chat bots who the best provider is and getting the recommendation, when those leads come in, make sure that they're qualified leads. And they hit your website and you have a contact form, You might have to do sneaky things like put some honeypot fields on there. So you make sure that it is a marketing robot coming in, it's gonna find that honeypot field and it's gonna fill it in, even though it's not visible to an actual human. So then you can weed those out right away. And then you can start looking for the patterns. ⁓ it's again, humans are better at recognizing patterns than any other tool that you could possibly have. So make sure that once you have the really sloppy things that are falling for the honeypot. fields look at it and say, okay, is this a real person? Does their phone number match up with their address? Is this somebody that I can even find on social media? And if so, then give it to an actual human to call back. Don't give it to the automated dialer that's gonna have say hello three times before it starts responding. Because we've all dealt with that where you pick up the phone, hello, hello, hey, is this ⁓ and it's You're on an autodialer. I know you're on an autodialer. I'm already turned off because you've annoyed me with the having to say hello twice. So again, getting real people to dial that number and to be there and actually responsive. And then ⁓ far as every brand goes, you need to have people out there networking. You need to have them going to conferences. You need to have them meeting the customer where the customer actually is and hey. ⁓ ⁓ I noticed that this is something that you might be having an issue with. Here's my business card. And that's another crazy thing. Most people don't even have a business card for their business and what they do. they think, ⁓ that's just ⁓ a antiquated relic. Nobody uses business cards anymore. But if somebody gives you a really high quality card and they talk to you in person, you're gonna remember them and you're probably going to engage with them further on down the line. So ⁓ a lot of the things that really work are the basics that always worked that people have just gotten kind of lazy and moved away from because well that just that's how people used to do it. Well that's how people still should be doing it because it worked then and it'll still work now especially if you can put your own spin on it. And that's why again, ⁓ market business that way. I go on car rallies with people. I have my license plate branded to my business. If they say what what's that stand for? I give him one of my business cards and say, Yeah, this is my business, e-com strategics. the license plate is exact same branding and colors as my business card. I have a black background license plate with blue letters on it. My business cards are ⁓ black foil embossing on both sides with a nice blue foil. And it out. It's a nice heavy card stock and it's something that they take notice of. and I've had people tell me, you know, you're the first person in the last ten years who's actually given me a business card. ⁓ some of those people have become my clients. So it's again back to the basics of what ⁓ and can you meet people? Where can you get out when find people that share other just personal interests that then you can kind of soft sell and say, you know what, if you ever need this, here's my information and I'm not gonna just try to hammer you and come at you on
Cindy Keyes: Yeah.
Dan: LinkedIn with a marketing script that's gonna send out the same message to 5,000 people every day, hoping that I have a conversion rate of 0.001% because then it pays for the marketing script. That doesn't work. What does work is actually engaging with people just finding that common ground and saying, you know what, this is something that I think would help you. And if you're interested, give me a call. And make it really easy for them to see where your phone number is, see where your website is. And ⁓ y you have a much higher conversion rate with those types of engagements than you do just with the cold outreach.
Justin: Yeah, I agree with you there. I you know, and I when you talk about business cards, I still too, like I will remember that person so much more if I touch the card, I looked at the card, I looked at their face, I read their name, and then later I come home from the conference and I go through the cards of the people I met and I don't I don't throw away business cards. I'm weird, like like I am a traditional I have like drawers and drawers of business cards going back twenty plus years, like 'cause I I I feel like Even if it was just for a second it was a personal connection with somebody and you never know. Like if I took I don't just take business cards from randos that I don't have any interest in, know, connecting with. It's always like there is some sort of potential for us to work together and know each other. So, you know, I I take that card, I keep it, and someday maybe I'll maybe I'll, you know, pick it up and call that number. Like people should do that, right?
Dan: I am different. I will throw them away if they're perforated edges and printed with an inkjet printer. Like if they put in the bare minimum effort to just have the Avery break apart from the Office Max, I'm not interested. But I do keep the good ones, especially if it's something that just impresses me design wise. Does it have a nice embossing or debossing on it? Is it something that I can get ideas to improve my own in the future with? And I do. I I probably keep
Justin: Yeah. Yeah.
Dan: twenty to twenty-five percent of the ones that I get just because wow this was really done extra nice. They put some thought into this and maybe there's some ideas that I can take from it.
Justin: Well and like in our industry too, like you can a lot of things we can be efficient about. And we should evolve with technology as quickly as we can. but know, I was working with a company that was one of the first that started using AI to do lead generation, and then they were using it to funnel into Hubspot that was then funneling to reps. So I'm here in like a rep capacity. And one thing that I noticed, the beginning of the funnel, like you mentioned the sales funnel. The beginning of the funnel was a meta campaign. And the time the leads were getting to the reps and reps physically calling them in real life, which took a little bit, because you know, you find out who's actually calling the leads and who's not, who's, you know, what other like ⁓ Dysfunctions there are in that chain, in that, in that chain. but long story short, I contact, you know, nine out of ten of these leads, and they are geriatric. Like, could like, this is a this is a technology that only doctors could buy for like $150,000. Like it was capital equipment. It was like a big thing. And they were like, you know, and the CEO was like, We're getting tons of leads, like make sure you're following your hub spot. And I was like, ⁓ I'm in my hub spot and I'm calling and I'm like, Mildred? Is this Mildred? And she's like, Huh? What? And Mildred is old enough to remember Pearl Harbor. Like this then I mean, and back to back, I don't know what happened or who got hosed in like whatever service that they purchased to to to market through through Meta, but I mean there wasn't a single doctor in there at all.
Dan: Yeah.
Justin: It was 100% the wrong demographic, right? ⁓ but those are the things that you gotta check. You gotta like, okay, you know, you have to audit these systems. know, if you're if you're a a company leader, you can't just like s get it started and trust that it's all gonna work out. You know, like you gotta audit every step of the process and and figure out, you know, otherwise you're you're in a ⁓
Cindy Keyes: Yeah. Yeah.
Justin: Sonic hyper speed race to nowhere.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah.
Dan: Absolutely. It always makes me think of the movie and play Glengarry Glenn Ross. And you want those good Glengarry leads. You don't want the garbage. You want the the quality that's actually gonna convert.
Justin: Yeah. The leads are weak, you're weak.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah.
Dan: Exactly. Alec Baldwin's best role.
Justin: Great movie. Mm-hmm.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah, so It's like that fine line, right? It's like it, you know, in everything that culture that happens to culture, it's like we just take everything and we just hyperspeed, you know, and we just go full forth not and we don't stop to think about it till we kind of hit a place where like, whoa, I think we've taken this a little too far, right? Like there are things like the administrative, the, you know, the the things that kind of make it easy, but don't let go of that human connection. And you know, I mean, first of all, I mean, I can say companies giving customer service to offshore call all-site ⁓ call centers have been a struggle. Right. ⁓ trying to explain like what's going on. And I'm like, can I I had a situation with a bank and it was, you know, clearly going to a call center somewhere else and to explain to them. And finally, I just had to put I had to like email them in like the secure center on on my in my bank and ⁓ this is where it actually ai helped me right I to Claude I said this is the situation I'm dealing with these are the issues I need help to put together an email that explains this in the right way and so it did and it gave me some insight into like you need to tell them that if they don't fix this you are going to report it to this agency and that agency. So I had sent one email And I just was like very nice about it and they didn't respond. Well, I sent a follow-up of the of my Claude created email with everything. I had somebody from the bank from the actual branch call me and was like, Hey, we you know, we got your message and I can help you. I said, I I kid you not. And I think Justin and both of you guys, I think I was talking to, I was on the phone for two hours with the bank. While I was talking to you guys on my other phone, I was sitting for two hours, get hung up and then get back with them, and then having going through that circle, and all I needed was somebody from the actual branch, a human, to call me and tell me they can get this situation taken care of. And this is what I think businesses start to need to really understand, whether you're a bank.
Dan: Yeah. Yep.
Cindy Keyes: or a doctor's office or a med spa or retailer, whatever it is, you gotta have, don't give up that human side, you know, because clearly when people call your customer service line, it's because they couldn't get it answered somewhere else through your texts, through your FAQs, through your website, they could not find it.
Dan: That's right.
Cindy Keyes: So they really need to talk to somebody, or it could be somebody who's not technol technologically savvy. It could be somebody who's older, who don't know how to go through and navigate all that, and they just want to pick up a phone and ask somebody. That's when you need to have a person on the other line to listen to them, but somebody who's here in the actual business, not in a call center somewhere else.
Dan: Sorry. And sometimes what that takes is you do a r a little bit of research and you can usually find the email addresses of a handful of the C level executives. you start sending the emails to the absolute top of the chain. Because if you start at the bottom and you get nowhere, sometimes flip it and go, Okay, who is the most powerful person in this industry that I can find that I can reach out to? ⁓
Cindy Keyes: Mm. Yeah.
Dan: And then they usually have executive customer support that'll reach back out to you if you've hit their CEO they see it firsthand. And then that's also how change can start happening because then they're aware of it. They see that this person was frustrated enough to reach out to me directly, whether it's an email, whether it's LinkedIn, whether it's you find a phone number, and relentless and you say, you know what, I'm tired of this, so I'm gonna go straight to the top. until I get it fixed. And 90% of the time it works. So you're absolutely right with that. And then again, you're bringing the right eyes to the problem. And maybe they'll say, you know what, we need to fix this top down and make sure that more customers aren't feeling this. Because if one person reaches out to them, that means probably anywhere from a hundred to a thousand hit a dead end and never out to anybody ⁓ and they lost their business. And that's what will kill a business really quickly.
Cindy Keyes: And sometimes it the damage is already done. Sometimes it is so bad. I mean, you know, there is a situation of a company that like gave their, you know, is somebody who is like focused on professional skincare, right? They work specifically with professionals. So people who are calling are professionals and having to send their call center to another country, one, not just to another country, but to people who are not professional.
Justin: ⁓ yeah.
Cindy Keyes: skincare providers, Who are reading things from a book and having their clients actually hang up because they thought they got the wrong number. Right. And having the data show, our custom the number of calls coming to our call center have decreased. So it means our customer service is doing well. It's like, no, you've lost a customer. People stopped calling because ⁓ they think the wrong number. ⁓
Justin: Well. Yeah. Yeah.
Dan: You're right. Well, that's because a lot of those call centers, not their only client. So you might be paying them two dollars an hour, but you're also spreading that against twenty different companies and twenty different industries. So that person again, they just have the same ⁓ with the these are the common questions and anything beyond that. You don't know the brand. You don't care about the brand. So it's better to say, you know what, maybe if I pay my receptionist up front, To not browse Facebook and to be text messaging in her off time and actually dealing with the customers. And if I pay her a little bit more to be engaged, then the consumer will have a better experience and that money will be worth it and pay out dividends and a better experience where the person's a little bit happier because they're not making a minimum wage. They're making a livable wage and they're able to then say, you know what, I to keep this job no matter what.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah.
Dan: And if they tell me that I can't use social media when I'm at work, I'm not going to. I'm going to engage with the customers and I'm going to a fair wage because I know nobody else is going to give it to me. So that's really where a lot of business gets and just say, you what, let's not try to find the cheapest route. Let's try to find the best route and take care of our people and have them take care of the customers. And then it's a better ecosystem. And then it just feeds back into itself. It's a flywheel effect.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah.
Dan: So yeah, it's definitely something that a lot of brands miss.
Cindy Keyes: like somebody doing customer service for like staples, helping people who are having trouble loading their their ink in, you know, is not going to be able to support a skincare brand that is, you know, used just by aestheticians, right? So it's like these are the things that people need to like leadership. top leadership need to understand that you cannot just look at the bottom line. You cannot say, ⁓ well, that company saved this much money because they got rid of all of their customer service people and now they're using a call center. So let's do that same. No, you got to understand your industry. You got to understand your business. And same thing for I mean practices too. Sometimes they think like, ⁓ well, I'll get this AI person who can
Justin: Mm-hmm.
Cindy Keyes: answer and respond and so I don't need a front desk person. I don't need an assistant in the front. Let's just have people check in. Well make sure that whatever you have set up is actually set up right because you could be losing customers and you don't even know it. So you don't even have chance to save it because you don't even know what's happening.
Dan: That's right. One of the best brands I've worked for had an amazing corporate educator who worked with everybody from customer service to people in marketing and taught them the exact same things about the product and it taught them what the messaging was, how the product worked best for people. it didn't matter where you were in the company, you got to spend time with this ⁓ who ⁓ you up to that level. To then matter who I'd run into, even if it was outside and I'd say, ⁓ who are you working for? I'm working for this brand, and they'd some questions about it, I could answer those questions even though they were kind of outside of my job title, but I was educated in it. ⁓ And if had same education that any of the reps that any of the customer service people had, ⁓ even though I was dealing with e commerce and trying to figure out how to keep that efficient. It really empowered me to be a better employee at every level. And that's where a lot of companies, they don't even think that, I need a corporate educator who's going to be embedded with my team and teaching them all the same thing ⁓ and sure that they're using the product, that they know what each product does and why, and being to out into the field on ride-alongs and see how the reps are selling it after you're educated. And then when the customer even asks you questions, you can answer it with the rep there and not look like an idiot that's just there along for the ride. So yeah, that's definitely something that a lot of brands don't even realize they're missing, but it's available. Other brands are doing it, and those are the things that AI can't replace. You really need to have those people that are again, experts on the product that can disseminate that knowledge across every employee, regardless what they're doing within the brand, whether it's an intern, whether it's customer service or a rep, they all should have the same education.
Justin: Yeah. Nobody wants to deal with a bureaucracy, right? So if you set up a hierarchy within your practice or you know, if you're selling products, you know, you're launching a new product in our space like a lot of our clients are. Like you can't have a chain of command where, well, that's not my job. Let me escalate it to so and so. You know, I mean, you do have to compartmentalize some things and people are specialized, right? But like what you're talking about is Everyone can help the customer a little bit and make them feel like they didn't waste their time by talking. Okay, well, I talked to like the computer guy, Dan. But he told me some helpful stuff and then recommended I talk to someone who's even more helpful. Like that's the experience you want to have, not like, well, call a hang up and call this number. ⁓ if you've ever worked with an insurance company at all, this is the kind of shit they Like, you want to buy a new insurance plan, there's
Dan: That's right.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah. Ha ha.
Dan: That's a true fact.
Justin: fifty people ready to help you and they're your best friend and you know they'll they'll, you know, bend over backwards to make sure, you know, you get connected with the right plan. And then you turn around and want to try and make a claim, it's bureaucracy time. You know, and it's I mean it's kind of a trope, but it's true. And they're the most guilty industry of it. And you know, we're in the aesthetics industry and you know, a ⁓ ask you know C level
Cindy Keyes: Ha ha.
Dan: ⁓ That's it.
Justin: aesthetics person if you'd like your your company to be an insurance company. And that's it, that's gonna be a hard map.
Cindy Keyes: And that's how a lot of them feel. That's how a lot of providers feel right now. They get they are courted, they buy, then they're
Justin: Yeah, exactly. Well and and when you're talking about, you know, physicians in our space, they got into the ⁓ aesthetics industry to so that they wouldn't have to deal with the insurance bureaucracy. Cause that's kind of who they work for in traditional medicine. You know, they're they're part of the bureaucracy, which is sad, you know. you are doing, you know, medicine and your company's owned by PE, I mean, that's that's a tough one.
Cindy Keyes: Exactly. Exactly.
Justin: You know, so
Cindy Keyes: Yeah. Well, Dan, you brought up a good point because I know in my prior companies, I spent a lot of time ⁓ the tech guys. And, know, I think that's where I learned a lot about technologies, because I ask them questions about how things are working, but I also explained to them the business side. And that's something that so many companies don't do enough of. They keep everyone siloed and and And there's a lot of blame when something doesn't go right. But if you don't spend the time to explain it, how does somebody who is in tech understand beauty if they've never been in the beauty industry? Right? So you have to have somebody to spend the time to explain to them like this is how it works and this is, you know, how things are sold, blah, blah, blah, blah, right? once they get it.
Dan: A hundred percent.
Cindy Keyes: They understand it and then they are able to help you by making sure the tech side meets your needs. this is over overlooked so many companies. I can't even tell you. ⁓ I mean, not just small companies. I mean, even in big, big global beauty brands, there is a disconnect because they're just not. Engaging with each other, and I think that's a shame.
Dan: It's almost the bigger companies have the bigger problem with it. It's the small to medium sized companies where people in other departments will talk with people in other departments. But once you get into the larger corporations, you're absolutely right. Everyone is siloed, they only do their job, they don't think anything beyond what they do on their day to day, it really work. And speaking as a tech person who got into a beauty company, my face regimen used to be ⁓
Cindy Keyes: Yeah.
Justin: Yeah.
Dan: If shampoo from my hair got onto my face, my face was getting clean and that was good enough. then again, we had a corporate educator who's like, no, really, what you need to do is have a good dedicated cleanser, you need to have a good moisturizing product, you need to have a good retinol, and need to be able to kind of bring that all together, and this is the order to use them in. And still to this day, I have an actual skincare regimen. That before I started in a beauty company, my regimen was soap gets on there, it's getting clean. And really wasn't the best approach, but ⁓ from the tech standpoint, hey, at least I was using shampoo. So I mean, yeah, it it's a whole different way of looking at things and the being open to being educated and learning about the products and saying, you know what If I know how to this as a consumer that actually would want it, I'm gonna just do my job better regardless what part of the business I'm in.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah. And getting your insights. I know we've had conversations about ⁓ you know, different things and you were able to give insights that were really helpful, right? Like ideas from a from a you know, not like a person that's like not so ingrained in the industry and it was like, you know, I never thought of that or I for I overlooked that piece. And sometimes I for myself Some of the best partnerships I've had with people on the tech side or analytics or you know BI team, it was because they understood what we did. I took the time to explain it. And sometimes ⁓ I was trying to find a solution for, they had it. Right? They knew it because they knew the tech. Exactly. ⁓
Dan: And they probably didn't even know they had it. And it's one of those things we all learn from each other, and that's the whole way street that a of companies don't understand. If you keep people siloed, the innovations and ideas that one person might have that's completely outside of their department, or just the comment that they make that sparks an idea in your head, that's what makes all the change happen. And that's what really turns ⁓ a brand into a powerhouse brand.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely.
Justin: Yeah. I mean I've seen in companies too where, you know, when you do create those silos that and that disconnect and I mean to to be fair, you know, the one I'm thinking of is kinda COVID times where everyone was started kind of getting disjointed and no one was in office together where you could run over and say, Hey, we've got a problem, right? And everyone kinda ran off into their own little corners and you know, they're all working from home and whatever. And all of a sudden you start to see You know, okay, I have some feedback, but I don't know who ⁓ who I need to give it to, the feedback is ⁓ going or not welcome, and then all of a sudden your business starts to decline and nobody knows why. We don't know where all these chinks in the armor are. Right? So
Cindy Keyes: Yeah. ⁓ you said it right then I said when you're giving feedback and it's not welcomed. I think that is that can kill a company's culture so quickly and I and it's unfortunate because it is so prevalent in so many companies. you know and that is a culture that has to be started by somebody in the top by all the leaders. You know, having a state like a space where
Justin: ⁓ yeah.
Cindy Keyes: all feedback is appreciated. it's it's unfortunate that's not the case in a lot of companies. ⁓ you know, and and I know we advise, like when we talk to new companies, startups, these new companies coming to commercialize, like kind of strategic advice we're giving isn't even about, ⁓ which channel are you going to go into and how do you do that? It's really like what kind of culture are you going to create? Because the culture that you're going to create now is going to set up your success for the future. So no matter what kind of AI or software or foundation, anything else that you want to put in, none of that matters. It's a culture that's going to start from the beginning. Either you have people, and that's the thing. Like all of us, all three of us, have like different skill sets, different talents. imagine imagine if we were in a place where
Dan: That's right.
Cindy Keyes: We felt threatened to say what we really felt. Or, you know, I mean, Justin and I probably would have been in a really bad business arrangement Dan hadn't said, Hey, know what, guys? I'm looking at numbers here for this project you guys are looking at. And I know if it's it's if it's right. And and then when we had a second to look at it, we're like, you know what? That model wasn't the best. Let's let's adjust it now. Let's flip, you know, let's let's tweak that. Okay, now okay, that is a good ⁓ model now. Right? ⁓ so.
Justin: Yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely. Like saves saved our butts. Right? Like you know, I it is crazy to think there are there are leaders out there that are like, Okay, thanks, you know. more from him, you know, like and it's like ⁓ like be careful, like welcome it, you know, like share with each other.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Dan: Yeah.
Cindy Keyes: Because it doesn't.
Dan: Well, you don't have to take everything personally. If you had something that came by and you didn't have a chance to think it all the way through, sometimes it takes that other perspective and it's not that perspective's an attack against what you thought might have looked good on the surface level. It was they about it and said, Like I said, if it don't make dollars, it don't make sense. And you can't figure out where the profit's coming from and you're to be sunk costs for maybe the first two or three years ⁓
Cindy Keyes: Yes.
Dan: That puts you at a lot of risk you wanna try to risk mitigate and again that's not a personal level, that's just business sense. And one of those things where you have to say, All right, ⁓ let's pick it apart and figure out where the is, know the brand, know the customer, and what competition gonna and where do you have a differentiator? What sets you apart from the ten other people doing anything because everybody comes to you with a I've got the most innovative product and there is no competition. if you really start to look, everything's done. You just have to figure out how do I do it better? What do I bring to the table that's different? And where can I meet the customer and the customer's needs? So yeah, that's definitely a really important thing to just kind of step back, first principles, just look at it very high level, and take pride and out of it and just say, let's look at the numbers.
Cindy Keyes: Ha ha ha. Yeah.
Dan: Let's look at everything else in the landscape. And then doesn't make sense. I've walked away from several clients who have come offered me significant money to work on their product just because like it didn't make sense to me and I didn't figure like how is this gonna work long term and do I wanna be part of a losing campaign or do I wanna pick winners? And I've even people come back to me ⁓
Cindy Keyes: Yeah.
Dan: A year later or come back to mutual acquaintances who are like, ⁓ I really wish I would have listened to Dan. I'm w sunk into this for a couple hundred thousand dollars and I don't know where I'm ever gonna get my money back. And he told me be cautious about it, and I didn't listen. I just I thought this supplement product was gonna change the world and I had the best influencer marketing strategy to have all these personal pushing my product and it just didn't work out. And it's like, you know
Cindy Keyes: Yeah.
Dan: not only could I have told you that, I did tell you that. And now you're you're where you are. Sorry.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah.
Justin: Yeah. Yeah, yeah. They call it the eating the poison cheese when you you start to think like, you know, I've got a winner here, and you start to see those biases those biases of like, ⁓ man, just gonna make this work. And it's it's good to bring in outside voices and welcome that feedback and keep those channels open, like make sure your people are communicating, even as your company grows. And you're like, well, I can't have salespeople on the phone with my customer service people all day. Well, yeah, but they also need to talk to each other, you know, and each one needs to know what the other is kind of up to, the challenges they deal with, and and and there needs to be a leaders communicating between them. You know, like like my favorite arrangement as a sales manager, like a a a sales director, was when I had an office right next door to the customer service director.
Cindy Keyes: Yes.
Justin: And so I had like 40 people under me and she had like one in each time zone under her. So she had like four, but they were getting calls all day long. And I'm I got like 40 and I had like, you know, deputies, I'm getting calls all day long. But every every morning and every afternoon, we kind of put our heads together and we talked to and and if there was ever a like a a real sticky situation, we could just walk over and go, hey. Let's figure this out. gosh, I I'd I love that dynamic and and and we encourage our companies to have that kind of dynamic where, you know, look there's structure, there's order, you know, everyone has their job they're responsible for, but we're all working together towards the same goals.
Dan: And that was easier when places actually had offices. But now as everything post-COVID has shifted to everybody's a remote worker, you really have to go and say, you know what, every four to six months, we need to have a in-person get together. We need to fly people into one place kind of mix people up and have people even just team building exercises, as cliche as those are. They definitely really help people get to know each other on that personal level.
Justin: Yeah.
Dan: to where then they do feel more comfortable during the other times to say, you know what, I had a really great time at this retreat with this one person and now I have some questions. They're the person I'm gonna hit up on Slack or I'm gonna pick up the phone and call. you have that camaraderie that otherwise if you're just on Zoom meetings with people all day long, you're never gonna get. And you can't have Zoom cocktail hours or things like people are trying to do that doesn't work either. Like you still Need to again get people face to face with each other, go out to meals with each other, share in just that human experience to then build the relationships that make your team a way stronger team than if they don't have.
Cindy Keyes: Well, and I think some companies are going back to office but with no real plan, right? Like they're like, ⁓ we'll we'll go back to office because that's what people should be doing. But then they're not creating that true office environment. Like every it's still very siloed. ⁓ it's like it defeats the point of even having a return to office if people are still kind of siloed and doing their own thing.
Justin: Yeah. Yeah, it's almost like, well, they're just forcing me to get in my car and burn gas every day and like, you know, just 'cause like to keep the keep the thumb on me, right? But like I don't know. You know, it's if you like who you work with and you enjoy your job, which like I think is kind of I mean it's not a analienable right in the constitution, but I think it is kind of like a it is kind of a basic human right in a capitalist world to to to to kinda
Cindy Keyes: Ha ha ha. Yeah.
Justin: Like what you do and like the people you work with. You know, not everyone is gonna meet you that you know, not every job fits that category, but you should kinda wanna like see your people, you know, then go, you know, hooker down at your desk when you need to and you have privacy when you need it, but like, you know, that's the whole point of humanity, right? We're all on just Zooms, like you might as well throw six AI agents on the Zoom, like, what's the difference? You know.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah. Yeah. I know.
Dan: And that's what most people do anymore. They turn their transcript machine on, they sit there, then yeah, they get the summary when it's done. And again, ⁓ wish we could go back to the days of the first dot com boom when there were perks to go into the office. You wanted to go into the office because it was fun and it was maybe a little bit too loose at that point where it was almost like going to a kind of recess and ⁓
Justin: ⁓ that's the worst. Yeah.
Dan: You do a lot of socializing in the office and then maybe do your actual work when you got home. But mean there's a happy middle ground to that, to where companies can say, you know what, let's have bring your pet to work day, or let's have your dry cleaning picked up from your cubicle and we send it out for you, ⁓ or let's a really good cafeteria where there's quality food where you don't have to all split off and we've got a a ⁓ personal chef who's gonna make sure that Everybody's eating well and just s some of those things that were kind of laughable during the again the first dot com boom, they actually were effective. And it wasn't lost cost when you really thought about what it was providing for your employees to say, you know what, I'm excited to go to work. I'm gonna have a good time today because we we've got this going on and it's not just gonna be the doldrum of I'm gonna sit in my cubicle, I'm gonna look at the clock all day long until it's time to leave.
Cindy Keyes: Absolutely. I mean, some of my best friends are all people I've met while working in an office environment because we're there all the time and you know, they know about my family. I know about their families. you know, and even till now, like even though I'm not incorporated more, I'm still very good friends with so many people that I've worked with. And there's so many great memories that you don't think about, I mean you know, I had like one coworker. He knew when I was like in my zone. Well, if I'm like working on a project, I'm just in a zone. And he'll come in, he'll go by me and he'll just like throw chocolate on my desk. Right. to see what kind of mood I am. It's like, am I in a mood where I can be like, I can break from my concentration ⁓ be like, okay, what's up? What do you need? Right. Or I just so focused? I'm like, okay, I'll be back later. Right. And and don't get that.
Dan: Ha.
Cindy Keyes: ⁓ online, right? Like you don't get that kind of like if I am not if I if you're focused on something and you don't give somebody attention and you're online, you might be short, or you you know, whatever, it's it's taken offensively. But when person they know that I'm not trying to be offensive, I'm not trying to push you off. I'm just like in the zone because we've already built a relationship and you know how I am, I know how you are. And we're we're good. And that's that's the hidden thing with working in a corporate environment. It's not just about being there in person. It's about getting to really, really know people and also being able to trust the people. Cause if you don't trust people, if you're in a company where you feel that everything you say or, you know, things that you don't agree with is going to be turnaround and is going to be something that's going to come back and bite you in the you know. bite you in the butt or throw you under the bus or whatever. No one's gonna talk. And then the company won't move forward. All the problems are still gonna be there, but no one's telling the people who actually need to know. People are just telling it among themselves. And then the you know and the people on the top are wondering, why are we in a decline? Well, this is the environment you created.
Justin: Yeah. You know, if if your whole team is virtual, I mean it is convenient. I get it. You know, you can wear gym shorts, you know, at your desk. You know, it's that's kinda nice. but you're not missing you're missing the nonverbal cues. You're missing the look, the smell of the communication, like you know, you're getting the context like it ⁓ of a of a text, you know, in the office if you ⁓ make like silly joke or something, ⁓ that was just like
Cindy Keyes: Yeah. Yes. ⁓
Justin: You know, something funny. But you text the same thing and they go, shit, my boss just tested me the was that a joke you think? And then now ten other people are talking like you know. You're like, ⁓ mind. You know, like so we need to try and get back to that. Maybe let the air
Cindy Keyes: Yeah. Yeah
Dan: Mm. Well at a minimum a hybrid approach where you're in the office at least a couple days a week. Because it is nice to be able to work from home and my work from home days, I really get a lot more done, but I'm getting those human connections done. I'm not learning about who I'm working with and what we're all working towards. So yeah, we definitely again there's a good middle ground to all of it and it's we have to get back to that place.
Justin: Yeah.
Cindy Keyes: We need more companies who are struggling to reach out to Matrix. You know, we will help you. know, and I think that's the benefit, is especially in this industry, because we're still so connected to so many people in companies as reps, as CEOs, as directors. Like we kind of have a good feel about what's going on, what's what the feel is at companies, what do they like, what do they not like.
Dan: That's it.
Cindy Keyes: And you know, we have the ability to be able to say, listen, okay, this is the reason why you're losing all these people, or this is the reason why people are quitting. This is a reason why your sales are not good. because this is what's really going on. And you either can listen and make a change or you can continue on that path and you know, try to help. ⁓ So awesome. Well, we're at the one hour mark. That was really great. I mean, I think we started really about AI ⁓ know, how we've kind of AI has become this place where it's so disconnected and now AIs are talking to AIs. And then we just kind of spiraled into why so important to have human connection. And I think that is cannot we cannot emphasize that anymore. Is human connection is so important. For every company, regardless of the industry you're in.
Dan: Yeah, you respect tools as tools, but there still has to be the human operators of those tools to make them effective. if you start to rely on the tool too much, you're gonna lose sight of where you need to be.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah. All right. Well, thank you for joining us again, Dan. It is always a pleasure to get your insight. Thanks for everyone for joining us.
Justin: Absolutely.
Dan: Absolutely. Thanks everybody.
Justin: Thanks everybody. Peace.
Dan: Thanks, Cindy. I'm glad to be back.
Cindy Keyes: So you know, one thing that we we talked about earlier is the fact that computers are talking to other computers. So kind of walk us through like how is that working right now? Because I think everyone wants to be the ones to take advantage of AI and use it in their business to save them time. But if everybody's doing that, then where is the human in this whole process?
Dan: Exactly. That's a problem a lot of my customers are facing now. We get their and their AEO and their GEO dialed in ⁓ they get a lot more visibility. But that visibility ⁓ to potential customers, but it's also to ⁓ all marketing bots that are out there that now find their contact forms and they come in like they're a lead and they're really coming in to be a customer. They're coming in to set up time for a salesperson. To waste your time with their pitch. So it becomes a really difficult thing to get time to go through all of these leads, and it just shows that okay, you've got your top of funnel working, but now you've got kind of a leaky funnel because once gets down and you get the lead in, are you inundated with them? Do you have the resources within your company to respond to everybody? And more to look through and qualify the leads. To know which ones to call back first and to which ones you should ignore. So that's really where the human element is super important to be able to kind of have that pattern recognition to say, you know what, this is obviously marketing bot that's trying to waste our time. And this one's obviously a person that we should call back ⁓ same day and not wait a week before we contact them back. So ⁓ definitely where a lot of brands struggle. And there are good ways to kind of that for them if they're aware that that's an issue.
Justin: Yeah, ar aren't we concerned that maybe people will I mean I've already found people have kind of stopped answering their phone almost always unless we're already friends and we already mutually interested in something. You know, we are we running the you know, maybe it's more of a philosophical question philosophical question, but like are we are we running the risk of like You know, when we when ⁓ when we mean to make a human to human call, like should we say, Hey, it's justin a human? know you're super interested in our product, just ⁓ give me a call back when you get a chance. Again, I'm a human and this is my human number. Like I don't know like
Cindy Keyes: Ha ha.
Dan: Yeah. The problem with that though, the robots will start saying they're humans just as much as the humans are. So it really comes down to somebody reaches out to me on LinkedIn, for instance, I'm v less likely to respond to anyone that I haven't met in real life that I know is a real person because, like you said, do we stop answering the phone because we're afraid a telemarketer might be on the other end? Absolutely. And if that telemarketer gets through, your number goes into another database. an engaged database. The database that they know these are the the hot leads that this person's gonna answer the phone maybe they'll say no the first ten times, but maybe that eleventh time we're gonna trick and gonna get through and we're gonna give them the pitch that wins. So then your phone starts ringing off the hook. So you really have to be really careful how much you engage just because it puts a on your back if you engage too much.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah, I don't don't know how I set this up, but apparently on my work phone it actually asks the caller what they're calling for. I didn't realize it did that until somebody mentioned to me and I was like, Well, I don't know how to change that, but I'm definitely keeping it because I think
Justin: Interesting.
Dan: That's an iPhone setting and I have it on mine as well and it's absolutely great. But again, some of the new encoders sound so much like real people that they're getting around that too, where you say, this sounds like a person and then again, as soon as you answer it for one, they will bombard you. And yeah, absolutely unbelievable.
Cindy Keyes: Okay. And well, it's interesting because the use of AI was kind of, you know, it's skyrocketing and we are seeing now going back, right? So much writing, so many graphics are being generated by AI that now people are wanting to go back to actual actually creating things themselves. You know, I found myself now. using Canva myself a little bit more often to put together graphics instead of having AI generate something because they all are starting to look the same. ⁓ you can see it right away. And if you're online, you can see that people are looking at AI generated material in a negative light, that it is showing laziness the part ⁓ of it's a company or provider. ⁓
Justin: Mm-hmm.
Dan: Yes.
Cindy Keyes: instead of actually putting it together. And I think because a lot of people are not prompting with AI. So it is all coming out very generic chat GPT style instead of a very clear prompt and where you're putting in specific information and you're asking A to help you put it together. But sometimes need that human creativity as well.
Dan: Absolutely. And we also need to be aware that there are tools that will help you spot the AI generated slop you can use those tools even if you are building things kind of in your favor. So you can run things through GPT or you can run things through Grammarly and say, Does this have the common hallmarks of AI? And then in and do a little bit of copy editing. And get rid of those things that are the huge red flags that will turn people against your brand quickly. And it maybe won't turn everybody against your brand, but it seems like a lot of people really that puts a sour impression about your brand if they ⁓ that they're just leaning on AI, they're not putting any effort into this, and they're just turning out product to turn out product and feeding a slop. And nobody wants that. So Yeah, you still have to figure out how to engage with your customer and the tools will not figure that out for you. You have to know your customer and then you can again use the tool to help get you eighty percent of the way there, but you still have to put in a little bit of effort at the end to make sure your brand voice is solid, to make sure that you're putting out something that just i immediately spotable as
Cindy Keyes: Mm-hmm.
Dan: ⁓ this person put in zero effort and that's how much they care about me as a customer. I'll go to somebody who will engage with me on a more human level give me a better experience because people all still want that ⁓ unique that a real brand and a good company will provide.
Cindy Keyes: Very true. I could see Justin thinking.
Justin: Wonderful. Well, I've been I've been replaying this scenario in my head. so I I was scheduled to see my dermatologist, like just for like a a follow-up, you know, not for any work thing, right? And something up I needed to reschedule and they sent me they have an automated system that sent me like a hey reminder your appointment is tomorrow morning ⁓ and you know, text confirm. And I was like, actually I do need to reschedule. So I hit the button for that. And it was like, okay, here are some times. Like I got like a prompt back that was like, please pick a time to reschedule. And I picked. evidently ⁓ it like register that. Like I was like, sure, okay, like, you know, one month from now, beep, you know, let's go. And then when I when I didn't show up for the appointment the next day, I started getting automated calls. And it was from an AI agent. And then I got a text and it was like, hey, this is Valerie, the AI or the yeah, it said like I'm a virtual assistant or something. And I was like, yo, I you know, I rescheduled or whatever. And it was like, I'm sorry, I don't understand this. I was like, you know, like I don't know why we had to go through all of this, ⁓ but wonder. You how much that is going on like inside of people's practices and they assume that it's getting handled, but it's and and they're assume they're assuming that this is so much more efficient and maybe saving them money. But in reality, like if I would have got just like one regular call or text like I would have in the past, I probably would have just nailed it. Like we would have just nailed it in one shot. You know, so I wonder like how much of this is going on and then And then if you're, you know, and this is a big dermatology group that's owned by big PE now, right? Like they all are. Then they're analyzing, know, whatever analytics they're looking at. Is is is program going to be honest with them about their retention? You know, like like they're they're say ⁓
Cindy Keyes: Yeah.
Dan: Well the assumption there is they're actually looking at the analytics, because most companies don't. they just kind of think that, well, we bought the tools, the tools are doing their jobs. But if the tools are integrated with each other and making that you don't have a problem like you just faced, then the tools are ⁓ actually working you and you don't even know it.
Justin: Right. So, you know, and knowing groups like that, then they're gonna start to see their their patient numbers dwindling and they're gonna start, you know, cutting humans. Right? ⁓ and then go, what happened here? And it's like, well, you kinda I think you over technologized your business a little bit, right? I'm not I'm not I'm not trying to be a Luddite here, but you know, we made it a little more confusing and complicated than we needed to.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah.
Dan: Exactly.
Cindy Keyes: Well, I think it goes back to you really do need people who understand what they're doing the end of the day. People like Dan. And I mean, it took a while for us to for me to meet Dan. And I told you I was like, my AI level maybe not be like the top of the top, but I think it was more than most people. And so when I met people and I talked to them, I was like, okay, no, I don't need your help. Right. Like I could do that myself. I don't but when I met Dan, I was like, Okay. Yes, this guy knows what he's doing. And I think that's what's happening. First of all, you have companies using AI and they think they're using it the right way. Right. Like you don't use it to make big company decisions and strategies. I mean, and there's companies doing that. or they're hiring the people who know maybe ten percent of what Dan can do. But they're very they're good at marketing or they're on social. They're saying I'm this, I'm that. I'm gonna get your your company to here and there and whatever. And so they're hiring these people and they're assuming that they're doing what they think that they're doing. but again, ⁓ back, you have to find people who are experts who have done it, who have experience, especially in your industry, right? Somebody who's been doing, you know, SEO. for a, you know, autobodies shop, whatever, wants to do that for Med Spa, it's you have to understand the industry. You have to understand the business and how it functions.
Dan: Absolutely. And that's what's always given me an edge is before AI existed, I got my career started as a network engineer for excite.com back in the first dot com bubble. And then when that faded out, I decided, okay, let's go into marketing and e commerce. And as an effective operator so many different fronts, now that these tools have come out, I'm a little bit more able to use the tools in smarter way because I think about How would I have done this myself before these tools existed? And where can I make them more effective and not just at it from let's say a private equity standpoint of how can I use these tools to ⁓ less and give ⁓ whatever experience to the customer that they can get? Like they don't care at the end of the day. Private equity is just notorious for saying, let's just make ⁓ and let's cut much fat as we can. And if we can cut ten people out of the workforce, who cares? At the end of the day, my bonus is gonna be bigger. ⁓ where even as a consumer, when I go to the veterinarian office with my cat, I made sure that I I went through several when I was making the phone calls and I did the research and I would check out, okay, who actually owns this practice until I found one that the doctor who I speak to when I go in is the doctor who owns that practice. He doesn't take money from private equity. He's not in somebody's pocket to try to sell me something that I don't need. He's going to be kind of more honest and upfront with me. So that's where I decide to spend my money and give my business to. even down to car mechanics. I do the same thing there. I just had ⁓ major service done to my vehicle where the the independent shop that I was dealing with wasn't so independent and turns out their prices were the same as the dealership. So then I did a little bit more research I was able to save about two thousand dollars on the service by finding somebody new that again was independent and was willing to tell me like, i the y the car brand that you have, these parts are actually made by this OEM ⁓ and if we them direct from that company They're the same things. They're made out of the same parts, they're the same factory, just the stamp on it is different, but they're exactly the same. And you're gonna save about fifty cents on the dollar because you don't have that middleman markup. So one of those things where if you go back and you do the research and you make sure that you're dealing with actual humans that are looking out for you, you can be a better consumer. So yeah, it every front, it's kind of good to do your research, use the tools, but don't rely on the tools. They're not gonna do everything for you. Know the questions to ask and get to the end result that you need.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah, you know, and I think in our industry, consumers, patients, clients, providers, they are all knowledgeable about lot of things in this industry, right? So whether it's a service or it's a product. And so ⁓ now their buying patterns are particular. ⁓ the market is very saturated. You know, there's so many options. you I think people are trying to find a way to stand out, trying to ⁓ simplify using using ways to market. But You know, I I feel like we're we're all trying to do the same thing at the same time. Does that feel right? It it's almost like, you know, whenever everything is is busy and there's a lot going on, it's like people are just seeing what somebody else is doing and just copying what they're doing. And then you just end up getting like it's like a it's a it's a block, I guess, you know. And people are not
Dan: Absolutely.
Cindy Keyes: stepping out and looking at different ways to adapt their business. You know, from your standpoint, how are you, ⁓ what would you advise, right? to a med spa or a physician provider that's coming in and to you and says, hey, I don't, I don't want to do what everybody else is doing. What can do and how can I do this so that my practice stands out? Because in a one mile radius, there's probably five other ⁓ practices. all doing the same services, selling the same product as I am. How can I stand out?
Dan: It's all about the just basics of marketing. You have to look at your sales funnel and where do your leads come in? How do you service those leads? if you really figure out, okay, I wanna stand out and be the number one when people are going into Google and searching or asking the chat bots who the best provider is and getting the recommendation, when those leads come in, make sure that they're qualified leads. And they hit your website and you have a contact form, You might have to do sneaky things like put some honeypot fields on there. So you make sure that it is a marketing robot coming in, it's gonna find that honeypot field and it's gonna fill it in, even though it's not visible to an actual human. So then you can weed those out right away. And then you can start looking for the patterns. ⁓ it's again, humans are better at recognizing patterns than any other tool that you could possibly have. So make sure that once you have the really sloppy things that are falling for the honeypot. fields look at it and say, okay, is this a real person? Does their phone number match up with their address? Is this somebody that I can even find on social media? And if so, then give it to an actual human to call back. Don't give it to the automated dialer that's gonna have say hello three times before it starts responding. Because we've all dealt with that where you pick up the phone, hello, hello, hey, is this ⁓ and it's You're on an autodialer. I know you're on an autodialer. I'm already turned off because you've annoyed me with the having to say hello twice. So again, getting real people to dial that number and to be there and actually responsive. And then ⁓ far as every brand goes, you need to have people out there networking. You need to have them going to conferences. You need to have them meeting the customer where the customer actually is and hey. ⁓ ⁓ I noticed that this is something that you might be having an issue with. Here's my business card. And that's another crazy thing. Most people don't even have a business card for their business and what they do. they think, ⁓ that's just ⁓ a antiquated relic. Nobody uses business cards anymore. But if somebody gives you a really high quality card and they talk to you in person, you're gonna remember them and you're probably going to engage with them further on down the line. So ⁓ a lot of the things that really work are the basics that always worked that people have just gotten kind of lazy and moved away from because well that just that's how people used to do it. Well that's how people still should be doing it because it worked then and it'll still work now especially if you can put your own spin on it. And that's why again, ⁓ market business that way. I go on car rallies with people. I have my license plate branded to my business. If they say what what's that stand for? I give him one of my business cards and say, Yeah, this is my business, e-com strategics. the license plate is exact same branding and colors as my business card. I have a black background license plate with blue letters on it. My business cards are ⁓ black foil embossing on both sides with a nice blue foil. And it out. It's a nice heavy card stock and it's something that they take notice of. and I've had people tell me, you know, you're the first person in the last ten years who's actually given me a business card. ⁓ some of those people have become my clients. So it's again back to the basics of what ⁓ and can you meet people? Where can you get out when find people that share other just personal interests that then you can kind of soft sell and say, you know what, if you ever need this, here's my information and I'm not gonna just try to hammer you and come at you on
Cindy Keyes: Yeah.
Dan: LinkedIn with a marketing script that's gonna send out the same message to 5,000 people every day, hoping that I have a conversion rate of 0.001% because then it pays for the marketing script. That doesn't work. What does work is actually engaging with people just finding that common ground and saying, you know what, this is something that I think would help you. And if you're interested, give me a call. And make it really easy for them to see where your phone number is, see where your website is. And ⁓ y you have a much higher conversion rate with those types of engagements than you do just with the cold outreach.
Justin: Yeah, I agree with you there. I you know, and I when you talk about business cards, I still too, like I will remember that person so much more if I touch the card, I looked at the card, I looked at their face, I read their name, and then later I come home from the conference and I go through the cards of the people I met and I don't I don't throw away business cards. I'm weird, like like I am a traditional I have like drawers and drawers of business cards going back twenty plus years, like 'cause I I I feel like Even if it was just for a second it was a personal connection with somebody and you never know. Like if I took I don't just take business cards from randos that I don't have any interest in, know, connecting with. It's always like there is some sort of potential for us to work together and know each other. So, you know, I I take that card, I keep it, and someday maybe I'll maybe I'll, you know, pick it up and call that number. Like people should do that, right?
Dan: I am different. I will throw them away if they're perforated edges and printed with an inkjet printer. Like if they put in the bare minimum effort to just have the Avery break apart from the Office Max, I'm not interested. But I do keep the good ones, especially if it's something that just impresses me design wise. Does it have a nice embossing or debossing on it? Is it something that I can get ideas to improve my own in the future with? And I do. I I probably keep
Justin: Yeah. Yeah.
Dan: twenty to twenty-five percent of the ones that I get just because wow this was really done extra nice. They put some thought into this and maybe there's some ideas that I can take from it.
Justin: Well and like in our industry too, like you can a lot of things we can be efficient about. And we should evolve with technology as quickly as we can. but know, I was working with a company that was one of the first that started using AI to do lead generation, and then they were using it to funnel into Hubspot that was then funneling to reps. So I'm here in like a rep capacity. And one thing that I noticed, the beginning of the funnel, like you mentioned the sales funnel. The beginning of the funnel was a meta campaign. And the time the leads were getting to the reps and reps physically calling them in real life, which took a little bit, because you know, you find out who's actually calling the leads and who's not, who's, you know, what other like ⁓ Dysfunctions there are in that chain, in that, in that chain. but long story short, I contact, you know, nine out of ten of these leads, and they are geriatric. Like, could like, this is a this is a technology that only doctors could buy for like $150,000. Like it was capital equipment. It was like a big thing. And they were like, you know, and the CEO was like, We're getting tons of leads, like make sure you're following your hub spot. And I was like, ⁓ I'm in my hub spot and I'm calling and I'm like, Mildred? Is this Mildred? And she's like, Huh? What? And Mildred is old enough to remember Pearl Harbor. Like this then I mean, and back to back, I don't know what happened or who got hosed in like whatever service that they purchased to to to market through through Meta, but I mean there wasn't a single doctor in there at all.
Dan: Yeah.
Justin: It was 100% the wrong demographic, right? ⁓ but those are the things that you gotta check. You gotta like, okay, you know, you have to audit these systems. know, if you're if you're a a company leader, you can't just like s get it started and trust that it's all gonna work out. You know, like you gotta audit every step of the process and and figure out, you know, otherwise you're you're in a ⁓
Cindy Keyes: Yeah. Yeah.
Justin: Sonic hyper speed race to nowhere.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah.
Dan: Absolutely. It always makes me think of the movie and play Glengarry Glenn Ross. And you want those good Glengarry leads. You don't want the garbage. You want the the quality that's actually gonna convert.
Justin: Yeah. The leads are weak, you're weak.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah.
Dan: Exactly. Alec Baldwin's best role.
Justin: Great movie. Mm-hmm.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah, so It's like that fine line, right? It's like it, you know, in everything that culture that happens to culture, it's like we just take everything and we just hyperspeed, you know, and we just go full forth not and we don't stop to think about it till we kind of hit a place where like, whoa, I think we've taken this a little too far, right? Like there are things like the administrative, the, you know, the the things that kind of make it easy, but don't let go of that human connection. And you know, I mean, first of all, I mean, I can say companies giving customer service to offshore call all-site ⁓ call centers have been a struggle. Right. ⁓ trying to explain like what's going on. And I'm like, can I I had a situation with a bank and it was, you know, clearly going to a call center somewhere else and to explain to them. And finally, I just had to put I had to like email them in like the secure center on on my in my bank and ⁓ this is where it actually ai helped me right I to Claude I said this is the situation I'm dealing with these are the issues I need help to put together an email that explains this in the right way and so it did and it gave me some insight into like you need to tell them that if they don't fix this you are going to report it to this agency and that agency. So I had sent one email And I just was like very nice about it and they didn't respond. Well, I sent a follow-up of the of my Claude created email with everything. I had somebody from the bank from the actual branch call me and was like, Hey, we you know, we got your message and I can help you. I said, I I kid you not. And I think Justin and both of you guys, I think I was talking to, I was on the phone for two hours with the bank. While I was talking to you guys on my other phone, I was sitting for two hours, get hung up and then get back with them, and then having going through that circle, and all I needed was somebody from the actual branch, a human, to call me and tell me they can get this situation taken care of. And this is what I think businesses start to need to really understand, whether you're a bank.
Dan: Yeah. Yep.
Cindy Keyes: or a doctor's office or a med spa or retailer, whatever it is, you gotta have, don't give up that human side, you know, because clearly when people call your customer service line, it's because they couldn't get it answered somewhere else through your texts, through your FAQs, through your website, they could not find it.
Dan: That's right.
Cindy Keyes: So they really need to talk to somebody, or it could be somebody who's not technol technologically savvy. It could be somebody who's older, who don't know how to go through and navigate all that, and they just want to pick up a phone and ask somebody. That's when you need to have a person on the other line to listen to them, but somebody who's here in the actual business, not in a call center somewhere else.
Dan: Sorry. And sometimes what that takes is you do a r a little bit of research and you can usually find the email addresses of a handful of the C level executives. you start sending the emails to the absolute top of the chain. Because if you start at the bottom and you get nowhere, sometimes flip it and go, Okay, who is the most powerful person in this industry that I can find that I can reach out to? ⁓
Cindy Keyes: Mm. Yeah.
Dan: And then they usually have executive customer support that'll reach back out to you if you've hit their CEO they see it firsthand. And then that's also how change can start happening because then they're aware of it. They see that this person was frustrated enough to reach out to me directly, whether it's an email, whether it's LinkedIn, whether it's you find a phone number, and relentless and you say, you know what, I'm tired of this, so I'm gonna go straight to the top. until I get it fixed. And 90% of the time it works. So you're absolutely right with that. And then again, you're bringing the right eyes to the problem. And maybe they'll say, you know what, we need to fix this top down and make sure that more customers aren't feeling this. Because if one person reaches out to them, that means probably anywhere from a hundred to a thousand hit a dead end and never out to anybody ⁓ and they lost their business. And that's what will kill a business really quickly.
Cindy Keyes: And sometimes it the damage is already done. Sometimes it is so bad. I mean, you know, there is a situation of a company that like gave their, you know, is somebody who is like focused on professional skincare, right? They work specifically with professionals. So people who are calling are professionals and having to send their call center to another country, one, not just to another country, but to people who are not professional.
Justin: ⁓ yeah.
Cindy Keyes: skincare providers, Who are reading things from a book and having their clients actually hang up because they thought they got the wrong number. Right. And having the data show, our custom the number of calls coming to our call center have decreased. So it means our customer service is doing well. It's like, no, you've lost a customer. People stopped calling because ⁓ they think the wrong number. ⁓
Justin: Well. Yeah. Yeah.
Dan: You're right. Well, that's because a lot of those call centers, not their only client. So you might be paying them two dollars an hour, but you're also spreading that against twenty different companies and twenty different industries. So that person again, they just have the same ⁓ with the these are the common questions and anything beyond that. You don't know the brand. You don't care about the brand. So it's better to say, you know what, maybe if I pay my receptionist up front, To not browse Facebook and to be text messaging in her off time and actually dealing with the customers. And if I pay her a little bit more to be engaged, then the consumer will have a better experience and that money will be worth it and pay out dividends and a better experience where the person's a little bit happier because they're not making a minimum wage. They're making a livable wage and they're able to then say, you know what, I to keep this job no matter what.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah.
Dan: And if they tell me that I can't use social media when I'm at work, I'm not going to. I'm going to engage with the customers and I'm going to a fair wage because I know nobody else is going to give it to me. So that's really where a lot of business gets and just say, you what, let's not try to find the cheapest route. Let's try to find the best route and take care of our people and have them take care of the customers. And then it's a better ecosystem. And then it just feeds back into itself. It's a flywheel effect.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah.
Dan: So yeah, it's definitely something that a lot of brands miss.
Cindy Keyes: like somebody doing customer service for like staples, helping people who are having trouble loading their their ink in, you know, is not going to be able to support a skincare brand that is, you know, used just by aestheticians, right? So it's like these are the things that people need to like leadership. top leadership need to understand that you cannot just look at the bottom line. You cannot say, ⁓ well, that company saved this much money because they got rid of all of their customer service people and now they're using a call center. So let's do that same. No, you got to understand your industry. You got to understand your business. And same thing for I mean practices too. Sometimes they think like, ⁓ well, I'll get this AI person who can
Justin: Mm-hmm.
Cindy Keyes: answer and respond and so I don't need a front desk person. I don't need an assistant in the front. Let's just have people check in. Well make sure that whatever you have set up is actually set up right because you could be losing customers and you don't even know it. So you don't even have chance to save it because you don't even know what's happening.
Dan: That's right. One of the best brands I've worked for had an amazing corporate educator who worked with everybody from customer service to people in marketing and taught them the exact same things about the product and it taught them what the messaging was, how the product worked best for people. it didn't matter where you were in the company, you got to spend time with this ⁓ who ⁓ you up to that level. To then matter who I'd run into, even if it was outside and I'd say, ⁓ who are you working for? I'm working for this brand, and they'd some questions about it, I could answer those questions even though they were kind of outside of my job title, but I was educated in it. ⁓ And if had same education that any of the reps that any of the customer service people had, ⁓ even though I was dealing with e commerce and trying to figure out how to keep that efficient. It really empowered me to be a better employee at every level. And that's where a lot of companies, they don't even think that, I need a corporate educator who's going to be embedded with my team and teaching them all the same thing ⁓ and sure that they're using the product, that they know what each product does and why, and being to out into the field on ride-alongs and see how the reps are selling it after you're educated. And then when the customer even asks you questions, you can answer it with the rep there and not look like an idiot that's just there along for the ride. So yeah, that's definitely something that a lot of brands don't even realize they're missing, but it's available. Other brands are doing it, and those are the things that AI can't replace. You really need to have those people that are again, experts on the product that can disseminate that knowledge across every employee, regardless what they're doing within the brand, whether it's an intern, whether it's customer service or a rep, they all should have the same education.
Justin: Yeah. Nobody wants to deal with a bureaucracy, right? So if you set up a hierarchy within your practice or you know, if you're selling products, you know, you're launching a new product in our space like a lot of our clients are. Like you can't have a chain of command where, well, that's not my job. Let me escalate it to so and so. You know, I mean, you do have to compartmentalize some things and people are specialized, right? But like what you're talking about is Everyone can help the customer a little bit and make them feel like they didn't waste their time by talking. Okay, well, I talked to like the computer guy, Dan. But he told me some helpful stuff and then recommended I talk to someone who's even more helpful. Like that's the experience you want to have, not like, well, call a hang up and call this number. ⁓ if you've ever worked with an insurance company at all, this is the kind of shit they Like, you want to buy a new insurance plan, there's
Dan: That's right.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah. Ha ha.
Dan: That's a true fact.
Justin: fifty people ready to help you and they're your best friend and you know they'll they'll, you know, bend over backwards to make sure, you know, you get connected with the right plan. And then you turn around and want to try and make a claim, it's bureaucracy time. You know, and it's I mean it's kind of a trope, but it's true. And they're the most guilty industry of it. And you know, we're in the aesthetics industry and you know, a ⁓ ask you know C level
Cindy Keyes: Ha ha.
Dan: ⁓ That's it.
Justin: aesthetics person if you'd like your your company to be an insurance company. And that's it, that's gonna be a hard map.
Cindy Keyes: And that's how a lot of them feel. That's how a lot of providers feel right now. They get they are courted, they buy, then they're
Justin: Yeah, exactly. Well and and when you're talking about, you know, physicians in our space, they got into the ⁓ aesthetics industry to so that they wouldn't have to deal with the insurance bureaucracy. Cause that's kind of who they work for in traditional medicine. You know, they're they're part of the bureaucracy, which is sad, you know. you are doing, you know, medicine and your company's owned by PE, I mean, that's that's a tough one.
Cindy Keyes: Exactly. Exactly.
Justin: You know, so
Cindy Keyes: Yeah. Well, Dan, you brought up a good point because I know in my prior companies, I spent a lot of time ⁓ the tech guys. And, know, I think that's where I learned a lot about technologies, because I ask them questions about how things are working, but I also explained to them the business side. And that's something that so many companies don't do enough of. They keep everyone siloed and and And there's a lot of blame when something doesn't go right. But if you don't spend the time to explain it, how does somebody who is in tech understand beauty if they've never been in the beauty industry? Right? So you have to have somebody to spend the time to explain to them like this is how it works and this is, you know, how things are sold, blah, blah, blah, blah, right? once they get it.
Dan: A hundred percent.
Cindy Keyes: They understand it and then they are able to help you by making sure the tech side meets your needs. this is over overlooked so many companies. I can't even tell you. ⁓ I mean, not just small companies. I mean, even in big, big global beauty brands, there is a disconnect because they're just not. Engaging with each other, and I think that's a shame.
Dan: It's almost the bigger companies have the bigger problem with it. It's the small to medium sized companies where people in other departments will talk with people in other departments. But once you get into the larger corporations, you're absolutely right. Everyone is siloed, they only do their job, they don't think anything beyond what they do on their day to day, it really work. And speaking as a tech person who got into a beauty company, my face regimen used to be ⁓
Cindy Keyes: Yeah.
Justin: Yeah.
Dan: If shampoo from my hair got onto my face, my face was getting clean and that was good enough. then again, we had a corporate educator who's like, no, really, what you need to do is have a good dedicated cleanser, you need to have a good moisturizing product, you need to have a good retinol, and need to be able to kind of bring that all together, and this is the order to use them in. And still to this day, I have an actual skincare regimen. That before I started in a beauty company, my regimen was soap gets on there, it's getting clean. And really wasn't the best approach, but ⁓ from the tech standpoint, hey, at least I was using shampoo. So I mean, yeah, it it's a whole different way of looking at things and the being open to being educated and learning about the products and saying, you know what If I know how to this as a consumer that actually would want it, I'm gonna just do my job better regardless what part of the business I'm in.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah. And getting your insights. I know we've had conversations about ⁓ you know, different things and you were able to give insights that were really helpful, right? Like ideas from a from a you know, not like a person that's like not so ingrained in the industry and it was like, you know, I never thought of that or I for I overlooked that piece. And sometimes I for myself Some of the best partnerships I've had with people on the tech side or analytics or you know BI team, it was because they understood what we did. I took the time to explain it. And sometimes ⁓ I was trying to find a solution for, they had it. Right? They knew it because they knew the tech. Exactly. ⁓
Dan: And they probably didn't even know they had it. And it's one of those things we all learn from each other, and that's the whole way street that a of companies don't understand. If you keep people siloed, the innovations and ideas that one person might have that's completely outside of their department, or just the comment that they make that sparks an idea in your head, that's what makes all the change happen. And that's what really turns ⁓ a brand into a powerhouse brand.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely.
Justin: Yeah. I mean I've seen in companies too where, you know, when you do create those silos that and that disconnect and I mean to to be fair, you know, the one I'm thinking of is kinda COVID times where everyone was started kind of getting disjointed and no one was in office together where you could run over and say, Hey, we've got a problem, right? And everyone kinda ran off into their own little corners and you know, they're all working from home and whatever. And all of a sudden you start to see You know, okay, I have some feedback, but I don't know who ⁓ who I need to give it to, the feedback is ⁓ going or not welcome, and then all of a sudden your business starts to decline and nobody knows why. We don't know where all these chinks in the armor are. Right? So
Cindy Keyes: Yeah. ⁓ you said it right then I said when you're giving feedback and it's not welcomed. I think that is that can kill a company's culture so quickly and I and it's unfortunate because it is so prevalent in so many companies. you know and that is a culture that has to be started by somebody in the top by all the leaders. You know, having a state like a space where
Justin: ⁓ yeah.
Cindy Keyes: all feedback is appreciated. it's it's unfortunate that's not the case in a lot of companies. ⁓ you know, and and I know we advise, like when we talk to new companies, startups, these new companies coming to commercialize, like kind of strategic advice we're giving isn't even about, ⁓ which channel are you going to go into and how do you do that? It's really like what kind of culture are you going to create? Because the culture that you're going to create now is going to set up your success for the future. So no matter what kind of AI or software or foundation, anything else that you want to put in, none of that matters. It's a culture that's going to start from the beginning. Either you have people, and that's the thing. Like all of us, all three of us, have like different skill sets, different talents. imagine imagine if we were in a place where
Dan: That's right.
Cindy Keyes: We felt threatened to say what we really felt. Or, you know, I mean, Justin and I probably would have been in a really bad business arrangement Dan hadn't said, Hey, know what, guys? I'm looking at numbers here for this project you guys are looking at. And I know if it's it's if it's right. And and then when we had a second to look at it, we're like, you know what? That model wasn't the best. Let's let's adjust it now. Let's flip, you know, let's let's tweak that. Okay, now okay, that is a good ⁓ model now. Right? ⁓ so.
Justin: Yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely. Like saves saved our butts. Right? Like you know, I it is crazy to think there are there are leaders out there that are like, Okay, thanks, you know. more from him, you know, like and it's like ⁓ like be careful, like welcome it, you know, like share with each other.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Dan: Yeah.
Cindy Keyes: Because it doesn't.
Dan: Well, you don't have to take everything personally. If you had something that came by and you didn't have a chance to think it all the way through, sometimes it takes that other perspective and it's not that perspective's an attack against what you thought might have looked good on the surface level. It was they about it and said, Like I said, if it don't make dollars, it don't make sense. And you can't figure out where the profit's coming from and you're to be sunk costs for maybe the first two or three years ⁓
Cindy Keyes: Yes.
Dan: That puts you at a lot of risk you wanna try to risk mitigate and again that's not a personal level, that's just business sense. And one of those things where you have to say, All right, ⁓ let's pick it apart and figure out where the is, know the brand, know the customer, and what competition gonna and where do you have a differentiator? What sets you apart from the ten other people doing anything because everybody comes to you with a I've got the most innovative product and there is no competition. if you really start to look, everything's done. You just have to figure out how do I do it better? What do I bring to the table that's different? And where can I meet the customer and the customer's needs? So yeah, that's definitely a really important thing to just kind of step back, first principles, just look at it very high level, and take pride and out of it and just say, let's look at the numbers.
Cindy Keyes: Ha ha ha. Yeah.
Dan: Let's look at everything else in the landscape. And then doesn't make sense. I've walked away from several clients who have come offered me significant money to work on their product just because like it didn't make sense to me and I didn't figure like how is this gonna work long term and do I wanna be part of a losing campaign or do I wanna pick winners? And I've even people come back to me ⁓
Cindy Keyes: Yeah.
Dan: A year later or come back to mutual acquaintances who are like, ⁓ I really wish I would have listened to Dan. I'm w sunk into this for a couple hundred thousand dollars and I don't know where I'm ever gonna get my money back. And he told me be cautious about it, and I didn't listen. I just I thought this supplement product was gonna change the world and I had the best influencer marketing strategy to have all these personal pushing my product and it just didn't work out. And it's like, you know
Cindy Keyes: Yeah.
Dan: not only could I have told you that, I did tell you that. And now you're you're where you are. Sorry.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah.
Justin: Yeah. Yeah, yeah. They call it the eating the poison cheese when you you start to think like, you know, I've got a winner here, and you start to see those biases those biases of like, ⁓ man, just gonna make this work. And it's it's good to bring in outside voices and welcome that feedback and keep those channels open, like make sure your people are communicating, even as your company grows. And you're like, well, I can't have salespeople on the phone with my customer service people all day. Well, yeah, but they also need to talk to each other, you know, and each one needs to know what the other is kind of up to, the challenges they deal with, and and and there needs to be a leaders communicating between them. You know, like like my favorite arrangement as a sales manager, like a a a sales director, was when I had an office right next door to the customer service director.
Cindy Keyes: Yes.
Justin: And so I had like 40 people under me and she had like one in each time zone under her. So she had like four, but they were getting calls all day long. And I'm I got like 40 and I had like, you know, deputies, I'm getting calls all day long. But every every morning and every afternoon, we kind of put our heads together and we talked to and and if there was ever a like a a real sticky situation, we could just walk over and go, hey. Let's figure this out. gosh, I I'd I love that dynamic and and and we encourage our companies to have that kind of dynamic where, you know, look there's structure, there's order, you know, everyone has their job they're responsible for, but we're all working together towards the same goals.
Dan: And that was easier when places actually had offices. But now as everything post-COVID has shifted to everybody's a remote worker, you really have to go and say, you know what, every four to six months, we need to have a in-person get together. We need to fly people into one place kind of mix people up and have people even just team building exercises, as cliche as those are. They definitely really help people get to know each other on that personal level.
Justin: Yeah.
Dan: to where then they do feel more comfortable during the other times to say, you know what, I had a really great time at this retreat with this one person and now I have some questions. They're the person I'm gonna hit up on Slack or I'm gonna pick up the phone and call. you have that camaraderie that otherwise if you're just on Zoom meetings with people all day long, you're never gonna get. And you can't have Zoom cocktail hours or things like people are trying to do that doesn't work either. Like you still Need to again get people face to face with each other, go out to meals with each other, share in just that human experience to then build the relationships that make your team a way stronger team than if they don't have.
Cindy Keyes: Well, and I think some companies are going back to office but with no real plan, right? Like they're like, ⁓ we'll we'll go back to office because that's what people should be doing. But then they're not creating that true office environment. Like every it's still very siloed. ⁓ it's like it defeats the point of even having a return to office if people are still kind of siloed and doing their own thing.
Justin: Yeah. Yeah, it's almost like, well, they're just forcing me to get in my car and burn gas every day and like, you know, just 'cause like to keep the keep the thumb on me, right? But like I don't know. You know, it's if you like who you work with and you enjoy your job, which like I think is kind of I mean it's not a analienable right in the constitution, but I think it is kind of like a it is kind of a basic human right in a capitalist world to to to to kinda
Cindy Keyes: Ha ha ha. Yeah.
Justin: Like what you do and like the people you work with. You know, not everyone is gonna meet you that you know, not every job fits that category, but you should kinda wanna like see your people, you know, then go, you know, hooker down at your desk when you need to and you have privacy when you need it, but like, you know, that's the whole point of humanity, right? We're all on just Zooms, like you might as well throw six AI agents on the Zoom, like, what's the difference? You know.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah. Yeah. I know.
Dan: And that's what most people do anymore. They turn their transcript machine on, they sit there, then yeah, they get the summary when it's done. And again, ⁓ wish we could go back to the days of the first dot com boom when there were perks to go into the office. You wanted to go into the office because it was fun and it was maybe a little bit too loose at that point where it was almost like going to a kind of recess and ⁓
Justin: ⁓ that's the worst. Yeah.
Dan: You do a lot of socializing in the office and then maybe do your actual work when you got home. But mean there's a happy middle ground to that, to where companies can say, you know what, let's have bring your pet to work day, or let's have your dry cleaning picked up from your cubicle and we send it out for you, ⁓ or let's a really good cafeteria where there's quality food where you don't have to all split off and we've got a a ⁓ personal chef who's gonna make sure that Everybody's eating well and just s some of those things that were kind of laughable during the again the first dot com boom, they actually were effective. And it wasn't lost cost when you really thought about what it was providing for your employees to say, you know what, I'm excited to go to work. I'm gonna have a good time today because we we've got this going on and it's not just gonna be the doldrum of I'm gonna sit in my cubicle, I'm gonna look at the clock all day long until it's time to leave.
Cindy Keyes: Absolutely. I mean, some of my best friends are all people I've met while working in an office environment because we're there all the time and you know, they know about my family. I know about their families. you know, and even till now, like even though I'm not incorporated more, I'm still very good friends with so many people that I've worked with. And there's so many great memories that you don't think about, I mean you know, I had like one coworker. He knew when I was like in my zone. Well, if I'm like working on a project, I'm just in a zone. And he'll come in, he'll go by me and he'll just like throw chocolate on my desk. Right. to see what kind of mood I am. It's like, am I in a mood where I can be like, I can break from my concentration ⁓ be like, okay, what's up? What do you need? Right. Or I just so focused? I'm like, okay, I'll be back later. Right. And and don't get that.
Dan: Ha.
Cindy Keyes: ⁓ online, right? Like you don't get that kind of like if I am not if I if you're focused on something and you don't give somebody attention and you're online, you might be short, or you you know, whatever, it's it's taken offensively. But when person they know that I'm not trying to be offensive, I'm not trying to push you off. I'm just like in the zone because we've already built a relationship and you know how I am, I know how you are. And we're we're good. And that's that's the hidden thing with working in a corporate environment. It's not just about being there in person. It's about getting to really, really know people and also being able to trust the people. Cause if you don't trust people, if you're in a company where you feel that everything you say or, you know, things that you don't agree with is going to be turnaround and is going to be something that's going to come back and bite you in the you know. bite you in the butt or throw you under the bus or whatever. No one's gonna talk. And then the company won't move forward. All the problems are still gonna be there, but no one's telling the people who actually need to know. People are just telling it among themselves. And then the you know and the people on the top are wondering, why are we in a decline? Well, this is the environment you created.
Justin: Yeah. You know, if if your whole team is virtual, I mean it is convenient. I get it. You know, you can wear gym shorts, you know, at your desk. You know, it's that's kinda nice. but you're not missing you're missing the nonverbal cues. You're missing the look, the smell of the communication, like you know, you're getting the context like it ⁓ of a of a text, you know, in the office if you ⁓ make like silly joke or something, ⁓ that was just like
Cindy Keyes: Yeah. Yes. ⁓
Justin: You know, something funny. But you text the same thing and they go, shit, my boss just tested me the was that a joke you think? And then now ten other people are talking like you know. You're like, ⁓ mind. You know, like so we need to try and get back to that. Maybe let the air
Cindy Keyes: Yeah. Yeah
Dan: Mm. Well at a minimum a hybrid approach where you're in the office at least a couple days a week. Because it is nice to be able to work from home and my work from home days, I really get a lot more done, but I'm getting those human connections done. I'm not learning about who I'm working with and what we're all working towards. So yeah, we definitely again there's a good middle ground to all of it and it's we have to get back to that place.
Justin: Yeah.
Cindy Keyes: We need more companies who are struggling to reach out to Matrix. You know, we will help you. know, and I think that's the benefit, is especially in this industry, because we're still so connected to so many people in companies as reps, as CEOs, as directors. Like we kind of have a good feel about what's going on, what's what the feel is at companies, what do they like, what do they not like.
Dan: That's it.
Cindy Keyes: And you know, we have the ability to be able to say, listen, okay, this is the reason why you're losing all these people, or this is the reason why people are quitting. This is a reason why your sales are not good. because this is what's really going on. And you either can listen and make a change or you can continue on that path and you know, try to help. ⁓ So awesome. Well, we're at the one hour mark. That was really great. I mean, I think we started really about AI ⁓ know, how we've kind of AI has become this place where it's so disconnected and now AIs are talking to AIs. And then we just kind of spiraled into why so important to have human connection. And I think that is cannot we cannot emphasize that anymore. Is human connection is so important. For every company, regardless of the industry you're in.
Dan: Yeah, you respect tools as tools, but there still has to be the human operators of those tools to make them effective. if you start to rely on the tool too much, you're gonna lose sight of where you need to be.
Cindy Keyes: Yeah. All right. Well, thank you for joining us again, Dan. It is always a pleasure to get your insight. Thanks for everyone for joining us.
Justin: Absolutely.
Dan: Absolutely. Thanks everybody.
Justin: Thanks everybody. Peace.
