AI Won't Replace Entrepreneurs—But It Will Replace Bad Systems

What happens when you stop building your business around hustle and start building it around systems? This week, I'm joined by my longtime friend, former high school classmate, and collaborator Trevor Davis, Founder & CEO of Digiwell Marketing. From travelling to 29 countries while running his business to helping founders build AI-powered operating systems, Trevor has become one of the sharpest minds I know when it comes to scaling sustainably. Together, we unpack what it really takes to build a business that creates freedom, why email marketing is still one of the most overlooked sales assets, and how to use AI to amplify your expertise, not replace it.

Here’s what we get into:

• Why you should be designing your business around the lifestyle you want, not the other way around
• How one strategically timed automated email generated over $10,000 in revenue by reaching the right people at exactly the right moment
• Why most businesses are overlooking the leads they already have instead of nurturing relationships that are ready to convert
• The difference between using AI to eliminate busywork and knowing where human connection will always matter most
• How creating an "AI brain" for your business can save hours, improve consistency, and help your entire team operate more effectively
• Practical ways to identify repeatable tasks and turn them into systems that free up your time without sacrificing quality

If this episode gave you a new perspective on AI and how to build stronger systems, I'd love to hear your biggest takeaway. Send me a DM on Instagram @autheticgazzy and let me know what you're implementing first. 

Connect with Trevor:

Digiwell Marketing
Work with Trevor
LinkedIn

Gazzy’s Links:
Website: https://www.authenticgazzy.com
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/authenticgazzy
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/authenticgazzy
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@AuthenticGazzy
Podcast Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@GazzyAmin
Tiktok: https://www.tiktok.com/@authenticgazzy

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:08

Welcome to CEO Sales Sessions. I'm Gazzy, your host, former political staffer, turned entrepreneur, and founder of Sales Beyond Script, where I build CEOs whose sales feel effortless and profit becomes inevitable. I've spent years in the highest pressure rooms, both in politics and business, and I'm bringing you everything I learned straight to this site. No fluff, no filler, just actionable steps, tough love, and big thinking alongside some of the sharpest COs in the game. Let's get to work. And today I'm bringing you actually an old classmate of mine. We used to go to high school together. He then became an entrepreneur. I became an entrepreneur. And here we are, years later working together. And he's actually my first male guest on the pod. So, Trevor Davis, welcome to the CEO sales session.

SPEAKER_00 1:28

Thank you for having me, Gazzy. An honor to be here.

SPEAKER_01 1:30

I have a little bio of you that I'm gonna read, but I'm gonna make it short because I want to get into the deep questions that I have for today. So let me tell you who Trevor is on paper. Trevor Davis is the founder and CEO of DigiWell Marketing, a Toronto-based company that builds AI-powered marketing and operating systems for founders and teams. He started as a copywriter, which is how we started working together, but that was before the AI era, which has now pulled him more into that space with email automation and eventually into building full operating system for growing businesses. As I told you, Trevor's my high school classmate, turn colleague. And since 2020, we've been collaborating on client projects, scaling companies together by combining our strategy and systems and a whole lot of Hubspot in between. So I'm so grateful that A, you were in Canada because that doesn't happen always, so that you could be on the episode. So thanks for being here.

SPEAKER_00 2:29

Yeah, great to be here.

SPEAKER_01 2:30

Well, one thing you should know about Trevor is that he's a bit of a nomad. So um over the last few years, you've traveled to 29 different countries. Is that right?

SPEAKER_00 2:42

A couple times back to a couple of repeats as well. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 2:45

Yes. And that's funny because you and I also met in Costa Rica once while we were traveling.

SPEAKER_00 2:50

Crossing paths.

SPEAKER_01 2:51

That was great. Yeah. Yeah. I want to start actually there because you didn't just travel to the countries. You actually built your company. You worked while you traveled. And I think that's quite impressive because most of the founders that I talk to, they feel like sometimes they can't even take a weekend away and they feel like they always have to be on. So what had to be true about how you built your business so that you could actually do that?

SPEAKER_00 3:16

Yeah, that's so true. I feel like it's so easy to get pulled into the entrepreneurial grind and hustle and just work through the weekends, work through the evenings, and let that, you know, overwrite the reason why you actually got into business in the first place to enjoy the lifestyle, the flexibility. And really what had to be true was designing that from the start. Of like I had the nomad vision paired with the entrepreneurial vision from the start. And obviously, having a supportive partner, you know, my girlfriend at the time, now now fiance, made that easier. Thank you very much. And we, you know, had each other to lean on in that whole system. But we had, yeah, really designed that lifestyle. And, you know, we went through the micro seasons where it was, you know, partying in you know beach towns in Costa Rica, crossing over, you know, crossing paths with you and Allie and enjoying that fun entry point to it. Yes. To then realizing, okay, let's course correct and we'll enjoy a city with a nice co-working spot nearby and a nice gym in the building and having those amenities and having those kind of like ebbs and flows of the season. Um and even if there wasn't always the perfect funnel, you know, up and running, it was like having the clients that knew you know we were gonna work together, whether I was in Asia or I was in Latin America and time zones weren't gonna make a big difference, setting up those asynchronous kind of relationships and really just building that sort of structure into the lifestyle in the world.

SPEAKER_01 4:29

Yeah, I wasn't sure. Sometimes I didn't even know what country you were in when we're working together. It's like, are you in Argentina? Are you here? Where are you? Are you in Toronto? Like, who knows? But I think it's because from what I saw, it's like you always had your shit together and you were always, I think it's like you're so organized and systems and everything is always so clear. And I think, well, correct me if I'm wrong, but because everything was so like you had, I don't know. I'm like, how do you travel and work at the same time? What was it like? Were you really clear with systems? Did you have boundaries? Did you set your day? Because 29 countries while building, like, what did that actually look like?

SPEAKER_00 5:05

Yeah, it was definitely a work in progress. And think we had to learn those lessons early on of being like, okay, that was a little over-indexed onto the fun, you know, exploration side. Let's pull it back to the business front. Yes. And then setting those systems up. But even as far as like the personal systems went, as well as the business system. So, you know, whether it was having a a VA to support on things and having, you know, team and reasons to, you know, enjoy the balance, knowing things were still getting done. Uh, but also recognizing that, yeah, we could set up shop in a new place with the right setup and we were gonna continuously reinvent the wheel, being like, where are we working today? Like sometimes it was jumping cafes and you know, Bali, and that was the less productive setup versus a nice dedicated desk in an apartment and a cowork across the street. So yeah, really building the systems in our lifestyle and in the business to really support us. So we were going.

SPEAKER_01 5:49

And what countries do you think had like a nomad vibe?

SPEAKER_00 5:52

And that was a big part of it. We loved building in those nomad cities. Like even if it was just the one city itself, even if there wasn't the huge nomad scene like a whole island of Bali was you know very much nomad everywhere you go in that spot. Um but seeing somewhere like Buenos Aires in Argentina, and there was like the one weekly meetup each week, and we knew that we'd go and connect with other entrepreneurs, other like-minded nomads who've built this lifestyle by design and have the businesses to support it. So yeah, places like that, certain spots in Thailand, of course, the the cheaper Southeast Asian countries we loved for the culture, the food, the the different, you know, beautiful aspects of it, but also the community. And it was cool to know that you could always meet people who are in that same sort of you know space.

SPEAKER_01 6:32

That's pretty cool, especially because entrepreneurship could get lonely. That's one of the things that we hear. It's like you don't always have colleagues, you're not meeting people. I mean, that's the beauty of our business. We could really work from anywhere, but that's also like you need that sense of community. So I guess that was one of the things that you guys really were leaning on is finding communities in the different countries that you were in that were just like-minded, maybe not speaking the same languages necessarily or coming from the same backgrounds, but sharing this. I guess it's this way of thinking about wanting to enjoy life fully and letting go of like, I don't know, I always admire people who don't feel like they need to be stuck in a certain place and have this desire to explore. Like, that's good vibes. That's one of the reasons why we loved working together. We had that. I respected that you were doing that and you always got your shit done. And I think finding other like-minded people like that was probably a really big part of that journey for you.

SPEAKER_00 7:26

Yeah, absolutely. From you know, new partnerships, new clients, new just friendships, where it was like, Oh, okay, we're not alone in this journey. I know I always had my partner, you know, as far as not literally physically being alone. And I know people get lonely when Was she also an entrepreneur? Uh, she was finishing her master's online through that whole time uh in psychotherapy and also supporting me in the business. So great way to be able to work together and have that sort of you know, ease of setting those boundaries and and working together to hold ourselves to a work season when it needed to be that. Yeah. And to, you know, compliment each other. But yeah, always having new friends, returning friends, you know, places we would visit. We'd meet someone in Argentina, then catch up with them. And uh we were actually with friends multiple times where we met up in Asia and then back over in Mexico, enjoyed Dia de los Muertos together in Oaxaca, all kinds of cool play squares.

SPEAKER_01 8:13

What a nice memory. And I think you bring up a good point because a lot of us get into entrepreneurship because we want to get away from this rigid lifestyle. But sometimes we end up getting so busy as founders in that what you said, that hustle and that build that we forget the essence of like, hey, you're only gonna be this age once, also enjoy while building. But I get it, that's a bit, it's a bit of a pull because it's like, oh, prioritize, prioritize scaling the business. But it's also like you want to enjoy those once-in-a-lifetime experiences as well.

SPEAKER_00 8:44

And there's seasons for it, right? Yeah. Like at the time we traded the nine to five for you know, maybe uh a shorter day, and now we've traded that for maybe longer days in this Toronto chapter and nice feedback and have that uh, you know, chance to reconnect with old friends and and clients and you know, partners alike, and have the space and time to do that in the season.

SPEAKER_01 9:02

So now it's a build season for you.

SPEAKER_00 9:04

There we go.

SPEAKER_01 9:05

Okay, so I I want to talk a little bit about AI today because obviously that's such a top of mind topic for people building systems these days. But I want to even pull back pre-AI days because you and I have been working together for years now. We've built out systems for clients, collaborating on different uh different businesses and building for them as well. And I had this one case study that I was like, I want to talk about this one. And obviously, client privacy, we're not gonna say the client's name, but we built out an automation for client. And one email, and I know this because I went back and looked at the report that we sent the client at the end of our six months together, and I remembered that one email that we had plugged in like three months in. So within a three month span, that email had generated over $10,000 for them. And I was like, yes, yes, yes. So I want to talk about that. A, the power of automations, email marketing. And also we studied the heck out of the client journey to know exactly when to send that email and how to capture that. But I want to hear it from your mind. What do you think we did well? How was that possible? I know this isn't a one-off example, and you've seen this multiple times, but if we just use that one example, what do you think made that possible?

SPEAKER_00 10:26

Yeah, I mean, I think it really comes down to again designing the system to allow for that result from the start, with you know, you coming in with a strategy, knowing what the team needed, what that you know software pick was going to be, having the you know, HubSpot, you know, plan and architecture for us to pull that off. Um, and then obviously knowing, you know, we had to reach the right person at the right time with the right message. And, you know, we've got that dialed in with the segmented list, with the right automation for the right people on that list, and even you know, bringing in lead scoring and bringing in the added elements of really knowing who those hottest leads were to reach them with that right message and obviously great copy and and great timing with the the automation in place, put all pull uh all together. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:05

That's literally like our love language when you we and I could talk about this forever. But I want to kind of go deeper into it so someone could take away how they could do this for their own business. So we collaborate because I can really understand sales systems and helping clients and really getting to understand what they need. And then you have this whiz mind that can come in and actually from a technology standpoint and from a building and copy and structure standpoint, kind of bring those two together. So when you say like we talk to the right people at the right time, I want the audience to understand that like we had created, I even think of like the mirror board visual of like when said person comes into our let's call them universe, this happens. Then after this happens, there's three case scenarios based on what happens in their journey. And you and I had really created a mix of human touch and automated system where based on that journey and what the client pain point was, you had the right messaging at the right time. So it actually wasn't even one of the first emails that converted, it was later in the client journey. And I think it was that we had studied that journey so well of like what are they gonna be experiencing after this point? And when that person read that email, multiple of those people to have generated 10,000, it spoke to them at the right time. And what I love about it is that the humans had to do no extra effort to make that happen. We set it up once and probably to this day, it's continuing to bring repeat clients. What's the power of email automation in that?

SPEAKER_00 12:51

Yeah, I mean, like you said, designing the whole map. We could have the elements where, okay, here's where you know a sales rep is going to make a touch point, and there's those parts on the journey. But then having this piece where we're gonna have that segmented exact user where they are in their journey and bring that right message to them at the right time. I think that's the power of, you know, again, could be doing that from anywhere, waking up in, you know, the middle of the Amazon River and knowing that that email is still being sent without us having to be there and having someone on the team being a part of it. So um, you know, it came down to, like you said, starting with the strategy, mapping it out. We knew where that user was going to be, understood the journey, understood the market and the business they were in, thinking of the different clients we've worked together. You know, you could see a big market shift update on in the industry, and that might affect that user, that potential customer differently. Let's bring that into the message. We've tied that in and made it so it's relevant, it's timely, you know, bringing all those um components together at the same time to make it so that uh we've got the right triggers, we've got the right messaging, we've got the right, you know, follow-ups um through the whole journey and we've designed it from the start, like you said.

SPEAKER_01 13:54

And I wonder, because I think a lot of people that would be listening, if they do email automation, they might, I don't I'm not sure. So I want to give some value on that if people are really um using tagging, segmenting, lead scoring to the degree that you and I would. So I just want to offer some value there because even I still sometimes get emails that it's like it's a wide cast email. Like I joined once, but I wasn't really in, they're not really talking to my specific needs. So I can tell it's an email list that's sending to everyone. But what you and I have worked on is specific emails going to specific people based on their specific need or point in the journey. Can you tell us a little bit about that and how, like, not how you do it, because I think that's what you hire experts for, but like why are we doing that?

SPEAKER_00 14:46

Yeah. I mean, happy to share how as well. I mean, people want to go and build it themselves, that's great. Um, but it really comes down to, again, like you're not gonna be able to cast the same wide net message to everyone and expect them all to be receiving it the same way, right? Um, classic copyright line, you know, when you're speaking to everyone, you're speaking to no one. If you're trying to do that even within your list, which might be niche down, might be, you know, well targeted, there's still every different stage of the customer journey in that. You might have people who have already, you know, been a past customer, people who might be a you know, low-ticket customer looking to move over to the to a higher ticket purchase, can't speak to everyone the same way. So the reasons we do that, of course, is to be able to get the right message to the right person at the right time. And it's email automation that allows us to do that and makes it really easy with these different components, whether we know you know the lead scoring in HubSpot or using different triggers, different data points that we can bring into the mix to So what is lead scoring with HubSpot?

SPEAKER_01 15:42

Because that was one thing that really made a difference for the companies that we worked with because it allowed them to know who to talk to when. Um and I don't know if this is exclusive to HubSpot. You and I have done it through that platform. Can you talk a little bit about lead scoring and if it does exist on other platforms? Is there a different name for it or are they calling it the same thing?

SPEAKER_00 16:02

Yeah, it's really just how you're gonna be scoring a lead, how warm, how hot they are, you know, inside of the interactions they've been having in your email service provider or in the CRM. Um so in different platforms, you might be pulling in different data points from different places and even trying to build the most full picture possible on someone. Um, thinking of, you know, different workflows that someone comes in from a different you know, application form, or someone that came in from a call, or someone that, you know, there might be different data that have brought those things in, and we're gonna score people based on, hey, they've already filled out a form, they've clicked on links, they've opened emails, we have all that data giving the rich picture inside the back end for us to be able to say, that's a very active, engaged lead. Yes. Let's talk to them, meet them where they are, really. Right.

SPEAKER_01 16:44

That's it, that's it. And that's gonna be especially helpful when you have a bigger list. Like if you have 20 people, you're giving all 20 people the same attention because you're just starting from there. But when you have, you know, 15,000 uh email subscribers and you're trying to sell something to them, how do you know who to talk to? And if you have people who are doing outreach, how do you know who to outreach to in a way that's not cold or salesy or pushy, but really, like you said, talking to them at the right time. So I really love like when I learned about lead scoring, it's literally like plus or minus. So we're talking about like, hey, if you got on a call with Gazzy, you're five points hotter than if you unsubscribed from our email list, which would be minus three points. And based on this, you would get a score and people know who to talk to when. So you're not talking to cold leads, you're talking to qualified prospects who are also ready to hear from you at that right time. So I found lead scoring to be one of those things where I was like, wow, game changer.

SPEAKER_00 17:46

Absolutely. And I think I've I've heard someone talk about in the AI age when everyone can hyper-personalize a cold outreach message that you know, personalized outreach is the new spam. And like if everyone can do that, there's no, you know, mode on that aspect. Uh the leads that do sign up and are in your actual, you know, ecosystem, meeting them where they are, personalizing that to meet them with the touch that you know is actually based on their engagement, not just based on something that you researched online with AI or something. It gives you that.

SPEAKER_01 18:12

And I want to talk about that a little bit because so many people focus on trying to find new leads. And what I love about email marketing and the work that we've done, it's always been about nurturing the leads that are already there.

SPEAKER_00 18:22

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 18:23

I want to talk a little bit about that because I think everyone's like, get leads, get more clients, new people. It's like sometimes, like Bob Proctor always says, acres of diamonds. Like you've got your leads right where you are. And I think email marketing puts more focus on treating the people who are already there well. Would you agree with that?

SPEAKER_00 18:41

Absolutely. Yeah. It's really honoring that relationship you already have. Someone opted in to be on your list, and you've got this, you know, sacred space that isn't dependent on an algorithm. It isn't reliant on another platform that is constantly changing. That's right. It's been the one that's been around, you know, from the start and continues to be the highest place for conversion. So respecting that space and and giving people the, you know, communications that they need or the chances to nurture them and build that trust, build that authority, build that credibility to, you know, build that long-term relationship. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 19:12

That's it. That's it. So what's is there a number that you would say like is too many emails a week or not? Like people who are doing it well, who are really honoring and building that relationship, what are you seeing that's like that sweet spot?

SPEAKER_00 19:24

Yeah, I mean, it's such a different, I think, situation depending on the industry, depending on the the list, the relationship they have with them. You know, thinking about if you're doing a weekly newsletter, you're dropping some value in someone's inbox, that's a great touch point. People look forward to. They're coming in and saying, you know, this person is adding value to my life. I'm I'm excited to read that. Let me check it out. If you're constantly sending them emails, hey, buy my thing, buy my thing, they might be a little less excited to come and read those emails. So if there's a balance, if you've got that nurturing, you know, place, I think doing a few a week, I know people who do daily and they still get people opening. Um, so finding the balance between you know the value and the the selling and in what degree your you know list is open and excited to read those emails and get that from you is uh yeah, really.

SPEAKER_01 20:11

I think you're more likely to open it if there is value. Like obviously, over time, if you provide value, then your audience is consit continually opening those emails. But I also want to talk about it because I guess it's also different now with AI, it's so easy to do this. Before, I mean, you and I literally would work together where you would copyright and spend days writing things. That's not necessarily the case anymore. So I want to talk about that. Like, what do you see changing in the AI space with the email side of things? And then also I want to talk about like what things should we be delegating to AI and not, but before we go into the AI thing, I just want to touch on it in the sense of email marketing still. So how are you seeing it changing now with AI?

SPEAKER_00 20:58

Yeah, great question. I mean, AI is touching everything as we know, especially in marketing. Um, even as we talk about segmentation strategy and knowing that you know, you've got these different buckets on your list, even to build out the whole sales flow and the mirror boards that we use to manually, you know, you could really build that picture, help you draft the vision and laying out the different research points you have on the different people on their user journeys, on their customer journeys. And then you could really help you know lay out those drafts for all of them and have that opportunity to shift the way that you're communicating without having to be in there manually writing every single email, thinking in the headspace like I used to, being like, okay, this is you know for for user A, this is for customer B. Like we're trying to write these segmented messages to reach everyone at the right time. And now you can really just build those personas, build those avatars, and then know that each time you're gonna hit them with the right language, have those sort of pieces saved in inside of the uh the AI process. Um and it just gives you more opportunity to segment more easily without having as many resources involved to write the perfect. Messages for every single person.

SPEAKER_01 22:01

And I think you touched on something important. Even last night I was at an event with TD, and the question was, will AI replace the humans? And like obviously the bankers were like, no, because you need like empathy and compassion and understanding every user case scenario. So that was their case. But one thing I noticed with you is like, sure, copywriting itself was different in nature. But the reason why I saw you excel even more in the AI space is because you kind of embraced it and also understood not how will it take my job, but how can I use it to get even better at what I do? And like I think that's what is gonna make people stand out in this AI era, is like obviously you've touched on your skills. Now you've expanded where we're gonna go next. So it's like you've gotten more into AI and it not being like, oh, well, I guess it will write copy for me now and people don't need me. It's like, well, how could I become even a better asset to them with this tool now? How was that transition for you? Were you scared at the beginning or no?

SPEAKER_00 23:05

It was like uh, you know, a whole wide open box. I was using uh an AI tool before ChatGBT even hit the market back in 22 and seeing where that was going, knowing it was only gonna get better from there, couldn't really put it, you know, the the the mystery, you know, the Pandora back in the box there. And um it it really led me to feel like, okay, let me disrupt myself and like you said, become the person who can better harness these tools from the start than have it, you know, go and replace everything. Um and I think it really comes down to that for for everything with AI is like how much input you're putting into it, the experts, the subject matter that you put into it is gonna give you the difference in your your output of your your quality of your output. Um and that's kind of how I look at AI now in general, is like when you're looking to automate things, where do you want AI to take over the grunt work in the middle to maybe write that first crappy draft? And that's great to get that sort of piece in place, but how much input you put into it, how much context you've put in and how much editing you're willing to do on the outside to you know get that proper output sounding like you fine-tuned to be whatever you know the target output is that you're trying to uphold the standard to will make all the difference. And then you know, as certain processes, whether it's you know, something generic like a lead form gets filled out and you're trying to create a quote or or something for different businesses, those things can get you know better and better over time and AI can do more of it and you need less human in the loop. But I think just yeah, remembering that we have our our our human pieces at the front end and back end and and through the process to iterate is is so key.

SPEAKER_01 24:34

Yeah. So let's talk about that. What is that, what is that line between based on the businesses that you're seeing, some case examples of things that are ethical and easy and a no-brainer to automate because who wants to do that grunt work? And then some things that it's like those things should not be automated. And that's where, you know, we still train sales reps, we still have human touch points. Like when you look at a business, what's where do you see that happening?

SPEAKER_00 25:05

Yeah. I mean, starting on the human side, I feel like as you just said, like having a sales rep having a real human conversation with someone, I think is so key. Um, you know, even if the emails are being written or templated or or you know customized with AI to help that human in the loop send it out and actually, you know, from the moment someone actually responds and says, Hey, I'd like to, you know, continue this human conversation, honoring that relationship and actually having that human-to-human interaction, I think is key. Um, but everything, you know, up until that point, how you're doing your researching, how you're doing your you know, planning of the process, um, even if you have someone just put their hand up and say, Hey, yeah, I'd like more information. Like if it's a generic thing that's being passed over to the person, you you have tools in place now to help automate a lot of those pieces, customize it and you know, help you meet them where they are. Um, but again, I feel like it's it's so different to business to business. You know, how much are you using something that's you know sensitive customer data where you don't want to be putting that up into these cloud models and wanting to make sure that you're you know respecting that and having uh responsible use of of AI. Um we're just talking about that on a panel before this, and very much so, you know, certain industries have regulations and you got to respect those and respect the client data and keep those out of the loop. But I I like the general line of like automate you know the reversible and then verify the consequential. And anything that's gonna have your sign-off on it, your name on it, you know, something that's going out into the public, something that's you know hitting a client and it's important in that regard, uh make sure you've got a human in the loop and you've verified that process before you go and let AI take it off to the races because uh I think with some of the connectors that we have now and capabilities that AAI has, we want to give them more and more and see how much we can push, but making sure we don't go too hard because I've heard about some of those horror stories.

SPEAKER_01 26:52

Like I wondered, like, is it a stretch that they're asking me if I want to connect my QuickBooks to my cloud? Like I kind of wanted it because I'm sure it could do a lot of financial analysis. But I was like, is that too far of a stretch? But I agree with you that there's all this heavy grunt work, this like admin work, draft one, draft two, review, get data, see common threads that it's a no-brainer to kind of use AI for that part of it. I mean, even if I'm just thinking about, I mean, I want to get you in, like, how can we use more AI in the podcast production? Obviously, this podcast is a human-to-human conversation. Like that's never gonna change. This is why people every Tuesday will tap in to listen to this episode because it's that human that's irreplaceable. But hey, like my spreadsheets, making sure all of the forms come to you and like automating the email sequence. So when you arrive here, you know, like, hey, you'll see the black door. So you don't have to text me to be like, hey, Gazzy, like, where is the entrance? Like, I could automate that entire process knowing, hey, I know what the client's gonna go through or my guest is gonna go through. How can I create um like checkpoints for them with an automated process? That's ethical. Like, I don't want to draw the line. Like, I'm not trying to use AI to be unethical. I'm trying to use AI to be more productive, right? So it's like, absolutely, yeah, how can I use it to do things that are not gonna get me in trouble? I'm not gonna give it the contracts, but I am gonna ask it, hey, is there a way that I should automate this process? Hey, if I'm gonna bring Trevor onto this, what do you think Trevor should focus on? And I think those are parts of the bit that aren't, it's not as like risky, even where it could save you so much time that it's just like productivity increases.

SPEAKER_00 28:44

Yeah, absolutely. And I think even laying that out when you kind of go to look at okay, what's your AI strategy gonna be like? Like when I'm building out an AIOS, you know, operating system for different pieces of the Pi you could pull together, be like, okay, where do I have these different you know tools and different things that could be speaking together, you know, pulling that data in to make it one cohesive, you know, story that you can tell. And maybe that's the QuickBooks, maybe for someone it's not, and you want to leave that out. Uh maybe it's you know pulling in the Google Drive or the email so you have those things all in one place. Um and I think really just mapping out all those different steps kind of the same way you would to see what you could you know hand off and delegate to another human on a project, seeing where you could do the same thing with AI and let it take certain pieces and parts of a process, even if it's not taking over the whole thing, because you're wanting to keep some of it you know held in for the human.

SPEAKER_01 29:28

But yeah, that makes sense.

SPEAKER_00 29:31

You know, integrity with the data and what it is.

SPEAKER_01 29:33

Yeah, and what tech is gonna be most helpful. Like it it's it's easy for me to connect Notion and Claude because my operating system is in Notion and that also talks to Google Drive. And it's nice because when Claude creates the documents, I can just save directly into Google Drive. So there isn't like I mean, you have to be okay with giving your information, but at this point, I'm like, make my life easy, connect all the things together, add it straight to my calendar if you can. Because before that would have to be a manual thing that I would like screenshot to my team member to be like, hey, Nika, can you plug this in the calendar? It's like, why do I need to do that now when Gmail just says, Hey, do you want me to like integrate this right into the calendar? It's like, yeah, I would love that.

SPEAKER_00 30:14

Yeah. It's yeah, not not replacing people, but just elevating everyone in the process to, you know, have more empowered tools at our fingertips and and also, you know, not having to do certain grunt work pieces that we can now focus our better on our zones of genius and in our areas of the business that we want to focus on.

SPEAKER_01 30:32

Okay. So I want to know some of some of the ways that you're using AI right now that's really helping you. Cause I imagine we're using it in a little bit more of an advanced way that maybe the average person. I think I saw a stat that said only 5% of people are paying for some sort of AI tool. So that's still a very low number. So I love to share like case scenarios, like even sharing, you know, between Claude Notion and Google Drive. That's helped so many of my clients really create an operating system, set some, you know, I've talked about it on my social where I've created like the intelligence brand and the AI brain of the company, where all those docs are kind of creating the tone, the voice, and all that stuff. And it helped so many people. I was just literally learning and doing it. So I would love to hear from you if there's some things that you're using, whether it's for your own businesses or clients that you're like, oh, this has made a really big difference for me, whether it's an email and content that somebody else might hear and be like, I would love to implement this into my own business. Anything you could share on that?

SPEAKER_00 31:33

Yeah. I mean, I think you just hit the nail on the head just using some of those connector tools, right? Yeah. Having MCP connections, API connections, whatever it is, there's built-in connectors inside of Cloud or inside of Chat GPT or Codex or a perplexity computer, whatever you're using. Manaus, everything now has some degree of, you know, let me plug in my tools that I'm already using, and going through and just seeing where those are already pre-built and where you can minimize the need to be copying and pasting, speaking from one to the other.

SPEAKER_01 31:59

Like what? What are you using?

SPEAKER_00 32:01

So specifically Notion, I think is a great one. Yep. Same thing. You're always going to have a new Notion page automatically updated from Cloud, or you know, things that you don't have to be manually doing. You could have a task manager and databases, whether you're doing the same thing in Airtable, databases, and in Notion, all that data can now be two-way synced. Um, I think using all the good uh all the G Suite tools are, you know, essential for starting places, having your email triaged, you could have a skill to then level up any of those processes that you're doing on repeat.

SPEAKER_01 32:28

So oh, I want to talk about that one because one of my questions is like, what's one system that you think every entrepreneur can have? And I think email is one of those things. Can you dive a little bit deeper of like the email triage thing? I think I tried it and I don't think it worked the first time I tried. So I was doing it under co-work and I tried to create a skill where it would like read all the emails and then let me know like these ones need a human reply, like, you know, if it's for an upcoming speaking engagement or we have to sign contracts or something like that, pay someone, get paid, that sort of a thing. But then like try and delete stuff that I didn't need. I'm not sure that it worked. So can you teach me in live time? Like, what are we setting up? And is it what I wanted was that it would email me every morning with kind of like a brief. That's what I saw. I was like, oh, I would love that set up. Can you tell me like what that could look like?

SPEAKER_00 33:17

Absolutely. So a few limitations and opportunities in that. So um, starting with just like what skills are in general for people who don't know any task that you have that you want to do on repeat, you can create a skill for it. And that is basically just this like preset plan that you know you can just simply call on each time with a slash command inside of Claude. Now it's inside of Codex, same thing inside of Perplexity or Manaus. And you can basically just say, hey, let's do the inbox triage. And it knows based on your preset rules what that looks like. So you could either call on it yourself, or to your point, you could use an automation to run that same call on a on a cron job. Um and the limitation on the the automation is that if you have it set to be um through cowork, that actually will only run when your laptop's open and online.

SPEAKER_01 34:03

Exactly. So when I said email me the debrief at 7 a.m., it but I don't open till my laptop till like 9.30. So, okay, so this is why it's not working.

SPEAKER_00 34:13

Right. But if you moved over to Cloud Code and you're feeling a little bit more advanced and want to set things up there, you could set up an automation in the cloud and that will live on Anthropics servers and it will actually fire at that same time. So you could set it up to be a Slack message, you could set it up to be a you know trigger right to your inbox and giving you a summary update. So I'll get you know the same thing, a Slack message every morning or a Slack message every week for something that you want to have on repeat. So you can set those sort of things up in the cloud so they do run in the middle of the night or they do, you know, produce those results on repeat, regardless of if you're at your desk, as we talk about having the lifestyle balance and you're taking a day off, or we're over here recording a pod and the automation is still running as as as our laptops are closed.

SPEAKER_01 34:56

Yeah, I love that. And it's like obviously I'm gonna that's gonna help Nika do her job better because like we have two emails with uh lots of opportunities in there, but sometimes it get it gets missed. And it needs before it needed the human eye, but now it doesn't always need the human eye anymore. It needs the human approval, but it could start to do the cleaning up in the first bit. So I want you to definitely help me set that up. Yeah, another thing that I want set up like I want to always know as an entrepreneur what are my top three priorities. So in my like, I'm trying to set this up right now where it's like using my calendar, knowing what my client projects are, and using what the clients are working on, because it tracks all of the client calls using AI and like their reports. How could I know what I should be focusing on? And like things like, hey, I have a speaking engagement in two weeks, like these should be your top 10 priorities. Like before I would do a weekly priority list, but I feel like that could also be a bit automated now. What would you suggest? Like, what am I connecting to be able to give me this data?

SPEAKER_00 36:04

Yeah, so a few layers you could bring into that. I mean, knowing that you already have your notion connected. Yes. Maybe you have your you know bigger goals and plans, everything in there. Yes. And knowing that Claude can always go and pull on that and read that specific page if you've given it that access. Yes. Um, so that's an opportunity to pull from there.

SPEAKER_01 36:19

Another thing that if you're using for example, sorry to interrupt, like if I gave it like my quarterly goals as a document.

SPEAKER_00 36:26

So if it knows your high-level priorities and then filtering against that as, you know, okay, what's on the list this week, it could then say, okay, let's check the calendar, let's check the inbox, what fits up against those priorities. And you could be doing that from the Notion, or you could be building that right in where it doesn't have to do a tool call over to Notion to check. It actually remembers that and you've got that already set up inside of your claw.md, or you've got that set up inside of a context file that's in place either in your project or inside of your uh actual folder structure inside of Claude Coworker or Yeah, that's so good because you know, as entrepreneurs, sometimes there's shiny object syndrome and there's a lot coming up and we're constantly like addressing fires.

SPEAKER_01 37:05

And I feel like, you know, at the beginning of the year, you set out your yearly goals, your quarterly goals. And I feel like to help, it's kind of like having, you know, a project manager check in with you. And it's not to say I wouldn't do that with my team, but it's just again helping us be really clear, cross-checking, saying, Hey, you told us this was the priority. Like every month, this is how much we want to bring into the company. How's that going? We're looking at the revenue tracker, we're comparing that to how many sales calls were there. Like I love AI because I think it could understand and kind of mirror back data opportunities to me in a way where because I'm not a naturally a number-ish person, it could go with my strategy mind and pull. So now it like opened a whole new thing. I'm like, oh my God, I could give it my annual sheets of like, this is Q1, Q2, because I do that with myself and my clients, but I didn't think to give it to that to help pull the priorities.

SPEAKER_00 38:01

Absolutely. Yeah. There's another connector for that, another API, another MCP, having all that pulled in, centralized, like you're saying, having your financials, having as much of your operating system inside of that is what, you know, I think is the opportunity now that the models are getting so good that you could have a fully structured, you know, folder structure that it pulls from for all those different areas of your business.

SPEAKER_01 38:22

The folder structure is on the actual computer, not inside of Claude Project. The it's the one that's on the computer that it makes reference to.

SPEAKER_00 38:29

You got it. Yeah. So if we're if you're using cowork, if you're using Cloud Code or over on Codex, all of those are going to be pulling and actually building up files inside of a folder structure on your computer. So while it might fill up your hard drive faster, it does give you that chance to have all that context and those pieces of the case. This is why this is why I have no space.

SPEAKER_01 38:46

But that's one of the things that Ali and I did that weekend that we did our Cloud Mastermind was we built out all of these, what we called like the AI brain, the intelligence documents of content, of sales, of team structure, of roles and responsibilities. So that literally in 48 hours, I educated it to know every single thing about my brand. And not only was that a well, obviously helpful for the output of what AI was going to give me, but as a founder, the exercise of getting that clarity of going back and saying, what is the mission again? What is the vision again? What does this person do? How would I describe Trevor's involvement in this project? It almost got me to be even more clear. So I know sometimes people are like, oh, AI is a lazy approach, like you're not doing as much. We did so much work to build that out. And it was such a good exercise. And then obviously the output of the content now is like always crisp because every time it's writing something, it's pulling from like a hundred past captions, a bunch of past emails, all these Zoom transcriptions. So the tone of it is like that's gazzy. And it is me because it's exactly what I said. Just it remembers it and repurpose it with the messaging that I'm trying to get across.

SPEAKER_00 40:03

Absolutely. And that's where it's so important to put that upfront time in to get your setup so that now the inputs are there, the context is there, and then you can start layering on to then say, okay, let's have a skill to just write the same thing in that voice. And you've got that voice skill and you've got those certain readings.

SPEAKER_01 40:19

I think that's what's next that I want your help to build out is like I've got, I think the the intelligence files are working. The chat side with the projects are really well organized. Like everything for the podcast and all that stuff, like that's where I'm working from. But I don't think I've really optimized like the skill or the cowork or repeating tasks. I've dived into the agents a little bit, but very briefly. I think that's what's next. So how does one how do you learn, how do you learn that other than asking AI itself? But like and hiring people, how do you know its capability if you don't know?

SPEAKER_00 40:56

Yeah, I mean, and it's ever evolving every single week. There's there's new upgrades, new models, new features. I think starting with like just looking at the foundations is gonna be your context layer. I think of having those three. So as you said, you've nailed the context layer. AI now knows about your business, who you are, how you like to write, what your past you know, posts look like, having the whole corpus of work. And then you can then look at layering on the skills. And that's like the next piece that I think about where it's like, okay, now you've got certain tools connected and you've got certain repeatable processes that you identified, and you can say, okay, let's make it so that every single time it could pull the transcript of this call, it could, you know, strip out the you know particular client names, and now you can have something to then turn into more context, or taking the podcast transcript and you've got something from there. So making those next pieces be the skills layer, anything that you do on repeat, same way you might just try to create SOPs for something, turning an SOP into an actual skill so that AI can help you with that draft and it can take care of that process and maybe even turn it into an automation and a workflow where it can.

SPEAKER_01 41:55

So that's the process you're saying is like once you know the SOP of like what's meant to happen, the steps that which is why I love it, because it gets you get clear on okay, what are actually the steps of onboarding? What are the steps between the day I ask a podcast guest, hey, would you like to be a guest to the day that they're here? There's a lot of steps. The intake form, the follow-up, the see you tomorrow, the invite, all of that, I guess, is what you're saying. Once you know that, you can turn that into the skill.

SPEAKER_00 42:22

Absolutely. And these are steps that we know as entrepreneurs, we should be, you know, operate operationalizing and standardizing as much as we can. But with AI now at our fingertips, it gives a little bit of an extra boost and motivation to know that you can set those up, looking at that in your business and making it so that you can actually be automating a lot more of it and just you know, smoothing out a lot of those edges and those processes. And like you said, it's not just giving away our critical thinking to AI, it's actually allowing us to have this as a partner to level it up.

SPEAKER_01 42:48

And embracing it because it's here. And if we're gonna if it's gonna be here, we may as well use it to the best of our abilities.

SPEAKER_00 42:54

Absolutely. And if people need a reason to go even faster with it, you know, it's as cheap as it's ever gonna get, you know, we're only gonna see the prices go up on these. That's it. As they stop subsidizing them on the plan. So max it out, set it up while we can.

SPEAKER_01 43:06

So to wrap it up, I want to know what's something that you are personally working on with AI. Like I just gave you some examples right now of some things that I'm trying to build. What are some things that you're building for yourself or learning how to do right now?

SPEAKER_00 43:20

Yeah, I mean, looking at some of those skills and workflows, I'm like every day trying to like go and customize another skill that for something that I'm I'm doing on repeat, um, whether for myself or for clients. Um, like looking at someone who's coming on board with me to do a bit of a kind of content workflow where you can take all those same sort of pieces and and seeing how there's different, you know, new tools, new connectors, new new skills and new things that you can kind of curate in to having a workspace and you know, really trying to just build out the most useful AI OS, you know, having the second brain, having the sort of context, everything in one place, so you've got the best kind of AI hygiene with it. Um so for myself, that's that's something I'm I'm working on every day, maxing out on a Codex Max plan, a Cloud Max plan, perplexity as well. Um, and you know, really just trying to build out the skills, build out that infrastructure, because uh it's only got a compound for us as we go.

SPEAKER_01 44:10

That's it, that's it. Well, always a pleasure working with you, Trevor. Always a pleasure to chat all things building and scaling. I think we gave a lot of good value away, and hopefully people are getting inspired to take action on some of those things to build. If people uh wanted to get connected with you, learn a little bit more about what you do, what's the best place to stay connected?

SPEAKER_00 44:31

Yeah, you can go check me out at uh diguelmarketing.com. Um, and that's probably the the best place there over or over at LinkedIn.

SPEAKER_01 44:39

Okay, perfect. And we'll drop all those in the show notes below. Thanks for being here, and we'll see you all next Tuesday. Well, that brings us to the end of today's episode. Thank you for sharing your time with me. I know as a CEO that time is your most valuable asset. So let's make it worth it. What's one thing that you're gonna implement or embody today? Because listening without action is just entertainment. So DM me your takeaway on Instagram at authenticGazzy. I want to hear it, and I promise you I will hold you accountable. And if this episode resonated, share it with a woman in your circle who needs to hear this. And if you haven't already, follow and subscribe so you never miss a Tuesday. I'll see you next week.