September 30, 2024 • 33 mins
In this episode, we dive into the hot topic of AI and how it's revolutionizing email marketing. From transforming the way we craft emails to leveraging tools like ChatGPT for faster, smarter email creation, we cover everything you need to stay ahead in this AI-driven landscape. If you're curious about how AI can streamline your email process and boost results, this episode is a must-listen!
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Send us an email at femailsacrossthepond@gmail.com and tell us what you'd like to hear. Want more help with your emails? Follow us on Instagram: Angie: https://www.instagram.com/angiemachado_/ Clara: https://www.instagram.com/claratoombsconsulting/ Download Our Free Resources Get instant access to Angie's Free Email Planning Bundle Get Clara's 14 AI Prompts to Help Transform Your Email Game
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
(upbeat music)
(00:02):
- Welcome to the Females Across the Pond and Beyond podcast.
Hi, I'm Clara.
- Hi, I'm Angie.
We're here to share all things email and beyond.
We go through the trials and tribulations
of running your own business,
being your own boss and sending your own email marketing.
- As email marketing experts,
we're dedicated to helping small businesses thrive
(00:24):
so they can have more freedom in their business.
- Ready to get started?
Let's dive into the episode.
(upbeat music)
- Hello everyone, and welcome to our episode.
Today we're gonna be talking about AI, all about AI.
So before we delve into that,
I'd love to know how you're doing, Angie.
(00:45):
How are things?
- Oh my gosh, I'm doing so well.
There's a lot going on,
like work-wise and personal wise,
'cause it's warm out, warmer.
And so there's a lot to do with the kids
and then also like work-wise.
I've been hosting a free challenge
(01:07):
with one of my good friends
and we've gotten a lot of people into the free challenge
which has been really exciting.
And so just been hustling,
just been hustling online on Instagram,
on the acquisition channels.
And coincidentally, have almost doubled my email list
(01:27):
even though it's super small to begin with.
But I was just talking,
we were just talking about how now I have to introduce
a whole slew of new people into my email list
and get them to not mass unsubscriber,
mass spam complaint me.
(01:48):
So I have to come up with a strategy,
outside of what we're doing with the challenge
if they're gonna be on my email list too.
Welcome them in and offer them away.
Out if they want.
And yeah, so usually I do those strategies
for my clients, not for myself.
So it's kind of fun to experience that.
What about you?
(02:08):
What's been going on?
- That's pretty cool.
I had a couple days off last week,
which I really enjoyed.
It was nice to just switch off from the business.
And I think it's important as smooth business owners
that we do take that time,
we take well being time.
So really enjoyed it.
- And it was your birthday?
(02:31):
Let's not just skip over that.
- Yeah, it was my better thing.
It was just so nice to celebrate.
And I think you've got to do these things, right?
It's important that you do take time for yourself
and actually it isn't all about the business.
So yeah, I think it was just so lovely to have some time off
(02:54):
to go on a boat ride, to go to a spa,
just to see friends spend time with people.
And yeah, I think we need to do more of that
as bit small business owners.
We need to make sure that we are prioritizing our health
and wellbeing.
So yeah, getting good after that.
(03:15):
- I have an actual friend who was also in the same program
that, oh no, I don't think she was in the same program
that we met in, but also in that like world,
where she's thinking about doing a membership
that helps women business owner include more self-care
into like our regular lives, you know, like taking...
(03:35):
I actually did a research interview with her.
Like she wanted to interview me and talk to me
about like what I need help with as far as taking time off
for myself.
And I was like, I need something that's feasible
that I can do continuously.
So like every month, I have like a three day weekend
or four day weekend somewhere so that it is ongoing
(03:56):
because I need ongoing self-care and I need breaks.
It's not like, because her whole thing is she used to be like
all about taking like sabbaticals or like long vacations.
And I'm like, I don't necessarily need like a long vacation.
I think I need more time throughout the year
that I'm making sure I'm taking off like more consistently.
I think that would have a bigger impact on how I am
(04:19):
like throughout the year.
I don't know.
I need that.
I think it's just we get so wrapped up in our business
that we forget and having those regular small time periods
of time off is really important.
And I think that we think, I think, you know,
when you're working in a corporate environment,
(04:41):
you get reminded to take your leave.
Otherwise you lose it.
Like it's much more something that you're reminded of.
Whereas when you're your own your own HR department,
like you have to remind yourself to take holiday.
So so here's me giving you all permissions to take some time off
for sure.
It will do the world as good.
(05:03):
And before you go off on your your leave,
why not listen to this podcast?
So today we're going to be talking about AI and RAT.
What does that mean for you as small business owners?
And what does that mean for how you use AI?
When it comes to email marketing?
So really huge benefits arise from using AI,
(05:28):
not just within email marketing.
And Angie and I are going to step through what
that looks like in a moment.
But you know, some of the big benefits
are being improvements in efficiency, getting more work done,
getting help with ideas and content.
You know, it can be used for so many things.
(05:49):
And we want to talk today about how actually you can reduce
the overwhelm because there's a lot out there when it comes to AI.
But then also how do you actually implement these strategies
and how, you know, what does this mean for your business?
And that's what we want to get into today's episode.
So let's dive in then in terms of the rise of AI
(06:14):
for small businesses.
Angie, do you want to kick us off with defining what you think
AI is from like your definition and its role in email marketing?
Yeah, to me, like AI is really a tool
that we can use to speed up the process of our email marketing.
(06:35):
And you know, anywhere from like strategizing
our sense to, in a sense, email creation.
But it's not something that is going to take over the whole process
for us, meaning like taking over all of our copywriting,
all of our designing of emails.
(06:57):
We want it to act more as like our assistant,
as we are creating or coming up with the strategies
and creating content for this.
But yeah, that there is a fine line of, we're not having AI do
all the doing because it's just not there yet, you know?
But we can have it help speed up the process,
(07:19):
especially as small business owners who are doing
our own email marketing and also maybe, you know,
not as confident in our skills to strategize or come up
with, you know, the emails that we are sending,
you can use it as, you know, to help you come up with those ideas
and maybe give you a path forward so that you can, you know,
(07:40):
you don't block yourself mentally with all of the things
that you could put or should be doing.
Yeah, I think I wanted to add actually that I saw someone
speak recently, he's known as Mo Gowr,
but I don't know if he's heard of him.
He used to work for Google and he's now basically an ambassador
(08:02):
for AI and happiness to quite interesting topics
that do come together.
And he said that if you are not in a corporate world,
more so, we'll relate this to small businesses in a moment,
but in the corporate world, someone asked him a question
in the audience to say, "My manager isn't open to AI.
(08:26):
What do I do?"
And he simply said, "Wait until that manager is moved on
and you get a new manager that is AI focused."
And he's, he's, tape on that is that you absolutely must start
to adopt AI to be relevant within the corporate world.
And I actually do think that it's something you do need to start
(08:50):
having an awareness of as a small business owner.
Now it can be overwhelming, you know, where do you start?
In terms of AI and how to apply it,
but I think the very first step is actually just to start
to be aware of how it's starting to shape businesses
and how it's starting to help small business owners
(09:15):
in their decision making and where the pain points are
in terms of time and what have you.
So I get in a kind of nutshell here, AI and its role
in email marketing is about helping you do more with less time,
do more with less resources.
And it's not supposed to be something that's going to cause any kind
(09:38):
of anxiety, but something that's going to help you do more
with less, basically.
And what we're seeing here is this shift towards AI driven
strategy, so very much about how AI is actually
becoming part of people's marketing plan and strategies.
(09:59):
And actually, you know, what ways could this help your business?
Well, if you are the small business owner and you're wondering,
you know, what could I possibly use AI for,
particularly when it comes to email marketing?
Well, there are so many different ways.
You might already be using some of these without realizing.
(10:20):
So, for example, send time optimization is a form of AI.
So what is time optimization you might be asking, well,
this is where in certain email platforms, your platform can determine
the best time to send an individual an email based
on their past behavior.
(10:41):
So it's using AI.
So think of AI not as, you know, this kind of separate entity,
but a way to use technology to make things easier for you
to give you more insight into decision making.
So already certain platforms like Xavier are already taking on AI
and using it.
(11:03):
You might be using AI in other ways.
Zoom, for example, has an AI summary now that essentially
listens to your meeting and summarizes it back.
So is it a surprise, Andrew, that actually AI is
a ready part of our lives?
No, not at all.
And it's been a part of our lives for a while.
It's just we're now getting more tools, you know,
(11:25):
like there's just more software that's being created out there
to continue to make our lives easier as content creators, right?
But you're absolutely right.
There is a lot of AI inside of your email marketing platforms
right now.
Klavio also has a subject line assistant
that you can paste your copy from your email into that.
(11:47):
And it'll spit out, you know, ideas for subject lines.
Do I use those subject lines ideas very rarely?
But does it spark ideas for me to kind of, you know, input,
like what I know is good for subject lines?
Absolutely.
So, and they also have a segment creation AI,
(12:12):
where like you can like input like what type of people
you're looking for on your email list.
And it'll create a segment for you of those people for you.
So they're just like really good tools, like you said,
to use to kind of gather data or just like quickly, you know,
create things for you that will just help you as you, you know,
(12:36):
create your emails or create your email strategy?
Yeah, 100%. It's no kind of surprise that platforms are already
starting to integrate these AI tools.
So think of it not as something separate,
but as a kind of part of your decision making
in determining what's best for your business.
(12:56):
You know, as Andrew mentioned, there's ways in which you can
determine subject line or segment, but also things like A/B testing.
So rather than you deciding, A/I will help you make
that decision.
So let's talk about how we actually implement AI
and actually how do some of business owners take on the
(13:21):
implementation?
Because it all sounds great.
Like I actually know as part of this event I went to with
MoGelda, I saw it a real life, I'm a curber,
the robots who is freakishly human like.
She was linking, looking at the, doing the side eye.
She was answering questions.
(13:42):
And even though that felt like a glimpse into the future,
AI is very much ready, not necessarily in robot form yet,
but ready in tools and platforms and products that we can use
as small business owners.
But where would you start, Angie?
If you were a small business owner and you didn't have any AI
(14:03):
integrated into your business, where would you start?
I think I would just start playing, right?
Like, honestly, which is what I did is, you know,
everybody was talking about chat GPT.
So I opened up a chat GPT account.
And I just started asking questions and just really started
(14:25):
to get used to, you know, the process of using chat GPT,
right?
So chat GPT is literally, you want to treat it like it's an
assistant of your own, like it's, like it's a person.
So you want to have a conversation with it.
And I really started using it to help me come up with like email
(14:48):
ideas, right?
So one way, one real easy, simple way to use it is to take copy
that's already on your website, like, you know,
you're about us page or a blog that you wrote or something
like that and paste it into chat GPT and say, hey, like, can
you come up with 10 email ideas from this blog poster, from this
(15:11):
webpage?
And that's really how I started using it in my own email
marketing, even for my clients, just to help me with idea
creation, you know?
So I think, and it was just very simple, you know, like, okay,
like just a very simple prompt and, you know, pasting and
then seeing what it came out with.
And I think just even starting with something very simple like
(15:33):
that to be like, you know, pasting a piece of copy and being like,
you know, telling it to, you know, help you in some way to take that
copy and do something with it is how I just first started using
it.
What about you?
I think that's a great shout out.
And G in terms of like starting really simple and, you know,
(15:55):
it can be very easy to get overwhelmed because you show like
everyone's using AI except you.
And actually chat to you see or copy AI, I use copy AI for idea
generation is essentially chat to beauty, but in that kind of
plugged into a different platform that allows you to do a little
bit more.
(16:15):
But essentially it allows you to not only look at subject
lines, but you can improve copy that you've already written.
You might want to maybe look at the update your tone of voice
or there's a lot you can do with these platforms.
And it's really important that you are open to AI and actually,
(16:38):
you know, do take some time to experiment because it might be
that AI can help you in other ways in your business.
For example, rather than on the copy side of your business,
it might be that it can save you time in analyzing data,
for example, I do use some, I do use help AI calls to help me just
(17:04):
understand data a bit more and it's anonymised of course.
So there are different ways AI can help you for ensuring that
you are careful about data quality and the data that comes back.
So ultimately you are the expert in what you do and whatever comes
back with, you know, in terms of the prompts you've given AI and
(17:26):
prompting is so important it comes to AI must must write the
right correct prompts.
Whatever you put in you get out.
So the better quality the prompts, the better the answer.
Yeah, and I so, oh God.
No, I was just going to say and with that, just know that
that comes with time too.
Like I think a lot of people put a lot of pressure on themselves to
(17:50):
come up with a good prompt, but even just like again, starting
that conversation as if this chat TPP window was your assistant
and you're trying to get super clear to your assistant,
like what would you, what would the steps and the direction that
you would literally give someone if you were to give them a task.
(18:11):
And typically when you are talking within assistant,
it's a conversation, right?
It's an ongoing thing and they ask questions or whatever.
So treat it as such that it is be curious as you are starting this
conversation or using chat TPP or whatever it is that you might not
get it on the first try, but the cool thing with AI is you can
(18:34):
continue to refine the output.
And you can even give it feedback.
Like that was close, but not not quite what I'm looking for.
I've even asked chat TPP if I wanted you to like create 10 pieces of
content for X, Y, C, what is the prompt that you would have me ask you
(18:56):
in order to get X output?
Like you can even get meta with it, you know, in that way.
And like ask AI like, what do you need to know in order to create X for me?
You know?
Yeah, that's really cool.
I think it's a really good analogy to see AI as a person or an
(19:17):
assistant to you in your business.
So you can go back and refine, refine, refine.
So if it comes back to something you don't like, well, you can say,
this isn't quite the right tone of voice, align the tone of voice to my
website and then put in your website, for example, like there's a lot,
you can train your tools to start really understanding your
(19:40):
business and actually help you.
And it takes time to do that and you have to get the quality of the
prompts right.
But when it comes to email marketing, I mean, there's things you can do to help
you come up with content ideas, subject lines, pre-headers.
There's so much you can use to help you with your email marketing
(20:03):
quickly around the more kind of creative side of the email.
But yes, some of the challenges you might encounter might be which
tool.
I mean, we've mentioned it quite a bit.
One I actually really like is that we haven't mentioned it as over-scripts,
where you basically upload and recording a video, YouTube, whatever it is.
(20:28):
And it's AI basically cuts the video into short clips in commuter
social media and it does that to three to a certain number of minutes.
So you get X number of minutes a month and then you upgrade pay.
That's really cool because it cuts it at the point in which this could be
a really good sound bite.
(20:49):
So I just want to might say, what about yourself?
Yeah, I use a cast magic a lot.
I use it to because at least with my clients, so I'm always using AI,
you know, phantom or that is also one that I use a lot is a phantom recorder on all
(21:10):
of my meetings with my clients because it gives me a transcript and it also gives
me a summary of like to do's and it automatically also sends that to my clients
after my meetings.
So I don't have to do any call wrap up or like any outreach afterwards.
Like they get all the directions from the actual AI.
(21:31):
And then I typically take that transcript and like a lot of my stuff, you know, I do a
lot of questions for my clients at least when I'm like creating strategies and, you know,
content creation and things like that.
And so I, in a sense, I interview my clients and a lot of times I'll take that interview,
that transcription interview and then I'll upload it into chat GPT and I'll be like,
(21:54):
okay, like tell me what are the main challenges of their customers?
Like what are their customers want?
What are their products, whatever.
And I get like a really good summary and overview of like the type of information I need
in order to create really good pieces of copy or email ideas and like things like that.
So what's really been clutch for me is any sort of AI that transcribes video in order to
(22:21):
create content or refine your content creation.
So with Cast Magic, I'll take like my clients YouTube videos or the reels that they're posting
online or any sort of like or podcast episodes.
I'll upload it.
It'll give me like a transcript and then I can also tell it to create content from these
(22:43):
videos that they've already posted.
So if you're a small business owner and you're putting out content on social media, AI can
absolutely like speed up that process of repurposing that content for you, which is really key.
Yeah, and you're kind of, it's almost like creating a bachelor's assistant through having
(23:05):
AI right because it's making it's helping you scale your business without having to hire
lots of new people.
I don't think you'll ever get rid of the human touch.
I do think that you need a human to oversee who's going to input the prompts, those kinds
of things.
And I do think you should retain an element of human in your tone of voice, otherwise we
(23:29):
all will start for some the same.
And that's one of the things I think it can be really obvious when someone sees AI for
their social media and it becomes really same.
Can we talk about that a little bit?
Yeah, of course.
Because I have clients that obviously, I'm like, okay, like, you know, we can have AI help
(23:50):
us with subject lines.
And we can have AI help us with this.
And then when they've sent an email, like, I can, I can spot an AI chat GPT subject line
from a mile away.
I'm like, it's honestly the output.
It's okay.
It's not the standards that I would want you to have for yourself in a subject line, you
(24:12):
know?
So I think it is really important not to go with what AI always outputs and to remember
like, okay, a good subject line, you want it to be like five to seven words.
You want it to be a hook.
You want it to be captivating.
And AI just, and you want it to have some sort of personality, right?
You're talking about brand voice, right?
(24:34):
AI does not, is the outputs right now are not giving you like those baseline things that
you need for subject lines, but it can give you a good idea of like how to create one,
right?
Yeah.
And I think that AI will catch up and I do feel eventually.
Yeah.
I've met a few people that are working on AI tools that completely get your tone of voice.
(24:56):
And I think we're in the early stage of that.
Yeah, but it's not there yet.
It's not there yet.
And I think for now, use AI as an assistant to your business, but don't replace, like,
don't completely outsort to AI.
You actually want to continue to have tone of voice that is uniquely used until AI becomes
(25:18):
super efficient at figuring that out.
So, yeah, one of the watch out for a mask is you should continue to use an embrace AI,
but continue to have a human element to your, your com through email or other social
for other channels.
The best, the best copywriting still comes from a human, like the best copywriting and pieces
(25:43):
of writing in general still come from your unique perspective and those stories that you have
inside of yourself that only your memory can retain and you telling that story is still
going to be way more special and connect way more with people than something an AI can
come up with.
So, just like keep that in mind that, yeah, it's good to help you with ideas, but actually
(26:08):
like doing the writing, like the magic still is inside of you, you know?
Yeah, 100%.
I think, you know, use it for inspiration, but when it comes, you know, like we get into
a lot of plagiarism and the thing that also, I think, is a watch out is don't put, like,
person data into your AI because, you know, that just personally I wouldn't do it because
(26:33):
that data is being shared with the AI gods and, you know, you want to kind of have some
to be around the data.
Anything you're kind of plugging in just make sure it isn't confidential or isn't, you
know, particularly if you're doing anything for your own business or for your clients, it
shouldn't be, yeah, confidential or kind of anything linked to a GDPR.
(26:58):
So, we do want you to be aware of that.
Just a touch on budget for any recommendation.
So, there might be this perception that AI is expensive and actually, you know, we've mentioned
a few talks here.
I mean, I don't know, class magic and is that free or is there like a question to that?
(27:20):
Which one, class magic?
Yeah.
No, that definitely costs, I think it's like 40 bucks a month.
I think it really depends on, you know, how you use AI, right?
So, I think it's okay to invest in some AI that really, really, really makes sense for you.
You know, and so the good thing about class magic is I think you can test it out for a month
(27:44):
for free and I think that's a lot, that's a lot with these AI tools.
They usually give you some sort of, you know, month free or whatever deal.
And I would definitely sign up for one that sounds like good to you, but really, you know, just
be cognizant of how much you actually use it and then go with the ones.
(28:05):
And then you can also, you know, you can also delete it or not, you know, not move forward
with it or whatever, take your account off.
So that's also an option.
But the thing I like about them is they usually are like $20 a month or something very accessible
that you can at least try and, you know, see, again, see if you actually do use it.
(28:26):
I mean, you know, like we said earlier, like, I think you saw about mindset and actually
being open to trying and experimenting with AI.
So really, I guess in summary, like, there are so many different ways AI can help for business,
but starting off slow and small, yeah, big, I don't get overwhelmed because there's a lot
(28:46):
out there.
And even if you just create a free chat to the account and play with it, start experimenting
with prompts.
But also taking a step back and thinking about your business and where the biggest kind
of time resources are, like, where, what is taking the most amount of time for you to be
within your marketing, what can help, what can AI help with?
(29:10):
I think we've discussed some of the key points today with email marketing, so subject
line and ideation, content, content ideas, coming up with suggestions on how to maybe look
at ways to, what social media are ideas.
There's lots of different ways that you can use AI.
And even just giving you a different perspective when your own copy is really helpful as well.
(29:37):
There's just so many opportunities.
And I think as a small business owner, we need to be careful not to be so stuck on our
day to day that we don't embrace the technology that is moving very, very quickly around us.
And I guess then, I'm looking at kind of the AI emerging trends for small businesses.
I do get, you know, going back to that, MoG out that point, do you agree with him that,
(29:59):
as we just think eventually, you'll be left behind if you're not embracing some form
of AI?
Do you agree?
Oh, absolutely, 100%.
Like, just the time that it can save for you as a small business owner is amazing, you
know?
And so the output of us as small business owners or small businesses is, you know, just
(30:22):
going to get more and more the more that we embrace AI, the more that we are able to
do, the more content we're able to make.
And so those businesses that are going to embrace AI are going to be able to, you know,
put out more content and send more emails and just kind of give themselves a leg up on
what they're able to accomplish.
So, you know, just for that, I think it's really important to embrace.
(30:46):
Yeah, absolutely.
I totally agree.
I feel like actually, you know, this week, and funny enough, I helped clients, sorry, last
week, I'm just flying by.
I helped a client interview to start building their team and this is an email marketing specialist
and this person had AI all over their CV.
(31:08):
So you can see now that AI is becoming almost a kind of unspoken requirement that you understand
AI.
And when we talk about understanding AI, you know, we're sick.
We, it is really just about understanding those prompts and helps us start helping.
Yeah.
It's really just, it's really just experimenting.
(31:30):
So, and over thinking it, just start trying and playing with it through chat to DC and some
of the tools we mentioned today.
Yeah.
But ultimately, it's a good thing for your business.
It can help you accelerate and do more with less.
Think of it as a way to potentially increase your reach, increase your effort without a huge
(31:55):
cost.
And there's definitely massive advantages to your business and, you know, we want you
to be saying ahead of the curve.
So, we encourage you to give it a go if you haven't already.
And if you're already using AI, I would love to hear, you know, your thoughts, how have
you used AI to help your email marketing efforts?
So, do get in touch with us.
(32:15):
Our details are in the show notes.
Anything else I'm doing?
You want to see to mention on AI before we wrap up?
I think, I think that's really it.
I would just love to hear how other businesses are using AI so that we can continue to help
each other, right?
Because the, the, the block of AI is just like, we don't know what we don't know, right?
(32:37):
So, we can only use AI to achieve whatever it is that we think it can achieve where it's
like, it is kind of limitless in this way.
So, if we can just like help each other out to be like, oh, I use this program, or I use
this way, and I use it this way, that's going to help you grow and figure out what
you're about, how to use it best for your business.
Yeah, absolutely.
The potential is huge, and I think even if you've done nothing so far, don't feel behind.
(33:04):
It's very easy to get started.
And for those of you who are ready using AI, like I said, we'd love to hear out of it
and on.
Well, thank you so much for listening to today's episode.
We look forward to seeing you again soon.
Thank you.
Bye.
[Music]
(33:24):
You've just listened to females across the pond and beyond podcast with your hosts, Clara
and Angie.
If you like our content, don't forget to subscribe, rate and review us on the platform of your
choice.
Is there something you want to hear about for our next episode?
Email us at females across the pond at gmail.com to let us know.
(33:45):
Until next time.
[Music]
[MUSIC]
(upbeat music)
(00:02):
- Welcome to the Females Across the Pond and Beyond podcast.
Hi, I'm Clara.
- Hi, I'm Angie.
We're here to share all things email and beyond.
We go through the trials and tribulations
of running your own business,
being your own boss and sending your own email marketing.
- As email marketing experts,
we're dedicated to helping small businesses thrive
(00:24):
so they can have more freedom in their business.
- Ready to get started?
Let's dive into the episode.
(upbeat music)
- Hello everyone, and welcome to our episode.
Today we're gonna be talking about AI, all about AI.
So before we delve into that,
I'd love to know how you're doing, Angie.
(00:45):
How are things?
- Oh my gosh, I'm doing so well.
There's a lot going on,
like work-wise and personal wise,
'cause it's warm out, warmer.
And so there's a lot to do with the kids
and then also like work-wise.
I've been hosting a free challenge
(01:07):
with one of my good friends
and we've gotten a lot of people into the free challenge
which has been really exciting.
And so just been hustling,
just been hustling online on Instagram,
on the acquisition channels.
And coincidentally, have almost doubled my email list
(01:27):
even though it's super small to begin with.
But I was just talking,
we were just talking about how now I have to introduce
a whole slew of new people into my email list
and get them to not mass unsubscriber,
mass spam complaint me.
(01:48):
So I have to come up with a strategy,
outside of what we're doing with the challenge
if they're gonna be on my email list too.
Welcome them in and offer them away.
Out if they want.
And yeah, so usually I do those strategies
for my clients, not for myself.
So it's kind of fun to experience that.
What about you?
(02:08):
What's been going on?
- That's pretty cool.
I had a couple days off last week,
which I really enjoyed.
It was nice to just switch off from the business.
And I think it's important as smooth business owners
that we do take that time,
we take well being time.
So really enjoyed it.
- And it was your birthday?
(02:31):
Let's not just skip over that.
- Yeah, it was my better thing.
It was just so nice to celebrate.
And I think you've got to do these things, right?
It's important that you do take time for yourself
and actually it isn't all about the business.
So yeah, I think it was just so lovely to have some time off
(02:54):
to go on a boat ride, to go to a spa,
just to see friends spend time with people.
And yeah, I think we need to do more of that
as bit small business owners.
We need to make sure that we are prioritizing our health
and wellbeing.
So yeah, getting good after that.
(03:15):
- I have an actual friend who was also in the same program
that, oh no, I don't think she was in the same program
that we met in, but also in that like world,
where she's thinking about doing a membership
that helps women business owner include more self-care
into like our regular lives, you know, like taking...
(03:35):
I actually did a research interview with her.
Like she wanted to interview me and talk to me
about like what I need help with as far as taking time off
for myself.
And I was like, I need something that's feasible
that I can do continuously.
So like every month, I have like a three day weekend
or four day weekend somewhere so that it is ongoing
(03:56):
because I need ongoing self-care and I need breaks.
It's not like, because her whole thing is she used to be like
all about taking like sabbaticals or like long vacations.
And I'm like, I don't necessarily need like a long vacation.
I think I need more time throughout the year
that I'm making sure I'm taking off like more consistently.
I think that would have a bigger impact on how I am
(04:19):
like throughout the year.
I don't know.
I need that.
I think it's just we get so wrapped up in our business
that we forget and having those regular small time periods
of time off is really important.
And I think that we think, I think, you know,
when you're working in a corporate environment,
(04:41):
you get reminded to take your leave.
Otherwise you lose it.
Like it's much more something that you're reminded of.
Whereas when you're your own your own HR department,
like you have to remind yourself to take holiday.
So so here's me giving you all permissions to take some time off
for sure.
It will do the world as good.
(05:03):
And before you go off on your your leave,
why not listen to this podcast?
So today we're going to be talking about AI and RAT.
What does that mean for you as small business owners?
And what does that mean for how you use AI?
When it comes to email marketing?
So really huge benefits arise from using AI,
(05:28):
not just within email marketing.
And Angie and I are going to step through what
that looks like in a moment.
But you know, some of the big benefits
are being improvements in efficiency, getting more work done,
getting help with ideas and content.
You know, it can be used for so many things.
(05:49):
And we want to talk today about how actually you can reduce
the overwhelm because there's a lot out there when it comes to AI.
But then also how do you actually implement these strategies
and how, you know, what does this mean for your business?
And that's what we want to get into today's episode.
So let's dive in then in terms of the rise of AI
(06:14):
for small businesses.
Angie, do you want to kick us off with defining what you think
AI is from like your definition and its role in email marketing?
Yeah, to me, like AI is really a tool
that we can use to speed up the process of our email marketing.
(06:35):
And you know, anywhere from like strategizing
our sense to, in a sense, email creation.
But it's not something that is going to take over the whole process
for us, meaning like taking over all of our copywriting,
all of our designing of emails.
(06:57):
We want it to act more as like our assistant,
as we are creating or coming up with the strategies
and creating content for this.
But yeah, that there is a fine line of, we're not having AI do
all the doing because it's just not there yet, you know?
But we can have it help speed up the process,
(07:19):
especially as small business owners who are doing
our own email marketing and also maybe, you know,
not as confident in our skills to strategize or come up
with, you know, the emails that we are sending,
you can use it as, you know, to help you come up with those ideas
and maybe give you a path forward so that you can, you know,
(07:40):
you don't block yourself mentally with all of the things
that you could put or should be doing.
Yeah, I think I wanted to add actually that I saw someone
speak recently, he's known as Mo Gowr,
but I don't know if he's heard of him.
He used to work for Google and he's now basically an ambassador
(08:02):
for AI and happiness to quite interesting topics
that do come together.
And he said that if you are not in a corporate world,
more so, we'll relate this to small businesses in a moment,
but in the corporate world, someone asked him a question
in the audience to say, "My manager isn't open to AI.
(08:26):
What do I do?"
And he simply said, "Wait until that manager is moved on
and you get a new manager that is AI focused."
And he's, he's, tape on that is that you absolutely must start
to adopt AI to be relevant within the corporate world.
And I actually do think that it's something you do need to start
(08:50):
having an awareness of as a small business owner.
Now it can be overwhelming, you know, where do you start?
In terms of AI and how to apply it,
but I think the very first step is actually just to start
to be aware of how it's starting to shape businesses
and how it's starting to help small business owners
(09:15):
in their decision making and where the pain points are
in terms of time and what have you.
So I get in a kind of nutshell here, AI and its role
in email marketing is about helping you do more with less time,
do more with less resources.
And it's not supposed to be something that's going to cause any kind
(09:38):
of anxiety, but something that's going to help you do more
with less, basically.
And what we're seeing here is this shift towards AI driven
strategy, so very much about how AI is actually
becoming part of people's marketing plan and strategies.
(09:59):
And actually, you know, what ways could this help your business?
Well, if you are the small business owner and you're wondering,
you know, what could I possibly use AI for,
particularly when it comes to email marketing?
Well, there are so many different ways.
You might already be using some of these without realizing.
(10:20):
So, for example, send time optimization is a form of AI.
So what is time optimization you might be asking, well,
this is where in certain email platforms, your platform can determine
the best time to send an individual an email based
on their past behavior.
(10:41):
So it's using AI.
So think of AI not as, you know, this kind of separate entity,
but a way to use technology to make things easier for you
to give you more insight into decision making.
So already certain platforms like Xavier are already taking on AI
and using it.
(11:03):
You might be using AI in other ways.
Zoom, for example, has an AI summary now that essentially
listens to your meeting and summarizes it back.
So is it a surprise, Andrew, that actually AI is
a ready part of our lives?
No, not at all.
And it's been a part of our lives for a while.
It's just we're now getting more tools, you know,
(11:25):
like there's just more software that's being created out there
to continue to make our lives easier as content creators, right?
But you're absolutely right.
There is a lot of AI inside of your email marketing platforms
right now.
Klavio also has a subject line assistant
that you can paste your copy from your email into that.
(11:47):
And it'll spit out, you know, ideas for subject lines.
Do I use those subject lines ideas very rarely?
But does it spark ideas for me to kind of, you know, input,
like what I know is good for subject lines?
Absolutely.
So, and they also have a segment creation AI,
(12:12):
where like you can like input like what type of people
you're looking for on your email list.
And it'll create a segment for you of those people for you.
So they're just like really good tools, like you said,
to use to kind of gather data or just like quickly, you know,
create things for you that will just help you as you, you know,
(12:36):
create your emails or create your email strategy?
Yeah, 100%. It's no kind of surprise that platforms are already
starting to integrate these AI tools.
So think of it not as something separate,
but as a kind of part of your decision making
in determining what's best for your business.
(12:56):
You know, as Andrew mentioned, there's ways in which you can
determine subject line or segment, but also things like A/B testing.
So rather than you deciding, A/I will help you make
that decision.
So let's talk about how we actually implement AI
and actually how do some of business owners take on the
(13:21):
implementation?
Because it all sounds great.
Like I actually know as part of this event I went to with
MoGelda, I saw it a real life, I'm a curber,
the robots who is freakishly human like.
She was linking, looking at the, doing the side eye.
She was answering questions.
(13:42):
And even though that felt like a glimpse into the future,
AI is very much ready, not necessarily in robot form yet,
but ready in tools and platforms and products that we can use
as small business owners.
But where would you start, Angie?
If you were a small business owner and you didn't have any AI
(14:03):
integrated into your business, where would you start?
I think I would just start playing, right?
Like, honestly, which is what I did is, you know,
everybody was talking about chat GPT.
So I opened up a chat GPT account.
And I just started asking questions and just really started
(14:25):
to get used to, you know, the process of using chat GPT,
right?
So chat GPT is literally, you want to treat it like it's an
assistant of your own, like it's, like it's a person.
So you want to have a conversation with it.
And I really started using it to help me come up with like email
(14:48):
ideas, right?
So one way, one real easy, simple way to use it is to take copy
that's already on your website, like, you know,
you're about us page or a blog that you wrote or something
like that and paste it into chat GPT and say, hey, like, can
you come up with 10 email ideas from this blog poster, from this
(15:11):
webpage?
And that's really how I started using it in my own email
marketing, even for my clients, just to help me with idea
creation, you know?
So I think, and it was just very simple, you know, like, okay,
like just a very simple prompt and, you know, pasting and
then seeing what it came out with.
And I think just even starting with something very simple like
(15:33):
that to be like, you know, pasting a piece of copy and being like,
you know, telling it to, you know, help you in some way to take that
copy and do something with it is how I just first started using
it.
What about you?
I think that's a great shout out.
And G in terms of like starting really simple and, you know,
(15:55):
it can be very easy to get overwhelmed because you show like
everyone's using AI except you.
And actually chat to you see or copy AI, I use copy AI for idea
generation is essentially chat to beauty, but in that kind of
plugged into a different platform that allows you to do a little
bit more.
(16:15):
But essentially it allows you to not only look at subject
lines, but you can improve copy that you've already written.
You might want to maybe look at the update your tone of voice
or there's a lot you can do with these platforms.
And it's really important that you are open to AI and actually,
(16:38):
you know, do take some time to experiment because it might be
that AI can help you in other ways in your business.
For example, rather than on the copy side of your business,
it might be that it can save you time in analyzing data,
for example, I do use some, I do use help AI calls to help me just
(17:04):
understand data a bit more and it's anonymised of course.
So there are different ways AI can help you for ensuring that
you are careful about data quality and the data that comes back.
So ultimately you are the expert in what you do and whatever comes
back with, you know, in terms of the prompts you've given AI and
(17:26):
prompting is so important it comes to AI must must write the
right correct prompts.
Whatever you put in you get out.
So the better quality the prompts, the better the answer.
Yeah, and I so, oh God.
No, I was just going to say and with that, just know that
that comes with time too.
Like I think a lot of people put a lot of pressure on themselves to
(17:50):
come up with a good prompt, but even just like again, starting
that conversation as if this chat TPP window was your assistant
and you're trying to get super clear to your assistant,
like what would you, what would the steps and the direction that
you would literally give someone if you were to give them a task.
(18:11):
And typically when you are talking within assistant,
it's a conversation, right?
It's an ongoing thing and they ask questions or whatever.
So treat it as such that it is be curious as you are starting this
conversation or using chat TPP or whatever it is that you might not
get it on the first try, but the cool thing with AI is you can
(18:34):
continue to refine the output.
And you can even give it feedback.
Like that was close, but not not quite what I'm looking for.
I've even asked chat TPP if I wanted you to like create 10 pieces of
content for X, Y, C, what is the prompt that you would have me ask you
(18:56):
in order to get X output?
Like you can even get meta with it, you know, in that way.
And like ask AI like, what do you need to know in order to create X for me?
You know?
Yeah, that's really cool.
I think it's a really good analogy to see AI as a person or an
(19:17):
assistant to you in your business.
So you can go back and refine, refine, refine.
So if it comes back to something you don't like, well, you can say,
this isn't quite the right tone of voice, align the tone of voice to my
website and then put in your website, for example, like there's a lot,
you can train your tools to start really understanding your
(19:40):
business and actually help you.
And it takes time to do that and you have to get the quality of the
prompts right.
But when it comes to email marketing, I mean, there's things you can do to help
you come up with content ideas, subject lines, pre-headers.
There's so much you can use to help you with your email marketing
(20:03):
quickly around the more kind of creative side of the email.
But yes, some of the challenges you might encounter might be which
tool.
I mean, we've mentioned it quite a bit.
One I actually really like is that we haven't mentioned it as over-scripts,
where you basically upload and recording a video, YouTube, whatever it is.
(20:28):
And it's AI basically cuts the video into short clips in commuter
social media and it does that to three to a certain number of minutes.
So you get X number of minutes a month and then you upgrade pay.
That's really cool because it cuts it at the point in which this could be
a really good sound bite.
(20:49):
So I just want to might say, what about yourself?
Yeah, I use a cast magic a lot.
I use it to because at least with my clients, so I'm always using AI,
you know, phantom or that is also one that I use a lot is a phantom recorder on all
(21:10):
of my meetings with my clients because it gives me a transcript and it also gives
me a summary of like to do's and it automatically also sends that to my clients
after my meetings.
So I don't have to do any call wrap up or like any outreach afterwards.
Like they get all the directions from the actual AI.
(21:31):
And then I typically take that transcript and like a lot of my stuff, you know, I do a
lot of questions for my clients at least when I'm like creating strategies and, you know,
content creation and things like that.
And so I, in a sense, I interview my clients and a lot of times I'll take that interview,
that transcription interview and then I'll upload it into chat GPT and I'll be like,
(21:54):
okay, like tell me what are the main challenges of their customers?
Like what are their customers want?
What are their products, whatever.
And I get like a really good summary and overview of like the type of information I need
in order to create really good pieces of copy or email ideas and like things like that.
So what's really been clutch for me is any sort of AI that transcribes video in order to
(22:21):
create content or refine your content creation.
So with Cast Magic, I'll take like my clients YouTube videos or the reels that they're posting
online or any sort of like or podcast episodes.
I'll upload it.
It'll give me like a transcript and then I can also tell it to create content from these
(22:43):
videos that they've already posted.
So if you're a small business owner and you're putting out content on social media, AI can
absolutely like speed up that process of repurposing that content for you, which is really key.
Yeah, and you're kind of, it's almost like creating a bachelor's assistant through having
(23:05):
AI right because it's making it's helping you scale your business without having to hire
lots of new people.
I don't think you'll ever get rid of the human touch.
I do think that you need a human to oversee who's going to input the prompts, those kinds
of things.
And I do think you should retain an element of human in your tone of voice, otherwise we
(23:29):
all will start for some the same.
And that's one of the things I think it can be really obvious when someone sees AI for
their social media and it becomes really same.
Can we talk about that a little bit?
Yeah, of course.
Because I have clients that obviously, I'm like, okay, like, you know, we can have AI help
(23:50):
us with subject lines.
And we can have AI help us with this.
And then when they've sent an email, like, I can, I can spot an AI chat GPT subject line
from a mile away.
I'm like, it's honestly the output.
It's okay.
It's not the standards that I would want you to have for yourself in a subject line, you
(24:12):
know?
So I think it is really important not to go with what AI always outputs and to remember
like, okay, a good subject line, you want it to be like five to seven words.
You want it to be a hook.
You want it to be captivating.
And AI just, and you want it to have some sort of personality, right?
You're talking about brand voice, right?
(24:34):
AI does not, is the outputs right now are not giving you like those baseline things that
you need for subject lines, but it can give you a good idea of like how to create one,
right?
Yeah.
And I think that AI will catch up and I do feel eventually.
Yeah.
I've met a few people that are working on AI tools that completely get your tone of voice.
(24:56):
And I think we're in the early stage of that.
Yeah, but it's not there yet.
It's not there yet.
And I think for now, use AI as an assistant to your business, but don't replace, like,
don't completely outsort to AI.
You actually want to continue to have tone of voice that is uniquely used until AI becomes
(25:18):
super efficient at figuring that out.
So, yeah, one of the watch out for a mask is you should continue to use an embrace AI,
but continue to have a human element to your, your com through email or other social
for other channels.
The best, the best copywriting still comes from a human, like the best copywriting and pieces
(25:43):
of writing in general still come from your unique perspective and those stories that you have
inside of yourself that only your memory can retain and you telling that story is still
going to be way more special and connect way more with people than something an AI can
come up with.
So, just like keep that in mind that, yeah, it's good to help you with ideas, but actually
(26:08):
like doing the writing, like the magic still is inside of you, you know?
Yeah, 100%.
I think, you know, use it for inspiration, but when it comes, you know, like we get into
a lot of plagiarism and the thing that also, I think, is a watch out is don't put, like,
person data into your AI because, you know, that just personally I wouldn't do it because
(26:33):
that data is being shared with the AI gods and, you know, you want to kind of have some
to be around the data.
Anything you're kind of plugging in just make sure it isn't confidential or isn't, you
know, particularly if you're doing anything for your own business or for your clients, it
shouldn't be, yeah, confidential or kind of anything linked to a GDPR.
(26:58):
So, we do want you to be aware of that.
Just a touch on budget for any recommendation.
So, there might be this perception that AI is expensive and actually, you know, we've mentioned
a few talks here.
I mean, I don't know, class magic and is that free or is there like a question to that?
(27:20):
Which one, class magic?
Yeah.
No, that definitely costs, I think it's like 40 bucks a month.
I think it really depends on, you know, how you use AI, right?
So, I think it's okay to invest in some AI that really, really, really makes sense for you.
You know, and so the good thing about class magic is I think you can test it out for a month
(27:44):
for free and I think that's a lot, that's a lot with these AI tools.
They usually give you some sort of, you know, month free or whatever deal.
And I would definitely sign up for one that sounds like good to you, but really, you know, just
be cognizant of how much you actually use it and then go with the ones.
(28:05):
And then you can also, you know, you can also delete it or not, you know, not move forward
with it or whatever, take your account off.
So that's also an option.
But the thing I like about them is they usually are like $20 a month or something very accessible
that you can at least try and, you know, see, again, see if you actually do use it.
(28:26):
I mean, you know, like we said earlier, like, I think you saw about mindset and actually
being open to trying and experimenting with AI.
So really, I guess in summary, like, there are so many different ways AI can help for business,
but starting off slow and small, yeah, big, I don't get overwhelmed because there's a lot
(28:46):
out there.
And even if you just create a free chat to the account and play with it, start experimenting
with prompts.
But also taking a step back and thinking about your business and where the biggest kind
of time resources are, like, where, what is taking the most amount of time for you to be
within your marketing, what can help, what can AI help with?
(29:10):
I think we've discussed some of the key points today with email marketing, so subject
line and ideation, content, content ideas, coming up with suggestions on how to maybe look
at ways to, what social media are ideas.
There's lots of different ways that you can use AI.
And even just giving you a different perspective when your own copy is really helpful as well.
(29:37):
There's just so many opportunities.
And I think as a small business owner, we need to be careful not to be so stuck on our
day to day that we don't embrace the technology that is moving very, very quickly around us.
And I guess then, I'm looking at kind of the AI emerging trends for small businesses.
I do get, you know, going back to that, MoG out that point, do you agree with him that,
(29:59):
as we just think eventually, you'll be left behind if you're not embracing some form
of AI?
Do you agree?
Oh, absolutely, 100%.
Like, just the time that it can save for you as a small business owner is amazing, you
know?
And so the output of us as small business owners or small businesses is, you know, just
(30:22):
going to get more and more the more that we embrace AI, the more that we are able to
do, the more content we're able to make.
And so those businesses that are going to embrace AI are going to be able to, you know,
put out more content and send more emails and just kind of give themselves a leg up on
what they're able to accomplish.
So, you know, just for that, I think it's really important to embrace.
(30:46):
Yeah, absolutely.
I totally agree.
I feel like actually, you know, this week, and funny enough, I helped clients, sorry, last
week, I'm just flying by.
I helped a client interview to start building their team and this is an email marketing specialist
and this person had AI all over their CV.
(31:08):
So you can see now that AI is becoming almost a kind of unspoken requirement that you understand
AI.
And when we talk about understanding AI, you know, we're sick.
We, it is really just about understanding those prompts and helps us start helping.
Yeah.
It's really just, it's really just experimenting.
(31:30):
So, and over thinking it, just start trying and playing with it through chat to DC and some
of the tools we mentioned today.
Yeah.
But ultimately, it's a good thing for your business.
It can help you accelerate and do more with less.
Think of it as a way to potentially increase your reach, increase your effort without a huge
(31:55):
cost.
And there's definitely massive advantages to your business and, you know, we want you
to be saying ahead of the curve.
So, we encourage you to give it a go if you haven't already.
And if you're already using AI, I would love to hear, you know, your thoughts, how have
you used AI to help your email marketing efforts?
So, do get in touch with us.
(32:15):
Our details are in the show notes.
Anything else I'm doing?
You want to see to mention on AI before we wrap up?
I think, I think that's really it.
I would just love to hear how other businesses are using AI so that we can continue to help
each other, right?
Because the, the, the block of AI is just like, we don't know what we don't know, right?
(32:37):
So, we can only use AI to achieve whatever it is that we think it can achieve where it's
like, it is kind of limitless in this way.
So, if we can just like help each other out to be like, oh, I use this program, or I use
this way, and I use it this way, that's going to help you grow and figure out what
you're about, how to use it best for your business.
Yeah, absolutely.
The potential is huge, and I think even if you've done nothing so far, don't feel behind.
(33:04):
It's very easy to get started.
And for those of you who are ready using AI, like I said, we'd love to hear out of it
and on.
Well, thank you so much for listening to today's episode.
We look forward to seeing you again soon.
Thank you.
Bye.
[Music]
(33:24):
You've just listened to females across the pond and beyond podcast with your hosts, Clara
and Angie.
If you like our content, don't forget to subscribe, rate and review us on the platform of your
choice.
Is there something you want to hear about for our next episode?
Email us at females across the pond at gmail.com to let us know.
(33:45):
Until next time.
[Music]
[MUSIC]
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