April 23, 2025 • 27 mins
What's the real difference between entrepreneurs who struggle and those who thrive? Jim Weldon, a dynamic entrepreneur who has co-founded six companies and built sales teams generating hundreds of millions in revenue, breaks it down with refreshing honesty on this episode of Ready Set Collaborate.
Weldon introduces us to the concept of "professional entrepreneurship" – a sustainable approach that ensures founders get paid throughout their journey rather than sacrificing everything for a potential future payoff. With over 25 years of experience across multiple industries, he dismantles the glamorized myth of the struggling entrepreneur and offers a practical alternative that prioritizes customer-driven revenue over venture capital funding.
The conversation takes a fascinating turn when Jim reveals his "leverage business development" approach that helped scale a business from nothing to $60 million in just 36 months without outside capital. Through asking three critical questions about customer access, his team discovered a powerful growth model that outperformed traditional partner programs. Whether you're bootstrapping a startup or scaling an established business, his insights on identifying the right market and value proposition will reshape how you think about growth.
Perhaps most valuable is Weldon's perspective on AI implementation for today's businesses. Far from theoretical, he shares his company's journey from viewing AI as a novelty to integrating it as a core function that dramatically increases efficiency. His practical advice on testing tools and creating your own AI resource library provides an actionable roadmap for entrepreneurs looking to leverage this technology without getting lost in the hype.
Subscribe, share, and join us for more conversations that spark meaningful collaboration and drive real business growth on Ready Set Collaborate with Wanda Pearson.
Connect with Jim Weldon on links below:
Linkedln: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jimweldon/
email: vinny@prospectdesk.ai
website: https://www.prospectdesk.ai/
Stay tuned for the next episode of Ready Set Collaborate with Wanda Pearson. Subscribe - Follow and Like Ready Set Collaborate with Wanda Pearson
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:08):
Welcome to Ready Set.
Collaborate with Wanda Pearson.
This is where ideas spark,connections grow and
collaborations fuse success.
Tune in for inspiring stories,expert insights and
game-changing conversations.
Let's build, connect and thrivetogether.
Remember collaboration is thekey to success.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
Welcome, welcome, welcome to the Ready Set
Collaborate podcast with WandaPearson.
I just want to say my guest,jim Felden Weldon.
I don't know where did I getFelden from, you know.
Speaker 3 (00:43):
I'm going to go with whatever you say, wanda, I am
not going to argue.
Speaker 2 (00:49):
Welcome to the Ready Set Collaborate, the podcast
where connection meets impact.
I'm your host, wanda Pearson.
I'm thrilled to introduce ourguest, jim Weldon, a dynamic,
professional entrepreneur whoknows what it takes to build,
grow and lead with purpose.
Jim brings a wealth ofexperience and a passion for
helping others succeed Well, andtoday he's going to drop a few
(01:12):
serious gems on us oncollaboration, leadership and
the entrepreneur journey.
You're in for a treat, so let'sget started.
So let me tell you a little bitabout Jim on his bio here.
Jim is a professionalentrepreneur who has co-founded
six companies and built salesteams that have generated
hundreds of millions in revenue.
With over 25 years ofexperience in data ecosystems,
(01:36):
business intelligence,e-commerce and entertainment, he
has served on the board ofdirectors for over a dozen
companies.
Wow, I'm here with a star here,an entrepreneur star.
Speaker 3 (01:48):
Yeah, I'm going to have you every time I go down
the street.
I'm going to have you in frontof me with the megaphone and be
my PR person, so thank you.
Wanda.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
Absolutely.
But no, welcome to the podcast.
I appreciate it so glad to behere.
Jim say hi to the audience andwe're going to get into some
interview questions.
Speaker 3 (02:04):
Hello everybody out there, Hopefully.
She said we dropped some gems,so the bar is set.
Let's see if we can meet it.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
Okay, absolutely, absolutely.
So.
Listen, I know we talked aboutthe serial versus professional
entrepreneur, and tell me alittle bit about that.
How do you become a serial?
Speaker 3 (02:20):
or professional entrepreneur.
It was about 10 or 15 years ago.
A friend of mine said hey,you're a professional
entrepreneur.
I'm like what's the differencebetween a professional
entrepreneur and a serial?
So he went on to explain aserial entrepreneur, which is
what I thought I was.
They start a bunch of companies.
They don't make a lot of moneyduring the path and maybe they
stumble over a winner.
And I said, yeah, that's aboutright, that's how I recognize it
(02:44):
.
I go.
Why do you think I'm aprofessional entrepreneur?
He goes.
Well, here's the difference.
A professional entrepreneurmakes money and gets paid the
whole time.
They may not have exited andrealized the enterprise value
from the stock, but they sellenough and have a path to cash
so it can actually afford theirlifestyle and not have to go
broke and go buried on theircredit cards.
They don't have to go borrowfrom family.
(03:05):
They can live in their own home.
We know a lot of entrepreneursthat are couch surfing into
their thirties, which ishorrible.
That's not a badge of honor,that just means you haven't
figured out the right place togo.
So to me, a professionalentrepreneur, bottom line is you
get paid the whole journey andthen maybe there's a pot of gold
at the end.
So that's the difference.
Anybody can start stuff.
Getting paid is a trick.
(03:26):
I felt kind of honored to betagged in that category.
Speaker 2 (03:30):
Listen, I would love to be tagged in that category
too.
Speaker 3 (03:34):
You had a hell of a career, so go easy on yourself.
Speaker 2 (03:37):
I did, I did, but I'm trying to be like Oprah.
Speaker 3 (03:40):
Well, I can make that money now Like we said earlier,
we're both trying to be Oprah,which is weird, but she's that
good.
Well, it's helping others.
That's what she's about.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
So there's the bottom line Exactly, and that's what
I'm about and that's why Istarted this podcast to really
kind of educate and empowerpeople to know the different
guests that I have on, such asyourself, that can share their
knowledge, their education, theeducation to educate us as well.
So which approach serialprofessional do you believe is
(04:08):
better suited to today's fastevolving tech landscape, and why
?
Speaker 3 (04:11):
Great question.
You know I haven't reallythought about it, but let me
just react to it on the fly here.
I would say it's the sameapproach I take when I look at
the internet.
Everybody says the internet'sthis new fangled thing.
All it really was was a quickerway to waste your money.
So if you think about it, inthe old days, if you and I
wanted to start a business, we'deither have to get a storefront
or we'd have to get a directmail piece.
(04:32):
We mail it out, we get a phoneset up, we take calls.
There's no internet.
The internet allows you and meto go nuts.
Put a credit card down onGoogle AdWords and we could
excuse my term here piss away$10,000 in a week, and Google Ad
would not have anythingaccomplished.
All the internet did was speedit up.
So the fundamentals are thesame.
You got to go after the rightmarket with the right product,
(04:53):
with the right offer and on theright terms.
So let's talk about serialentrepreneur versus professional
.
Yes, you could go and usecursor and some of these AI
tools to rapidly develop anapplication and throw it out
there.
Okay, one approach.
Or go do your darn homework andit doesn't have to be a long
time using these same tools andcould you get paid for what you
(05:16):
know in that space?
And this is one of my biggestthings If I'm not trusted enough
to earn a check and you knowthis very well from IBM Day's
professional services IBM gotpaid a lot of money for their
expertise, more than just theirhardware.
I think it's the same way whensomebody builds in this new AI
tech data world.
(05:37):
If you're savvy enough to buildthe app, you're also savvy
enough to consult people on howto potentially approach building
it, doing it for themselves.
So I think it's the same thing.
You should be a professionalapp company builder today,
because the only sustainable wayto build your company is
through sales and people need tostop getting off this.
I'm going to go raise money.
(05:57):
I got a connection.
I'm going to get money from myfamily.
I'm going to get money from mybank account.
I'm going to get money from VCs?
No, go get money from acustomer who's willing to pay
you, and I don't care if it's anAI app or not.
That should be the tenant.
So I think we answered our ownquestion.
Is it's professionalentrepreneur?
Stay the course, pack the cash.
Speaker 2 (06:16):
Absolutely, Absolutely.
I like that, I like that.
So now, and we talked about andlet's get into the next thing
about how you fund the companywithout leveraging a VC Now what
does VC mean?
Speaker 3 (06:26):
Venture capitalists.
So we hear a lot about thesecompanies in Silicon Valley.
I think roughly 40% of all theventure early stage startup
money is still in Silicon Valley, northern California, and
that's pretty spectacular whenyou think about how big the US
is.
Right, we're 335 million peopleand let's say, 8 million, and
they're in the Bay Area Well,it's really Menlo Park.
(06:48):
That's where all the venture,most of the venture firms are,
and what I found was if theytake a hundred business plans,
they might fund one.
Well geez, you're 99 times morelikely to get turned down and
fail.
So why would that be yourprimary strategy for raising
capital?
It should be.
Can I get somebody to pay mefor what I know?
(07:08):
Then can I borrow a productfrom somebody?
White label it.
Can I take that to market untilI can build my own?
And we use customer drivensales to fund our development.
That's what we've always done.
Speaker 2 (07:19):
That's awesome.
That's awesome so yeah, becauseI remember my husband was in
his own business for 25 yearsprinting, and it was hard, when
you got a storefront, to try tokeep that business going and
trying to get those bigcustomers right, yeah, to be
able to keep the business going.
So it it really is hard andnowadays, today, it's even, it's
(07:40):
even harder.
Speaker 3 (07:40):
I guarantee you, if one of the things we talk to
your husband about is, Iguarantee you he's a hustler.
It's even harder, I guaranteeyou.
If one of the things we talkedto your husband about is, I
guarantee you he's a hustler.
One of the things I've found ispeople that have retail and I
would consider it a storefrontprinting retail.
At the end of the day, he's gotto be able to shake hands.
People got to be able to trusthim and he's got to hustle.
He just can't stand there andwait for them to come.
He's got to network.
He got to send direct mailpieces.
(08:01):
He needs to ask me or you orsomebody else.
Hey, do you know anybody wholooks to print posters, banners,
direct mail?
You just can't say, oh, I'lljust, I'll run an advertisement
in the newspaper, I'll run adisplay ad online and hope they
come.
That's not how it works.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
Yeah, and that's what we do in our business now the
Legal Shield business.
You got to get out there.
So I'm considered, like yousaid, I'm the networking queen
because I get out there andnetwork.
And I joined actually when Ileft corporate.
I joined BNI, which is BusinessNetwork International.
They taught me how to networkand you got to network with
people that you know, like andtrust.
So that's that relationshipthat you build with that client.
Speaker 3 (08:38):
Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (08:39):
To be able to trust and also to give referrals.
Yeah, so you know, absolutely.
Yeah, it really is veryimportant to be able to do that.
So how do you balance growthexpectations when you bootstrap
or rely on a customer revenueversus taking on venture capital
?
Speaker 3 (08:55):
What's the first part of the question?
How do I balance?
Speaker 2 (08:57):
Yeah, how do you balance growth expectations,
like when you're in a, whenyou're oh?
Speaker 3 (09:00):
shoot, you have none.
When you're bootstrappingYou're just trying to survive.
And then, when you get venture,you make up numbers and then
you hope you hit them.
I swear to God, that's aboutthe amount of scientific
application.
The other thing too is I seecompanies when they raise
venture, they staff too quicklyand they're more worried about
getting the right people in theright roles, even though they
don't have revenue to supportthem.
(09:21):
So they incur something calleda burn rate, which is, if I
raised a million and I'm burninga hundred thousand a month,
negative that means I got 10months of runway.
Well, jesus, that's nuts Versus.
If it's your cash and you'retrying to bounce on a bootstrap,
it's just you.
You don't burn cash, you'rejust trying to pay your bills
and hopefully you break evenuntil you get a little bit of
(09:43):
excess and maybe you hiresomebody part-time as a
contractor.
Then, if it gets really good,maybe I bring them out full-time
or another outside firm to dothe job six hours a week instead
of 40.
So the difference in thebalance is, if you want to stay
sane, stay married, stayfinancially whole in
bootstrapping, don't set anyexpectations.
(10:04):
Just keep ranking the problemyou're solving in the market.
And if the customer keepspaying you, you're on the right
track.
Venture I hate to tell everybody, but it's a game of BS.
You make up these numbers, theboard goes yep, that sounds
fantastic, go get them, and thenyou miss them.
You miss them, then you firethat VP of sales because it's
not your fault as the founder.
You get to fire on average twoVPs of sales and they look at
(10:25):
starting to want to fire you asthe CEO, just so you know.
So the balance there is none.
Survival is bootstrap and makespin the wheel.
Guessing is venture.
Speaker 2 (10:37):
Yeah, and that makes sense that I tell you because
you're trying to make up thosenumbers with your venture
capital.
I mean, like you know, hisbusiness trying to get a loan
from a bank.
Yeah, that's another, that'seven a harder.
Speaker 3 (10:49):
that's a whole other path to go down.
For sure, because now they'relooking at the predictability of
the cash flows, the size of thecustomers, his bad debt.
They're looking at theiroperating costs, their net
income, and if the numbers don'tline up, the bank will not lend
.
Speaker 2 (11:03):
Absolutely, absolutely.
What's the biggest myth aboutgrowth that gets exposed the
moment a founder starts sellingdirectly.
Speaker 3 (11:11):
That's the biggest myth.
It's going to be easy to getcustomers.
This thing's so good, ourproduct, they're going to be
running at us.
I always tell people, if youwant to figure out if you're any
good stand still, is anybodychasing you?
Is anybody knocking on yourdoor?
Are you getting the message tothe right markets?
So the biggest myth is and thisis especially with
technologists that build theseearly stage startups in the
(11:32):
Valley is they look at it fromthe feature perspective.
This thing's so great, I don'treally need a salespeople.
They're overpaid anyways andyou and I both know from IBM.
If it's a corporate, complexsale, my gosh, you need a team.
If you're middle markets,you're going to need at least a
couple of people.
And if it's direct to consumer,you better have a website that
converts and that's expensive,even if you go to Shopify and
(11:54):
buy a template, the way it's setup, the call to action.
So the biggest myth, I think,is if I build something great,
they will come.
The field of dream strategy ifthey build it, they will come.
No, that's BS.
It takes hard work and tweakingand listening, tweaking,
listening, and if you don't havethe grit and, by the way, the
(12:18):
temperament to take that kind ofreally heavy, negative feedback
.
People perceive it as I do.
The old Tom Watson piece on this, which is you know it's.
What is it?
Oh, sorry, edison, you know hefound 10,000 ways that the light
bulb didn't work and then hefound the one way it did.
Same thing in business.
Hopefully you don't have to getto 10,000 experiments.
Maybe you can get to a hundredor 150, 200, but I'll tell you
(12:39):
it's a number, it's not five.
I'm amazed how many people giveup.
We tried everything.
Man, bullshit, excuse me, it'slike nah, you tried five.
Get back to me at 150, 200,then we can talk.
So that's the biggest myth Iwould say is end of the day.
Speaker 2 (12:54):
Yeah, and that's good .
Actually, you said ThomasWatson, that is an IBM company.
Speaker 3 (12:57):
That was the IBM founder.
That made me think about it.
I was like hold it, it's.
Speaker 2 (13:02):
Edison.
So, after building multiplebusinesses, what's your goal to
sales motion that consistentlydrives long-term revenue?
Speaker 3 (13:13):
You know, what's funny is our first company,
brothers and I hit on somethingbut we didn't know it, we didn't
understand the power of what wehad learned and it's answering
three questions.
And we it was interesting wherewe had this three-day tax
business in the hispaniccommunity because that's where
three irish white guys are goingto do fantastic.
As you go to hispanic communityand low-income areas of east la
(13:34):
south, centro, central, sanJacinto, at the border, ventura,
we're the only white things inthose neighborhoods besides the
lines on the street.
Here's why it worked we'reIrish Catholic.
A lot of the people we dealtwith were Catholic because
they're family people.
And here's the other thing welearned they all are just trying
to make a buck and take care oftheir family.
So there was a lot ofcamaraderie and the things we
(14:01):
learned building that businessfrom nothing to 60 mil in 36
months.
But no outside capital is.
We had my brother had boughtthis green little diary book
journal at Staples and we weresitting down and on the
left-hand side we said, hey,what are all the things we're
going to keep doing?
On the right side we're likewhat are the things we're going
to stop doing?
And we did that every month wewere in business and all of a
sudden we started.
These three questions came outfor leverage, which was one who
(14:23):
has our customer?
Well, it wasn't enrolled agents, it wasn't CPAs, because we
were in the tax refund business.
That's where we thought theywere Cause we're like well, if
you want to get an average ordervalue up, you got to go with
clients that are low-incomeclients and tax preparers.
So who has our client?
Tax preparers, will they giveus access to their clients?
Right, because they trust us.
(14:45):
We didn't know.
And the last thing was is byhow they gave access?
Did they give an impliedendorsement?
So what we were able to do is,when we answered those three
questions, we're like holysmokes and people go that sounds
like a reseller program.
And what we found was, when youdo a reseller program you know
this better than anybody at IBMit's a program you have to have.
(15:06):
Here's my FAQs.
Here's the program overview.
Here's the sandbox.
Here's the market developmentfunds.
Here's your program manager.
Here's your partner manager.
Here's your free samples.
Holy, if you're IBM, you'remaking 30 or 40 promises before
the reseller even makes oneprospecting.
Here's what we told them to thetax offices hey, listen, wanda,
if you go ahead and offer thisto all your clients.
(15:29):
We guarantee you could doubleyour profit in your business.
They're like what, yeah, if 10%attach because there's no extra
fees, you could double yourprofit.
And we showed them on a pieceof paper and they're like holy
crap.
Well, what we found out was is80% of the clients wanted it and
they were able to 8X their netprofit in their business without
adding a customer.
So what helped us in this wholeprocess?
(15:50):
Long-winded answer is welearned leverage in our
situation.
That was the thing that made usso successful on that.
That's good, yeah, and leveragemakes a big difference, because
we didn't have any money, so youhad to invent a capability to
extend your reach and leveragebusiness.
We call it LBD, leveragebusiness development.
It's not a partner program,it's.
(16:12):
You know how do you dosomething so simple?
It allows you to go ahead andabsolutely ramp your growth and
go to market strategy yeah,which, by the way, was your
question.
That was a long arc, I'm sorry.
Speaker 2 (16:21):
No, and then you explained it a lot better here.
So let me ask you so what's themoment in your career where you
realized the business youthought you were building wasn't
business?
You were actually in?
Speaker 3 (16:32):
Every single one about anywhere from three months
to a year in.
They're called a pivot in thebusiness world where we come
from in the tech side, and thejoke is you usually don't
survive the second pivot as afounder.
So one of the things we did,out of the first six companies
we had two of them we raisedwhat they call institutional
venture money for and you gettwo pivots and then you get hit,
(16:55):
eject, they move you aside andquote bring in the real CEO,
this last business we had built.
We pivoted three times in twoyears, intentionally because we
got better feedback, the marketwas better, we could see the
path and we survived it becausewe were the investors, it was
our capital.
So we didn't as the four of us,we didn't have to answer to an
(17:16):
outside firm.
But yeah, when do I realize it?
Here's what I realized when Istart is not where I'm going to
wind up.
That is the rule of thumb forthe last 20 years and I've never
been disappointed.
We always think we have itfigured out right up until we
don't.
As Mike Tyson said, everybodyhas a plan until they get
punched in the face, and that'stech.
You all have a plan until we go, try to sell and then we're
like, oh, that's not going towork.
(17:39):
So, I'm doing it right now withthe company we built.
We've just pivoted it for thesecond time in two years and I'm
glad we did.
We rebuilt our platform threetimes, which is insane to do,
but we hit on the right techstack approach.
Now we're like oh man, we gotsomething now, but we took our
time.
We didn't have any, we had asmall team and we didn't have
unreasonable expectations.
You have to get to five or 10million sales and we're like
(18:03):
let's keep talking with ourpartners, let's listen, and
that's what we did.
Speaker 2 (18:07):
And it really makes it this when you listen, and
also trial and error.
So you try it, you pivot, youget it right and then you try it
and you see what works here.
So how do entrepreneurs getbetter at recognizing their true
value for their firm beforemarket?
Teaches them the hard way, likeconsult get paid before
building a product.
Speaker 3 (18:27):
Hopefully I can remember the three buckets
entrepreneurs come in.
So are you the person that'sgoing to bring the dollars?
As you and I know, Wanda,there's people in our lives that
, no matter what they do, theycan raise money.
Then there's other people youand I know that can bring deals
in.
They're not.
They don't know investors, theydon't shine well in front of.
Because people assume becauseyou and I can close a customer,
(18:50):
we can close money.
Those are two different things.
So in a founding team, somebodyhas to be able to handle the
dollars raising money, Somebodyhas to handle the deals.
And then in my world, becauseit's technology, it's
development, do we have thecapability of somebody to
develop?
So if I look at the mix of andgo back to your original
(19:10):
question, just so I answer itcorrectly, I'm sorry.
Speaker 2 (19:13):
How did you get better at recognizing their true
value?
Prop.
Speaker 3 (19:16):
Oh, so real quickly know what bucket you're in as an
entrepreneur.
So are you doing dollars, dealsor development right?
So, especially in the techworld?
And then the goal isrecognizing.
So go back to the value of thequestion.
I just wanna make sure I get itright.
Speaker 2 (19:31):
A value prop for their firm before market.
Teaches them the hard way,right, right?
I just want to make sure I getit right.
Speaker 3 (19:34):
A value prop for their firm before market teaches
them the hard way, right.
So if you don't know whatbucket you're in, it's going to
be really hard to understand howyou present yourself to the
market.
So if you're the person raisingmoney and you're trying to go
out there and talk to people onthe development side, that's
ridiculous.
If you're in development andyou're not listening to the
customers, with the salespeople,it's going to be super hard to
understand how to get, how to besuccessful and get the market
(19:56):
to respond.
So what I found was is there isno one way or path is I guess
the net of it it's understandingyour perspective and how you
interact with the market.
I would say that's probably theone of the best approach I
would do yeah, that and thatmakes sense here.
Speaker 2 (20:11):
we're winding down here because I mean, listen,
we've got so many questions Iwant to ask you here I got a few
minutes, so whatever you want.
Yeah, so how should early stagefounders think about
incorporating LLMs or AI?
Because AI is now taking over alot now.
So how do they incorporate thatinto their business?
Speaker 3 (20:29):
I can share our experience on how we did it.
So we're like everybody elsegoing, oh, this is going to be
awesome.
We didn't even know what thehell it was.
We were caught up in the hype,right.
So then you start, you get yourfree chat GPT account and you
put in a question.
You're like, oh, that'sinteresting.
Then, when we started doing, westarted going, okay, so it's a
really good answer questionanswer machine, an LLM.
And then we said, hey, can weget better at the prompting
(20:52):
piece?
Or like, oh, if you're a greatprompt engineer approach, it's
going to be helpful.
Then we started going, hey, wereally don't know what the heck
all this is.
So then we started listening topodcasts like yourself and
listen.
By the way, instagram has someunbelievable resources online of
people that have reallydissected the meta models for
this.
(21:12):
So first thing is, I'd say it'sa force multiplier.
If you're not using LLMs andthen LAMs, large action models,
and then educating yourself onwhere this could go, you're
going to hire too many people.
You're going to miss out on thespeed with which you can get
answers.
Content.
Up a funnel prospects.
(21:33):
Build SDR sales development repcontent.
Apple funnel prospects.
Build SDR sales development rep, agentic AI models.
We're doing all that stuff.
So it started slow.
We were just kind of you know,hey, kind of cool, so we went
from novelty to how do we usethis every day, to how do we
make this core to our business,and then we don't have to hire
(21:53):
those roles.
So I'll give you one example.
We looked at about I don't knowseven or eight different web
development tools that are AIbased in this LAM and or LOM and
LAM space, and what we foundwas Cursor is incredible.
It gets us 85% of the way there, and then we spend the next
week or two fixing the last 15.
Well, normally that projectwould have taken us three months
(22:14):
, two weeks.
So the speed is back to yourpoint.
How would I incorporate it?
Put away the time every day, anhour and a half, build a little
Google sheet, put the tabs on.
Does this help me with content?
Does this help me with images?
Does this help me with displayads?
Does this help me with my SDRtop of funnel?
We do that.
So just use a Google sheet andwe put the URLs with the
(22:35):
description in, and then whathappens is, after a month, you
probably accumulate 50, 60, 70links that you've personally
have experienced.
Then you start going hey,here's the five that really
helped.
So that's how we did it andit's been fantastic.
I mean the stuff we crank out.
Here we go Simple, one jobdescription.
Remember what a pain it waswhen you had a new hire at IBM?
(22:56):
Yeah, you'd have to give HRyour job description.
They'd have to approve it, thenit would go to legal, then
you'd go to the compensationpeople and then you'd run a
newspaper ad.
Well, now you can run Indeed oryou know one of the job boards.
Well, right now it takes meabout two minutes to write a
world-class job descriptionthrough ChatGPT.
Here's another one we weredoing.
(23:17):
Hey, here's our currentdifferent ads and our website.
What can we do to make morecompelling display ads?
It rewrites our ads, gives us10 versions.
We test them.
They're better than everythingwe did.
So it evolves, is the question.
Here's what it is not.
It's not a silver bullet One.
There is no one magic platform.
It's a compilation of tools.
(23:38):
So get ready to use five or 10.
And it has to be something thatyou enjoy, because it's going
to take some time to learn.
Speaker 2 (23:47):
And that makes sense there.
Speaker 3 (23:50):
So now, what is the name of your company?
Again, jim Prospect, so likeyou're prospecting
prospectdeskai.
Speaker 2 (23:56):
Okay, okay, good, good, good, definitely.
So, yeah, that.
And I love what you just saidbecause, yeah, I've been taking
some.
Well, actually, we had aspeaker on AI and how it helped,
and when she put stuff in, Isaid, oh my God, wow, as long as
we'd be thinking about stuff,and I said, here it perfects it.
I mean, you put what you wantto say in there and then it
perfects it for you, which iswhat I love about that system
(24:17):
here.
So, yeah, that's, it's takingover the world.
So I've never heard a LAM andyou just explained the language
action models.
Speaker 3 (24:24):
Large action.
So there's large language,Large action, Large action
models.
So think of them like, if youknow, Zapier, that tool that
allows you to move data from onesystem to another.
They call them ZAPs In the oldworlds when you and I were doing
ETL, which is, you know,extract, transfer, load.
A large action model tiestogether multiple AI tools so
(24:44):
they can work in concert.
That's what a large actionmodel is.
Speaker 2 (24:48):
Yeah, and I was looking at the next inflection
point of SAAS.
I remember IBM had that and weused to have it in our thing and
I said what is SAAS?
So spread it a little bit to meabout what SAAS.
I still never understood whatthat was.
Speaker 3 (25:05):
You know, SAS is just cloud-based application.
That's all it is.
Speaker 2 (25:08):
Yep, Now I recall what it was.
Yeah, I said yeah, it wascloud-based.
Speaker 3 (25:11):
Everybody just laughs now because, remember, that was
a term we all didn't know.
And Salesforce set the tone foreverybody.
It became the largest SaaSsoftware company in the world.
They sure did.
Speaker 2 (25:20):
They sure did.
Yeah, and I remember it allwould be because I was actually
helping the marketing rep with alot of stuff.
And then we had ELA's, thesoftware for big companies that
ran their computers and stuff.
I've been into all of that.
I never knew what it meant.
So listen, jim, tell people howthey can get in touch with you
(25:40):
so we can know more about whatyou do.
Speaker 3 (25:43):
Absolutely Go to our website, wwwprospectdeskai, or
you can go jim at prospectdeskaiand just reach out to me
directly, since anybody who's onyour podcast and wants some
insights or clarity on what wespoke about, I'm glad to email
them back.
Speaker 2 (25:59):
Oh, absolutely Absolutely so.
Wow, what an inspiringconversation with you, jim.
Jim's journey as a professionalentrepreneur reminds us of the
power of perseverance, visionand working together to create
impact.
I hope you've been leaving thisepisode with new ideas that Jim
has shared and fresh motivation.
(26:19):
Don't forget to follow, shareand leave a review, and stay
tuned for more stories thatspark collaboration and growth
Until next time.
This is Wanda Pearson signingoff with Ready Set Collaborate
where we connect, grow andthrive together.
Thanks again, jim, for being onmy podcast and make sure you
also subscribe.
It's going to be on YouTube aswell, so you can see Absolutely,
(26:40):
we're excited for it.
Speaker 3 (26:41):
Wanda, thanks for having me on here.
Speaker 2 (26:42):
Excited for it.
Wanda, thanks for having me onhere I really appreciate it,
thank you.
Speaker 3 (26:45):
Thank you, jim, have a great day.
Speaker 1 (26:46):
You too, thank you.
That wraps up another episodeof Ready Set.
Collaborate with Wanda Pearson.
I hope you found inspirationand valuable insights to help
you build meaningful connectionsand successful collaborations.
If you enjoyed today'sconversation, be sure to
subscribe, share and stay tunedfor more great discussions.
Until next time, keepcollaborating and making an
(27:08):
impact.
Welcome to Ready Set.
Collaborate with Wanda Pearson.
This is where ideas spark,connections grow and
collaborations fuse success.
Tune in for inspiring stories,expert insights and
game-changing conversations.
Let's build, connect and thrivetogether.
Remember collaboration is thekey to success.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
Welcome, welcome, welcome to the Ready Set
Collaborate podcast with WandaPearson.
I just want to say my guest,jim Felden Weldon.
I don't know where did I getFelden from, you know.
Speaker 3 (00:43):
I'm going to go with whatever you say, wanda, I am
not going to argue.
Speaker 2 (00:49):
Welcome to the Ready Set Collaborate, the podcast
where connection meets impact.
I'm your host, wanda Pearson.
I'm thrilled to introduce ourguest, jim Weldon, a dynamic,
professional entrepreneur whoknows what it takes to build,
grow and lead with purpose.
Jim brings a wealth ofexperience and a passion for
helping others succeed Well, andtoday he's going to drop a few
(01:12):
serious gems on us oncollaboration, leadership and
the entrepreneur journey.
You're in for a treat, so let'sget started.
So let me tell you a little bitabout Jim on his bio here.
Jim is a professionalentrepreneur who has co-founded
six companies and built salesteams that have generated
hundreds of millions in revenue.
With over 25 years ofexperience in data ecosystems,
(01:36):
business intelligence,e-commerce and entertainment, he
has served on the board ofdirectors for over a dozen
companies.
Wow, I'm here with a star here,an entrepreneur star.
Speaker 3 (01:48):
Yeah, I'm going to have you every time I go down
the street.
I'm going to have you in frontof me with the megaphone and be
my PR person, so thank you.
Wanda.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
Absolutely.
But no, welcome to the podcast.
I appreciate it so glad to behere.
Jim say hi to the audience andwe're going to get into some
interview questions.
Speaker 3 (02:04):
Hello everybody out there, Hopefully.
She said we dropped some gems,so the bar is set.
Let's see if we can meet it.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
Okay, absolutely, absolutely.
So.
Listen, I know we talked aboutthe serial versus professional
entrepreneur, and tell me alittle bit about that.
How do you become a serial?
Speaker 3 (02:20):
or professional entrepreneur.
It was about 10 or 15 years ago.
A friend of mine said hey,you're a professional
entrepreneur.
I'm like what's the differencebetween a professional
entrepreneur and a serial?
So he went on to explain aserial entrepreneur, which is
what I thought I was.
They start a bunch of companies.
They don't make a lot of moneyduring the path and maybe they
stumble over a winner.
And I said, yeah, that's aboutright, that's how I recognize it
(02:44):
.
I go.
Why do you think I'm aprofessional entrepreneur?
He goes.
Well, here's the difference.
A professional entrepreneurmakes money and gets paid the
whole time.
They may not have exited andrealized the enterprise value
from the stock, but they sellenough and have a path to cash
so it can actually afford theirlifestyle and not have to go
broke and go buried on theircredit cards.
They don't have to go borrowfrom family.
(03:05):
They can live in their own home.
We know a lot of entrepreneursthat are couch surfing into
their thirties, which ishorrible.
That's not a badge of honor,that just means you haven't
figured out the right place togo.
So to me, a professionalentrepreneur, bottom line is you
get paid the whole journey andthen maybe there's a pot of gold
at the end.
So that's the difference.
Anybody can start stuff.
Getting paid is a trick.
(03:26):
I felt kind of honored to betagged in that category.
Speaker 2 (03:30):
Listen, I would love to be tagged in that category
too.
Speaker 3 (03:34):
You had a hell of a career, so go easy on yourself.
Speaker 2 (03:37):
I did, I did, but I'm trying to be like Oprah.
Speaker 3 (03:40):
Well, I can make that money now Like we said earlier,
we're both trying to be Oprah,which is weird, but she's that
good.
Well, it's helping others.
That's what she's about.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
So there's the bottom line Exactly, and that's what
I'm about and that's why Istarted this podcast to really
kind of educate and empowerpeople to know the different
guests that I have on, such asyourself, that can share their
knowledge, their education, theeducation to educate us as well.
So which approach serialprofessional do you believe is
(04:08):
better suited to today's fastevolving tech landscape, and why
?
Speaker 3 (04:11):
Great question.
You know I haven't reallythought about it, but let me
just react to it on the fly here.
I would say it's the sameapproach I take when I look at
the internet.
Everybody says the internet'sthis new fangled thing.
All it really was was a quickerway to waste your money.
So if you think about it, inthe old days, if you and I
wanted to start a business, we'deither have to get a storefront
or we'd have to get a directmail piece.
(04:32):
We mail it out, we get a phoneset up, we take calls.
There's no internet.
The internet allows you and meto go nuts.
Put a credit card down onGoogle AdWords and we could
excuse my term here piss away$10,000 in a week, and Google Ad
would not have anythingaccomplished.
All the internet did was speedit up.
So the fundamentals are thesame.
You got to go after the rightmarket with the right product,
(04:53):
with the right offer and on theright terms.
So let's talk about serialentrepreneur versus professional
.
Yes, you could go and usecursor and some of these AI
tools to rapidly develop anapplication and throw it out
there.
Okay, one approach.
Or go do your darn homework andit doesn't have to be a long
time using these same tools andcould you get paid for what you
(05:16):
know in that space?
And this is one of my biggestthings If I'm not trusted enough
to earn a check and you knowthis very well from IBM Day's
professional services IBM gotpaid a lot of money for their
expertise, more than just theirhardware.
I think it's the same way whensomebody builds in this new AI
tech data world.
(05:37):
If you're savvy enough to buildthe app, you're also savvy
enough to consult people on howto potentially approach building
it, doing it for themselves.
So I think it's the same thing.
You should be a professionalapp company builder today,
because the only sustainable wayto build your company is
through sales and people need tostop getting off this.
I'm going to go raise money.
(05:57):
I got a connection.
I'm going to get money from myfamily.
I'm going to get money from mybank account.
I'm going to get money from VCs?
No, go get money from acustomer who's willing to pay
you, and I don't care if it's anAI app or not.
That should be the tenant.
So I think we answered our ownquestion.
Is it's professionalentrepreneur?
Stay the course, pack the cash.
Speaker 2 (06:16):
Absolutely, Absolutely.
I like that, I like that.
So now, and we talked about andlet's get into the next thing
about how you fund the companywithout leveraging a VC Now what
does VC mean?
Speaker 3 (06:26):
Venture capitalists.
So we hear a lot about thesecompanies in Silicon Valley.
I think roughly 40% of all theventure early stage startup
money is still in Silicon Valley, northern California, and
that's pretty spectacular whenyou think about how big the US
is.
Right, we're 335 million peopleand let's say, 8 million, and
they're in the Bay Area Well,it's really Menlo Park.
(06:48):
That's where all the venture,most of the venture firms are,
and what I found was if theytake a hundred business plans,
they might fund one.
Well geez, you're 99 times morelikely to get turned down and
fail.
So why would that be yourprimary strategy for raising
capital?
It should be.
Can I get somebody to pay mefor what I know?
(07:08):
Then can I borrow a productfrom somebody?
White label it.
Can I take that to market untilI can build my own?
And we use customer drivensales to fund our development.
That's what we've always done.
Speaker 2 (07:19):
That's awesome.
That's awesome so yeah, becauseI remember my husband was in
his own business for 25 yearsprinting, and it was hard, when
you got a storefront, to try tokeep that business going and
trying to get those bigcustomers right, yeah, to be
able to keep the business going.
So it it really is hard andnowadays, today, it's even, it's
(07:40):
even harder.
Speaker 3 (07:40):
I guarantee you, if one of the things we talk to
your husband about is, Iguarantee you he's a hustler.
It's even harder, I guaranteeyou.
If one of the things we talkedto your husband about is, I
guarantee you he's a hustler.
One of the things I've found ispeople that have retail and I
would consider it a storefrontprinting retail.
At the end of the day, he's gotto be able to shake hands.
People got to be able to trusthim and he's got to hustle.
He just can't stand there andwait for them to come.
He's got to network.
He got to send direct mailpieces.
(08:01):
He needs to ask me or you orsomebody else.
Hey, do you know anybody wholooks to print posters, banners,
direct mail?
You just can't say, oh, I'lljust, I'll run an advertisement
in the newspaper, I'll run adisplay ad online and hope they
come.
That's not how it works.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
Yeah, and that's what we do in our business now the
Legal Shield business.
You got to get out there.
So I'm considered, like yousaid, I'm the networking queen
because I get out there andnetwork.
And I joined actually when Ileft corporate.
I joined BNI, which is BusinessNetwork International.
They taught me how to networkand you got to network with
people that you know, like andtrust.
So that's that relationshipthat you build with that client.
Speaker 3 (08:38):
Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (08:39):
To be able to trust and also to give referrals.
Yeah, so you know, absolutely.
Yeah, it really is veryimportant to be able to do that.
So how do you balance growthexpectations when you bootstrap
or rely on a customer revenueversus taking on venture capital
?
Speaker 3 (08:55):
What's the first part of the question?
How do I balance?
Speaker 2 (08:57):
Yeah, how do you balance growth expectations,
like when you're in a, whenyou're oh?
Speaker 3 (09:00):
shoot, you have none.
When you're bootstrappingYou're just trying to survive.
And then, when you get venture,you make up numbers and then
you hope you hit them.
I swear to God, that's aboutthe amount of scientific
application.
The other thing too is I seecompanies when they raise
venture, they staff too quicklyand they're more worried about
getting the right people in theright roles, even though they
don't have revenue to supportthem.
(09:21):
So they incur something calleda burn rate, which is, if I
raised a million and I'm burninga hundred thousand a month,
negative that means I got 10months of runway.
Well, jesus, that's nuts Versus.
If it's your cash and you'retrying to bounce on a bootstrap,
it's just you.
You don't burn cash, you'rejust trying to pay your bills
and hopefully you break evenuntil you get a little bit of
(09:43):
excess and maybe you hiresomebody part-time as a
contractor.
Then, if it gets really good,maybe I bring them out full-time
or another outside firm to dothe job six hours a week instead
of 40.
So the difference in thebalance is, if you want to stay
sane, stay married, stayfinancially whole in
bootstrapping, don't set anyexpectations.
(10:04):
Just keep ranking the problemyou're solving in the market.
And if the customer keepspaying you, you're on the right
track.
Venture I hate to tell everybody, but it's a game of BS.
You make up these numbers, theboard goes yep, that sounds
fantastic, go get them, and thenyou miss them.
You miss them, then you firethat VP of sales because it's
not your fault as the founder.
You get to fire on average twoVPs of sales and they look at
(10:25):
starting to want to fire you asthe CEO, just so you know.
So the balance there is none.
Survival is bootstrap and makespin the wheel.
Guessing is venture.
Speaker 2 (10:37):
Yeah, and that makes sense that I tell you because
you're trying to make up thosenumbers with your venture
capital.
I mean, like you know, hisbusiness trying to get a loan
from a bank.
Yeah, that's another, that'seven a harder.
Speaker 3 (10:49):
that's a whole other path to go down.
For sure, because now they'relooking at the predictability of
the cash flows, the size of thecustomers, his bad debt.
They're looking at theiroperating costs, their net
income, and if the numbers don'tline up, the bank will not lend
.
Speaker 2 (11:03):
Absolutely, absolutely.
What's the biggest myth aboutgrowth that gets exposed the
moment a founder starts sellingdirectly.
Speaker 3 (11:11):
That's the biggest myth.
It's going to be easy to getcustomers.
This thing's so good, ourproduct, they're going to be
running at us.
I always tell people, if youwant to figure out if you're any
good stand still, is anybodychasing you?
Is anybody knocking on yourdoor?
Are you getting the message tothe right markets?
So the biggest myth is and thisis especially with
technologists that build theseearly stage startups in the
(11:32):
Valley is they look at it fromthe feature perspective.
This thing's so great, I don'treally need a salespeople.
They're overpaid anyways andyou and I both know from IBM.
If it's a corporate, complexsale, my gosh, you need a team.
If you're middle markets,you're going to need at least a
couple of people.
And if it's direct to consumer,you better have a website that
converts and that's expensive,even if you go to Shopify and
(11:54):
buy a template, the way it's setup, the call to action.
So the biggest myth, I think,is if I build something great,
they will come.
The field of dream strategy ifthey build it, they will come.
No, that's BS.
It takes hard work and tweakingand listening, tweaking,
listening, and if you don't havethe grit and, by the way, the
(12:18):
temperament to take that kind ofreally heavy, negative feedback
.
People perceive it as I do.
The old Tom Watson piece on this, which is you know it's.
What is it?
Oh, sorry, edison, you know hefound 10,000 ways that the light
bulb didn't work and then hefound the one way it did.
Same thing in business.
Hopefully you don't have to getto 10,000 experiments.
Maybe you can get to a hundredor 150, 200, but I'll tell you
(12:39):
it's a number, it's not five.
I'm amazed how many people giveup.
We tried everything.
Man, bullshit, excuse me, it'slike nah, you tried five.
Get back to me at 150, 200,then we can talk.
So that's the biggest myth Iwould say is end of the day.
Speaker 2 (12:54):
Yeah, and that's good .
Actually, you said ThomasWatson, that is an IBM company.
Speaker 3 (12:57):
That was the IBM founder.
That made me think about it.
I was like hold it, it's.
Speaker 2 (13:02):
Edison.
So, after building multiplebusinesses, what's your goal to
sales motion that consistentlydrives long-term revenue?
Speaker 3 (13:13):
You know, what's funny is our first company,
brothers and I hit on somethingbut we didn't know it, we didn't
understand the power of what wehad learned and it's answering
three questions.
And we it was interesting wherewe had this three-day tax
business in the hispaniccommunity because that's where
three irish white guys are goingto do fantastic.
As you go to hispanic communityand low-income areas of east la
(13:34):
south, centro, central, sanJacinto, at the border, ventura,
we're the only white things inthose neighborhoods besides the
lines on the street.
Here's why it worked we'reIrish Catholic.
A lot of the people we dealtwith were Catholic because
they're family people.
And here's the other thing welearned they all are just trying
to make a buck and take care oftheir family.
So there was a lot ofcamaraderie and the things we
(14:01):
learned building that businessfrom nothing to 60 mil in 36
months.
But no outside capital is.
We had my brother had boughtthis green little diary book
journal at Staples and we weresitting down and on the
left-hand side we said, hey,what are all the things we're
going to keep doing?
On the right side we're likewhat are the things we're going
to stop doing?
And we did that every month wewere in business and all of a
sudden we started.
These three questions came outfor leverage, which was one who
(14:23):
has our customer?
Well, it wasn't enrolled agents, it wasn't CPAs, because we
were in the tax refund business.
That's where we thought theywere Cause we're like well, if
you want to get an average ordervalue up, you got to go with
clients that are low-incomeclients and tax preparers.
So who has our client?
Tax preparers, will they giveus access to their clients?
Right, because they trust us.
(14:45):
We didn't know.
And the last thing was is byhow they gave access?
Did they give an impliedendorsement?
So what we were able to do is,when we answered those three
questions, we're like holysmokes and people go that sounds
like a reseller program.
And what we found was, when youdo a reseller program you know
this better than anybody at IBMit's a program you have to have.
(15:06):
Here's my FAQs.
Here's the program overview.
Here's the sandbox.
Here's the market developmentfunds.
Here's your program manager.
Here's your partner manager.
Here's your free samples.
Holy, if you're IBM, you'remaking 30 or 40 promises before
the reseller even makes oneprospecting.
Here's what we told them to thetax offices hey, listen, wanda,
if you go ahead and offer thisto all your clients.
(15:29):
We guarantee you could doubleyour profit in your business.
They're like what, yeah, if 10%attach because there's no extra
fees, you could double yourprofit.
And we showed them on a pieceof paper and they're like holy
crap.
Well, what we found out was is80% of the clients wanted it and
they were able to 8X their netprofit in their business without
adding a customer.
So what helped us in this wholeprocess?
(15:50):
Long-winded answer is welearned leverage in our
situation.
That was the thing that made usso successful on that.
That's good, yeah, and leveragemakes a big difference, because
we didn't have any money, so youhad to invent a capability to
extend your reach and leveragebusiness.
We call it LBD, leveragebusiness development.
It's not a partner program,it's.
(16:12):
You know how do you dosomething so simple?
It allows you to go ahead andabsolutely ramp your growth and
go to market strategy yeah,which, by the way, was your
question.
That was a long arc, I'm sorry.
Speaker 2 (16:21):
No, and then you explained it a lot better here.
So let me ask you so what's themoment in your career where you
realized the business youthought you were building wasn't
business?
You were actually in?
Speaker 3 (16:32):
Every single one about anywhere from three months
to a year in.
They're called a pivot in thebusiness world where we come
from in the tech side, and thejoke is you usually don't
survive the second pivot as afounder.
So one of the things we did,out of the first six companies
we had two of them we raisedwhat they call institutional
venture money for and you gettwo pivots and then you get hit,
(16:55):
eject, they move you aside andquote bring in the real CEO,
this last business we had built.
We pivoted three times in twoyears, intentionally because we
got better feedback, the marketwas better, we could see the
path and we survived it becausewe were the investors, it was
our capital.
So we didn't as the four of us,we didn't have to answer to an
(17:16):
outside firm.
But yeah, when do I realize it?
Here's what I realized when Istart is not where I'm going to
wind up.
That is the rule of thumb forthe last 20 years and I've never
been disappointed.
We always think we have itfigured out right up until we
don't.
As Mike Tyson said, everybodyhas a plan until they get
punched in the face, and that'stech.
You all have a plan until we go, try to sell and then we're
like, oh, that's not going towork.
(17:39):
So, I'm doing it right now withthe company we built.
We've just pivoted it for thesecond time in two years and I'm
glad we did.
We rebuilt our platform threetimes, which is insane to do,
but we hit on the right techstack approach.
Now we're like oh man, we gotsomething now, but we took our
time.
We didn't have any, we had asmall team and we didn't have
unreasonable expectations.
You have to get to five or 10million sales and we're like
(18:03):
let's keep talking with ourpartners, let's listen, and
that's what we did.
Speaker 2 (18:07):
And it really makes it this when you listen, and
also trial and error.
So you try it, you pivot, youget it right and then you try it
and you see what works here.
So how do entrepreneurs getbetter at recognizing their true
value for their firm beforemarket?
Teaches them the hard way, likeconsult get paid before
building a product.
Speaker 3 (18:27):
Hopefully I can remember the three buckets
entrepreneurs come in.
So are you the person that'sgoing to bring the dollars?
As you and I know, Wanda,there's people in our lives that
, no matter what they do, theycan raise money.
Then there's other people youand I know that can bring deals
in.
They're not.
They don't know investors, theydon't shine well in front of.
Because people assume becauseyou and I can close a customer,
(18:50):
we can close money.
Those are two different things.
So in a founding team, somebodyhas to be able to handle the
dollars raising money, Somebodyhas to handle the deals.
And then in my world, becauseit's technology, it's
development, do we have thecapability of somebody to
develop?
So if I look at the mix of andgo back to your original
(19:10):
question, just so I answer itcorrectly, I'm sorry.
Speaker 2 (19:13):
How did you get better at recognizing their true
value?
Prop.
Speaker 3 (19:16):
Oh, so real quickly know what bucket you're in as an
entrepreneur.
So are you doing dollars, dealsor development right?
So, especially in the techworld?
And then the goal isrecognizing.
So go back to the value of thequestion.
I just wanna make sure I get itright.
Speaker 2 (19:31):
A value prop for their firm before market.
Teaches them the hard way,right, right?
I just want to make sure I getit right.
Speaker 3 (19:34):
A value prop for their firm before market teaches
them the hard way, right.
So if you don't know whatbucket you're in, it's going to
be really hard to understand howyou present yourself to the
market.
So if you're the person raisingmoney and you're trying to go
out there and talk to people onthe development side, that's
ridiculous.
If you're in development andyou're not listening to the
customers, with the salespeople,it's going to be super hard to
understand how to get, how to besuccessful and get the market
(19:56):
to respond.
So what I found was is there isno one way or path is I guess
the net of it it's understandingyour perspective and how you
interact with the market.
I would say that's probably theone of the best approach I
would do yeah, that and thatmakes sense here.
Speaker 2 (20:11):
we're winding down here because I mean, listen,
we've got so many questions Iwant to ask you here I got a few
minutes, so whatever you want.
Yeah, so how should early stagefounders think about
incorporating LLMs or AI?
Because AI is now taking over alot now.
So how do they incorporate thatinto their business?
Speaker 3 (20:29):
I can share our experience on how we did it.
So we're like everybody elsegoing, oh, this is going to be
awesome.
We didn't even know what thehell it was.
We were caught up in the hype,right.
So then you start, you get yourfree chat GPT account and you
put in a question.
You're like, oh, that'sinteresting.
Then, when we started doing, westarted going, okay, so it's a
really good answer questionanswer machine, an LLM.
And then we said, hey, can weget better at the prompting
(20:52):
piece?
Or like, oh, if you're a greatprompt engineer approach, it's
going to be helpful.
Then we started going, hey, wereally don't know what the heck
all this is.
So then we started listening topodcasts like yourself and
listen.
By the way, instagram has someunbelievable resources online of
people that have reallydissected the meta models for
this.
(21:12):
So first thing is, I'd say it'sa force multiplier.
If you're not using LLMs andthen LAMs, large action models,
and then educating yourself onwhere this could go, you're
going to hire too many people.
You're going to miss out on thespeed with which you can get
answers.
Content.
Up a funnel prospects.
(21:33):
Build SDR sales development repcontent.
Apple funnel prospects.
Build SDR sales development rep, agentic AI models.
We're doing all that stuff.
So it started slow.
We were just kind of you know,hey, kind of cool, so we went
from novelty to how do we usethis every day, to how do we
make this core to our business,and then we don't have to hire
(21:53):
those roles.
So I'll give you one example.
We looked at about I don't knowseven or eight different web
development tools that are AIbased in this LAM and or LOM and
LAM space, and what we foundwas Cursor is incredible.
It gets us 85% of the way there, and then we spend the next
week or two fixing the last 15.
Well, normally that projectwould have taken us three months
(22:14):
, two weeks.
So the speed is back to yourpoint.
How would I incorporate it?
Put away the time every day, anhour and a half, build a little
Google sheet, put the tabs on.
Does this help me with content?
Does this help me with images?
Does this help me with displayads?
Does this help me with my SDRtop of funnel?
We do that.
So just use a Google sheet andwe put the URLs with the
(22:35):
description in, and then whathappens is, after a month, you
probably accumulate 50, 60, 70links that you've personally
have experienced.
Then you start going hey,here's the five that really
helped.
So that's how we did it andit's been fantastic.
I mean the stuff we crank out.
Here we go Simple, one jobdescription.
Remember what a pain it waswhen you had a new hire at IBM?
(22:56):
Yeah, you'd have to give HRyour job description.
They'd have to approve it, thenit would go to legal, then
you'd go to the compensationpeople and then you'd run a
newspaper ad.
Well, now you can run Indeed oryou know one of the job boards.
Well, right now it takes meabout two minutes to write a
world-class job descriptionthrough ChatGPT.
Here's another one we weredoing.
(23:17):
Hey, here's our currentdifferent ads and our website.
What can we do to make morecompelling display ads?
It rewrites our ads, gives us10 versions.
We test them.
They're better than everythingwe did.
So it evolves, is the question.
Here's what it is not.
It's not a silver bullet One.
There is no one magic platform.
It's a compilation of tools.
(23:38):
So get ready to use five or 10.
And it has to be something thatyou enjoy, because it's going
to take some time to learn.
Speaker 2 (23:47):
And that makes sense there.
Speaker 3 (23:50):
So now, what is the name of your company?
Again, jim Prospect, so likeyou're prospecting
prospectdeskai.
Speaker 2 (23:56):
Okay, okay, good, good, good, definitely.
So, yeah, that.
And I love what you just saidbecause, yeah, I've been taking
some.
Well, actually, we had aspeaker on AI and how it helped,
and when she put stuff in, Isaid, oh my God, wow, as long as
we'd be thinking about stuff,and I said, here it perfects it.
I mean, you put what you wantto say in there and then it
perfects it for you, which iswhat I love about that system
(24:17):
here.
So, yeah, that's, it's takingover the world.
So I've never heard a LAM andyou just explained the language
action models.
Speaker 3 (24:24):
Large action.
So there's large language,Large action, Large action
models.
So think of them like, if youknow, Zapier, that tool that
allows you to move data from onesystem to another.
They call them ZAPs In the oldworlds when you and I were doing
ETL, which is, you know,extract, transfer, load.
A large action model tiestogether multiple AI tools so
(24:44):
they can work in concert.
That's what a large actionmodel is.
Speaker 2 (24:48):
Yeah, and I was looking at the next inflection
point of SAAS.
I remember IBM had that and weused to have it in our thing and
I said what is SAAS?
So spread it a little bit to meabout what SAAS.
I still never understood whatthat was.
Speaker 3 (25:05):
You know, SAS is just cloud-based application.
That's all it is.
Speaker 2 (25:08):
Yep, Now I recall what it was.
Yeah, I said yeah, it wascloud-based.
Speaker 3 (25:11):
Everybody just laughs now because, remember, that was
a term we all didn't know.
And Salesforce set the tone foreverybody.
It became the largest SaaSsoftware company in the world.
They sure did.
Speaker 2 (25:20):
They sure did.
Yeah, and I remember it allwould be because I was actually
helping the marketing rep with alot of stuff.
And then we had ELA's, thesoftware for big companies that
ran their computers and stuff.
I've been into all of that.
I never knew what it meant.
So listen, jim, tell people howthey can get in touch with you
(25:40):
so we can know more about whatyou do.
Speaker 3 (25:43):
Absolutely Go to our website, wwwprospectdeskai, or
you can go jim at prospectdeskaiand just reach out to me
directly, since anybody who's onyour podcast and wants some
insights or clarity on what wespoke about, I'm glad to email
them back.
Speaker 2 (25:59):
Oh, absolutely Absolutely so.
Wow, what an inspiringconversation with you, jim.
Jim's journey as a professionalentrepreneur reminds us of the
power of perseverance, visionand working together to create
impact.
I hope you've been leaving thisepisode with new ideas that Jim
has shared and fresh motivation.
(26:19):
Don't forget to follow, shareand leave a review, and stay
tuned for more stories thatspark collaboration and growth
Until next time.
This is Wanda Pearson signingoff with Ready Set Collaborate
where we connect, grow andthrive together.
Thanks again, jim, for being onmy podcast and make sure you
also subscribe.
It's going to be on YouTube aswell, so you can see Absolutely,
(26:40):
we're excited for it.
Speaker 3 (26:41):
Wanda, thanks for having me on here.
Speaker 2 (26:42):
Excited for it.
Wanda, thanks for having me onhere I really appreciate it,
thank you.
Speaker 3 (26:45):
Thank you, jim, have a great day.
Speaker 1 (26:46):
You too, thank you.
That wraps up another episodeof Ready Set.
Collaborate with Wanda Pearson.
I hope you found inspirationand valuable insights to help
you build meaningful connectionsand successful collaborations.
If you enjoyed today'sconversation, be sure to
subscribe, share and stay tunedfor more great discussions.
Until next time, keepcollaborating and making an
(27:08):
impact.
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