January 19, 2025 • 22 mins
We kick off the year discussing smart automation and AI tools with our special guest, Vit Muller from Standout from the Pack. Discover how small businesses, particularly gyms, barbers, and accountants, can revolutionize their marketing strategies using an all-in-one platform. Vit shares groundbreaking insights into cost-effective campaigns and the magic of database reactivation strategies. We also dive into AI's ability to assess sales calls and craft strategies to triumph over sales objections.
Learn how AI chatbots can dramatically boost your conversion rates by ensuring instant communication and engagement with your potential customers.
This episode is supported by CareSuper.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
Hello and welcome to the Canberra Business Podcast
brought to you by the CanberraBusiness Chamber in association
with Kia Super.
I'm Greg Harford from theBusiness Chamber and I'm
delighted to be joined today byVit Muller, a smart automation
engineer from Standout from thePack, a small Canberra business
specialising in capturing,harnessing and closing more
leads using smart AI tools.
(00:30):
Witt, welcome to the podcast.
Thank you, greg.
Appreciate it.
Now that sounds very excitingto any small business owner.
Most small businesses I talk toare definitely keen on
harnessing and closing moreleads.
Tell us a little bit about yourbusiness and what you do.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
Yeah.
So we are a smart automationsand AI platform offering
marketing campaigns at afraction of the cost of a
traditional sort of a custombuild-out.
So the way we do it iscustomers pay a subscription for
our software, which is anall-in-one sales and marketing
platform.
I'm not going to bore you withhow many features it's got, but
(01:08):
think about it as a toolbox.
And it's got a lot of tools andwe don't sell on the tools, we
sell on the outcomes.
So you know, most smallbusinesses are really busy
running their day-to-day andwhat's really important to them
at the end of the day is to growtheir business.
So we like to focus onstrategies that we've tried and
(01:29):
has been proven to work.
Things like databasereactivation right, like one of
the first things that we do.
If a business has a list of adecent size amount of contacts
like a couple hundred at leastand they've got a phone number,
we can do a simple databasereactivation sms campaign with
you know, hey, come back.
We've got this offer.
Like works for gyms, forexample.
(01:49):
Like hey, come back for a weekof treat, free training you've
trained with us in the past oryou were interested in training
with us in the past, and wegenerally see about five percent
of the list will take you up onit and so depend depending how
big is your list.
But if you've got a thousand,ten thousand contacts, you know
if you've been around for five,ten years you would have decent
(02:10):
size lease you can expect about.
You know, from what is it fivepercent?
From a thousand?
What is that?
A fifty?
So you might have five hundredif you got ten thousand on the
list and they take you up on it.
I mean if you convert, youconvert from the 500, I mean
that's a lot of business.
So we like to focus on quickstrategies right away and then
(02:30):
we've got lots of other ones.
Speaker 1 (02:32):
All right.
And who are your customers?
Who is your product for?
So?
Speaker 2 (02:36):
predominantly service-based businesses.
So we don't really doe-commerce, Although we have
different tool sets that we canhelp, but it's predominantly
service-based businesses.
Think about like a local gym,local barber, local hairdresser,
local accountant.
We also do professional-likebusinesses, so local accountants
(02:57):
.
We have lawyers that we helpwith and you know there's
different needs and differentoutcomes that businesses need
from using our software.
But ultimately what we look atis every business has some sort
of acquisition process toacquire a new customer.
So that's where we generallystart.
We look at that and then welook at how we can marry that
(03:19):
with our software and how it canbe configured for the needs of
the business.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
And your software?
It it is.
It is what exactly?
It's a whole a whole.
It's a toolbox, you say, butit's a crm and a database yes,
so we are strong.
Speaker 2 (03:33):
I mean, really the main core thing that drives it
is data, and we're big believersin data.
You need to have data that'ssecure and then you can leverage
off for smart automations,because AI and automations are
only as good as the data thatyou have.
So it's the fundamentally, it'sa CRM that you can have many
different data points that aremaybe relevant to your business,
(03:55):
for qualifying potentialbusiness, for qualifying
potential customers and whatnot.
But then you know what you canthen do with the software is you
can build sales funnels, youcan build custom web pages.
You can also power the wholething with custom automation.
So, example being, you have awebsite and you have a chat
(04:17):
widget or you have a way tocapture leads so they inquire.
As soon as that comes true, youwant that lead to be, you know,
to get acknowledged thatthey've sent something.
So send them an email.
You can automate that so thattells them yeah, we got your
inquiry, we'll get back in touchshortly.
You, as the business owner, canget notified right away as well
(04:38):
that you've got an inquiry.
But that's, I mean, that's thesort of functionality that's
been around.
It's nothing, you know, overlycomplex, but where you take it
to.
The next level is with thingslike AI, chatbots and voice AI,
but I'll talk about the chatbotsif you like.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
Yeah, let's talk about chatbots and AI.
Chatbots sound a little bitscary to anyone who grew up with
Terminator and that sort ofthing.
So how does it work?
Anyone who grew up withTerminator and that sort of
thing?
So how does it work?
And you say voice chatbotsyou've actually got AI
interacting with customers.
Speaker 2 (05:10):
Yes.
So two separate tools.
I'll talk about the chatbotfirst.
The text-based chatbot first,so that one works really well.
If you're a tech type ofbusiness that doesn't always
have time to respond toinquiries through an SMS fast
enough and, as we know, in sales, you know speed to lead is one
(05:31):
of the most important indicatorsfor likelihood of closing
conversion, right?
So good example being chatwidget on the website.
People submit their inquirythrough it.
They get an sms back to say hey, thank you for inquiry.
Um, did you have any otherquestions that we can help with?
Now?
If they respond to that, thatwill kick in an ai chatbot.
(05:55):
So it's a basically ai that youfully train around your
business so you give it back andinformation about your products
and your services andtraditional, you know,
frequently asked questions thatpeople ask.
You give it the knowledge so itbecomes smart around your
business so that it can thenanswer and have a conversation
with leads.
A good use case.
Let's just bring it tosomething that brings it back
(06:17):
home.
So, martial art clubs mostmartial art club owners are
passionate martial artists andthey might be on the mats
coaching.
Most martial art club ownersare passionate martial artists
and they might be on the matscoaching.
Now, if they got a call andthis is what we call a missed
call text back they got a calland they missed that call.
That could have been a newmember.
Now what we do is, when thatcall comes in, if they don't
(06:41):
pick up that call, the SMS willgo out of the system to the
person that called saying hey,jimmy, he just busy on the mats
coaching.
How can I help?
Or how can my assistant canhelp.
Now if that person responds tothat message saying something
like, yeah, look, I'm interestedin trying out martial arts, the
chatbot will kick in and have aconversation Like hey, what
sort of martial arts are youlooking at?
Have you trained martial arts?
(07:01):
Yada, yada, yada.
And if it picks up that thereis an intent for the person to
actually really sort of go aheadand try the gym, it will
actually offer that to, to booka book, a visit, a book a
meeting with the coach.
And because it's direct, likeour software can directly
contact, connect with yourcalendar, it will know when
you're available.
So it'll literally say cool, noworries, yeah, so we got.
(07:22):
We got a free sport like thiswednesday at three, thursday at
nine and friday at two.
Which one of those would youlike?
And then a person responds withthe option and I will book it
in your calendar.
So by the time Jimmy has leftthe mats from the coaching
session, they've got anotherbooking in the calendar.
Speaker 1 (07:39):
And voice AI you mentioned as well.
So how is that working?
Is AI really good enough to behaving an actual conversation
like we're having now?
Speaker 2 (07:47):
Yes, it is, and it's only getting better.
Again, it comes down to howwell you train it.
So, for voice, oh, we have avoice ai.
Currently we have it forinbound only um.
Outbound is coming, but there'sa few things we need to iron
out um, and there's regulationsand things like that which might
(08:08):
get into.
Second, but for inbound itworks.
Again, if you're that type ofbusiness that trades, let's go
trades.
Good example You're anelectrician, you're a plumber,
whatever On the job, you mightmiss a call.
Well, if you don't pick upwithin a certain time frame, the
voice AI will kick in and willpick up that call and have a
(08:30):
conversation.
We've got many different voices.
You can pick from manydifferent like and you know male
, female voices.
We got american accent.
We got australian accent too,so you can pick which voice over
the ai one.
You can give the ai its name.
So, for our own company, if youtry and ring up our number on
stand up from the back, if you'dlike to have a crack at it, you
(08:54):
call the number on the websiteand Sophie will pick up and she
will introduce herself.
Hi, sophie, ai from Stand UpFrom the Park.
You've, you know, obviously,you've called us, you know
something along those lines andshe'll say how can I help?
And then you just have aconversation and because we've
given her all the back-end info,there's about 5,000 words that
(09:14):
you can put into the prompt forthe AI so you can explain what
type of tonality, what type ofhow you want her to talk.
You give her back-endinformation about your products
and services FAQ.
So it's similar to the chat AI,but you can give it a lot of
information.
She will draw from that backlog, from that knowledge base, when
she's got a conversation withyou and if she can answer a
(09:37):
certain question, she will.
If she can't, she will cleverlysay look, that's something I
don't know, but why don't we putyou in touch with somebody on a
team?
Would you like that?
Speaker 1 (09:45):
So what's your experience having rolled this
out with customers?
Are customers keen to talk toAI?
Do customers even know thatthey're talking to an AI bot?
Speaker 2 (09:55):
Yeah.
So we found that initially wetry to like, yeah, let's try and
hide, it Might be like.
You know, people might not like, if they realize it's AI, they
might not talk to it.
But then we realized, you knowwhat.
We actually found that peopleare interested in speaking
because there's a bit of anovelty and they're like, ooh,
(10:18):
actually found that people areinterested in speaking to
because there's a bit of anovelty and they're like oh,
when is ai gonna call me?
You know, um?
And so, yeah, we, we'veprogrammed the ai now to
basically introduce yourself ashey, I'm sophie, I'm an ai
assistant, how can I help?
So, and it works fine, peoplehave conversation and the
outcome is very similar.
You know it's it's never gonnabe.
I mean, let's be, let's befrankie, it's never going to be
the same as a real humanconversation.
You can add more, you knowcolor to your voice and things
like that.
(10:38):
And um, you know, but thinkabout it from the business
perspective.
What's the outcome you'retrying to achieve?
Um, you know, sometimes we gettoo romantic about like too.
You know, we're too much of aperfectionist sometimes, and
we're like, oh, yeah, that's it,I'm not going to use it.
But really, what it comes downto.
Is it going to help yourbusiness capture more
opportunities?
Speaker 1 (10:58):
yes, it will so I'm fascinated by the voice side of
this, and you mentioned thatthere's different voices.
You can you can roll outamerican, australian, presumably
a whole whole range, but dothey vary?
Is there a risk that suddenlyall the tradies in Canberra are
going to be having the samevoice?
Speaker 2 (11:18):
answer that is a good question.
Speaker 1 (11:20):
I mean that could happen.
Yeah, so can you customize thevoice beyond kind of the
standard off-the-shelf one?
Can I record content to put onthe Chamber's AI call, for
example?
Speaker 2 (11:33):
You can.
So we have I mean, on a backlogwe've got about 50 different
voice avatars, so you pick oneand that's the one that's going
to be.
You can't really modify itfurther.
But as we continue to innovate,there is definitely I could
definitely see for the downtrack an ability to have a voice
(11:54):
that's in your own voice.
It comes with certain.
Speaker 1 (11:58):
The future is both exciting and terrifying all at
once.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (12:02):
Well, on that, what I would say is yes, but think of
it this way.
It's giving a massive point ofleverage and whether you decide
to start implementing AI or not,somebody else will, and more
likely that more businesses willthan not.
So it's kind of like there's noreal way.
(12:24):
I don't think there's other wayto go against it.
It's really just to embrace itand try and like make the most
of it for your business, whileyou can, I guess.
Speaker 1 (12:33):
Yeah, and it's a tool , ultimately, that will help
drive productivity and betterbusiness outcomes.
And look, many firms I'm awareof are already using AI in some
form, so it's definitely thereand growing.
What's your take on the privacyissues and the data security
issues around AI?
Because obviously, if you'retalking to an AI bot or you're
(12:57):
chatting to an AI bot in a textform, all that information is
going somewhere.
What happens to it?
Speaker 2 (13:03):
So, yeah, it'll be stored on servers.
We have our servers in US on areliable Google servers, our
servers in US on a reliableGoogle servers.
But ultimately it's aboutproviding, like being
transparent with the callers,with potential leads calling in.
So we have AI.
At the beginning of the call itwill say, hey, this call is
(13:25):
recorded, so if the persondoesn't like that, they can hang
up.
So the transparency is there,the opt-in is there, and then
the AI will introduce itself asan AI assistant.
So that's as far as I guess youcan go.
I mean, aside from that,obviously, protecting your data,
protecting access to youraccount, is paramount.
We do on our end, we doeverything we can at our best
(13:46):
ability to make sure that yourdata is protected.
But, yeah, I think that's asfar as you can go In terms of
where, on the flip side, howthat is very useful.
For example, the voice recordingis like for sales reps.
So if you're doing sales overcall and you have a team of
(14:06):
sales reps and they don't alwaysclose, it gives you tremendous
power.
You can now look at transcript.
We can re-listen theconversation where the lead and
the sales rep had a conversationabout a particular objection
that the lead had and theydidn't quite overcome it and
they lost that sale.
Well, now you can actually takethat transcript.
You can take a sample of thatone and maybe a couple of other
(14:28):
of your sales reps that didn'tdo so well, pass it on to
perhaps even AI and say, hey,look at these conversations.
Can you analyze it and suggestwhat would be a better way of
overcoming these particularobjections?
Bring it back to the sales team, train them up on it and you
should see an improvement inconversion.
Speaker 1 (14:46):
Which is really exciting for any small business
person who's looking to growtheir business.
So conversion is ultimatelywhat it's what it's all about,
right?
Um, so so ai tools are part ofyour offering, but, but, um,
you've got other otherautomations that you you build
in as well.
Is that right?
Speaker 2 (15:04):
absolutely.
Yeah.
Yeah, because that software isso robust and it's got so many
tools.
Uh, we do find that somebusiness owners, they just get
either overwhelmed or or theydon't have time to properly
utilize it, like you know,because it's just a set of tools
and like you got to still likeconfigure the automations, build
your own funnels with it,things like that.
So we found not everybody hastime for that.
(15:24):
So some customers are like, hey, can you build it for us?
And so we then, um, what we'vedone is long, long story short
is we build a thing we call theProfit Roadmap Profit Roadmap
System, which is a combinationof 10 unique modules that fall
like Lego pieces into another,one into another.
(15:44):
They are ordered individually,they are set up in a particular
order and ultimately, eachmodule is installed into a
customer's account.
We configure the module forthem and with each module, the
ideas they get more profitable.
So just to give moreexplanation to it, the first
module is called the EssentialBusiness Marketing System and
(16:06):
that's one we installed into allour customers' accounts because
we found, at the end of the day, when it comes to sales and
marketing, what is the mostimportant thing is your list.
So the essential business modeldoes that.
It helps you build lists,newsletter signups and different
mechanisms, but also keeps yourlist clean.
So if somebody opt-outs, theycan easily opt-out.
If somebody's email address isno longer functioning, it
(16:29):
bounces, it'll automaticallydisable them from being able to
receive more emails.
So when you, as a businessowner, want to run your monthly
newsletters, you can be restassured that your newsletter is
going to the right inboxes andnot the bad ones.
And there's a thing calledascending domain reputation,
really really important.
A lot of people don't knowabout about this.
(16:50):
But if you spend, you know,like, put it this way, like if
you spend all this money ongenerating leads, paid ads and
whatnot, you're generatingcontacts and then you need to
nurture them through email.
But if you have got really badsetup, um, then you could be,
you know, you could be reallywasting money away on that.
So that's what?
So that's the first module.
And then we go like in the itemmodules such as reputation
(17:14):
management module, which helpsto automate way of feedback from
current customers, the whole,the whole thing.
By the way, like you, if youlook at it, you would see more.
Your number 10 is called artsoptimizing module, which is
optimizing your paid ads and wehad a questions like hey, why,
why wouldn't you like, have youknow paid ads at the beginning,
(17:35):
when it's like effective andreally quick?
Well, the argument to that is,yes, you can give money to
Facebook and they'll help yougenerate leads, but if you don't
have the underlying mechanismsto convert the leads, you don't
have the lead nurture systems inplace, and all that and it's
the only way you could do it isif you call people.
Great, but we found that not alot of business owners are that
(17:56):
organized and that like on pointto be able to call every single
day within five minutes.
So the profit room up modulethe profit room up system is is
done in a way where we focus onthe back end first, such as
reputation, be able to generatereferrals for business, be able
to increase customer lifetimevalue, things like that you can
do right away with the list thatyou have, and those are things
(18:20):
that are not costing you anextra money.
But once you got that dialed in, once you do have, like, proper
lead nurture system in placeand all those you know,
reactivation campaigns, allthose type of things then when
you spend dollar on anadvertising, you know that that
lead comes through into thesoftware.
Those automations will kick in.
The lead will be nurturedthrough, you know, initial
campaigns.
Your sales reps will benotified right away to call them
(18:43):
all those things and yourconversion is going to go up so,
but how long's the businessbeen going for?
so we had this business for fouryears on the software side, but
before that we've been doingagency services since, like 2013
, doing websites.
Speaker 1 (18:56):
Wordpress websites is where we started and how so you
launched four years ago.
How's it going?
Are you happy with progress?
Speaker 2 (19:04):
I'm very happy with progress.
Yeah, it did took a interestingside turn, uh, over the last 18
months, where we actuallystarted to work with US agencies
that needed help as well.
So we never intended to be ourtarget market, but you know
where the money flows.
Speaker 1 (19:22):
You wouldn't say no to that, so you know we do that
as well, yeah, so you'reactually exporting services from
Cambridge to the States,fantastic, fantastic.
And is there anything inparticular that you would?
What have you learned from thatkind of services exporting?
Have there been particularchallenges along the way?
Speaker 2 (19:42):
Not really.
It's been pretty smooth.
The only thing obviously a timezone.
So when you have like on amorning meetings, you've got to
line up the times.
But it's not too difficult.
You're just going to wake up alittle earlier, yeah excellent.
Speaker 1 (19:55):
And and how did you come to be in Australia?
You're from the Czech Republicoriginally.
Yes, yes, correct.
Speaker 2 (20:00):
Yeah, so originally 2010, as I came to Australia and
I was after living in Scotlandfor three years and you know I
was back in my 20s.
I was just partying and youknow, doing stuff that you do
when you become like anindependent individual.
You know longer living withyour parents, so initially it's
fun, but after three years ofdoing that I was like, yeah, I
probably should do somethingmore serious.
(20:21):
I was working in likeconstruction jobs and things
like that and partying on theweekends and, yeah, I got to do
something more serious andaround that time one of my mates
was leaving to Australia and sothat sort of sparked the idea
for me as well to do the same.
So 2010 is when I moved over toAustralia on a student visa and
I studied fitness and became apersonal trainer and did massage
(20:45):
therapy and got into gymmanagement.
I was very much into the wholefitness industry, gym management
.
I was very much into the wholefitness industry and that's
where my passion started forsales and marketing as well,
because I ran a business whereit was a bit more unorthodox in
a way, where, as a personaltrainer, I decided, rather than
paying a rent for like big boxgym, like fitness first, but you
have to pay like I don't knowfour grand franchise fee and
(21:06):
then three $400 a week rent, butyou still have to wear their
t-shirts.
I didn't quite like that idea.
I wanted to sort of build myown brand.
So I started training peopleout in a park and doing boot
camps and stuff like that.
But obviously the downside ofthat is you don't get access to
like a gym reception that theycan pass on leads, new members.
So I realized very quickly Ineed to generate my own lead.
(21:28):
So I built my own website andthen spoke to a mate of mine who
was working for some agents.
He gave me a few tips andmanaged to get my website up on
the first page in google forsearch term personal trainer in
Sydney.
Yeah, that's an awesome result,right yeah, and that gave me
like confidence and andunderstanding that this online
thing works if you do it well.
So that's why I've becomereally passionate.
(21:49):
I'm a bit of a nerd as well.
I like to build stuff andtinker with software and things
like that.
So, yeah, it's been fun.
It's been a fun journey.
Speaker 1 (21:56):
Yeah, so you've morphed from there into selling
essentially an online salestoolkit, which is really
exciting.
Speaker 2 (22:05):
Yep.
Speaker 1 (22:07):
Vip Muller.
Thank you so much for joiningus here on the Canberra Business
Podcast.
I'm Greg Harford from theCanberra Business Chamber.
I've been talking to Vit Mullerfrom Standout from the Pack, a
smart automation businessspecialising in capturing and
harnessing and closing moreleads using smart AI tools.
Now this podcast has beenbrought to you by the Business
(22:27):
Chamber with the support ofCareSuper, an industry super
fund with competitive fees andreturns, exceptional service and
a focus on real care.
Don't forget to follow us onyour favourite podcast platform
for more episodes and we'llcatch you next time.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
Thank you, Greg.
Hello and welcome to the Canberra Business Podcast
brought to you by the CanberraBusiness Chamber in association
with Kia Super.
I'm Greg Harford from theBusiness Chamber and I'm
delighted to be joined today byVit Muller, a smart automation
engineer from Standout from thePack, a small Canberra business
specialising in capturing,harnessing and closing more
leads using smart AI tools.
(00:30):
Witt, welcome to the podcast.
Thank you, greg.
Appreciate it.
Now that sounds very excitingto any small business owner.
Most small businesses I talk toare definitely keen on
harnessing and closing moreleads.
Tell us a little bit about yourbusiness and what you do.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
Yeah.
So we are a smart automationsand AI platform offering
marketing campaigns at afraction of the cost of a
traditional sort of a custombuild-out.
So the way we do it iscustomers pay a subscription for
our software, which is anall-in-one sales and marketing
platform.
I'm not going to bore you withhow many features it's got, but
(01:08):
think about it as a toolbox.
And it's got a lot of tools andwe don't sell on the tools, we
sell on the outcomes.
So you know, most smallbusinesses are really busy
running their day-to-day andwhat's really important to them
at the end of the day is to growtheir business.
So we like to focus onstrategies that we've tried and
(01:29):
has been proven to work.
Things like databasereactivation right, like one of
the first things that we do.
If a business has a list of adecent size amount of contacts
like a couple hundred at leastand they've got a phone number,
we can do a simple databasereactivation sms campaign with
you know, hey, come back.
We've got this offer.
Like works for gyms, forexample.
(01:49):
Like hey, come back for a weekof treat, free training you've
trained with us in the past oryou were interested in training
with us in the past, and wegenerally see about five percent
of the list will take you up onit and so depend depending how
big is your list.
But if you've got a thousand,ten thousand contacts, you know
if you've been around for five,ten years you would have decent
(02:10):
size lease you can expect about.
You know, from what is it fivepercent?
From a thousand?
What is that?
A fifty?
So you might have five hundredif you got ten thousand on the
list and they take you up on it.
I mean if you convert, youconvert from the 500, I mean
that's a lot of business.
So we like to focus on quickstrategies right away and then
(02:30):
we've got lots of other ones.
Speaker 1 (02:32):
All right.
And who are your customers?
Who is your product for?
So?
Speaker 2 (02:36):
predominantly service-based businesses.
So we don't really doe-commerce, Although we have
different tool sets that we canhelp, but it's predominantly
service-based businesses.
Think about like a local gym,local barber, local hairdresser,
local accountant.
We also do professional-likebusinesses, so local accountants
(02:57):
.
We have lawyers that we helpwith and you know there's
different needs and differentoutcomes that businesses need
from using our software.
But ultimately what we look atis every business has some sort
of acquisition process toacquire a new customer.
So that's where we generallystart.
We look at that and then welook at how we can marry that
(03:19):
with our software and how it canbe configured for the needs of
the business.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
And your software?
It it is.
It is what exactly?
It's a whole a whole.
It's a toolbox, you say, butit's a crm and a database yes,
so we are strong.
Speaker 2 (03:33):
I mean, really the main core thing that drives it
is data, and we're big believersin data.
You need to have data that'ssecure and then you can leverage
off for smart automations,because AI and automations are
only as good as the data thatyou have.
So it's the fundamentally, it'sa CRM that you can have many
different data points that aremaybe relevant to your business,
(03:55):
for qualifying potentialbusiness, for qualifying
potential customers and whatnot.
But then you know what you canthen do with the software is you
can build sales funnels, youcan build custom web pages.
You can also power the wholething with custom automation.
So, example being, you have awebsite and you have a chat
(04:17):
widget or you have a way tocapture leads so they inquire.
As soon as that comes true, youwant that lead to be, you know,
to get acknowledged thatthey've sent something.
So send them an email.
You can automate that so thattells them yeah, we got your
inquiry, we'll get back in touchshortly.
You, as the business owner, canget notified right away as well
(04:38):
that you've got an inquiry.
But that's, I mean, that's thesort of functionality that's
been around.
It's nothing, you know, overlycomplex, but where you take it
to.
The next level is with thingslike AI, chatbots and voice AI,
but I'll talk about the chatbotsif you like.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
Yeah, let's talk about chatbots and AI.
Chatbots sound a little bitscary to anyone who grew up with
Terminator and that sort ofthing.
So how does it work?
Anyone who grew up withTerminator and that sort of
thing?
So how does it work?
And you say voice chatbotsyou've actually got AI
interacting with customers.
Speaker 2 (05:10):
Yes.
So two separate tools.
I'll talk about the chatbotfirst.
The text-based chatbot first,so that one works really well.
If you're a tech type ofbusiness that doesn't always
have time to respond toinquiries through an SMS fast
enough and, as we know, in sales, you know speed to lead is one
(05:31):
of the most important indicatorsfor likelihood of closing
conversion, right?
So good example being chatwidget on the website.
People submit their inquirythrough it.
They get an sms back to say hey, thank you for inquiry.
Um, did you have any otherquestions that we can help with?
Now?
If they respond to that, thatwill kick in an ai chatbot.
(05:55):
So it's a basically ai that youfully train around your
business so you give it back andinformation about your products
and your services andtraditional, you know,
frequently asked questions thatpeople ask.
You give it the knowledge so itbecomes smart around your
business so that it can thenanswer and have a conversation
with leads.
A good use case.
Let's just bring it tosomething that brings it back
(06:17):
home.
So, martial art clubs mostmartial art club owners are
passionate martial artists andthey might be on the mats
coaching.
Most martial art club ownersare passionate martial artists
and they might be on the matscoaching.
Now, if they got a call andthis is what we call a missed
call text back they got a calland they missed that call.
That could have been a newmember.
Now what we do is, when thatcall comes in, if they don't
(06:41):
pick up that call, the SMS willgo out of the system to the
person that called saying hey,jimmy, he just busy on the mats
coaching.
How can I help?
Or how can my assistant canhelp.
Now if that person responds tothat message saying something
like, yeah, look, I'm interestedin trying out martial arts, the
chatbot will kick in and have aconversation Like hey, what
sort of martial arts are youlooking at?
Have you trained martial arts?
(07:01):
Yada, yada, yada.
And if it picks up that thereis an intent for the person to
actually really sort of go aheadand try the gym, it will
actually offer that to, to booka book, a visit, a book a
meeting with the coach.
And because it's direct, likeour software can directly
contact, connect with yourcalendar, it will know when
you're available.
So it'll literally say cool, noworries, yeah, so we got.
(07:22):
We got a free sport like thiswednesday at three, thursday at
nine and friday at two.
Which one of those would youlike?
And then a person responds withthe option and I will book it
in your calendar.
So by the time Jimmy has leftthe mats from the coaching
session, they've got anotherbooking in the calendar.
Speaker 1 (07:39):
And voice AI you mentioned as well.
So how is that working?
Is AI really good enough to behaving an actual conversation
like we're having now?
Speaker 2 (07:47):
Yes, it is, and it's only getting better.
Again, it comes down to howwell you train it.
So, for voice, oh, we have avoice ai.
Currently we have it forinbound only um.
Outbound is coming, but there'sa few things we need to iron
out um, and there's regulationsand things like that which might
(08:08):
get into.
Second, but for inbound itworks.
Again, if you're that type ofbusiness that trades, let's go
trades.
Good example You're anelectrician, you're a plumber,
whatever On the job, you mightmiss a call.
Well, if you don't pick upwithin a certain time frame, the
voice AI will kick in and willpick up that call and have a
(08:30):
conversation.
We've got many different voices.
You can pick from manydifferent like and you know male
, female voices.
We got american accent.
We got australian accent too,so you can pick which voice over
the ai one.
You can give the ai its name.
So, for our own company, if youtry and ring up our number on
stand up from the back, if you'dlike to have a crack at it, you
(08:54):
call the number on the websiteand Sophie will pick up and she
will introduce herself.
Hi, sophie, ai from Stand UpFrom the Park.
You've, you know, obviously,you've called us, you know
something along those lines andshe'll say how can I help?
And then you just have aconversation and because we've
given her all the back-end info,there's about 5,000 words that
(09:14):
you can put into the prompt forthe AI so you can explain what
type of tonality, what type ofhow you want her to talk.
You give her back-endinformation about your products
and services FAQ.
So it's similar to the chat AI,but you can give it a lot of
information.
She will draw from that backlog, from that knowledge base, when
she's got a conversation withyou and if she can answer a
(09:37):
certain question, she will.
If she can't, she will cleverlysay look, that's something I
don't know, but why don't we putyou in touch with somebody on a
team?
Would you like that?
Speaker 1 (09:45):
So what's your experience having rolled this
out with customers?
Are customers keen to talk toAI?
Do customers even know thatthey're talking to an AI bot?
Speaker 2 (09:55):
Yeah.
So we found that initially wetry to like, yeah, let's try and
hide, it Might be like.
You know, people might not like, if they realize it's AI, they
might not talk to it.
But then we realized, you knowwhat.
We actually found that peopleare interested in speaking
because there's a bit of anovelty and they're like, ooh,
(10:18):
actually found that people areinterested in speaking to
because there's a bit of anovelty and they're like oh,
when is ai gonna call me?
You know, um?
And so, yeah, we, we'veprogrammed the ai now to
basically introduce yourself ashey, I'm sophie, I'm an ai
assistant, how can I help?
So, and it works fine, peoplehave conversation and the
outcome is very similar.
You know it's it's never gonnabe.
I mean, let's be, let's befrankie, it's never going to be
the same as a real humanconversation.
You can add more, you knowcolor to your voice and things
like that.
(10:38):
And um, you know, but thinkabout it from the business
perspective.
What's the outcome you'retrying to achieve?
Um, you know, sometimes we gettoo romantic about like too.
You know, we're too much of aperfectionist sometimes, and
we're like, oh, yeah, that's it,I'm not going to use it.
But really, what it comes downto.
Is it going to help yourbusiness capture more
opportunities?
Speaker 1 (10:58):
yes, it will so I'm fascinated by the voice side of
this, and you mentioned thatthere's different voices.
You can you can roll outamerican, australian, presumably
a whole whole range, but dothey vary?
Is there a risk that suddenlyall the tradies in Canberra are
going to be having the samevoice?
Speaker 2 (11:18):
answer that is a good question.
Speaker 1 (11:20):
I mean that could happen.
Yeah, so can you customize thevoice beyond kind of the
standard off-the-shelf one?
Can I record content to put onthe Chamber's AI call, for
example?
Speaker 2 (11:33):
You can.
So we have I mean, on a backlogwe've got about 50 different
voice avatars, so you pick oneand that's the one that's going
to be.
You can't really modify itfurther.
But as we continue to innovate,there is definitely I could
definitely see for the downtrack an ability to have a voice
(11:54):
that's in your own voice.
It comes with certain.
Speaker 1 (11:58):
The future is both exciting and terrifying all at
once.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (12:02):
Well, on that, what I would say is yes, but think of
it this way.
It's giving a massive point ofleverage and whether you decide
to start implementing AI or not,somebody else will, and more
likely that more businesses willthan not.
So it's kind of like there's noreal way.
(12:24):
I don't think there's other wayto go against it.
It's really just to embrace itand try and like make the most
of it for your business, whileyou can, I guess.
Speaker 1 (12:33):
Yeah, and it's a tool , ultimately, that will help
drive productivity and betterbusiness outcomes.
And look, many firms I'm awareof are already using AI in some
form, so it's definitely thereand growing.
What's your take on the privacyissues and the data security
issues around AI?
Because obviously, if you'retalking to an AI bot or you're
(12:57):
chatting to an AI bot in a textform, all that information is
going somewhere.
What happens to it?
Speaker 2 (13:03):
So, yeah, it'll be stored on servers.
We have our servers in US on areliable Google servers, our
servers in US on a reliableGoogle servers.
But ultimately it's aboutproviding, like being
transparent with the callers,with potential leads calling in.
So we have AI.
At the beginning of the call itwill say, hey, this call is
(13:25):
recorded, so if the persondoesn't like that, they can hang
up.
So the transparency is there,the opt-in is there, and then
the AI will introduce itself asan AI assistant.
So that's as far as I guess youcan go.
I mean, aside from that,obviously, protecting your data,
protecting access to youraccount, is paramount.
We do on our end, we doeverything we can at our best
(13:46):
ability to make sure that yourdata is protected.
But, yeah, I think that's asfar as you can go In terms of
where, on the flip side, howthat is very useful.
For example, the voice recordingis like for sales reps.
So if you're doing sales overcall and you have a team of
(14:06):
sales reps and they don't alwaysclose, it gives you tremendous
power.
You can now look at transcript.
We can re-listen theconversation where the lead and
the sales rep had a conversationabout a particular objection
that the lead had and theydidn't quite overcome it and
they lost that sale.
Well, now you can actually takethat transcript.
You can take a sample of thatone and maybe a couple of other
(14:28):
of your sales reps that didn'tdo so well, pass it on to
perhaps even AI and say, hey,look at these conversations.
Can you analyze it and suggestwhat would be a better way of
overcoming these particularobjections?
Bring it back to the sales team, train them up on it and you
should see an improvement inconversion.
Speaker 1 (14:46):
Which is really exciting for any small business
person who's looking to growtheir business.
So conversion is ultimatelywhat it's what it's all about,
right?
Um, so so ai tools are part ofyour offering, but, but, um,
you've got other otherautomations that you you build
in as well.
Is that right?
Speaker 2 (15:04):
absolutely.
Yeah.
Yeah, because that software isso robust and it's got so many
tools.
Uh, we do find that somebusiness owners, they just get
either overwhelmed or or theydon't have time to properly
utilize it, like you know,because it's just a set of tools
and like you got to still likeconfigure the automations, build
your own funnels with it,things like that.
So we found not everybody hastime for that.
(15:24):
So some customers are like, hey, can you build it for us?
And so we then, um, what we'vedone is long, long story short
is we build a thing we call theProfit Roadmap Profit Roadmap
System, which is a combinationof 10 unique modules that fall
like Lego pieces into another,one into another.
(15:44):
They are ordered individually,they are set up in a particular
order and ultimately, eachmodule is installed into a
customer's account.
We configure the module forthem and with each module, the
ideas they get more profitable.
So just to give moreexplanation to it, the first
module is called the EssentialBusiness Marketing System and
(16:06):
that's one we installed into allour customers' accounts because
we found, at the end of the day, when it comes to sales and
marketing, what is the mostimportant thing is your list.
So the essential business modeldoes that.
It helps you build lists,newsletter signups and different
mechanisms, but also keeps yourlist clean.
So if somebody opt-outs, theycan easily opt-out.
If somebody's email address isno longer functioning, it
(16:29):
bounces, it'll automaticallydisable them from being able to
receive more emails.
So when you, as a businessowner, want to run your monthly
newsletters, you can be restassured that your newsletter is
going to the right inboxes andnot the bad ones.
And there's a thing calledascending domain reputation,
really really important.
A lot of people don't knowabout about this.
(16:50):
But if you spend, you know,like, put it this way, like if
you spend all this money ongenerating leads, paid ads and
whatnot, you're generatingcontacts and then you need to
nurture them through email.
But if you have got really badsetup, um, then you could be,
you know, you could be reallywasting money away on that.
So that's what?
So that's the first module.
And then we go like in the itemmodules such as reputation
(17:14):
management module, which helpsto automate way of feedback from
current customers, the whole,the whole thing.
By the way, like you, if youlook at it, you would see more.
Your number 10 is called artsoptimizing module, which is
optimizing your paid ads and wehad a questions like hey, why,
why wouldn't you like, have youknow paid ads at the beginning,
(17:35):
when it's like effective andreally quick?
Well, the argument to that is,yes, you can give money to
Facebook and they'll help yougenerate leads, but if you don't
have the underlying mechanismsto convert the leads, you don't
have the lead nurture systems inplace, and all that and it's
the only way you could do it isif you call people.
Great, but we found that not alot of business owners are that
(17:56):
organized and that like on pointto be able to call every single
day within five minutes.
So the profit room up modulethe profit room up system is is
done in a way where we focus onthe back end first, such as
reputation, be able to generatereferrals for business, be able
to increase customer lifetimevalue, things like that you can
do right away with the list thatyou have, and those are things
(18:20):
that are not costing you anextra money.
But once you got that dialed in, once you do have, like, proper
lead nurture system in placeand all those you know,
reactivation campaigns, allthose type of things then when
you spend dollar on anadvertising, you know that that
lead comes through into thesoftware.
Those automations will kick in.
The lead will be nurturedthrough, you know, initial
campaigns.
Your sales reps will benotified right away to call them
(18:43):
all those things and yourconversion is going to go up so,
but how long's the businessbeen going for?
so we had this business for fouryears on the software side, but
before that we've been doingagency services since, like 2013
, doing websites.
Speaker 1 (18:56):
Wordpress websites is where we started and how so you
launched four years ago.
How's it going?
Are you happy with progress?
Speaker 2 (19:04):
I'm very happy with progress.
Yeah, it did took a interestingside turn, uh, over the last 18
months, where we actuallystarted to work with US agencies
that needed help as well.
So we never intended to be ourtarget market, but you know
where the money flows.
Speaker 1 (19:22):
You wouldn't say no to that, so you know we do that
as well, yeah, so you'reactually exporting services from
Cambridge to the States,fantastic, fantastic.
And is there anything inparticular that you would?
What have you learned from thatkind of services exporting?
Have there been particularchallenges along the way?
Speaker 2 (19:42):
Not really.
It's been pretty smooth.
The only thing obviously a timezone.
So when you have like on amorning meetings, you've got to
line up the times.
But it's not too difficult.
You're just going to wake up alittle earlier, yeah excellent.
Speaker 1 (19:55):
And and how did you come to be in Australia?
You're from the Czech Republicoriginally.
Yes, yes, correct.
Speaker 2 (20:00):
Yeah, so originally 2010, as I came to Australia and
I was after living in Scotlandfor three years and you know I
was back in my 20s.
I was just partying and youknow, doing stuff that you do
when you become like anindependent individual.
You know longer living withyour parents, so initially it's
fun, but after three years ofdoing that I was like, yeah, I
probably should do somethingmore serious.
(20:21):
I was working in likeconstruction jobs and things
like that and partying on theweekends and, yeah, I got to do
something more serious andaround that time one of my mates
was leaving to Australia and sothat sort of sparked the idea
for me as well to do the same.
So 2010 is when I moved over toAustralia on a student visa and
I studied fitness and became apersonal trainer and did massage
(20:45):
therapy and got into gymmanagement.
I was very much into the wholefitness industry, gym management
.
I was very much into the wholefitness industry and that's
where my passion started forsales and marketing as well,
because I ran a business whereit was a bit more unorthodox in
a way, where, as a personaltrainer, I decided, rather than
paying a rent for like big boxgym, like fitness first, but you
have to pay like I don't knowfour grand franchise fee and
(21:06):
then three $400 a week rent, butyou still have to wear their
t-shirts.
I didn't quite like that idea.
I wanted to sort of build myown brand.
So I started training peopleout in a park and doing boot
camps and stuff like that.
But obviously the downside ofthat is you don't get access to
like a gym reception that theycan pass on leads, new members.
So I realized very quickly Ineed to generate my own lead.
(21:28):
So I built my own website andthen spoke to a mate of mine who
was working for some agents.
He gave me a few tips andmanaged to get my website up on
the first page in google forsearch term personal trainer in
Sydney.
Yeah, that's an awesome result,right yeah, and that gave me
like confidence and andunderstanding that this online
thing works if you do it well.
So that's why I've becomereally passionate.
(21:49):
I'm a bit of a nerd as well.
I like to build stuff andtinker with software and things
like that.
So, yeah, it's been fun.
It's been a fun journey.
Speaker 1 (21:56):
Yeah, so you've morphed from there into selling
essentially an online salestoolkit, which is really
exciting.
Speaker 2 (22:05):
Yep.
Speaker 1 (22:07):
Vip Muller.
Thank you so much for joiningus here on the Canberra Business
Podcast.
I'm Greg Harford from theCanberra Business Chamber.
I've been talking to Vit Mullerfrom Standout from the Pack, a
smart automation businessspecialising in capturing and
harnessing and closing moreleads using smart AI tools.
Now this podcast has beenbrought to you by the Business
(22:27):
Chamber with the support ofCareSuper, an industry super
fund with competitive fees andreturns, exceptional service and
a focus on real care.
Don't forget to follow us onyour favourite podcast platform
for more episodes and we'llcatch you next time.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
Thank you, Greg.
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