 The evolution of good content can be speeded up, I think, with the technology. Welcome to the Smarter Building Materials Marketing Podcast, helping you find better ways to grow leads, sales, and outperform your competition. All right, everybody. Welcome to Smarter Building Materials Marketing, where we believe your online presence should be your best salesperson. I am Zach Williams, alongside my co-host, Beth Alpy Glove. And we've got a very fun additional co-host today on the show with us. We have our director of growth, Steve Coffey, on the show with us as well. Welcome to the show, Steve. Zach, I am chat GPT-ing, how to introduce yourself on a podcast. And my top result is, hello, I am Steve. It's a pleasure to be with you here today. So for our listeners today, we're talking about chat GPT and all things AI. I want to dive in. If you're not familiar with what chat GPT is. So chat GPT stands for generative pre-trained transformer. It's essentially a chat bot launched by OpenAI in November of 2022. And there's different versions of it, and Beth, just interject here if I'm missing something, but there's different versions of it. So they're constantly training this model of information to allow a person, a user to ask questions and then chat GPT this app, if you will, will spit back answers to you. So for example, you could say, hey, what is chat GPT? And it gives you the information right back at you. Very similar to Google, but what's where it takes a step further. Is it also can give you creative output. So the other day I was talking to Steve about coming on the show and I, he didn't really know very much about chat GPT. And so what I did, I was like, hey, give me a wrap written about something random that Tupac wrote and instantaneously it gave me a wrap. And I just took a screenshot and sent to Steve. And it was a very good wrap. Yes, it was a good wrap. And so is that a good enough explanation, Beth, is there anything you want to add to that? Yeah, I mean, the thing is it's not a chat bot isn't anything revolutionary. And if you didn't know that chat GPT was utilizing some new technology, it might not seem really significant to you. I think one of the best examples I've seen that really starts to put into frame how unique and how powerful it is. There's actually an advertisement that Mint Mobile is using. Have you seen this ad? So Mint Mobile is owned by Ryan Reynolds and they had chat GPT right there at, and that's literally what the ad says. Hey, I asked chat GPT, it's Ryan Reynolds talking to write a commercial for Mint Mobile in the voice of Ryan Reynolds. Tell one joke and swear one time. And he reads exactly what chat GPT created. So that's what makes it a little bit different is that amount of nuance is very unique to chat GPT. So it's not just scraping the internet for a general summary of whatever topic you ask it, but it understands nuance that it feels like humans should really only understand. Well, from perspective to the reason why this is such a big deal, if you compare the user base of chat GPT to let's say Instagram and Spotify. Instagram, it took 75 days to reach one million users. Spotify took 150 days to reach one million users. It took chat GPT five days. Oh yeah, it's also at max capacity all the time. So for any of our users, I was on the waitlist for like 30 days. I was very excited when I got in. Well, the other thing too, the reason why the site sometimes goes down. So if you go Google chat GPT, you'll find it is because they're training a new model. So they're currently on the third iteration. There's some actual graphs out there. We'll include it in the write up that showed the amount of data that chat GPT was trained on in the amount of data that the next version chat GPT for this train on. It's like exponentially greater. And so this has a lot of people concerned because it's not like, I mean, the idea of AI has been around for a while. Like I would make an argument that the AirPods that I'm using Siri is AI. I tell to do something, it does it where chat GPT is taking things further is that example that Beth gave. Hey, do this thing with this creative output within these constraints and output. And so that has a lot of people going, oh my gosh, what is this? You know, if we're training on bigger and bigger models, what is going to happen here? And I don't want to go down too far of a rabbit hole, but one of the companies that's really concerned about this is Google. So there's actually an article that got posted in the New York Times and I believe let me just make sure I get this correct. I was looking in this up beforehand to insider business insider as well that there was like a code red alert that happened within Google because people are going oh shoot and Google if people can just bypass us and get the get the information directly, there is no ads. So I pay for the mobile version of chat GPT because I like being able to ask questions and not have to pay and that I think that's the big difference between the platform. If you compare that to Google is that Google makes money off of ads and chat GPT is no ads. Just answers, you know, and so I was thinking about this the other day. I I cook a good amount and not as good as Steve, but you guys ever like Google like, hey, chicken macaroni recipe and then it gives you four recipes, right? And then you click on the site and then you have to scroll all the way to the bottom of the article because that article did a bunch of a bunch of SEO things that we all know you have to do in order to rank and history of chicken. Yes, it puts it at the very bottom, right? Yeah. And that's where you go. That's not happened. I don't have to do that. You're like, hey, give me four different recipes for the same thing and make sure it's gluten-free and make sure I can make it in 25 minutes. I'm done. Right. Did you see that bang came out in the last couple weeks saying they're going to incorporate chat GPT into their algorithm. Yeah. That's a big part of it too, which we don't have too much. We probably don't have time to get into that, but there's a lot of talk about how my how Microsoft is leaning into this even more smart. It's smart because meta and for my nose, Facebook and Google have had AI like these kinds of things for a long time, but nowhere to this extent that the quality of output has been nowhere near as good. So we could go at nauseum on this. But Steve, I want to hear like your initial reaction to this. Well, you know, I think we oftentimes don't realize how much AI impacts our everyday lives and we use search engines all the time. We use, you know, tools that have semantic search all the time and can understand us, but I don't think we fully grasp how much AI already makes decisions for us. How how how integrated is even in the building materials industry, just getting a product from point B, the technology that's that's used all the aspects of technology that's from the individual purchasing to all the way to getting the technology to build it to getting it to the end result. So I feel like chat GP T it has made it accessible in a unique way that offers me convenience, which I think to your point, Zach is Google has almost gotten a little bit inconvenient, whereas this removes a lot of that and it makes it way more accessible. So you're starting to get an idea of how how much it impacts your life. I think Google is actually part of the reason why this is happening because if you compare Google to 2015 to Google today, the search UX is not as is not where it once was. It's like there's 500 pixels of ad space, which you make my own ads, right? Because that's where people get information. I'm not saying it's not smart to do that, but people are like, I gotta go sort through that like versus just like give it to me immediately. It's like speed kills like Spotify got rid of, you know, BitTorrent and Napster and all of those because you could get the audio quicker. So this to me is like it's even quicker. So it begs the question of what's going to happen. You know, what's going to happen to our space? See if I don't want to get ahead of ourselves, but I was I was talking with somebody about this. I'm right before the show a friend of mine and I he's like, Hey, what do you think is going to happen? Yeah, I'll just say this. I don't think any I don't think I'll say two things. I don't think anyone knows exactly what's going to happen, but I do think that anytime there's been major influx of new technology, like if you take the Internet and the iPhone, for example, like those two things, people have had the very same reaction, like, Oh my gosh, this is going to kill a bunch of jobs. And it's actually been the opposite. More job creation has happened from this. So for example, like there's a site that's come out called promptbase.com where you can go and pay for prompts that people have come up with to get different types of creative output for chat GPT and other AI technology. So people are paying for, Hey, how do I train the chat to give me the type of output I want? You know, so for example, like one of the things you can buy is, uh, is an essay writer. Hey, write me an essay this way. Spit it out, put it this way. So I think that that's important too, but they're saying, Hey, what do you think is going to happen? I was like, you know, I think that the importance of originality and personal brand development is only going to increase. Like I told him, I was like, I think if I was, if I was Google, I would really lean into that because you're never going to get rid of the importance of authenticity and expertise. And where Google has, has made things more difficult is you don't really have a like average answers are everywhere. Authenticity is difficult to find. And so to your question, Steve, Steve, you asked me before the show started, like, what's this mean for manufacturers? I was like, the data we have says manufacturers are the number one source of information to architects, builders, contractors, et cetera. And I think the importance of the quality of information you're putting out and the level of connection and reliability you're giving your team is really, really important. So Zach, I have a whole list of questions for you, you, Beth as well. And they're very direct questions. I'll lean more towards the copywriting side of chat GPT and how it's utilized in that, in that world. Um, and this is to, to both of you, uh, do, can I get rid of my content writers? Can I get rid of the expense and can I use this to make me copy? I think it's a great question. And I think a lot of people are thinking it. I think it's an excellent question. So if you zoom out a little bit, Google got really concerned about AI over the last year because what's happened if you look at the internet, the influx of AI generated content has started to go like this. Just like through the roof. And so they started instituting all of these like reviewers of content that started going site by site by site and going, oh my gosh, does this look like AI generated content? And we're penalizing them. Like I know people who own websites who are penalized because they thought their content was AI generated and Google is trying to get rid of that. Um, what I think is that the importance of firsthand knowledge is only going to increase D but I would view this as a tool to rapidly test ideas. Okay. So like, let's say, for example, I'll give you an example. Okay. Let's say you sell a roofing product. Okay. And you're like, Hey, here's my content calendar for all the things I want to produce this year. What is going to hit the most? Like what's going to work the best out of all this content instead of going and giving this to a writer out of the gate all the content he is and working through that I would produce most of them pretty quickly review them internally and then rapidly execute and promote them. Right. From that, I would then go, okay, of those 20 ideas or 20 content pieces, which ones perform the best and then I would go back to my content writer who's got the A level expertise and then get them to take it a step further. So I think it will help prototyping and creativity on an exponential level. I think I think about more of as a tool for for writers to know what's going to work and resonate with my audience versus let me get rid of them completely. But you can feel free to disagree here. I know. I feel like that's very true on a personal level. I took a an email that I had written and put it into the chat and said, give me five bullet points on ways that I can make this better. And it actually gave me five bullet points on being more professional and being more readable, right? More easily readable. So I think the evolution of good content can be speeded up, I think with the technology. So I absolutely agree with you. I think it's a great way of going like, let me test a bunch of different ideas. Like there's no such thing as writer's block anymore. Like I was trying to, I was trying to think about the word scale recently. I was like, how do I describe the word scale like scaling a business? And I was like, give me 10 different ways someone could describe scaling a business. And I like quickly wrote it out. And the one that I like the most they're like, oh, it's outpacing cost. I was like, that's a really good way of putting it. And so I think it's your point, Steve, I don't know if it will get rid of your copywriter. I think it will will improve. If you use the tool the right way, it will improve the quality of output. So another question it'll improve quality and speed as well. So another question, Beth, if what it let's say I put something in there and it produces something that reads better than what my let's say what my agency has given me, right? A piece of copy. Does that mean that it's better? Does that mean that I should use what the chat spit out versus what the agency wrote? That's a great question. I would have a conversation with an agency or whoever wrote that about it because what you're going to get from AI is going to be about B level writing. It's not bad. And honestly, it's going to be about average because it's just a summary of what's already out there and then put into readable casual language. So I would ask the question, why does it read better? And is there is the information is accurate? Potentially it might read better because it's closer to casual conversational language. And so it just seems clearer. Maybe it's less technical. It's more relatable, more engaging. But I would want to know is the accuracy and the important information there and then have a conversation about potentially we need to marry the two. Hey, you have information to Zach's point. There's firsthand information, firsthand experience that the agency content has that. I don't see an AI, but I like the voice that I'm seeing here. And I think people are going to read this and understand it and remember it better. I agree with you, Beth. I think the other element of that is the expertise that the agency will have and understanding how it's going to interact with Google's algorithm, right? So it's written in a way that's going to effectively work with in terms of SEO, whereas chat GPT may be just focusing on the verbiage or the wording and it may sound better, but technically it may not. So you still need that voice of expertise in the conversation. Because we haven't quite gotten to the point where we can just rely specifically on that information. Yeah, I think that's a great point. Well, the thing I was going to say here to Steve is that I think if you ask chat GPT for use the example of a recipe earlier, it give me a recipe for chicken marsala. Okay, you're going to trust they might give you some ideas. Okay, but if I got that same recipe from someone who is like, let's say an influencer or somebody who's got clout, I'm going to trust that a little bit more. So we still trust brands for answers, whereas chat GPT, I think your point here, Steve is really good for spurring create creativity at the current state that could change down the road. But if you if I was to say, Hey, Steve, give me ideas. You're going to go to chat GPT if I'm like, Hey, Steve, what would you do in the scenario? What's the right roofing material or what's the right application of this product? You're going to go seek out the information because you still trust Google and the sources that gives you in your own decision making around. Do I trust that more than you trust a trained algorithm in the current state that may change, but in the current state, I would say that's how users perceive it. I think that's great. Next question is more around sales team. How can sales teams? Let's say specifically for manufacturers, how can they utilize this technology? What do you think, Steve? So I have a lot of thoughts on it and I think the I think I'd start out with the danger of sales teams using it and the danger of sales teams using it is actually veering away from the brand and the voice that the marketing team has established because if I'm using it and saying give me five email headlines that are going to win with CEOs that may may give me really good, you know, good email taglines, but it's not going to be it might not necessarily be in alignment with our marketing teams direction and staying in alignment with that is really important, even responding to individuals and refining the pitch that a sales rep may have that can veer away from that brand strategy. So I think the danger in sales teams using it because you can do a lot of things and you can do it really quick and quickly get down into this vortex of information that you're getting and using in your sales tactics with it. Obviously, I'm speaking from experience and I think it's important for you to reign back into the overall marketing strategy of the brand and make sure that you're in alignment with it using it though. However, I think it's important to make sure that you're evolving the current pitch that you have and you're using it to aid in more successfully communicating it. So I think the way that it can interact with your copy, it can refine how is this read? Example, I put in a chat, how can this specific phrase that I was using in responding to somebody on LinkedIn, I said, how can this be more relatable? And I actually use that term and so it actually gave me five bullet points on how that can be more relatable and A, B testing those things and seeing, hey, is this going to get more of a reaction out of somebody and actually communicate what I'm doing because I think to sales is, is this product, is this manufactured product in the building space? Is it really a benefit to this particular individual? Well, if it's not, I should be selling it to them. If it is, they need to know about it so I can use chat GPT to essentially refine that and make sure that I'm being more relatable and actually being that much more successful with the brand message that's already been established. I think there's still a lot to be learned from this. Like if we take this episode right now and we zoom out six months, like things are going to look very different. Like I'm trying to think of moments in my career where I felt like, oh my gosh, this is like a really big moment for technology like this moment right now. You know, I'm either going to go, wow, like, I'm going to look like, wow, this, um, I remember in 2010 or 2009, sorry, 2008, 2009, starting to see smartphones like really come up and trying to solve for that on mobile and going like, this is going to be really, really big starting to see like this is going to be really big. I think that there's something here. I don't know what it is yet. Like I don't know, um, but it's really interesting to me. I do think, as I said earlier on that the importance of brands building personal brands within their organization is going to become exponentially even more important. Like I don't see influencers going anywhere because everyone's going to question is that a bot. Okay. So for those of you don't know and I'm going to close in this Twitter was bought by Elon Musk and Elon Musk is also an investor in open AI, AKA chat GPT, right? What was one of the very first things that Elon Musk did when he started at Twitter? He got rid of bots. Why did he do that? Because he knows that where technology is going. You're not going to be able to know is that a bot who's typing that? Or is that an individual because the technology is getting so good. And so I'm just saying that to say that the importance of authenticity value creation is only going to increase on the part of brands who really want to stand out. So hopefully this is a valuable conversation. I feel like I monopolized a lot of it. I just think it's really, really interesting. It was good. Thanks, Steve. Great questions. Yeah. Thank you, Steve. I've got a lot more. I've got a lot more whenever you're ready. We'll do a part. Well, next time up for it. Yeah, we'll do a part two and we'll we'll ask your AI deepfake to come on. We can do that. Excellent. All right, everybody. We hope you enjoyed this episode. If you want more, check us out at vanvio.com slash podcast to subscribe. Till next time. I'm Zach Williams. Thanks everybody.