Ai: Irl

Did you know that each year farmers lose about 35% of their production to pests, like insects, weeds, and crop disease? Increasing that yield by just 2% would be life changing — in terms of profit for the farmer but also in terms of global food security.  Yet those fields have the potential to produce 35% more. Imagine the difference that would make. 35%. That’s what’s on the mind of Ofir Shlam and his team at Taranis. On this episode of AI:IRL, I sat down with Ofir to look at another way AI is changing lives. We talked about Taranis is applying AI to increase crop yields in agriculture, the framework they used to do that, and how this application of AI will make a positive impact around the world. 

Often times, people get caught up in technology for technology’s sake. But we should really be using technology more strategically to help us do one thing: make better decisions. With 25 years of experience, Gary Saarenvirta, Founder and CEO of Daisy Intelligence, is an expert at doing exactly that — implementing technology to help companies make better decisions. Daisy is focused on delivering AI powered technology that helps retailers make decisions that drive higher sales and profits. Gary came on the latest episode of AI:IRL to talk about the work he’s doing at Daisy, how you can leverage AI to make better decisions, and why we should view AI as augmenting human capabilities instead of replacing them.  

You only need to look at the media or read a news report to see that the retail industry is facing challenging times. There are big things about store closures, bankruptcy, etc.  But these challenging times bring plenty of opportunity, as well. Retailers must step up and focus on serving customers in an exquisite way. And with the rise of technology and things like AI, there is that opportunity to serve customers better than ever before.  On this episode of AI: IRL Oliver Banks joins me to talk about how retailers can think strategically about the digital transformation to create the best possible customer experience. 

It’s usually completely obvious when you’re speaking to an AI, right? Actually, that’s exactly the way it ought to be. I got to talk to Arjun Pillai, Founder & CEO at Insent.ai, about transforming engagement with prospects and customers through conversational AI. Within standard AI, Arjun is building a B2B conversational marketing platform that will enable marketing and sales to engage one-to-one with their prospects and give them a very personalized real-time experience supported by AI. “We are not trying to camouflage the bot as a human,” Arjun said. To learn how conversational AI will connect humans to humans in real time, listen to the podcast.  

This week’s episode is a followup to the excitement of the VentureBeat Transform conference in San Francisco. The discussion continues the discourse on how AI technology and humans can work together to create a new way to transform our world.  Today’s guest, Amit Ben, who is the head of AI at LogMein, dives into the historical relationship between humans and technology. Citing the first typewriter, he explains that adapting humans to technology has been the status quo for decades. However, with the influx of AI capabilities, that’s all about to change. 

We often touch on the opportunity to leverage AI to create a better user experience.  So, on this episode of AI:IRL, I invited Vittorio Banfi, a great subject-matter expert, to add to that conversation. Vittorio brings an interesting perspective on the mix of user interface and user design. Vittorio talked about his company, Botsociety, and how it came to be. He also shared two great points to keep in mind as you start experimenting with AI solutions in your own company. 

During our CXNext Event in Boston I had the chance to sit down with Mariya Yao, CTO at Metamaven and Founder of TOPBOTS. She had just given an excellent presentation, so I wanted to invite her onto the AI:IRL podcast to talk a little bit more about AI. In this episode, Mariya talks about what executives need to know to begin tackling machine learning.

When a company rolls out self-service capabilities, they have to be deliberate. Keeping use cases narrow is the way to go at first. It’s something that Patrick Quinlan, Senior Manager for Self-Service and Analytics at Citrix, has found out firsthand. In this one, Patrick shares how Citrix has rolled out a chatbot on their site—but also how KCS (Knowledge-Centered Support) is just as important as their customer-facing tech.

One of the primary ways any SMB can impact their online presence is by leveraging the power of SEO. On this episode of AI:In Real Life, we interviewed Rich Fong, CEO of Bliss Drive. Bliss Drive has a simple mission with a challenging task: Help businesses increase sales and leads by delivering incredible SEO results. We asked Rich for his top 5 SEO insights for SMBs. We wanted the most return for the least amount of effort. Here’s what he said.

There was a time when all the transactions of companies and their buyers were episodic. That time is past. With the proliferation of so many digital touchpoints, you no longer have to wait in line to speak to someone from a company. You can get instantaneous feedback from social media, WhatsApp, etc. It’s a challenge for companies to rise to that expected level of service. How can you do it? Listen in to hear Paddy Srinivasan, SVP Products and General Manager at LogMeIn, tell you. Also, be sure to check out CXNext, an upcoming event demystifying AI and machine learning.

The pharmaceutical industry is a lot like Texas. Everything is bigger there. Development costs are in the billions of dollars. Drug trials can last as long as a decade because they can’t find enough patients. On the most recent AI:IRL podcast, I spoke with Amitabh P. Mishra, President and Global CTO at Emcure Pharma Group, about how AI is changing his business and other industries as well. Mishra believes that artificial intelligence has the potential to facilitate every stage of the clinical trials process from matching eligible patients with studies to the data collection processes.

When the cost of drug development has increased a few hundred fold, how do find a way to cut expenses and time? AI to the rescue, according to Crystal Black, Director of Marketing Programs for Saama Technologies. The tonnage of data is mind-boggling: Patient monitoring devices produce over 86,000 readings per day. By 2025, 70% of clinical trial participants will be using wearable technology, creating even more data. There are 2 billion data points in a typical phase two trial that runs for six months with a hundred patients. That equals 200 billion data points. To learn how AI will help cut through all this data, listen to the podcast.

Which is a better therapist, an AI app or a human? According to two recent studies, an app is just as good and in some cases better than a human therapist. The app is called Woebot, a friendly AI powered chatbot that delivers cognitive behavioral therapy at scale to make such therapy much more accessible. In our latest AI:IRL podcast, we spoke with Woebot CEO and Co-Founder Alison Darcy, a clinical research psychologist out of Stanford University about why the app works so well. Woebot solves the issue of accessibility in three ways.   By being an app, it is always in your pocket and always available, it lowers the barrier to entry. You can get help the moment you need it. Unlike a human, Woebot can scale to serve many more people 24/7 for a few pennies worth of additional server space. It reduces stigma. The app moves people toward the idea that everybody has mental health and everybody must tend to it regularly. Think of it less as therapy, and more like the very popular meditation and brain-training apps.

What can conducting a symphony orchestra teach you about AI? Plenty, according to Lukáš Kovařík, symphony orchestra conductor and CEO & Founder of the AI consulting firm Bohemian AI. Kovařík was a guest at our latest AI: IRL podcast. AI hype is everywhere. For Kovařík the problem is baked into the name itself. You don’t often hear someone in any industry begging for the creation of a standards board to give needed transparency, but that’s what Kovařík believes will help educate the marketplace. He wishes for truth in labeling that would let AI customers know exactly what they’re buying with industry standards that everyone agreed were tested and independent. People can’t tell the difference between real AI and fake AI. They need to have marketing that’s grounded in reality.

In the final chapter of our three-part deep dive into improving your company’s customer engagement maturity model, we look at the customer engagement maturity level tactics you can deploy right now. This week we conclude our conversation with Ross Haskell and Amber Gregorio from LogMeIn’s Bold360 team about the Customer Engagement Maturity (CEM) Model Assessment they developed with Forrester Consulting.   You can find the amazing results of their research in their report Build Competitive Advantage Through Customer Engagement and AI on the Bold360 website. Deploying AI was the number one difference for those who saw the largest ROI.   AI is not going to replace people, but what it can do is it can help you to offload some of the more mundane tasks so that your people can do the really high value stuff. Things that require empathy, understanding persuasion maybe in a selling kind of environment.

How would you like a tactical advantage for your company that allows you to outpace your competition by an ever-widening margin, year after year? A recent two-year survey of 450 companies revealed that the higher a company’s customer engagement maturity model, the faster it outpaces its competition across key metrics, with the gap increasing year after year. This week we spoke with Ross Haskell, Lead Evangelist for Bold360 at LogMeIn, and Amber Gregorio, Senior Product Marketing Manager at LogMeIn, about a model they’ve developed with Forrester Consulting to help companies understand where they are in the customer experience spectrum. One of the silver bullets that helps improve companies at all levels of customer maturity is deploying AI into their customer workflows. Technologies like AI help a business become more efficient. Those companies that have already piloted and implemented AI are accelerating at a much faster pace than those that have not. Unfortunately, the data confirms that those setbacks compo

Thinking holistically about the customer experience journey can have a huge impact on the bottom line. Experts on the customer engagement maturity curve are 30% more likely to have double digit growth than companies with less advanced strategies. One of the challenges that companies face in closing the customer engagement maturity gap, is silos of people and technology. That manifests itself when customers who deal with one department are transferred to another area and they have a very different experience. Ross Haskell, Lead Evangelist, Bold360ai at LogMeIn, has a lot of expertise in helping companies deliver better customer experiences. Amber Gregorio, Senior Product Marketing Manager at LogMeIn, has a number of years of experience in the financial services industry.

Artificial Intelligence and machine learning deliver serious ROI when you’re dealing with large data volume, but sometimes you need to know when a human should intervene. There are also times when human marketers need to give up a little control to let the AI help drive the conversion process. Finding that happy medium is an ongoing challenge according to Jaime Romero, Global Head of Marketing and Customer Delivery at MRP, a leading global predictive intelligence organization, combining cutting-edge predictive analytics with a full suite of account-based marketing services to acquire new customers, faster. In this episode of the podcast, you’ll learn: Quantification Challenges Where AI Can Lead Where AI Needs Your Help

How helpful are the chatbots on your website? Are they good for resetting a customer’s password but not much else? Brian Bagdasarian, Senior Manager of Digital Engagement & Conversational Marketing Strategy here at LogMeIn, was not satisfied with that kind of chatbot. That’s why we brought him on to develop the conversational and digital engagement experience for each of our product families. His goal is very simple: make it simpler to start using the product and become a customer. Because he believes it’s possible to have a chatbot that can help you figure out which product is the best fit for you, what kind of plan you should be on and how to use the features in each tool. We’ll, it’s possible when you have the right team. On today’s episode of AI: IRL, Brian walked us through the 3 people you want on your chatbot development team.  

On the latest episode of AI: In Real Life, I sat down with Yoav Barel to talk about the opportunities, challenges, and successes we’re seeing in the conversational AI space. Yoav is an industry leader who’s been at the forefront of customer experience for quite some time. From personal interactions in store, to the app revolution, to now, when conversational interactions occur through chat bots, Yoav has been there for it all. He’s also the CEO and Founder of the Chatbot Summit, a community and conference series dedicated to conversational experiences.