EPISODE OVERVIEW

Duration: Approximately 52 minutes

Best For: Business owners who are working 10+ hour days, skeptical about AI, and desperate to step away without everything falling apart

Key Outcome: Listeners will understand exactly where to start with AI automation to reclaim their time, plus gain the mental framework to stop being the bottleneck in their business

THE BOTTOM LINE

If you have been telling yourself that AI is too complex, that it does not apply to your business, or that you simply do not have time to figure it out, this episode will change your mind. Michael Elliott went from six months of crippling depression where he could not leave his house, to building a PPC agency that generated 100k in its first four months, then scaling into caravan parks, AI automation services, and micro-SaaS companies. His message is brutally honest: if you do not embrace AI, you are going to lose your business. But here is the good news. Michael breaks down exactly how business owners can start implementing AI in their sales processes TODAY to do what a team of 20 sales reps can do with four people. This is not about adding complexity. It is about finally getting your time back.

WHY THIS EPISODE MATTERS TO YOU

You will discover how AI sales automation can handle inquiry qualification automatically, freeing your team to focus on the 20 percent of leads that actually matter instead of drowning in admin

Michael shares how one client reduced their support workload by 56 percent in just six weeks, meaning their team now has capacity for growth instead of firefighting

You will learn the three-step framework for AI adoption that takes you from complete novice to outperforming 80 percent of business owners, without becoming a tech expert

If you keep putting this off, your competitors who embrace AI will operate with a fraction of your overhead while delivering faster response times to customers

KEY INSIGHTS YOU CAN IMPLEMENT TODAY

Speed to lead is everything. When an inquiry comes in, AI can respond within 10 seconds via text message, qualify the lead, and route them appropriately. This alone can transform your conversion rates and eliminate the bottleneck of waiting for staff to manually follow up.

You are sitting on a goldmine. Michael points out that businesses have millions of pounds worth of opportunity in their existing databases that they never touch. AI can automate reactivation campaigns to warm leads you have already paid to acquire.

Start with sales, not complexity. The biggest impact Michael sees for businesses is implementing AI in their sales processes first. This creates immediate ROI and builds confidence before tackling other areas.

Protect your energy windows ruthlessly. Michael is an absolute demon between 8am and 3pm, but trying to push through after that yields only 20 percent of normal productivity. Know your peak hours and guard them.

Fifteen hours will change your life. Michael recommends spending 5 hours watching YouTube tutorials, 5 hours experimenting with ChatGPT, and 5 hours exploring make.com or n8n. This minimal investment puts you ahead of 80 percent of business owners.

GOLDEN QUOTES WORTH REMEMBERING

"If you don't embrace it, you're going to lose your business. That's a fact." - Michael Elliott on AI adoption

"I could do what a team of 20 sales reps can do with four people." - Michael Elliott on AI sales automation

"The basketball finally hit the floor. I was in freefall for six months, and then one day I felt one percent lighter. That's all it took to start climbing back." - Michael Elliott on depression and recovery

"Every day when I put my head on the pillow, I know that I gave 100 percent to that day. I'm not looking at somebody else. I focus like a horse with blinkers on my own race." - Michael Elliott on entrepreneurial focus

"If you're in a position where data entry is a big part of what you do, your job's not safe. Seriously." - Michael Elliott on AI disruption

QUICK NAVIGATION FOR BUSY LEADERS

00:00 - Introduction: Meet Michael Elliott, serial entrepreneur who transformed tragedy into business success

04:30 - The Year Everything Changed: How near-death experiences shaped an entrepreneurial mindset

12:15 - Rock Bottom Depression: The six months that became the best thing that ever happened

18:40 - The Pivot Point: How COVID revealed the path to business freedom

24:20 - Building the PPC Agency: From 3,000 pounds to 100k in four months

30:45 - The AI Automation Revolution: Why business owners must embrace it now or lose everything

36:30 - Speed to Lead: How AI sales automation transforms conversion rates overnight

42:15 - Real Results: A SaaS company went from 22 percent to 78 percent first-response close rate

47:00 - The 15-Hour Challenge: Your minimal investment to get ahead of 80 percent of business owners

50:30 - Conclusion: Where to start and how to connect with Michael

GUEST SPOTLIGHT

Name: Michael Elliott

Bio: Michael Elliott is a serial entrepreneur and AI automation specialist who built his PPC agency from zero to six figures in four months. After spending six years as SEM Director at a major UK agency, he now helps businesses implement AI systems that dramatically reduce overhead while improving customer response times. His portfolio includes a 7-million-pound turnover caravan trade business, multiple micro-SaaS companies, and clients including Vitabiotics, Perfect Draft, and DirecTV.

Connect with Michael:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelelliottai/

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@michaelelliottai

Instagram: instagram.com/michaelelliott.ai

Facebook: facebook.com/michaelelliottai

YOUR NEXT ACTIONS

This Week: Download ChatGPT or Google AI Studio and spend 30 minutes each day asking it questions about your business challenges. When you get the perfect answer, ask it to write you the system prompt that would have given you that answer the first time.

This Month: Map out your sales inquiry process from first contact to close. Identify every manual touchpoint where someone has to respond, qualify, or route a lead. This is your automation goldmine.

This Quarter: Implement one AI automation in your sales process. Start with automated text message responses to new inquiries that qualify leads before your team even picks up the phone.

EPISODE RESOURCES

Tools mentioned:

- ChatGPT by OpenAI

- Google AI Studio

- Perplexity Comet (AI-powered search browser)

- Make.com (no-code automation platform)

- n8n (no-code automation platform)

- Closedbot (AI conversation flows)

- Botpress (AI conversation platform)

- Go High Level (CRM and automation)

- HubSpot (CRM)

- Freshdesk (customer support ticketing)

- Gamma (AI presentation builder)

- OpenAI Agent Builder

- Google Opal and Project Mariner (emerging AI tools)

YouTube Channel: Michael Elliott AI - live builds of automation flows and AI implementation tutorials

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READY TO ESCAPE THE TRAP?

Take the Freedom Score Quiz: https://scoreapp.atpbos.com/

Discover how trapped you are in your business and get your personalized roadmap to freedom in under 5 minutes.

Book a Free Strategy Session: https://www.atpbos.com/contact

Let's discuss how to build a business that works WITHOUT you.

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CONNECT WITH YOUR HOST, ROY CASTLEMAN

Roy is the founder of All The Power Limited and creator of Elevate360, a business coaching system for entrepreneurs ready to scale without burnout. As a certified Wim Hof Method Instructor and the UK's first certified BOS UP coach, Roy combines AI automation, wellness practices, and business operating systems to help trapped entrepreneurs reclaim their freedom.

Website: www.atpbos.com

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/roycastleman/

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@allthepowerltd

How we doing power movers Today we've got Mike Elliot

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and Mike is a serial entrepreneur. He has done a

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lot of work with Google. He's now in, up in

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Skegness in the UK where he has caravan park business.

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He has a Google Ads business. And he also has

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a story to tell. It has a story to tell

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about how wellness can really impact who, who we are

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and who we become. Mike, let me just go straight

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into you, thank you for joining me and tell us

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a bit more about your story. No problem, Roy. I'm

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absolutely excited to be here and share my journey with

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the, with the listeners. I've got quite a, quite a

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unique story. I've had a lot of ups and downs

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which has pushed me to where I am today. That

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is something that has shaped me. So I'll probably, if

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you don't mind, start from day one, which is growing

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up. I grew up in Sheffield. I'm from Sheffield originally

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and I come from a very poor family at the

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time, not now that my, even my mum and dad

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are successful now, but at the time we. My mum

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was watering down milk to feed me when I was

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born. Dad was working two jobs, was never at home

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like. And that I owe them everything because otherwise I

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wouldn't be here to go through that stage. That slowly

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improved. But I had quite a turbulent sort of period

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in my life at 8 years old, which I didn't

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comprehend at the time but now I can comprehend at

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60, at 16, my brother's age was 16, I was

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8. At that age. When it come down to,

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to me, my brother had a motorbike accident and he's

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now got seven metal plates in his face. He was

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on life support. He was like being fed for a

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tube for months. We thought we were going to lose

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him and that was a, that was a really big

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hit for the family. But what was under the sleeve

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that nobody knew was actually, even though he was only

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16, his partner at the time was pregnant with his

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baby and she revealed that to my mom when she

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was in the hospital while Mark was. My brother's called

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Mark whilst he was on life support. So obviously that

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caused huge amounts of stress. That baby, he survived by

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the will of God. Touchwood. I love my brother. He

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survived but then when the baby was born nine months

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later, the baby was born with down syndrome. But not

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only that and they often have heart problems when you

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have. When babies are born with downs. He is my

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best buddy, his name's Lewis. I love him to pieces.

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He literally is my best friend. But he, he went

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down for an open heart surgery. I think it was

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five days old or four days old. They had to

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go down for open heart surgery and there was a

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terrible story and if the family members just by chance

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happen to listen to this lab, so sorry for your

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loss. But at that exact moment that my nephew went

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down for his operation, another Indian family had the exactly

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the same scenario in Leeds Hospital. Their baby was born

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with downs very similar operation to operation to Lewis. When

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they came out one baby made it and one baby

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didn't and the baby that made it was my nephew

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which obviously I'm thankful for but desperately sorry for the

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other family and that happened obviously all in the space

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and I don't know, seven, eight months, seven, eight months

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from the accident the baby was born. My brother was

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still recovering like my brother was still for many months

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been fed for a tube like it was really bad.

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His jaw was all wired shut. But then it got

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even worse because three months after that my dad had

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a heart attack. He died. They brought him back with

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the defibs and he's still with us today. But I

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could have lost my brother. My brother now has four

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sons so I would have not had four nephews that

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I have in my family and my dad in the

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space of a year. And. That was at

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the time I didn't really understand it but looking back

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now I understand how lucky I am like for that

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to have happened. Not for it to have happened but

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for the fact that they're still here. Moving on to

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my later as I aged, we moved to Skegness. Because

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of that my mum and dad wanted a fresh start.

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We moved. My brother and sister stayed in Sheffield, we

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moved to Skegness and in Skegness is where I grew

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up. Great place to be. It's not just this holiday

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place where everyone comes. If you do live here it

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is a lovely place for kids to grow up. Generally

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speaking there's not much crime etc so I had a

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good childhood. There wasn't much to say between the age

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of 8 and 16 for me there wasn't apart from

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the fact that I had a girlfriend at the time

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and it was really serious relationship to me. We were

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in love with each other and it was like something

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that was like it was going to. It felt like

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it was going to last forever. But we were going

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to university and we went to study at Sheffield Hallam.

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She fell pregnant when she was 18 and that was

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like first year of university. And what happened was

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simply this and I take all the responsibility for this

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what happened was, is that I didn't grow up and

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be the man that I needed to be for the

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family at that time. There's no feelings there now or

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anything. But I just. I didn't do what I should

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have done at that time. I should have stepped up,

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being there, provided. Etc. It was only later in life

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to give myself some leeway and credit, which is true.

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I was still a baby myself at 18. You're not

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a man at 18. Even though people say you are,

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you're not. I'm looking back now at 33, thinking how

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I felt at 18. And I know full well that

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I am a completely different individual. But I didn't grow

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up in time. I was too busy drinking, taking recreational

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drugs at the time at partying too much instead of

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being with the. With the family. Not that I wasn't

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there, but I wasn't there enough. Ran out of chances

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effectively, if you like, if that's how you call it.

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We split up, university finished. I came back to Skegness

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because basically because she came back to Skigness with my

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baby and I wanted to be around. I carried on

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the drink and recreational drugs, partying with my friends, feeling

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like I was on top of the world. Everything, freedom,

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this and that, like everything was good. And I woke

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up. This is just the genuine, honest truth. If you've

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never experienced depression, I. I can't explain it to you

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any better than this. I woke up one day and

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I felt like the whole world's weight was on my

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shoulders. I woke up. I literally woke up and I

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felt like it. It wasn't something that gradually built. I'm

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sure it did mentally, but I didn't feel it. The

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drugs and alcohol wouldn't have helped, but it gradually built

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up to a stage where I was like, boom. I

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realized what I'd lost. I realized I wasn't going to

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grow up with my eldest daughter. I realized that I'd

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lost my partner at the time. And it hit me

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like a steam train. So much so that I didn't

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leave the house for six months. So my mum and

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dad were actually worried about like the most serious of

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events happening. I was that bad. Like I was literally.

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I would cry in the shower. I have no shame

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in this because the biggest killer in men under 35

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is. Is suicide. And I share this with people because

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I never actually thought about it. I have to say

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that never crossed my mind. But what I'm saying is

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that I understand how you can feel that way for

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whatever reason it is when it hits you, there is

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nothing you can do about it. There was no. I

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tried everything. I tried, literally. I was trying to get

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myself out of it. My mum and dad were trying

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to help me out of it. Family members, I felt

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alone. Friends that were there for me before were no

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longer there for me anymore. The three or four friends

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that stuck around are the only three or four friends

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I'll. I have to this day and I will only

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ever have unless it's in business. And I went through

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a horrible period. But you know what? I am so

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thankful for that, that six months is the best thing

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that ever happened to me. And I say that because

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on a lot of people have an entrepreneurial spirit, but

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because they never hit rock bottom. They get caught in

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the nine to five rat race, they get caught in

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the wheel, they don't ever have any adversity so therefore

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they end up in a position where they're comfortable, they

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get a job, they earn 40k a year, they, they're

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happy 9 to 5, they enjoy their weekends, they get

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28 days in the UK annual leave. It's like they,

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they have that lifestyle and they never really get pushed,

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push to do anything. Whereas me, I like pick a

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basketball up and drop it in the air. I was

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in freefall for six months, just dropping and as soon

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as I hit the floor, I woke up one day

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and all that happened was I felt 1% lighter. It

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didn't go away, but I felt 1% lighter than the

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day before and I could feel it. I was still

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depressed, I still didn't leave the house but I felt

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1%, 1% lighter. Fast forwarding onto the entrepreneurial stuff.

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I then got a job at a PPC agency and

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it's again fate. I was meant to go and have

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an interview somewhere else and on the day that happened,

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my car was parked on a hill and it had

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snowed and I couldn't get the car out of the,

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out of the hill to get to the interview. I

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was late to the interview, therefore didn't get the job

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because being punctual is important. Didn't get the job. Two

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days later I had the interview at the marketing agency

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of the PPC executive role. Got the job, worked my

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way up to SEM Director at that agency. It was

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quite a large agency in the uk, had quite a

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few staff members, learned everything there is to know about

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digital marketing over the course of that period of time.

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And yeah, it was SEM director for six years, six

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and a half years and then something even more. I'm

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a big believer in fate. Some people think it's nonsense,

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but for me, I believe it. And what happened was

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Covid came around. And guess what? My heart goes out

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to all the millions of people that lost their life

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to Covid. Genuinely, like it was a horrible thing. But

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Covid was the best thing, the second best thing to

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ever happen to me. Because what happened was I wasn't

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furloughed. I was put working from home. And as soon

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as that happened, I realized that if I can do

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this from home at this desk, with this computer, this

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phone and the Internet, I can do it for myself.

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I don't need to work for anyone else. All of

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that pain that I felt, the heartbreak, the way people

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treated me, the things that happened during that time, the

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bounce back, the education, the analysis, the understanding, it lit

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a fire in me that is still there right now

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as we speak. That fire, I still feel it every

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day. Every day when I wake up, I have the

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fire. And every day when I put my head on

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the pillow, I know that I gave 100% to that

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day. I'm not looking at somebody else who's got 80

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million. And as a Lambo and this and that, whatever

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he's running or she's running her own race, I focus

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like a horse with blinkers on my own race. And

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I get the best out of every day I possibly

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can because that's all I can control. I can't control

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anything else. One of the most stupendous things that somebody

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can do in business is look at their competitors. Not

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analyze their competitors, but look at their competitors growth and

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think that they're doing something wrong. You should stay in

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your own lane. So then I launch a PPC agency.

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I sit down, I had a conversation with a friend

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of mine. He came around my house. He'd quit the

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agency a year before. He looked me in the eye,

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he said, don't take offense to this, but watching you

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still be at that place right now tells me all

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the reasons why I left. The very next day, I

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handed my notice in at the agency. I quit. I

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went on my own. I had £3,000 in my bank

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account. I had a two month old baby. I had

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nothing. It was back against the wall time. It was

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like fight or flight. Like I was either sinking or

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I was like. It was sink or swim. And that

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best possible way, that's the best possible fire. Exactly what

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I was going to say. People who don't feel that

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pain, that's why they stay in the nine to fives.

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They don't have that Feeling I wasn't scared of. I

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wasn't scared of going to the edge because like I'm

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from the edge. I've been depressed, I've been this and

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that. I know what it feels like to be there.

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I'm not scared of going there. It doesn't matter. It's

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okay. Like you'll be okay through the other side of

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it. So I just took the leap of faith, my

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friend. And you know what happened? I made 100k in

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4 months. Amazing. And my salary was 35k. I then

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went and hired a girl called Chloe who I am

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forever indebted to from the agency I used to work

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at. Right. Because I'm not going to go into too

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many details but looking back now, it wasn't a very

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nice place to work frankly. I'm not going to say

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the name but when it comes down to her, I

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knew she was still in that position. I spoke with

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her and she took a massive pay cut to come

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and work for me. I'm talking like 15 grand, 18

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grand a year pay cut to come and work for

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me. And that was effectively like 40 of a salary

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basically or whatever to come and work for me. And

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the reason, I've shared a bit too much personal info

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about her there, but that's fine when it comes down

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to the, the leap. The only reason she came is

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because she knew what I was capable of and she

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saw the fire. Because she'd worked with me for so

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long, she knew, she knew I could sell. One thing

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I've always been able to do is sell anything. I

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could sell ice to the Eskimos, mate. Like I could

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sell. If I'm selling something, I can sell it. Like

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as long as I know what I'm selling, it's easy,

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it's easy for me. So she came and took the

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leap with me. I'm not going to bore you with

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the intricacies now. There's a small team in that PPC

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agency that all worked at that previous agency that I

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give a better quality of life to. I pay them

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better salaries, I look after them, I look after their

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children, I look, I'll make sure that everything is taken

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care of. But that agency has allowed me to diversify

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and basically like most entrepreneurs, this is the like bread

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and butter way is that people have a cash flowing

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business and then they buy houses. That's a really common

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thing. You see a lot of people do that. I

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hear a lot of people do that cash flowing business.

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They'll buy a house every year or two or multiple

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if they can afford it, depending on how big the

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company is. I own houses but I also invested in

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other companies such as a caravan trade business which turns

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over like 7mil a year. I also have invested in

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micro SaaS, companies that I'm building out now literally as

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we speak. And I pivoted about three years ago. I

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say pivoted, I don't mean pivoted as in I went

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away from it. PPC is still my main bread and

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butter, but I know what's coming in the future from

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an AI perspective and I knew that I had to

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follow that trend. So I basically got behind AI. I

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now implement systems for some of the world's biggest clients.

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Vitabiotics, Perfect Draft, directv out of the us, implementing automations,

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managing PPC campaigns for them, automating businesses and basically saving

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them time and money. And yeah, any business owner listening

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to this that hasn't implemented AI yet, like, seriously, you

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need to get a move on because you are going

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to. I'm going to come back to a in a

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second because I think, yeah, this is going to be

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an interesting discussion but I just wanted to really touch

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on. Yeah, yeah, there's this piece on wellness that, that

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I focus a lot on wellness and we can talk

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about this in more detail. Yeah, for me I had

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a similar situation. I built up companies over 20 odd

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years. I've got three IT companies in London and I've

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got all the power which is this business. And I

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also got to that edge. I got to that edge

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of actually just about taking the jump off the building

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in terms of being that depressed and losing millions of

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pounds during COVID and. Yeah, so I understand that. Rock

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bottom. Yeah. And I understand that another thing that is

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so missing at the moment in the business world, which

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is one of the things that I really like to

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talk about is this mental strength and mental resilience and

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then physical strength and physical resilience. We don't equate that

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to profit and we should because we're all after the

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profit. Yeah, I was working 14 hours a day. I

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was working. Yeah. Oh yeah. I literally ran myself at

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the ground. I ended up in hospital with the first

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colon because of the stress. And yeah, I've been at

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the bottom of that barrel so many times and I

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would much rather now go and go on a holiday,

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leaving things to themselves and have some good, a good

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time than just chase after that money. Yeah. Because the

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mental piece is so important. I get up every day.

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This morning I got up, I did some breath work,

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I did a Meditation. After this, I'll probably go and

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do some workout, get into the ice bath. And that

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for me, it gives me the energy in the moment,

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it gives me power at the moment. Yeah. And from

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there I can actually do good work. What is your

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take on just the importance of understanding where you are

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mentally? So my understanding of where I am mentally,

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I've been medicated ever since then, so I am still

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medicated for that because of how bad I was. I'm

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still to this day, and I openly admit because like,

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again, if someone's listening to this, it might save a

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life. And that's why, that's why I tell it like

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I am medicated. You would, if you met me in

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real life and you, I don't know, we went out,

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we played a round of golf or whatever it was

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that we did, you would not believe for one second

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that I could ever suffer from depression or anxiety or

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anything like that. You won't believe it because I'm outgoing,

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I'm like, I'm always there to help. I speak to

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anybody in a room. Like, I'm so charismatic. You, it's

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not, it can be so well hidden that you don't.

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You should never look past anything. I am the first

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person to ask if someone's all right when it comes

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down to my own health. A couple of things. One

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thing, I don't look after my health enough in terms

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of exercise, which is definitely something on my agenda for

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2026 because I've been for the last four and a

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half years in strict grind mode. And I put that

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on the back burner. But as you clearly know, if

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you do that for too long, you will burn out.

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No matter who you are. It doesn't matter how much

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fire you've got, no matter how much you've got inside

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of you. And energy. I'm still young, I'm 33. So

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yeah, I've got that on my side. But when it

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comes down to that work life balance I actually do

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have, what I do is I work extremely hard. And

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then what I tend to do is I tend to

363

go on holiday every eight weeks. So I literally take

364

a break every eight weeks or so. So I graft.

365

I spend time with my daughters on the weekends or

366

in the evenings. I graft as I can. I do

367

10 hour days, like, but then every eight weeks there's

368

a 10 day trip and then that 10 day trip,

369

I just completely reset. Don't get me wrong, you'll know

370

as an entrepreneur and a business owner, you never really

371

are away from the business, you're always on call if

372

you like, but 80% of the workload's gone and I'm

373

just sat on a beach chilling and I just have

374

to answer a few questions, maybe give a few yeses

375

and nos and approve a few things. I don't have

376

to do anything that's strenuous. So that's how I balance

377

it. So the health thing, the gym, etc, I did

378

during COVID like when I first started out and I

379

was in the best shape of my life. Now, not

380

gonna lie to you, slightly overweight. Nothing crazy, but slightly

381

overweight. But it's obviously I'm sedative, I sit at a

382

computer all day, all my work is like that. I.

383

The way that I manage my mental health is, is

384

by surrounding myself with people who love me. And what

385

I mean by that is like I set dedicated time

386

to. Okay, this hour is, you're going to go and

387

play games with your daughter. You're going to go and

388

play. You're going to go and play. You said something

389

to me earlier which I found really interesting before we

390

got on here. You're like, okay, it's still morning time

391

here. I'm still got my energy until about 3 o'.

392

Clock. And yeah, this energy piece for me is so

393

important, right. I get up in the morning, I get

394

up at 5 o', clock. Let's say I do my

395

morning routine and that really bounces me out. But then

396

I know from an energy perspective I have my, my

397

best brain work from say 7:30. Yeah. Until 12, 12:30.

398

And then I'll do these kind of podcasts and then

399

I'll do the things that are more mundane. So just

400

understanding that energy piece, understanding where you're most effective just

401

means you get more out of the day, right. Do

402

you know what people do? And I've been guilty of

403

it when I'm trying to do a big task. But

404

I'll tell you exactly what people do, what they do

405

is when I in the morning, right, between eight and

406

three. Three, like I say, between eight and three. I

407

am an absolute demon. And what I mean by that

408

is I am so productive. Like I, I don't know

409

if it's OCD or what, but I am just like

410

knocking tasks off of my list. YouTube videos for my

411

YouTube channel, onboarding clients for my PPC agency, scoping AI

412

automation projects for my AI agency. I'm absolutely on fire.

413

You can't stop me. It's like something like, don't, no

414

one disrupts me. My partner knows. Don't disrupt me. This

415

is, I'm in the mode what happens if I try

416

and work? Let's say I, let's say my partner and

417

my daughter have gone away for two days with them

418

to see a mum. Let's say she lives in Durham,

419

let's say they've gone there. If I try and sit

420

there from three till seven, yeah I will get 20

421

done of what I would have done in those same

422

hours the following morning. Yeah. No matter how hard I

423

try I've lost the motivation. My, my brain is telling

424

me you're fried mate, you need a break. And instead

425

of just taking the break even if it was just

426

to go away for a couple of hours, go for

427

a walk, walk the dog, do, go to get something

428

to eat, cook, do something and then come back that

429

would be, that even, that would be enough but instead

430

whenever I try and push through I fail. So I'm

431

a strong believer in that. Yeah, I can't, I'm not

432

a liar so I, I won't ever say that I

433

meditate, I do this, I do that. I wouldn't ever

434

come on here and start trying to preach things I

435

don't do but I do protect my sanity with. We're

436

gonna, we're gonna have a conversation after this because yeah,

437

yeah I think there's a lot of alignment and yeah

438

so let's move on now. Just super interesting journey so

439

far. Yeah, yeah the future, the future is here now.

440

It's coming, it's AI. I've spent two and a half,

441

three years in AI now just going deep into it,

442

understanding the automations, understanding where we're going and yeah we

443

were talking about business owners and not necessarily looking into

444

AI at all. People are a bit scared of it

445

and yeah I really dig into AI as just a

446

tool. It's a tool that you can use. You need

447

to know how to use it effectively, you need to

448

know how to use it efficiently. But then what do

449

you use it for? You know what I'm really working

450

with business owners on now is what are the business

451

functions that you're a trying to automate? People don't have

452

the right SOPs, they don't understand what they're actually doing

453

and then B from that point of view once you

454

know what you're doing, how do you do it so

455

that you can bring more human back And I really,

456

yeah, I really think that the companies for the of

457

the future are going to be those companies that are

458

able to be much more human and then use the

459

AI to automate Things in the background. If I could

460

have a team of people working six hours a day

461

instead of 10 hours a day and they're doing five

462

times as much to me, that's going to be a

463

win, win. Right, where do you see AI is at

464

the moment? What are the things that you're using it

465

for? And what would be your advice on people actually

466

thinking about getting into a. So the biggest thing that

467

I implement for businesses, that has the biggest impact. Let

468

me. Sorry, let's remove that. The biggest impact that I

469

see for businesses when it comes down to AI and

470

where I always advise that they start is in their

471

sales processes. Yeah. What you'll often find traditionally is like,

472

what did you do? Go back. What? The AI age

473

is no different to every other age that we've gone

474

through, the digital age. We're in the digital age now.

475

We've gone through the agricultural age. Land was king. We've

476

gone through the industrial age where offices and factories and

477

all of that, that, that was king. Now we're in

478

the digital age. And it's no different of a transition.

479

It's just technology is what's taking over. People need to

480

understand it from a basic human history perspective first. If

481

you're worried about AI, just look at what's happened in,

482

in, in history. Does everybody remember putting a CD in

483

a Walkman to walk around to listen to you, to,

484

to your music? Everybody. Maybe you're your age and older,

485

but the youngsters. Exactly. So at my age, I remember

486

walking to school, you know, I'd have this in there.

487

I would have like my 50 cent CD or whoever

488

I was listening to at the time. I'd have that

489

CD in there and I was playing it. Guess what?

490

Then came the ipod and the ipod mini. You could

491

have the music on it and just click it and

492

it would clip to your clothes. And then all of

493

a sudden, now it's like music's on demand on an

494

app, on your phone. Like you can get anything on

495

this, literally anything on, on the planet Earth. Were you

496

scared when, like your house telephone went to a mobile

497

telephone? It's the same evolution, just at a different scale.

498

So back on track to business. When it comes down

499

to businesses, that's why they shouldn't be scared of it.

500

If you don't embrace it, you're going to lose your

501

business. Right. That's a fact. If you don't embrace it,

502

you're going to lose your business. AI trained. We have

503

different levels of people. People come to us, they say,

504

we've already tried to implement AI, but it's not working.

505

Can you help us fix it, etc. There's inefficiency. We

506

also have people that come saying we have no idea

507

what to do. But there are effectively. I'll give you

508

a few of the main net areas. Speed to lead.

509

Traditionally inquiry comes through the door. Now let's say you're

510

an accountant. A sales member picks that up an hour

511

later, an hour and a half later, no one answers.

512

They send an email, they try them the next day.

513

We've set up a task manually in HubSpot or something.

514

Try them again, try call, no answer, send them an

515

email again. Slowly they die because fresh inquiries have come

516

through that you've been speaking to. There's no active retention,

517

there's no active ongoing reactivation business. There's none of that.

518

There's businesses out there sat on millions of pounds worth

519

of work in their databases and they're not even touching

520

them. If you implement AI into your sales process, an

521

inquiry form is submitted and 10 seconds later they receive

522

a text message that can have a two way backwards

523

and forwards. Even if you wanted the text message just

524

to say thank you for your inquiry, we've received it.

525

A member of team is going to give you a

526

call. Is there an ideal time or do you have

527

any questions? And then you use something like go high

528

level and close bot, which is Closed bot's my favorite.

529

There is bot press which is also exceptional but closed

530

bot is the one that I use. You build out

531

these flows and you can send answers depending on what

532

they say. Let's say you are a digital marketing agency

533

and then you receive an inquiry but you don't know

534

whether that inquiries, ppc, SEO, email marketing. The first question

535

the AI will ask is so thank you for your

536

inquiry, what services are you interested in? If it's ppc,

537

it will go the PPC route. Okay, are you currently

538

running ads or are you brand new? Then it will

539

go down two different branches. If they're running ads, it

540

will do. Say one thing, if they're not, it's the

541

other. So what I'm trying to get at here is

542

just it streamlines the business. No one cares really about

543

the tools and complexity like closed bar etc. The fact

544

is it improves your efficiency as a business. It makes

545

you look more professional, it makes you more efficient, your

546

conversion rates will be higher, there's less pressure on your

547

staff members. From a sales perspective, it weeds out any

548

completely good inquiries. Spam calls, spam things that you get,

549

whatever spam, spam form submissions, it weeds them out straight

550

away. And your staff can focus 80% of their time

551

on the 20 that matter. And you can do what

552

a team of 20 sales reps can do with four

553

people. Yeah. Because you have the qualification process already automated.

554

The next one to move on. Because I want to

555

give some value on where you can focus customer relationships

556

and customers customer support you can plug in. I've done

557

this recently for a client called the Reporting Hub out

558

of Canada. Basically they use fresh desk. They're a SaaS

559

business. They use fresh desk for tickets. If there's a

560

problem with their SAs, someone submits a ticket, right? Their

561

response rate, first response close rate of tickets that got

562

opened. Think about it, someone opens a ticket with them,

563

that ticket now open, their business has to deal with

564

it. Their first response close rate was 22%. After

565

six weeks of me implementing a bunch of other automations

566

alongside that, their first response close rate is now 78%.

567

Well their. So their sales support team are actively in

568

a position where they're twiddling their thumbs. They're not really.

569

I just use that analogy to make it like to

570

showcase like 50, what was it? 50? 57, 56 of

571

their work is gone. So that's disappeared. Guess what? Now

572

for the major tickets where there are major complex issues,

573

everybody is at hand to fix them quicker. You bring

574

the human back, right? You bring the human back. Yeah.

575

And it's all, it's not AI making it up from

576

thin air. They've built out a really detailed knowledge base

577

that it pulls this information from. And no, AI is

578

not correct 100 of the time. It isn't. But that's

579

why you have fallbacks in place that if there's an

580

issue and something seems to get stuck, it pings a

581

real life employee to take it over. But if you

582

can get a 98%, 97% hit rate as a first,

583

like with things like that, a 97% correction, you trade

584

off the other 3%. Because the gains you make, especially

585

from sales or ticketing issues like that SAS business, the

586

gains you make from efficiency there and time spent, less

587

overhead on staff members, staff members focusing on what actually

588

matters and growing the business like all of those things

589

suddenly become possible. Whereas what you would have to do

590

normally is you would have to go out and hire

591

another sales member to handle the, the processes. You can

592

do it for a fraction of the cost. That's the

593

thing now, right? Yeah. If we're looking at, if we're

594

sitting here as business owners and I've got A few

595

of my clients, new entrepreneurs that just starting out and

596

the opportunities now to build, grow and scale your company,

597

just amazing. If you just. I wouldn't go and say

598

learn AI, because that's the joy of AI. You don't

599

need to learn it. It will tell you everything you

600

need to know, depending on what tool you're using and

601

how you're using it. Yeah. I think there is now

602

this role that you're taking up here, which is almost

603

an AI architect kind of role, which is understanding how

604

can we actually slot the AI into our processing. And

605

then there's the role before that, which I take on

606

board, which is the how do you actually know that

607

you're doing the processes correctly? How do you get the

608

sops right? How do you understand? Yeah, because so many

609

especially small to medium sized businesses, there's a team of

610

10 people and each of them are doing their own

611

thing in their own way and no one's really put

612

it into documentation and no one really knows exactly what

613

everybody does. So yeah, you need to get clear on

614

your business and then you can automate it. You've got

615

to. Yeah, you've got to. The first place I start

616

with an inquiry is where like I find. They tell

617

me, but I, I find their bottlenecks. I don't come

618

in here saying, we can do this, we can do

619

that, we can do this. It's not the same for

620

every business. Every business has a different bottleneck. Sometimes there's

621

a lot of crossover. Like for example, 95% of businesses

622

could improve with AI sales automation. That's one that's a

623

given. But things like manual data entry, some businesses have

624

huge amounts of manual data entry where they're spending hundreds

625

of hours a week across 10 members of staff. I

626

could automate it. You can save all those hundreds of

627

hours. So that might be something that comes up. But

628

you've brought up a really interesting point and something I'm

629

a big believer in. There's three steps to automation, right?

630

The first step of automation is just AI itself. That

631

is my dad going to chat GPT to ask what

632

time chef. The chef for Wednesday game kicks off on

633

Saturday. Something probably a little bit more complex than that,

634

but let's just say he goes to chat, GPT, asks

635

it a question, it's conversational, right? It's asking it, it

636

can answer. You ask it a question about the World

637

War II and it'll answer, that's AI's power. We now

638

have power at our hands. That alone is incredibly powerful.

639

Okay. If you're stuck on something, you can ask it

640

a question. I still use it for that. I use

641

Comet. If anybody out here is really deep into using

642

the way that the future of search is going to

643

be, download Perplexity's Comet and use it as your search

644

browser. I've got a video on YouTube about how it

645

books booked. I stopped it right before it did, but

646

it booked a flight to New York from London Heathrow

647

for me without me touching a thing. I just told

648

me the fly. But you have three steps. First step

649

is that you have the basic, the guy who goes

650

to chat GPT and if they are clever and a

651

little bit of wisdom for small businesses or solopreneurs or

652

whatever who are using this, who are not fluent with

653

AI at all is this. If you go to AI

654

with a problem in your business and you sit there

655

and you speak to AI and you have this conversation

656

and you're having backwards and forwards until you get the

657

right answer, you might spend half an hour talking to

658

this AI. Yeah. You might say, what are the best

659

five, what are the five issues for this? This client

660

has this problem. What are the best five solutions? You

661

go through all these things, you're having conversations backwards and

662

forwards and you finally get your answer. Do you know

663

when you get the answer in the exact format that

664

you get the, that you want the answer in and

665

you look at it and you think that is exactly

666

what I wanted. This is. Nobody does this. All you

667

need to do is say to the LLM doesn't matter

668

what you're using AI Studio, Perplexity, Claude, Chat GPT, which

669

is obviously the big one. Ask it to write you

670

the system instructions that would have given you that answer

671

the first time you asked it. Yeah. And as soon

672

as you do that, it will give you a system

673

prompt that the very next time you have to go

674

and solve that issue, you, you have the system instruction

675

already. You give it the system instruction, you save it,

676

I save mine, but you save it. If it's for

677

something specific, you go there, you say this client has

678

this issue. It will give you the exact response in

679

the exact format without the half an hour backwards and

680

forwards. I think that, yeah, I'm just going to come

681

in on that conversation there. One of the things that

682

AI has taught me right. Over the last two and

683

a half, three years is that I don't communicate as

684

well as I thought I communicated. Yeah. And that's. Yeah.

685

So I'm using it very much as a mechanism to

686

understand my own communication. Be more clear with My communication.

687

Because we. Yeah, AI. Remember AI. All the large language

688

models are trained on humans, okay? They're trained on how

689

humans talk. So it is just a reflection of us,

690

you know? And when you have a staff member, especially

691

as a business owner, we have staff members and we

692

bring them on board and we're all excited and we

693

know what we're doing and we've done it 100 times.

694

And then we just tell them, just do this. And

695

then suddenly they're like, they didn't get it. But they

696

don't communicate that back to us and we don't ask

697

the right questions and be communicative. So I really love

698

the way that AI is helping me be a better

699

communicator. And that's a piece. You said there were three.

700

Three elements, three steps. So that's the first step. That

701

second, the final section is the most important. But that

702

will take you from a complete novice to be in

703

70% of the people in the world with AI at

704

the moment, if you just know how to get to

705

a certain stage, get a system prompt ready and then

706

reuse it. In your business, for example, like the training

707

issue you had, if they are stuck on a certain

708

problem, you upload your documentation, you say, hey, my member

709

of staff is stuck on this. They couldn't get past

710

this problem, get the right answer, and then ask it

711

to rewrite it, Rewrite the script to do that. Every

712

time you have a problem with your training documents, you

713

would just go to it and ask it and it

714

will give you the answer that would put you above

715

80% of people in the industry. So then after that,

716

you have the middle ground. No code developers, which is

717

where I started, right? You have the no cut. These

718

are people. If you watch my YouTube channel, I go

719

like, I live build flows that use gamma to build

720

presentations based off of a form or whatever. And it

721

fully automates. It can. You can parse data, you can

722

take. You can manipulate data, all of the techie stuff,

723

but without having to be a developer, you can actually

724

quickly learn it. There are plenty of templates out there

725

on make.com and NAN that you can literally just plug

726

in that will do something for you, from Google Sheets

727

to HubSpot, that you'll be like, oh my God, that

728

took me so long to do. But actually it's just

729

done it automatically without any need. And slowly you pick

730

things up about how you would build it. You can

731

watch people like myself or other people on YouTube and

732

learn how to build and how AI is impacting stuff.

733

But that's the middle ground, that's the next level. If

734

you're wanting to learn AI, you need to become familiar

735

with no code. Yeah. My personal opinion on it is

736

that when you look at tools like OpenAI's Agent Builder

737

that they've just launched, when you look at tools like

738

Opal Google, Opal Google will win the AI marathon, I

739

guarantee you. You can stand on my words five years

740

from now that Google will win it. I just firmly

741

believe it because of, they obviously because of the search

742

engine that they have, the data that they have on

743

the, on search behavior historically, I think all of their

744

tools, the things that are under the radar, Project Mariner,

745

Project Astra, these things people don't even know about, that

746

are probably going way over people's heads. And I'm not

747

trying to bore you with information, but there's a lot

748

of things that Google are working on in the background

749

that people don't know are happening. And then the Agent

750

Builder comes out and everyone's whoa, that's been in production

751

for a long time and it's not been a secret.

752

But the difference is with those no code builders in

753

comparison to nanmake.com is that you just type what you

754

want and it does it for you. So what's going

755

to happen is in five years time, not even that,

756

like in two years time, you're going to be able

757

to go to any no code platform, probably including Nan

758

and make, and you're going to be able to use,

759

probably use an LLM. Tell it your problem, tell it

760

the issue that you've got. Yeah, Data entry. I have

761

to, when an inquiry comes in, I have to take

762

that inquiry, I have to add it to HubSpot, I

763

then have to add it to a, an inquiry sheet

764

and then I have to date it or whatever. And

765

you would tell that to an LLM and tell it

766

to write you a system instruction for Opal for AI

767

Agent Builder. You paste it in and you've got yourself

768

a fully functioning fly. It's already in production. Yeah, that's

769

where it's headed. So I guess that, yeah, just to

770

jump in there, you know, that is the reality of

771

the gap that's building at the moment. Right? Yeah, we.

772

And I see this gap building and building. The more

773

I do, the more I know I need to do,

774

but the more I see a lot of people not

775

doing it. And yeah, what I'm trying to get so

776

many people I'm working with to do is this literature.

777

Just pick up chat GPT at the very Base or

778

Claude Gemini or one of them and just start getting

779

used to it every day. Like you said, you're saying

780

your dad, go and go and search for this, go

781

and use it to take a picture of what's in

782

your fridge and make a meal or book your holiday

783

or you just get used to the flow of using

784

it. Because that's the first, very much the first flow.

785

Like you said, just get moving, get using it. And

786

we, we're going to build this whole other set of

787

work. Everyone's worried about work going, but now there's going

788

to be a whole another set of work which is

789

going to be what you're doing, which is all about

790

how to automate things and how. To structure things 100%.

791

True. But you know what the issue is? The problem

792

is that if you. I made a video on this

793

recently, right, and it's probably my favorite video I've ever

794

made. And what I was basically doing is warning people

795

that they need to start having an entrepreneurial mindset. And

796

I don't mean in the essence of just creating a

797

business, as in when you're looking. If you're going to

798

stay employed by a company, you have to be able

799

to look at a business, you, or at least your

800

department's efficiency and understand how to implement AI into it.

801

Because if you don't, you're going to be, you're going

802

to be gone. Like, there's certain jobs, certain tasks that

803

you're gonna. That are going to be completely eradicated. Anything.

804

Data entry, like moving one bit of data from here

805

to there, that is going. If you are in a

806

position there, you need to change career. Like, seriously. Because

807

it's so simple to move data now from AI, it's

808

like the most basic task you can do. You can

809

build it in 30 seconds, right? To move. If something

810

comes in from a form, it goes into a spreadsheet,

811

it goes into HubSpot, you could build it in literally

812

a minute right inside of Nan. So as soon as

813

businesses catch up and start to realize that actually this

814

is a thing, what's going to happen is what the

815

businesses want. They want a bigger bottom line, they want

816

a better. But they want a better profit margin. How

817

do they do that? Staff is a big problem for

818

them. Like staffing is a big issue. So if you're

819

in those industries where, if you're in those positions where

820

data entry is a big part of what you do,

821

a lot of admin, anything in those related industries, your

822

job's not safe. Seriously. And my warning was to become

823

an architect, someone still needs to architect that data and

824

make sure that it's managed properly. And you know, you

825

need to position yourself in that space. AI is going

826

to take a lot of jobs, but I don't necessarily

827

buy into the whole scaremongering thing around. There's going to

828

be no jobs left on the planet. Like, they're going

829

to change. It's just another, like I said, from, like

830

from the industrial age. It's just another change in the

831

age and new opportunities are going to present themselves, new

832

businesses are going to be created, technologies are going to

833

advance that never existed before that mean that new people

834

get new opportunities in business. But if you are especially

835

an older demographic, if you are 55 years old, 60

836

years old, and you are in a job where you.

837

All you do is admin. You better like you. You

838

should panic like that. Those areas are areas where you

839

should definitely be concerned. Don't think that it's not going

840

to happen because it will. Like it's happening. It's happening

841

right. Not. Well, I'm going to start wrapping up now

842

and I just want you to think about here the.

843

That one thing that you. Obviously that last open was

844

pretty useful. What's the one thing people should do first

845

of all to start themselves on the wheel with AI?

846

And then secondly, people get hold of you and how

847

can we, how can I obviously share your contest and

848

stuff on the podcast. So, yeah, so no, when it

849

comes down to getting into AI, the first thing that

850

you need to do is breathe. Because it's not the

851

big, scary, overwhelming beast that you think it is. And

852

that is something that a lot of people do, especially

853

again older demographic, breathe, do basic research, chat, GPT, make.com

854

perplexities. Comet is a search engine just like Google. Use

855

it, but you'll see how efficient it is. It will

856

answer your questions, it will show you what it's researching,

857

it will give you sources. Slowly integrate AI into your

858

personal day so that you feel more comfortable with it.

859

At that stage, you can then start to look at,

860

maybe looking at things like make.com or nan for basic

861

templates. Not. You don't have to build anything. Just use

862

the templates they've got and just see how they work

863

and function because they have functions inside of them for

864

testing to show you how it works. Familiarize yourself with

865

that. But just educate yourself on AI. Subscribe to my

866

YouTube channel. Subscribe to other people's YouTube channel. Not the

867

gimmicky ones, the people who speak the truth. Subscribe to

868

those Channels watch what they say about the AI space.

869

Learn about what the way. Because it's not about the

870

tools. Every week there's a new tool. Forget, forget about

871

the tools. Just understand that AI is an age that's

872

coming and you just need to slowly start incorporating into

873

your day. And you know what you'll very quickly find

874

if you do that? That when you wake up in

875

the morning and you get an SMS or you get

876

an email that tells you everything you've got to do

877

on that day. Don't forget you've got to pick the

878

kid up from school today. Don't forget that you're cooking

879

tea today. Don't forget that you've got to do this

880

today. You'll be surprised with how helpful it can be

881

with basic day to day life tasks. And when you

882

realize that, you'll start to realize how efficient it could

883

be in business. And that might just spark an ins,

884

an entrepreneurial fire inside of you to build something for

885

yourself. So that's where I would start obviously reading from

886

the correct places, but YouTube is the main value. YouTube

887

is where I started with my journey, like listening to

888

people and watching people build it and use it with

889

real life examples in business. Personally you can't beat it.

890

But at the very least guys, if you're listening to

891

this and you and you are one of those people

892

who are terrified from about AI, just please just start

893

incorporating like AI Studio or chat GPT or whatever. But

894

then do a little bit of googling, spend half an

895

hour and just look for some of the features. AI

896

Studio, Google's AI Studio for example has a feature where

897

you could load up ebay or you could load up

898

Asda and you can click the voice button and you

899

will be able to have literally a discussion with an

900

AI agent at that moment in time and say 2

901

liters of milk from Asda is this how much is

902

it at Morrisons? And it will go and research and

903

tell you or it will say what are the most

904

popular brands of this? And it will do it for

905

you. You could easily take 15 hours and

906

just say, you know what I'm going to do for

907

my life? I'm going to spend 15 hours, 5 hours

908

watching YouTube videos, 5 hours messing around with chat GPT,

909

5 hours looking at advanced features like make.com and N8.

910

Do that. Your life will change forever. And then getting

911

a hold of you. Obviously I'll share your YouTube stuff

912

and then yeah, what's the best way to. Get all

913

of you, the best way to learn from me is

914

by using is by subscribing to YouTube. YouTube.com Michael

915

Michael Elliot AI the best way to reach me, if

916

you want to be professional contacts, obviously LinkedIn, same handle.

917

If you want to reach out about any services and

918

AI automation services, you can do it through LinkedIn or

919

you can head over to AI train or I'll tell

920

you what I'll do. I'll Give Roy a MyCal link

921

booking meeting that you can put in the description of

922

this video so you can book a meeting with me

923

to discuss anything from just generic advice. I am a,

924

I am somebody who is not a gatekeeper. Don't feel

925

like you're wasting my time. If you want somebody who's

926

scared and you want the basics, don't think you have

927

to come and start implementing massive things into businesses, because

928

you don't. But if you have a business and you're

929

thinking about incorporating AI, use the CAL link that's in

930

the description of this, of this podcast and book a

931

meeting with me and I'll go through it with you.

932

Right, Magic. Thank you for your time, sir. No worries.

933

Thank you, Roy.