In case you missed it: This bonus episode of The ChangeOver revisits a memorable conversation with Sam Mallikarjunan from Agent.ai, the place we mentioned how AI brokers are reworking how companies function particularly in gross sales and advertising.
Once we first began speaking about AI brokers on The ChangeOver podcast, it felt like one thing on the horizon — shut sufficient to discover, however not fairly concrete. That’s modified.
Since we talked, the Weidert staff’s been constructing and experimenting with agentic instruments to automate and help in knowledge gathering, evaluation, reporting, and extra. From assembly summarization to automating first-draft content material creation to real-time insights from analytics dashboards, these instruments are now not a novelty. They’ve rapidly turn into a part of how we work.
This mini-episode with Sam is the dialog that lit the fuse for me. If you happen to’ve been interested by what AI brokers are and why they matter — particularly for entrepreneurs — this one’s price your time.
Take a look at episode 26 of The ChangeOver, then subscribe on Apple, YouTube, Spotify, Weidert.com, or your favourite podcast app.
What Is an AI Agent?
Earlier than diving into experiments, I wanted readability on the idea.
Sam put it merely:
An AI agent… can take actions in your behalf. So it has company within the literal sense.
— Sam Mallikarjunan, Agent.ai
So it’s not only a instrument that tells you what to do. I’s not only a instrument that does what you inform it. It’s a system that takes autonomous motion in your behalf, based mostly on the targets and context you present.
RELATED: What is an AI Agent? Get our free study guide.
Brokers Speaking to Brokers: The Subsequent Layer
Sam additionally shared one thing that actually reframed the long run for me:
Your agent goes to get all the data from my agent… and enable you to make that call higher.
Think about two brokers negotiating the most effective answer — one working to your purchaser, the opposite to your gross sales staff. That’s not sci-fi. That’s coming sooner than most of us are prepared for.
We’re exploring what this would possibly appear to be inside Weidert Group, particularly for early-stage shopper discovery and content material personalization. And whereas we’re not handing over the keys, the AI co-pilot position is rising.
What We’re Studying by Constructing Our Personal
Once I requested Sam what recommendation he offers entrepreneurs and salespeople, he flipped the query again to creativity:
The largest obstacle is the clean web page drawback.
That struck a chord.
So as a substitute of attempting to instantly resolve a business-wide problem, we began smaller, constructing instruments to assist scrape, collect, and analyze knowledge. Group members have constructed agentic GPTs that repurpose content material into a number of codecs. And we’ve developed an inner course of to make it simpler for staff members to get the skilled assist they should plan and construct new options.
What’s working for us proper now could be beginning with ache factors, not platforms. We didn’t begin by asking, “What instrument ought to we use?” We began by asking, “How a lot of my day may I get again?”
No Have to Velocity Up the Spam Machine
I appreciated Sam’s candid warning:
“Don’t take the lazy approach — how do I spam extra effectively at scale? That’s a cause to bomb.”
We’ve all seen what occurs when automation will get disconnected from technique. So we’ve set a number of inner floor guidelines; each agent we experiment with should meet a number of of those targets:
- Enhance human creativity and problem-solving
- Improve shopper and and worker expertise
- Release time for deep and high-value work
If it doesn’t meet a kind of, we don’t pursue it.
Recommendation to Entrepreneurs
You don’t should be a developer to begin. What’s wanted is curiosity, humility, somewhat endurance, and a tolerance for imperfection. Don’t count on to begin off constructing issues completely. Or utilizing them completely. And sure, your first few experiments would possibly break. However that’s the worth of studying one thing new.
“Take a step in between there,” is what Sam instructed me. That’s what we’re doing.
In order for you inspiration, try websites like There’s An AI For That or Agent.ai. See what others are constructing. Then ask your self: What jobs do I do this really feel like time sinks?
That’s the place your first agent ought to dwell.
FULL TRANSCRIPT
GREG: Hello. I’m Greg Linnemanstons, president of Weidert Group. On this episode of The ChangeOver podcast, we’re studying how AI brokers are serving to companies of all sorts overcome labor challenges, enhance effectivity and high quality, and extra. Becoming a member of me is Sam Mallikarjunan.
Take us again to when brokers first began to seem, after they began to point out up as components of merchandise that every one of us are utilizing on a regular basis. When would you say brokers first begin displaying up?
SAM: So to take a good barely larger step again, an AI agent versus simply, like, the form of AI and normal machine studying that we’re used to, the principle differentiator is that it could possibly take actions in your behalf. So it has company within the literal sense, not the philosophical sense. Identical to you’d have a purchaser’s agent for those who have been, you realize, shopping for a home or for those who have been shopping for inventory or one thing like that, it could possibly take actions in your behalf.
And, traditionally, AI wasn’t good at understanding why and when it ought to do issues, which is why you needed to have a human within the loop. So it will inform us, like, right here’s the analytics. Right here’s a bunch of knowledge that we’ve crunched about your organization and your prospects, no matter. Now go do one thing.
And over the previous a number of years, what it is gotten actually good at is figuring out what it in all probability needs to be doing, as a result of it is vacuumed up the complete web. There are different methods to do it, however the best way OpenAI did it was they vacuumed up the complete Web and each piece of content material humanity has ever created. Yeah. So it could possibly say, like, right here’s an electronic mail, and it could possibly write the e-mail.
It could actually even ship the e-mail for those who form of belief it that a lot. So it’s gone from, you realize, us form of letting AI simply resolve, you realize, what advertisements to point out individuals. It’s very low draw back. You’re unlikely to tank your small business since you confirmed the mistaken advert as soon as in individual.
So now there are very impactful selections that it’s beginning to make. It’s speaking along with your prospects immediately. It’s speaking along with your workers immediately. In order that’s been form of the historical past from simply analytics and machine studying via to our form of first exploration as entrepreneurs with AI brokers, Fb advertisements, now to, you realize, who’s actual on the Web anymore.
Proper? Like, I get so many messages on LinkedIn. I’m positive half of them aren’t truly actual individuals.
GREG: Yeah. Yeah. I’ve truly I used to be following a dialogue on any person’s LinkedIn put up, and it was questioning how are we gonna defend ourselves from the entire ping-ponging that’s gonna be occurring between brokers and recognizing, how do you ferret out the human there?
SAM: Yeah. I imply, I feel that will probably be a very attention-grabbing factor is, you’ll have your individual agent.
And that really is the AI in aAgent.ai. Proper? Like, we’ve a market, and its job is to know you rather well and your job and your title, your organization, your opponents, your preferences. After which based mostly on what you’re attempting to do, it would resolve what brokers it’s best to use.
It’ll feed them the suitable knowledge. And so it would, it’s gonna be brokers speaking to brokers, and so they have completely different incentives. Proper? So I may need an agent whose job is to promote you one thing.
You may need an agent whose job is to make good buy selections, similar to you’d underneath a traditional, you realize, me-talking-to-you form of state of affairs.
However your agent goes to get all the data from my agent and from everyone else’s agent. It’s gonna synthesize that, enable you to make that call higher. So I don’t suppose it’s a problem if brokers find yourself taking loads of the emails and PowerPoint shows and, you realize, recorded gross sales demos and every thing else like that, and taking loads of that work off of our plate and simply doing that with one another till they will determine, you realize, what choice ought to it advocate and what ought to what ought to it resolve.
So there’s undoubtedly gonna be some ping-ponging, however I feel that is a characteristic, not a bug, as a result of that implies that we don’t must.
And the belief is, that ping-ponging is including worth, and it’s transferring us or defending us from the low worth and saving our time for the very best human worth.
I spend much more of my time doing attention-grabbing issues like podcast interviews and rather a lot much less of my time in conferences and, you realize, and standing reviews and that form of stuff, as a result of I’ve brokers that simply, like, attend the conferences for me and summarize the issues that I truly would have cared about. So I did not want to sit down in a one-hour assembly to get the seven minutes of content material that I might have discovered attention-grabbing. And, you realize, studying Spanish, getting higher at chess, and doing podcast interviews, like, do no matter you need with the extra free time that you’ve got.
GREG: So what recommendation are you giving to advertising and salespeople on constructing brokers? As a result of it appears like there’s no obstacle. There’s no boundaries. Your personal creativity?
SAM: Yeah. The largest obstacle is the clean web page drawback, proper? Everyone that I speak to, they’re like, what can I do with AI brokers? It’s such a tough query to reply as a result of the reply is rather a lot.
You recognize, it may be easy. Summarize my day, draft an electronic mail, analyze the info for me, etcetera. It may be fairly soft-skills oriented. So I’ve a good friend who has some communication challenges and struggles, and he makes use of AI to rewrite his textual content messages to his household and buddies to simply try to talk higher.
I feel the largest piece of recommendation I am going to give is don’t take the lazy approach, which is how do I spam extra effectively at scale? Proper? And that’s what most of what we see at this time is. Proper?
Like, LinkedIn is simply nonsense. E-mail advertising is insane. search engine marketing is insane.
And it’s as a result of everyone’s attempting to, as a substitute of taking this know-how and saying, ‘How do I spend extra time partaking in human interactions with my prospects or giving my individuals extra time to to suppose deeply and creatively?’ They’re as a substitute simply saying, like, how can we write two thousand weblog articles a month? And that’s only a cause to bomb. So the primary primary piece of recommendation I’d give is determine your individual clean canvas factor.
So there are websites like theresanaiforthat.com, Agent.ai has a bunch of examples, and many others., the place you’ll be able to simply go see what different individuals are doing, after which construct one which’s only for your self personally. One in every of our first builders, earlier than we opened it up, they constructed a Dungeons and Dragons AI, which is outwardly fairly an advanced factor. There’s these books you should learn, and there’s every kind of stuff that I don’t learn about. But it surely was apparently fairly time-consuming.
And as soon as he was in a position to construct one for that objective, he then understood AI brokers higher and will begin constructing ones which can be extra attention-grabbing for, you realize, gross sales prospecting and buyer analysis and product design and all these sorts of issues.
So get impressed. Go on the market and, like, take a look at issues that different individuals are constructing. Suppose deeply about your day, and what are the belongings you do this suck, proper? Like, I hate being in conferences.
After which simply begin with one thing that, you realize, the stakes are low, proper? Like, if that AI agent hadn’t labored out for him, he would have been in a position to be okay with it. I feel proper now, we’re all apprehensive that it’s not gonna be good. We’re not gonna construct it good. We’re not gonna use it completely, after which it’s gonna do one thing that’s gonna get us in some hassle.
And so, like, take a step in between there.
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