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Locally Owned
Ep 27 How a Former Tesla & Uber Innovator is Bringing AI to Local Small Businesses
01:14:28
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- [00:02]
Dave
Imagine this for your business. An inside sales rep who never misses a call, nails the presentation every single time, handles complaints, gets the jobs booked and on the schedule. They work 24 7, never complain, never call out sick. And when they're not answering the phones, they're following up with leads and talking to your clients exactly the way you would. That sounds kind of too good to
- [00:26]
Host
be true, doesn't it?
- [00:27]
Dave
Well, that is exactly what today's guest, Zeb Dawson has created. Using AI to help Main street businesses take their business to the next level and blow out their sales goals every quarter.
- [00:45]
Host
Hello and welcome back to another episode of Locally Owned. And today I'm joined by Zebulon Dawson, a visionary entrepreneur who went from leading operations at Tesla Motional and In Charge Energy to founding Happy Path Marketing, a virtual sales and marketing team for small businesses.
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Dave
Zebulun now pioneers AI powered tools like
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Host
Follow Up Pathway and Service Path, helping companies automate, grow and build what he calls trust bridges. His story is about innovation, freedom and creating technology that empowers local small businesses. Zeb, I'm excited to have you on the show. Welcome and tell us a little bit about yourself, how you got started.
- [01:29]
Zeb Dawson
All right, yeah, I'll go back to the early days and thanks for having me on Locally Owned here. Dave. I appreciate the opportunity to share my story and also maybe a few nuggets that some of your audience members can take away and apply to their businesses. But it's really, it does go back to my early know as a kid really had a, my very first, I guess, quote unquote business was I had a rock tumbler and I was, I was making jewelry and, and selling it at my mom's yard, sales and, and things like that. So early days of kind of always figuring out, okay, how do I start to make my own money. And you know, I think it was driven by both my parents are entrepreneurs. They've had a couple of businesses throughout the years, some brick and mortar. My dad currently owns a fishing charter on Lake Erie, so we do charter business. So it growing up on a farm and everything else, kind of always been in that entrepreneurial world and influenced by business owners in our community. So as time went on I ended up, you know, I was kind of grew up there in the 90s with the evolution of the Internet and computers and technology. So I saw a need in my local community for PC repair and an IT service kind of business. So when I was in high school, I officially launched my first LLC with a couple of close friends of mine that there was the three of us started our first company, we called it PCA Tech and, and we were doing home computer repair business. So really, really from the early days I've been in the service industry and you know, if you naturally kind of progress, it was all about learning the business and operations and customer service and all of these utilization. And so it, you know, kind of organically was able to feed into my career in the corporate world of operations. And that's where I went and spent a majority of my career, as you mentioned in the, in the intro there with some big names people recognize like Tesla and Motional and actually spent some time at Uber as well and some of those big tech companies in some of their early days. So was able to learn a lot, influenced a lot by, you know, seeing the, how the tech industry moves quickly. There's a saying they use in the tech industry move fast and break things. And that's basically, you know, a lot of trial and error is what that really means. And you know, I think as a local business and a small business owner, we're always doing a lot of trial and error. You're always trying to figure out what works, what resonates with your audience, your community. And when you look at technology, it's changing so quickly. You're always trying to figure out what's where should I be putting my dollars for the best return. And I know as a, you know, my parents, as business owners, I remember we were always getting everybody's coming in every day, like some trying to sell you in ad space in the local newspaper, on the radio or on a billboard or a place mat or a phone book back in the day. So, you know, you're kind of overwhelmed with options on like where do I put my, my business? So that's what you know, really led me to saying, you know, I want to get back into, be able to guide businesses through the, the challenges that technology presents and allow them to use that to their benefit.
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Host
Yeah, you know, it's, it's interesting that you started this company PCA Tech and you considered it a service company and not a technology company.
- [04:56]
Zeb Dawson
Yeah, well, we were really, you know, back then, this was early 2000s and we named it PCA tech because back then that was PDAs. Personal digital assistants were kind of the trending thing. So we were kind of a play on words that, so we were personal computer assistants. And so our PCA Tech was our DBA name, but it was really personal computer assistance. And we were, we were just that we'd go to your Home and help you, you know, set up your Internet, set up your home computer, your personal printer, whatever it may be. This was the, you know, time period where a lot of people were getting home computers, getting Internet. I grew up in a more rural area, so we didn't have a Best Buy, a geek squad. There wasn't really a lot of resources for locals. And then that evolved into businesses. A lot of these local communities were business owners. So I had a, the local optometrist, the local car dealership, the local accountant. So we started doing their business and then it's like their employees were like, well, can you come to my house and help me? You know, I've got an issue or I'm trying to get a laptop for, you know, my kids are going to college. Like, what do you recommend? And so it was, it was more service. I would say we were doing more hardware service, repair, break fix work back then, then. Whereas today, you know, when people ask, what, what do I do? I say, you know, we. I own a software company.
- [06:15]
Host
Okay. Now, how did you get involved in technology and how old were you when you started PCA tech?
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Zeb Dawson
Yeah, I was in high school. And so, you know, probably 17, 16, 17 somewhere in that time frame with PCA tech. And, you know, I was very fortunate. My parents were very, they were kind of visionaries in a sense of technology. They saw that the home computer was really going to be important to the future for their kids. So in the early 90s, I remember my dad, my mom and dad went into a Sam's Club and bought a Compaq Presario. If you guys remember the Compaq computer.
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Host
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.
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Zeb Dawson
And we had a compact Presario with a Intel Pentium 486 processor. I think it didn't even come with a 56k modem. I think it was. We upgraded it to put the dial up modem in. And it was, I think I had like a 28k old modem. And so it was, in fact it still had a five and a half quarter floppy. So that'll kind of give you the time frame. Early 90s. And, and it was, I think it came with Windows 3.1 at that time. And so it was early days. And that was our first computer. And my uncle, actually, my dad's brother, my uncle, he owned a, an appliance repair business. So he was kind of always into, you know, appliances which kind of bled into tech. And he had some co workers and other business partners that were more into the computer. So we had a Few extra PC sitting around that I could tear apart. And I just naturally was always one of those kids that was always tearing things apart. It didn't matter if it was the, the telephone or the radio or whatever, taking it apart, putting it back together, figuring out how it works. So just that natural curiosity kind of led me into the, the tech and then, you know, I was really just fascinated. And there was a TV channel called zdtv, later became Tech tv. And I would literally put in a VHS and record this show called Call for Help that Leo Laporte was, who's now actually a podcaster himself, but he was recording. People would call in with their computer problems and say, hey, my printer's not working. This was going on. He would troubleshoot it on tv. So I would record those and then go back and watch it. And then I kind of taught myself how to solve computer problems and fix issues and applied that to what later on became my business. Yeah, and you know, we had that time, it was kind of popular, the build your own computer. So that was something that was kind of fun. So I'd order the parts and there was a lot of learning, compatibility and troubleshooting and things not working. I kind of evolved from building Legos to building computers through my childhood. It was a fun time. A lot of, you know, trial and error and technology was moving fast then and it's moving even quicker now.
- [08:59]
Dave
Listening to this part of Zeb's story, what really stands out to me is how consistent his wiring has been from the beginning. His constant deep curiosity for how things work, paired with a service oriented mindset that doesn't just build tech, but figures out how to help people with it. I love how he didn't shy away from exploring different paths early on and pushing himself out to learn sales, even though he was an introvert. Just understanding how important that is for every entrepreneur. So that mix of curiosity, service oriented mindset and tenacity, it feels like it's been a through line all the way through into what he's doing today.
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Host
So tell me, how did you, you know, walk me through a little bit of your path and your time working with Tesla and Uber and some of these other bigger industries and how that shapes the way you do business now?
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Zeb Dawson
Yeah, absolutely. So I'll give you a really quick kind of jump through some of my history, of my work history. So I didn't end up going to college. I started off, I went to actually Pittsburgh Technical Institute, which is actually no longer around, but like went there for a while for classes. For doing, you know, hardware and learning things. And I realized that, you know, I'd already spent so much time doing it. I was kind of bored there. And I liked, I was like, I went out. So I was one of those kids that went to college and it was like, it's not for me. I was kind of bored. I did go to Devray University and took some classes in entrepreneurship later on. But I went into the workforce pretty quickly and you know, it was customer service. I grew up on the farm, we grew up next to a winery. So I did a lot of labor and things like that. But then my first real job was actually at J.C. penney's. And when I was in high school, I went in and you know, I was selling family shoes. And so I was kind of learning my. That was my first sales job. And, and then did some server work at Bob Evans, a restaurant back in Ohio and some different places and Dillard's and some different retail sales. And then I fast forward, I went into door to door sales. I was selling for Scott's Miracle Company selling lawn service down in Daytona Beach, Florida area. And, and then I did some home security sales. So early days after, after, you know, had the computer business for a while, kind of decided to, you know, find my way. And you know, I always was told, you know, if you, if you can sell, you'll never starve, you know, so like get out there and learn how to sell. And I was a little bit more introverted, probably a lot more introverted back then. So getting out to do door to door sales was very uncomfortable for me. But it taught me so much and it really, you know, these little moments in time, you don't realize that you're doing it at the moment. I was doing it because I needed to make money to survive. But along the way you're learning, you know, how to deal with rejection and you're learning, you know, how to overcome objections with sales and you're learning how to approach strangers and to cold, cold door knocking. Later on I did Aflac, how to
- [11:43]
Host
effectively talk to people even if you're introverted, you know.
- [11:47]
Zeb Dawson
Right, yeah, yeah, yeah. So it was, so that was, you know, I kind of did that for a while. Then I came back into the IT space for a bit, did some contract work and was doing a little bit of more software side of things. And then through 08, you know, with the economic kind of challenges in the country, my position was eliminated and some changes forced me to kind of make a career change. And at that time, Tesla was kind of just coming into the, you know, they've been around for a few years, but they're really now kind of making a name for themselves. And I was like, man, this is great. I love automotive and I love technology, and this was like a big computer on wheels and it put the two together. So I, you know, through a series of time, I was. And. And it took a while to get hired in there. I got hired in that Tesla and it was fun because Tesla was in the, what I call the Wild west days. It was a, you know, we were trying to really sell electric vehicles, educate people on electric vehicles. And. And the company was going bankrupt almost every single day. Like, it was really, you know, it was not the company it is today. So they were not profitable at that time. So there was this spirit of like, do whatever you, you know, have to do essentially to, to build your teams, to grow the sales, to educate. So once again, I got to come. I treated like my own business. I could in there. And I. And I was in Cleveland, Ohio, working for Ryan Beck was who became, you know, a good friend of mine. And we're still friends today. My, my manager there and kind of give me free rein and. And we were able to, you know, sell a bunch of cars. Tesla, you know, gave me a position out in California at the headquarters in Fremont to do some of their first early programs out there for. With actually doing what they called a key swap program and people buying, trading in their old Tesla now and buying a new Tesla. So that was something brand new to Tesla to do. And then I went into Boston, a new territory, and helped open up stores, helped open up their flagship store in downtown Boston at the Prudential center. And I helped open up the Cape and New England and expand. So it was really, you know, I did everything from government regulation with Tesla and getting Teslas into Michigan to superchargers and electrification, to sales, customer service, doing home deliveries, home test drives, all of that. And I really got to run that as my own kind of business. And so that was a huge learning experience and a ton of work and. But it wasn't sustainable. It's one of those careers that it'll burn you out after time. If you talk to anyone at Tesla, you'll hear similar stories. So I was ready for a change. And now, now we're looking at the time period of about 2016 and autonomous vehicles are coming into the picture. And Uber had just launched their autonomous vehicles in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. And I'm originally from Northeast Ohio. I'd lived in Pittsburgh, like I mentioned earlier, and going to school a little bit. So I was like, well, let me head back to Pittsburgh and see what's going on. And I did. And before I even had a chance to apply to Uber, they had reached out to me. I think I posted my resume or something online somewhere. They reached out to me. And I remember distinctly, it was. It was in 2016, on Thanksgiving Day. I had the interview because it was a Canadian recruiter, so there was just a normal workday for them. And I interviewed with them and I started and I said, you know, I need a little time off from. I'd left Tesla in October 16th. I said, I need a little time off now and want to started the beginning of the year. So I started with Uber in 2017. And a fun fact about Uber is back in, When I lived in Columbus, Ohio, prior to Tesla, when I was kind of in between, after the 08 issues with the losing my job and kind of in between things, I was driving for the first time. I'd actually driven as an Uber driver for a little bit of time. And back then it was like an iPhone 4 and you would. You actually went to a hotel and got training on how to be an Uber driver. And so I joke, I said, you know, I kind of saw the full thing go full circle because later on when I was at Motional, we did the first driverless, truly driverless rides with Uber. Nobody in the driver's seat at all. And so I went from being an Uber driver to building autonomous vehicles that were Ubers with no driver. So it was kind of a. Yeah, kind of a cool.
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Host
You built yourself out of a job.
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Zeb Dawson
I did, I did. And so, so throughout those time, I was at an autonomous vehicles. We were learning, you know, we're doing passenger rides also. Once again, always been kind of customer facing, customer service. But you're learning about all these challenges and you're looking at leaders. You know, you're looking at Travis Kalanick. And there was the whole kind of fallout with that. And you looked at, you know, I was, you know, I was in rooms with Elon Musk and Travis Kalanick and these guys that were founders and built large companies, right? So they kind of, for me, it was like, okay, this is really inspirational for me. But they also had, you know, none of us are perfect and neither are they. And so there was always, you know, there was definitely some conflicts and some, you know, different decisions that, that led to undesirable outcomes sometimes. And so I, I transition, I get recruited over to this company which actually was Delphi Automotive at the time, if you remember Delphi from the days of the old GM days, they had just bought a company called Automatica out of Carnegie Mellon in Pittsburgh. And Delphi was changing the name, going to kind of splitting off their powertrain division and becoming Aptiv, which is still around today, and launching an autonomous vehicle division in Las Vegas. So they sent me out, I launched our Las Vegas market from the ground up, hired a couple hundred people, built an organization. You know, I started off as an autonomous vehicle driver and operator because that's what the only role they had open. Quickly became an operations manager.
- [17:34]
Host
What year was this?
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Zeb Dawson
This is 2017. So I was at Uber for just a, just a short amount of time for about probably 10 months or so at Uber with their Pittsburgh operation. And then it was October of 17, I moved out to Vegas.
- [17:47]
Host
So I didn't realize we had driverless vehicles at that point. So. So you're saying there were driverless vehicles in Vegas at, in 2017?
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Zeb Dawson
So in. Yeah, so in 17 we were doing a time they were self driving cars. So there's a distinction between a driverless car and a self driving car. A driverless car has no human at all in it. Self driving car has a human behind the wheel. What the car is doing the driving. But there's a safety operator there.
- [18:14]
Host
Gotcha still.
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Zeb Dawson
Yeah, gotcha.
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Host
Okay.
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Zeb Dawson
Yeah, so it was actually we came out here with the, with the Audi SQ5 platform, went to a BMW later on to crash Pacifica and ended up with the, the Hyundai Ioniq 5, which is what they still use today. So I still see my, some of the vehicles that I helped develop out on the roads today, driving around. But yeah, so I built that up. It was a huge learning experience. Opened up multiple markets Los Angeles and I was managing our Vegas, Los Angeles at times I was doing some of the Pittsburgh in Boston and then we had a little bit of a global presence in Singapore and South Korea. So that was really a great experience. I went from a vehicle operator to a manager to a director to a senior director. And so it was really a great. I learned so much in those six and a half years of scaling companies, hiring, firing, figuring out what makes a good person, how to develop leaders, how to build out teams. You know, I was on the business development side, I was seeing, you know, from the legislative side, I was seeing all angles, working with our executive team, worked on our R D and then eventually I let our commercialization and our deployments team. So, so that was, that was the
- [19:27]
Host
majority of My career just a little bit. I want to know at that level, you know, with something like that because it's different for, you know, different companies. But that's a pretty high level to be launching something. So what are the big pieces and how do they come together to law like to go to Vegas and to launch something like that?
- [19:52]
Zeb Dawson
Yeah, it was, you know, for us as a, it's a new, you know, not only is it a new, a new site, it's a whole new industry. So there's a lot of layers of complexity here with working from the local government, you know, meeting with the city of Las Vegas, Clark county, the state of Nevada, all of that to, you know, hiring folks that are comfortable and doing training. So part of that, you know, the complexities I would say is the number one is safety. That's always, you know, and you know, if you look at the history of autonomous vehicles, unfortunately, you know, Tesla had some, or no, I'm sorry, Tesla has also, but, and Uber as well has had some, you know, really undesirable outcomes. And you know, so safety is always at the pinnacle of this because it's really, you know, you're one accident away from really having, you know, a detrimental impact to your business. And so, you know, figuring out how do you safely train your operators and then putting your, your standard operating procedures in place and you know, making sure that you have the, the right folks in charge when you're building your leaders, you're doing your shift briefs, you're doing your, your allowing your team to have these safety breaks, doing check ins. The, the one thing that is dangerous when you're owning your own business, you're scaling a company is everybody's very excited, ambitious and, and burnout can get, you can kind of get burned out without really acknowledging that. And that becomes dangerous especially when you're in a safety environment. And so, and moving fast and breaking things does not work well with, when you're trying to. Talking about putting vehicles on the road.
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Host
Right.
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Zeb Dawson
You know, so, so a lot of it came to training and you had to build out that. And it's when you're going into emerging technology, you don't really have a reference. So a lot of times I would look at like the airline industry because it was a parallel industry in a lot of ways with safety being so important.
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Host
Right.
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Zeb Dawson
You know, utilization efficiencies, new technologies. Like there's, there were a lot of parallels when you looked at the aviation industry, which is also a passion of mine. So I enjoyed looking at those parallels. And you Know, obviously, you know, working with NHTSA and some of that. So safety was always at the pinnacle of our, you know, what we were doing. But and then the next part of that is finding the right leaders, hiring people that you can develop into leaders.
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Dave
As you're listening to Zeb, it can kind of be difficult to relate because the work that he's describing, it's not everyday stuff for Main street businesses. But there are definitely some lessons to be learned here. I mean, you may not be launching something as technologically advanced as autonomous vehicles, right? But you are off. Like often when you have this great idea for your business, you are faced with a challenge. Well, how do I implement this?
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Host
Right.
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Dave
It's great idea, but there's a lot of things that you don't know how to do. So I think a great takeaway is to think of an idea the same,
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Host
the same way you would how a
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Dave
company like Uber approaches a launch and then as Zeb describes, break it into its essential components and figure out who are the who's that know the hows in order to get the job done. Now that is where most of us get stuck, right? We have to find who's that know how to do something that we don't know how to do in order to get this idea to come to life. And that really scale scares us. One, because we don't really know where to go to find the who's that already know the hows. But two, we don't know that we can trust that they understand our vision and that they're going to be as committed to it as we are. And that's often where we just give up, right? We just don't even, we give up on this great idea. But the problem in that equation is us, right? The right who's are out there. We just have to get past our
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Host
fear of giving up control.
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Zeb Dawson
And there's always, you know, there's some people that are just, they want to come in, they want to do their job. And that's great because you need those folks as well. Then there's other people that really have that drive, that want to come in, learn the craft, excel at it, and learn how to build teams and duplicate that. And you need those folks as well. Especially when you're scaling and so going in and hiring the right folks. And then also not being afraid to admit, hey, we know we probably, probably not the best fit for the team. You need to make some restructuring and some changes. And those are always a little bit more difficult conversations. But it's important to make those decisions. And also I've noticed in these different companies that there's a lot of decision paralysis where people are not, nobody wants to make a decision, so then nothing happens. And that's also challenging. And I tell people all the time, I said, just make a decision. It doesn't matter if it's the right or wrong decision right now. I mean, obviously if it's a safety critical thing, it's a little bit different. But most of the time they're not safety critical decisions. Make a decision and let's move and then now let's learn from that and let's say, okay, will we do it differently or the same? You know, a lot of times not making a decision at all can actually be more detrimental than actually just making the wrong decision. So you know, it's, there's no perfect timing in life and a lot of things and it's, I talk to people all the time that are like, well, I'm thinking about starting a business. I'm like, well start now because there's no per. You're never going to find that perfect time. It's like trying to find the best time to buy a house and have kids and start a family and do. There's no perfect time. You just got to.
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Host
Yep.
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Zeb Dawson
Just got to do it.
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Host
Yep. And that, that the right decision is never, doesn't just pop up and say here I am.
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Zeb Dawson
You know, it's exactly.
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Host
Yeah, it looks like the other decisions a lot of times, you know, exactly.
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Zeb Dawson
I tell people I said it's there, there's going to be multiple decision, multiple answers that are right and you got to just pick, try to pick the most right one. But there's never, it's not going to be ever very rarely, very clear that this is exactly what you need to do. And especially when you're looking at like what I'm doing today with, with technology because things are changing and you're dealing with algorithms. You've got, you know, now AI that is constantly changing, even like search algorithms and SEO and all of these, you know, kind of back end things that we've all learned one way are all kind of being upended a little bit right now with, with AI and how those, how that's changing. So just make a decision, go with it, look at the data and then we can make a decision. And that's one of the things with, from whether it was autonomous vehicles or whether it's my clients today is I always look at, let's make a data driven decision. Don't just we don't have to guess. Let's look at the data. If we don't have our own data, can we find some comparative analysis data that we can look at to see like, okay, well here's something that's similar, you know, here's what the data shows and I'll try it. Let's see our own data and then like, let's, you know, let's reevaluate after we get some data in.
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Host
Right, right. Yeah. It's like the law of physics. You can only direct a moving object. Not.
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Zeb Dawson
Not exactly. So, yeah, yeah. And I tell people that even with the retail, I said, you know, you don't know what's going to work. So if you're trying to figure out how to get more customers in the door, you know, you can start doing things and then you got to collect, just collect some data on it, figure out what it is, you know, and what do you did differently and you know, how you're trying to, you know, connect with your, with your customer. The biggest issue I see out there nowadays is there's so much noise everywhere on our phones. We're just inundated with it. So it's, as a small business owner, it's hard to connect with your, with your clients. And I find the most impactful way for me, even in a business, more of a virtual business, is getting out there and going to events. In fact, I have an event tonight, a dinner that I'm going to, going to a networking event, and meeting people face to face as much as you can. That's kind of the, the best and most impactful way. I think we're all, we're almost getting fatigued from just so much, you know, just digital. And ever since COVID you know, there hasn't been, I feel like we still haven't got fully back to that in person environment. And really that's, that's where you build the most impactful relationships.
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Host
Yeah, yeah, no, you're right. I think Covid sort of put the development of the technology to meet people and to have, you know, zoom certainly, you know, became a word that everybody was familiar with. And, and so it, you know, it made it easier for us to connect, but at the same time you're missing that, you know, face to face element that, that you can't replace, you know, and, and so like you said, it just makes it easier so that face get. Your space gets filled up with so many more contacts and it's, yeah, nothing. It's hard to find things that are meaningful within that Yep.
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Zeb Dawson
No, exactly. And it, and it's important to have those like, you know, you'd said in my introduction, I call them trust bridges. And it's, you know, when it's networking, don't always think about it as what am I going here to get for myself. It's just like meeting people and then, you know, they're going to bring up through natural conversation. And I, there's, you know, I kind of have this saying, I always say, like, oh, I know a guy, right? Like there's always, you know, like, I mean, we're talking about getting our driveway, you know, we need to get our driveway seal before winter gets here. So. Oh, I know a guy that does that, you know, owns a business, right. And, and I joke that, you know, I should have launched a website years ago called I Know a Guy. And you can just go in there and, and find these businesses. But that's what I really like to do. I love to connect other people. I love. And that's, that's why I call it a trust bridge. I said, you know, you know me, you trust me. I know someone that owns another business that they trust me. And because you mutually, you both trust me, I can build this trust bridge, introduce you and, and you naturally have this trust. So it naturally is versus a cold contact. There's a little bit of trust there that's already being built so that you can continue that, that relationship. And now, you know, if Dave wants his driveway sealed, he can, he knows this, he trusts this guy more than off of somebody that he would find just doing a Google search because, because I introduced him. And so that's kind of what I mean when I say trust bridges. And it's, it's important because if you do that enough and I, there's a saying that I didn't come up with this, but you know, they say if you, if you help enough other people get what they want, you're going to get what you want. And, and you know, so again, it's like what goes around comes around. So you help other folks connected build business. They're going to say, hey, you know what? That's right. You need to talk to Zeb because he's got some AI software that would really benefit your business and it'll come back around to you.
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Host
Yeah, no, I'm, I'm a big believer in that. Yeah, I think that was Zig Ziglar that said that.
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Zeb Dawson
So, yes, I think you're right.
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Host
I think, I think, I think people have heard of that guy.
- [30:05]
Zeb Dawson
So I think So a few of you, the audience members have, well, you
- [30:11]
Host
know, that sounds like, okay, that's fine, that works nice. And you know, if you're my neighbor, I can help you with that or you know, in a small little setting. But you've, you know, built trust bridges. That's been a really important thing for you even you know, as in your roles with Tesla and Motional, hasn't it?
- [30:31]
Zeb Dawson
Absolutely, yeah. I mean, when I was, you know, I think there's a key quality on honestly with leadership. I mean when you're in a leadership position, your, your team needs to trust you for the decision making and also your executive, you're so it's trusting up and down and you know, you're trusting that you know, the, your leaders are making the right decisions and they're, and you're empowering them. And one of the things I really stress with my, my own leadership and others is, you know, it's hard sometimes, especially when you're a business owner, it's hard to back away and let someone else do things because nobody can do it as good as you can. And trusting that they will and they may not do it the exact same way you're going to do it. And they may not do it as well as you think that you could do it. But what is important is allowing them to do that, showing them that you trust them to do this task or this project and watching them grow and just giving them some guidance when necessary, not hovering over them. But that will allow you now, whether you're a leader or a business owner, to focus on new opportunities, new growth and other things that really do desire, that need to require your attention. And you know, you can't do everything. And if you want to scale, you want to grow your business, you have to be able to learn how to build these trust bridges between you and your employees and also your, whether it's your partners outside your vendors, your other business associates in order to allow you to scale. And a lot of us built these businesses so we can have some freedom. And if you ever want to step away and go take your kids on a, on a trip or something, you need to be able to have people you can trust to continue to run your business.
- [32:02]
Host
Right. You know, this is something that I've
- [32:05]
Dave
observed in myself and a lot of other business owners that I work with is that deep in the nature of a small business owner is the spirit of diy, right. And that's do it yourself mentality. It can be a great asset to, as far as getting things done. But at some point it really does become a liability. And what I think Zeb is so smart for is being intentional about networking. Because remember earlier he said that he was an introvert, but he learned sales by just getting out there being uncomfortable until he wasn't. And I think think our independent streak as business owners makes us shy away from networking with others or going to networking events because those environments are really uncomfortable for us and sometimes they can feel a little bit contrived to us.
- [32:55]
Host
But I love the quote that he
- [32:57]
Dave
used by Zig Ziglar that you can have everything in life that you want if you just help enough other people get what they want. So essentially, if we have a mindset, should shift about networking and see it as a way of helping others get what they want, whether it's our services or connecting them to other people, that we will eventually get what we want too, because we're building our network of professionals that we have relationships with. And honestly, I don't think you can really take your business to the next level without building that relationship capital.
- [33:34]
Zeb Dawson
And you know, if you, a lot of the audience is probably familiar with Robert Kiyosaki and that cash flow quadrant on the book that in the front of that book he has those four quadrants. It's an employee, self employed, business owner and investor. And you know, a self employed. A lot of people say, well, I'm self employed. Well, that's great. But that doesn't get you that time and money freedom necessarily.
- [33:55]
Host
Right.
- [33:55]
Zeb Dawson
You know, a dentist might own a practice that's self employed, but they can't. If they leave and they're the only dentist, the dentist, the office has to be closed. They're not making money.
- [34:03]
Host
Yeah.
- [34:03]
Zeb Dawson
You know, where, where a business owner has those folks in place that they can trust that are out, you know, running the crew doing the work and they can, they can step away and, and they can be at a networking event, they can take time with their family or they can do other things to help grow the business. So I tell you, that's a big distinction between be careful when you're saying, are you self employed or a business owner. Because there's a really a big difference. There's.
- [34:28]
Dave
Right.
- [34:29]
Zeb Dawson
And so. Yeah, well, that's. Yeah, go ahead.
- [34:32]
Host
Well, I was going to say that there's a book, I don't know if you ever read it. It's called the Speed of Trust and it's written by.
- [34:38]
Zeb Dawson
Okay.
- [34:38]
Host
It's written by Stephen Covey and everybody knows Stephen Covey.
- [34:41]
Zeb Dawson
Oh, yeah, of course, yeah.
- [34:42]
Host
Yeah, I think it's a much better book. It is, it is. You know, the things that he goes into just. I wouldn't do it justice if I tried to give you a brief synopsis, but it's really is about how you can get so much more done when there's trust there. And a simple, simple example that I remember from reading that book that I applied to my own life, my old, you know, the business I sold, we had a, you know, a front area to the shop where people came in and parked. And I thought, well, I need to get some. I need to make this look nice, you know, and get some flowers and stuff like that. And I spent about an hour trying to figure out what to put out there, what gets good sunlight, all that. And then I was just like, you know what? Okay, let me do what this book says. The guy who owns the local nursery, he's a client of mine. I'm going to call him and just say, hey, John, can you send someone over here to fill this up? I trust you that whatever, you know, that they'll do a great job. And whatever the price is, I'm sure it's fair. And I mean, within, you know, a day or two, the place looked amazing, you know, and it was just like, I didn't have to put any effort into that. And it looked fantastic and was better than I could ever do on my own, you know.
- [36:02]
Dave
Hey, friends, it's Dave.
- [36:04]
Host
And I want to give something back
- [36:05]
Dave
to you, my listeners, as my way of saying thanks for supporting this show and thanks for supporting your local business
- [36:12]
Host
community that we all care a whole lot about.
- [36:14]
Dave
So right now I'm offering a free online business readiness assessment. And what that is is it's an online assessment. It's a series of questions that you can do online that help you see exactly how sellable your business would be if you needed to exit today. Now, you might. Selling your business might be years away for you you right now, but getting it ready to sell provides some immediate benefits. It becomes more profitable, it runs smoother with less stress. It gives you, the owner, more freedom. And as a bonus, when the time comes, it can be worth hundreds of thousands, maybe even millions of dollars more. So I'm offering this now because I want to thank you, my listeners, but I can't promise it's always going to be free free.
- [37:05]
Host
Or that I'll always have the time
- [37:07]
Dave
to review it personally with you.
- [37:09]
Host
So while it's available, click on the
- [37:11]
Dave
link in the show notes, take the assessment, and see where you stand and then start building a business that gives you freedom now and a bigger payday now and later.
- [37:23]
Host
All right, back to the show.
- [37:32]
Zeb Dawson
And so, yeah, 100 exactly. And that's where like in my business, you know, we, we're a virtual business, but we use a lot of, you know, virtual assistants. We use other, other folks to help scale because, you know, like you said, I, I, I have relationships with vendors and, and other business partners. And you know, it's, you said something also that's important there, not only to trust but also recognizing that you're not an expert in everything. And I think as business owners sometimes, you know, we like to feel that we're business, we're experts in everything. And, and so I've learned to don't be an expert. Know how to identify and build a trust bridge with an expert that you can lean on, bring in, whether it's for yourself or your clients or whatever. You know, I do that with dig with digital ads. I mean, digital ads are very complex and it's a lot of money and you want to make sure you're getting a good return. I'm not an expert on digital ads, but we have great guys on the team that are Google Ad experts, that are meta ad experts and, and that's, that's what they do and that's what they love to do and they're really good at it. So I'm not going to go try to do that and just like you're not going to go try to learn about, you know, all the right flowers and plants to put in front of the building trust, someone that has that knowledge is going to be able to do it. And you know, like you said, they're a client and I always love that. I love doing business with someone that's doing business with me and vice versa, like it's, you know, to me, I always try to figure out a way like how can I, even if it's a client that I might not traditionally, like, you know, say I had a florist or somebody doing bit like I might. But hey, I want to send my grandmother some flowers. I'm going to call that florist and have them sent because like, I've got a real existing relationship with them.
- [39:03]
Host
Right? Yeah, yeah, you already, the trust is there already, you know.
- [39:06]
Zeb Dawson
Exactly.
- [39:07]
Host
Sure. Just go ahead and do it. I know it's going to be fine, you know, so, yeah, and it just, it makes things so much easier. But a lot of people, a lot of business owners get into business because they have this skill or this ability and they, they do it themselves or if that's exactly, you know, they're DIYers, you know. And so the knee jerk reaction when something needs to get done is let me figure out how to do it,
- [39:35]
Zeb Dawson
you know, do it myself.
- [39:36]
Host
Yeah, right.
- [39:37]
Zeb Dawson
Yeah, yeah, exactly. Well and I think, you know, for me one of the reasons I started Happy Path Marketing was because, you know, when you're a small business you are trying to do it yourself and you're trying to, okay, well let me do the website. And ends up being, well, I think this is good enough for now. Or you know, I'm notorious out of my own home projects. You know, I've got a half dozen of them that get started and you know, that don't get finished or whatever. Right. So you know, somebody starts to build a website or they started, do they have good intentions. But then the business, you know, you got to take care of the customers and things like that. And so, you know, what I realized was like I love to come in as, you know, I call it your virtual sales and marketing team and say hey, like you focus on, you know, doing your craft, going out, you know, running your cruise to do H vac or running your, your teams to do solar sales or whatever it may be. Let us handle, you know, the kind of the digital, your digital footprint in a sense. And so just much like you had somebody come over to do the landscaping, like, you know, let us do your digital landscaping and let us do your website. Let us take care of, you know, what you want to do. But we want to know, you know, we're going to create your vid, we're going to take your vision and make it into something. So you know, we're going to talk to you and do it. It's very boutique type of consultative sale where we want it to look just like you're doing it but, but we're going to do it on your behalf essentially. And so that's where we found a lot of success because they're like a lot of guys that we talked to are like, yeah, thank goodness, please because I've been, I'm tired of doing it. Or I had a, you know, a friend's kid that was doing it for a while and now they're off in college and so or it's just overwhelming. It's like, yeah, I hear AI. I don't know how to, I don't even know where to start with it. I've been using chat GPT. Like is that AI? It's like, yeah, Is it really helping your business? I don't know. Probably not as much as it could be. So that's where we kind of come in and figure out, like, okay, in this kind of changing environment now, how do you, you know, where do you want to grow? Where do you. What are the, you know, what are the new clients that you're trying to contact, build relationships, build those trust bridges with? And how can we help you, you know, with your brand? Kind of like the, the last podcast I listened to that you put out to hear recently about branding is, you know, you talked about putting that, you know, that salsa brand on the end of an end cap in a grocery store because of the, the trust you have with that grocery store. Much like on your digital front, you know, you want to get your brand out there, whether it might be on social media, on some, you know, industry sites or whatever. You know, getting your brand out there in correlation or in cooperation with another brand that you're trusting or partnering with that's trusted brand is really important. It's. It's similar to why people join the Better Business Bureau or they join the Chamber of Commerce. There's a inherent trust there with those organizations that their name's associated with. And so we just help kind of extend that.
- [42:23]
Host
Yeah, yeah, you're. You're bar. You're taking a loan out on their trust, you know.
- [42:27]
Zeb Dawson
Exactly. Yeah, I love that analogy.
- [42:28]
Host
Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, you mentioned Happy Path Marketing. So how did you make the jump from, you know, you're working with companies like Tesla and Motional and Uber and launching, you know, doing these launches. So now you're doing Happy Path Marketing. How did you go from one to the other?
- [42:52]
Zeb Dawson
Yeah, absolutely. So, you know. Well, I was emotional. And, and it's a tech world. Like, there's ups and downs. You can kind of see some things changing. And I thought, you know, I'm. I've done a lot here. I've kind of, you know, was at a pretty good level making good money, and the future was like, what am I going to do now? Like, I've kind of like, I, I was, I. I'm one of, you know, one of my, I guess, you know, qualities or, you know, good or bad is I get bored easily, you know, if not being challenged, I got to go find a new challenge. Right. So I felt like I was kind of going to a plateau in my career there. And there were some changes that were coming. Hyundai was buying out part of Aptiv, and there was financial changes and this restructuring was coming. And so I started thinking about what do I want to do next? Like, what's my next. I don't really want to go work for somebody. I've helped a lot of people build their businesses. I really miss that, just that satisfaction and really getting in there doing my own thing. And so I started looking now at. I've always loved tech. I've loved passion for small business, but I didn't want to be locked into a brick and mortar and a zip code. I want to be able to travel and spend time at my clients locations. And so I, I started looking at digital marketing. I've always loved sales marketing. And I said, everybody needs this. It's, it's. AI is coming on. Let's. So I, I kind of decided that, you know, I can do it from a laptop. And what really helped me is I. Good friend of mine, him and his wife are both pilots for Hawaiian Airlines and they're, they live in Honolulu. And they invited me out early 24, I guess it was about March of 24 to Hawaii. And I'm sitting there, you know, by the pool, and I'm thinking, boy, it would be great if I could just work from here whenever I wanted to and, and not have to report to an office, because this was the time I was still working at Motional.
- [44:33]
Host
Well, that's a sign you're an entrepreneur is if you're sitting around a pool thinking about working.
- [44:37]
Zeb Dawson
Yeah, exactly. Yeah, so, so that kind of, that really sparked it. And then, you know, so I had a lot, I was doing a lot of work and like, okay, what do I want to do? And then you're always kind of thinking about that, but you're in the comfort zone. And one of the, one of the challenges is when you're in a comfort zone, you got a good paycheck. It's hard to make that leap out. So, you know, it's like, you know, the water looks nice. I don't know if I really want to get into. I think I'd rather just stay in the boat and kind of go along. Well, come May. I was pushed overboard essentially. Right. I was, I was pushed out of the boat. I was forced to go into the water and kind of do my own thing because there was restructuring and, and I was laid off. Impacted my entire team. My boss, who's the coo, all the way down, we all were, were, were kind of, you know, we were just laid off and they were doing restructuring, which we kind of knew was coming. So like, that was, that was the final push. That was like well, now I've got a decision. Now I got to, like, either am I going to go back to work, help somebody else build a business, or I'm going to do this myself.
- [45:32]
Dave
Tummy ship or getting pushed overboard for most entrepreneurs really ends up being a pivotal moment for them. And I love what Zeb is saying about how when we're in the comfort zone, we tend to want to stay in the boat, even though we don't really want to be there. And so sometimes we create what I call benevolent stressors and think of them like this. We exercise, we do ice baths, or we do saunas. We put ourselves in these extreme situations because we know that when we. We give ourselves over to them, they're actually good for us and they help us grow, finally.
- [46:08]
Zeb Dawson
So I said, okay, I'm gonna. I'm gonna do this now. I'm gonna take this leap. So I called my financial advisor. I said, here's the. Here's what I'm gonna do. What's my Runway? How do we, you know, what are the investment opportunities? And here's what, you know, kind of figured all the financial things out. And I did do a little bit of work here and there, contract work. But then we did that. I launched Happy Path. And Happy Path is a play on from engineer. So when it was kind of an inside joke, emotional. When we're trying to get the autonomous vehicle to take the best route, it's the happy path. Always stay on the happy path. It's an engineering term. So I kind of took that Happy path for the customer. Like, you want the best experience for your customer. You want to keep them on the happy path, solve their problems, give them a great experience, and in turn get a good review and referrals. So I launched as a more traditional digital marketing agency, and then we started incorporating AI. Then voice AI came around, and then we started thinking, okay, I love emerging technology. I was, I always like to see. I just was watching the most recent Apple. In fact, I'm waiting for my AirPods to show up on Friday because they have the voice translation in them and the new AirPods. So I'm excited. I'm always trying to get new tech stuff. So I said, let's get into this AI. So we really started a couple of folks. Luckily, you know, I was in this industry, engineers and folks I knew from, you know, building vehicles. I said, we're not going to build vehicles, but let's build some, you know, let's get into some of this AI and figure out how do we build software that can benefit small businesses, keep it affordable and do all of that. So that's where the first product was, the follow up pathway, which was a CRM, which is simply, it's, it's the biggest thing that's always kind of consistent across sales and businesses. Everything else is follow up. It's one of those things we all know we need to do. We all probably need to do more follow up. And so how do we automate that follow up process? And also part of it is a competitive edge. You may not think you have to do it, but if you look around and everybody else in your industry starting to do this, it's like sooner or later you're going to be forced to do it or you're going to get left behind.
- [48:01]
Host
Right.
- [48:02]
Zeb Dawson
It goes back to the day I tell people I said AI is here. Like, you may not think you need it right now, but eventually you're going to really have to start thinking about how you're incorporating into your business. Because it's like the Internet. It's like when in the 90s, everybody's talking the Internet, that's all right, I'll take another ad out in the Yellow Pages and you know, it'll be fine. Well, eventually, you know, Yellow Pages are no longer getting delivered to your doorstep in the Internet. You got to be, you have to be online. And so that's where AI is. We're in those early days of that transition. So what we are starting to do now is we're talking how are you thinking about incorporating AI? In my opinion, we're not designing AI to replace employees. We're there to a system so they can be more efficient. And it's like having little virtual assistant helping you get some mundane tasks done so you can focus on something that's actually driving a little bit more revenue for the business.
- [48:51]
Host
Yeah, everybody's using it at this point.
- [48:54]
Zeb Dawson
Everybody's using it and you can't get away from it. It's in our phones, it's on our computers, it's, it's everywhere we go. And so if you're a business, you need to have your business. You know, your people need to be able to find you when they're searching, when they're using it as a search engine. So AI, we use a lot with the voice AI and appointment setting. That's one of the areas where we have a lot of clients and success is we have a lot of clients that run ads, paid ads, have been running paid ads. And traditionally someone submits a form and then a human somebody has to call them back. Well, now with AI, our AI software will call them and actually qualify that customer and set an appointment so that the business owner is only dealing with a high intent customer that's qualified instead of wasting their time. It also, we were talking about before we started recording, it also filters all the spam out and also, also makes it so when you're getting those phone calls coming in, they're actually, you know, a really, a good customer that's, that's interested in doing business with you, not someone that's trying to tell you that your car warranty is expired right now.
- [49:55]
Host
Is this technology that you have developed or is this technology that you're using to help small business owners and you just figure out a way to use this?
- [50:06]
Zeb Dawson
No. Great question. And it's really, it's a collaboration. So on the back end we still rely on those language learning models. There's actually a couple of the different engines that we use. The Gemini engine from Google, we can kind of switch around on some of those. So we've built a couple of models on that. So it's still built on that. Because those are so massive, it would be impossible to really build our own language learning model. But what's really unique about it, I tell people, I said like, everybody can go get the raw ingredients, but what's really magical is the recipe and how you put those ingredients together and make the masterpiece. Right. And so what we're really good at is creating the, getting the right ingredients together to create a product that delivers for our customer. And that's, I tell people ChatGPT is great, but it's only as good as the prompt that you give it. And that's what's really, you know, important when you're creating this. And so I show people, you know, what we do. Could you do it? Yeah. You could spend hours learning how to do it and you could probably figure it out eventually. I'll open the hood and I'll show you. It's just like a vehicle. Could you build a vehicle? Yeah. If you had enough time and you get all the parts and everything else, you can build your own car. You could build a vehicle, but you know it's going to cost you a lot more. It's not going to be very efficient. And that's what I tell folks. We've got a team that's doing this, that, that's their, this is their expertise. So that like it's a tool that's available to you to scale and we're super flexible. I had a conversation with somebody this morning. I said like I'm not here to get rich quick. I'm here for the, in the long run. And, and my only way I'm going to be here in the long run is if you're successful. So I said we need to make this work for you. You're making money, you're making a return on your investment. And I have a saying that we use here at Happy Path and it's, we want to turn your dollars into data. You're spending dollars with us. We want to show you the data that's coming out so you know where this money's being spent, how it's being invested and what the return is. And we don't do any long term contracts. You can go to our website, you can find that, you can buy yearly agreements. I tell people, I said don't sign up for a yearly agreement until we've done business together. We trust each other. And then you want to save some money, you can do a yearly agreement next, next year or whatever. But I like doing it month to month. It holds us both accountable and it lets you have that freedom that you know, like, hey, if this isn't working out, I'm not happy. I can step away at any time and I'm, I'm not, I don't have to spend money. I'm not stuck. And that was one of my core. You know, if you talk to a lot of people, they tell you don't do that, have them sign contracts, do all that stuff. But you know, I don't like doing that personally. And so we've, we've kind of stuck with that. So there's a few things like that that kind of differentiate us from going to a, a large corporation and doing business with a salesforce or somebody like that where you're, you're going to spend a lot of money and, and be locked into longer term contracts.
- [52:37]
Host
Yeah, you know, a lot of people that's, that's a hiccup for them, you know, is, is when they got to sign a long term contract. Now this technology, you know, the follow up pathway, how do you like, what's a typical way that, that this is used? Like you're, who are you looking for? Or, or how have you seen people take this technology and use it in
- [52:59]
Zeb Dawson
a practical y question. And, and what I love about it when I talk to clients is they always come up with new ideas on how we can use the technology that we haven't even thought about yet because they know the business the best. But Some of the most classic and, you know, successful areas we're using it for, like H Vac. Any of the H Vac guys that are doing that sell maintenance plans or they're trying to sell maintenance plans. You know, we're doing outbound calling for them, reminding folks to schedule their appointment for their, you know, annual or biannual maintenance. So getting that scheduled on the, on the calendar with them and also selling it if they haven't have it. Hey, you know, you purchase a new unit from us this spring, it's time, you know, for your, you know, winter maintenance or fall maintenance. You know, we have a special going on right now to, to get into a maintenance plan or scheduling that maintenance. That's one way we're doing outbound to help people grow their businesses. And, you know, that is just adding revenue filtering in to these H Vac companies. The other one is like in the solar industry end of this year, due to some of the regulatory changes and everything, that the solar incentives are going away at the end of the year for folks that are buying, paying cash and buying these solar panels. So there's a lot of, you know, solar companies that are using our software, reach out, put these appointments on because about a month lead time to get solar installed. So really getting down to the, the end of the time here. So we're seeing it for that. So anything, anybody, any business that is looking to set appointments, our outbound AI is really great for that. On the flip side, our inbound voice AI is really great for handling calls, handling any sort of inbound inquiries, whether it's, you know, you're trying to set an appointment, you got FAQs, or you're just trying to do call routing. We do all of that with our inbound. And a lot of, we even have insurance agents that are using our software now that are doing both inbound and outbound calling versus using a calling center that was traditionally overseas or outsourced somewhere. So what's great about it is we can do, is, you know, you can do one agent or you can do a hundred agents from us. You can, you can really scale. So it's really suitable for a small business. And it's really important. I go back to this florist in town. If someone's calling you and you're the only one there and you're dealing with the customer in front of you, you're the have to make the decision to step away from that customer, answer the phone or let the phone go to voicemail. And so now that AI can at Least take the call. It'll send the shop owner a text message with that call information on there, or if they want to place an order or however they want to have it set up. The AI can handle probably, I'd say, 60 to 80% of the call based on that business. And then the shop owner has an opportunity to get that sale without step away from their customer that's in front of them.
- [55:39]
Dave
What a smart and practical way to use AI technology for Main street business owners. Because the sale that's most likely to happen is obviously the person that's in your store. They're right in front of you, they've already driven to your place, they got a situation, and they're trying to find a business that can handle it for them. So you're not going to ask them to wait while you answer the phone and try to make another sale. But you certainly don't want to lose the. Not answer the phone and lose the opportunity that's there as well. So because that phone ringing is the second strongest possible sale, somebody is calling you out of all of the businesses because they need your help. And let's face it, if you don't answer, they're hanging up and they're going to call somebody else. Now you can literally help the person in front of you and answer the phone at the same time, or at least help the customer on the phone. That is such a great solution to a real problem.
- [56:35]
Zeb Dawson
So there's a lot of small businesses where they don't have somebody that's answering the phone all the time or, you know, you're at the ball game with your kids, you don't want to answer the phone. I know a lot of small business owners that are answering the phone all the time, no matter where they are, because it's forwarded to their cell phone or their cell phone is their main number.
- [56:48]
Host
It's really geared for small, local business owners mainly.
- [56:52]
Zeb Dawson
Really is. That's our. That's our bread and butter.
- [56:54]
Host
Now, can it answer technical questions or.
- [56:57]
Zeb Dawson
Yeah. So we have a. We build the knowledge base for you based on your business. It can answer technical questions, it can give pricing, and it can do, you know, as little or as much as you would like it to do. Everything is, you know what I tell people? I said, if you were to train a new employee that was going to answer the phone for you, what is the information they need to know? Because that's essentially what we're doing. We got to train this AI to do that. And it can reference your website, it can Reference your calendar. It can reference materials, databases, you know, knowledge bases, any of that information. So, you know, it really is a, it really is like an employee in a lot of ways that's there to answer the phone. It can also send emails, it can send text messages. So. And it can do follow up. So it can also, you know.
- [57:43]
Host
Yeah, no, that's incredibly useful. So. And it's. And it doesn't call out sick.
- [57:49]
Zeb Dawson
And it doesn't call out sick. And it's always in a good mood. It doesn't get, you know, you know, tired after lunch or anything like that and.
- [57:57]
Host
Right, right.
- [57:58]
Zeb Dawson
And it can have different personalities. That's what's really also unique about it. You can have it, it can have different accents. It can have. We actually can even create office environments in the background. So it can have. It sounds like it's in a call center or it can sound like it's in a, you know, whatever environment. We can record voices and we have, you know, so. So you can really customize it to your business and you can speed it up, slow it down, be more empathetic, depending on your business, you know, so if you're a funeral home and you're dealing with people that are calling in and more of a state that are, you know, you want to be a little more somber and things like that, you can customize it for that.
- [58:33]
Host
That's amazing. My company that I sold was very dependent upon answering the phones. We didn't have anything online where people could book. And so everybody was responsible to answer the phone. If, you know, if it didn't rang more than three times, everybody's running to answer it, you know, because that means everybody's who's supposed to answer it is, is on another line. You know, we never, never let it go to voicemail because just the, the independent numbers that I did of just missing one job a day for a small business at the end of the year. And our tickets were small. They weren't, you know, you got roofing companies that are, you know, 10, $15,000. Our average job size was $363. So just missing one job a day, five days a week was, would amount to $93,000 at the end of the year. You don't think about that until you think about it and put those numbers together and yeah, you don't want to miss answering the phone, so.
- [59:33]
Zeb Dawson
No, you don't. And also, like a lot of people are interested now. They're like, they're big in the texting, you know, they want to get it, set an appointment, vitexing and all of that. So, you know, we can set it up to the number, you can text the number, you can call the number. It's also really, what's cool is we actually have. The AI can do a live transfer. So if it calls, I need to talk to Dave. Like, you know, it'll ask some details and then it'll do an introduction and it'll transfer to your cell phone. You can set it up to that. So if you want to transfer to a human, you can still do that. So it's, you know, it's really, as I said, tell people, I said it's very customizable. Like, tell me what you want to do and we'll tell you. There's probably, you know, very few things that we could not really deliver on. I mean it's, we can do probably 90% of it now and then. And I tell people, I said, today is the worst it's ever going to be. It gets better every single day. Yeah, that's just evolving as technology evolves. But so, yeah, so that's one of our really cool ones. And then we have a lot of the traditional automations, email marketing, all of those types of tools that kind of go in that. But I, you know, we lead with our voice AI right now because it's such a popular product and we've got a strong team behind that. And you know, it's, it's really great for us is that we love to build out a demo. So anyone that's listening, that's interested, you know, and they contact us like we'll build out a demo number for them, a demo example, so they can call it and they can try it. And then on our site as well, we have some numbers that people can call into just to experience it because a lot of people have, is it going to sound like a robot? How's it going to sound? Am I going to be able to understand it? You know, is it human natural? So we've created a few different demos for different industries like insurance and H Vac and some of those industries. So you can, you can do both demos. You can call in and listen to it, or you can put your number in and have it call you and you can kind of understand how it works both ways.
- [61:17]
Host
So, and I would imagine by doing that you're able to get their feedback and what they might want tweaked. So you set that up and then they call it and they go, oh, this is great, but we really need it to be able to handle this and you're able to. If you're able to accommodate that, you're able. At least we do.
- [61:36]
Zeb Dawson
And then, you know, everything's recorded. That's another nice thing too is all these calls are recorded. So now you can use it for training. You can use this. You can kind of gather other customer data points. So, you know, we can either do an analysis for you or you can do it yourself. But we can figure out, like, you know, you're getting a lot of calls about particular. This particular thing or this, you know, wanting to know where. Like, for example, you're getting a lot of calls, people calling when to know when is your technician going to show up at the house? Well, you know what maybe we should ought to do? Let's do a little bit more proactive. Let's implement a texting system that tells your tech when they're on their way. So now people aren't just calling in and saying, like, where's your tech? Boom. They got a text message that says, hey, Brian's on his way. He'll be there in 20 minutes, or whatever, you know, so there's. It leads to discovering different things that we can kind of help with the business they may not have known because, like, the business owner's like, well, I didn't know people were calling in that much because Sarah's been answering the phone the whole time and she just tells them, yeah, here it is. And never really says, hey, we're getting a lot of calls about that. So there's interesting data points that we've been working with business owners that we've discovered.
- [62:35]
Host
Well, you know, I know we're getting close to the end.
- [62:38]
Zeb Dawson
Yeah.
- [62:39]
Host
So what are some of your favorite things that you've seen people do with this that you, you know, that maybe you hadn't intended or, you know, or ideas that popped up for you that were like, this is, you know, a new way of using this.
- [62:55]
Zeb Dawson
Well, I think the appointment setter was. Was a big one for us. Like realizing what we realized, especially when you're paying, do you're doing paid ads? Because what we realized was that customers, our customers were spending a lot of money on paid ads. And when they're getting those inbound inquiries, a lot of times a customer's shopping around, so they're looking at. They're doing a Google search and they pull up a couple. Open a couple of tabs, the same of you and your competitors, and they're either calling or inquiring about at multiple times. So it was really a Game of who was the first to respond that typically got the business. So I can tell people it's the early bird that gets to warm, right? So now when they do an inquiry or AI calling within a few seconds before they even have a chance to call your competitor has been huge. So I think that's one of the biggest things is where it's like, that's why I tell you, I say if you're not doing it, someone else is going to do it and they're going to beat you to the punch, right? So, so I think that was one of the really unique things because we just launched the outbound calling in July, so that's fairly new and we've people are just extremely excited about that. So that's been rewarding for me anytime I see success. And the other thing too I think is realizing the amount of leverage that like mundane tasks that, that we all end up doing that we don't think about, that we can actually leverage and automate with AI and through our follow up pathway, I think that was it with including automating like social media posts and all these things that we know we should be doing that we're not doing. And now what happened was when we started letting these, doing these AI do these tasks, now the business owners are having more time to actually create more revenue, do more active, reach out, do networking events or follow up with people that they know also going out and actually spending more time with customers. The one thing I'll tell your audience is video testimonials are extremely powerful. So if you're a service business and you've got somebody that's a happy customer, having them either record it or you going out and recording a video testimonial of them and putting that on your social media is very powerful words. The problem with AI, the good and bad, anybody can write on the words like, and an AI can write out reviews or whatever. So what's becoming important is, you know, showing your authentic version and brand you holding your phone up and doing a video, just an announcement or anything and then posting it to your social media is going to get huge traction. It helps the algorithms without spending any money. So if I was to tell people, I said if you want to, do you want to get some growth without spending any money, start doing video uploads and putting that on your social media and sharing that out and then getting your customers to do video testimonial reviews, that'll be huge.
- [65:27]
Host
That is such great advice because people aren't expecting a video testimonial Right. That just makes that person more real people connect with it better. You're right. The problem is, like you said, you hate doing it. A lot of people just, yeah, it's,
- [65:43]
Zeb Dawson
it's uncomfortable for, but, but just do it. Just have fun with it. And I tell people, I said, you know, if you really don't feel comfortable, like, that's one of the things we offer. Like, we do that. We help people with video. We help. We have professionals that do that. We can edit, we can do whatever you want. We do a lot of video ads now. But do, just start doing it and you know, if you're, if you got a little goofy person out, make it goofy, do whatever. But it's, it is really powerful and it doesn't really cost you anything other than some of your time and maybe a little dignity every once in a while, but it's well worth it.
- [66:16]
Host
Yeah, well, you know, I think it's a really good way of following up with people because the follow up is the thing that sometimes maybe people feel like, oh, this guy's just following up with me. Because that's what salespeople do. And so if you can do anything a little bit different and if you can do that where you can just take a quick video and say, you know, hey, Zeb, listen, I was really excited about our talk the other day and I had a couple ideas that I think might help you. And hey, just whenever you want, just give me a call, you know, and I'd love to go over this with you. You know, just something really quick like that. It's. It's not what they're normally going to get and.
- [66:54]
Zeb Dawson
Exactly. Text texting, you know, especially nowadays, it's easy to do. Just open your text message and send a quick video of you through a text even. It's quick and easy and it catches people off guard in a good way. They're like, oh, I'm not expecting the. And it's like, one, you took a few seconds longer than just sending a message. Two, they know it's not automated. They know it's actually coming from you. It's very genuine. And it's just kind of that raw, authentic version of you and your brand. And, and I tell people I said this, think about ways to do it. Do it in front of your truck, do it in front of your brand with your branding on it, your company in your office, you know, and start showing the people that are behind the scenes, like have on your social media and things like let them know, like, show the office Folks that are working there, show the technicians, show like more because so much of it is kind of, especially if you're a service business and you're not, you're kind of in a warehouse or you're somewhere that people don't really see the rest of your company and all they know is your name and your tech that shows up. Show them that there's more to you and, and it's easy to do with quick video nowadays. So yeah, so that's really good. The other thing I'll tell people, if you're a retail shop owner or anything like that from a, a brick and mortar standpoint is as crazy as it sounds. Get on, get on the TikTok live stuff and get on to doing live, live streaming. That's where the, that's where the E commerce and that's where the retail side is going to. We all know QVC on tv. Become your own local QVC version on your social media.
- [68:28]
Host
I've seen people do that and they've, people have had pretty good success with that.
- [68:33]
Zeb Dawson
It's huge. And the algorithms are picking this up and it's a huge trend in Asia and it's moving this way. So if you're not doing lives, you need to. That's a new area that we've kind of explored with our E Commerce. We've got some E commerce clients now that we're doing and then we get them connected with influencers. So anyone that's out there, that's in that, in that space like it's really, it's powerful. Especially with the holiday season coming up now if you're trying to boost in store sales and retail sales, supplement it with those online sales.
- [69:03]
Host
Yeah.
- [69:03]
Zeb Dawson
Still keep your, your store the brick and mortar but remember that brick and mortar you're, you're kind of restricted. You've got a, a radius that people are going to travel to. So I always, I tell people, I said the people you know which are in your area and the people you don't know, you know, the people you don't know is much larger. So go target them and you can do it very cost effectively now with, with some of that. So yeah, anyways it's, that's what I love to do. I love to problem solve, I love to just meet with business owners, bounce ideas off of them, you know, figure out what's going on, how do we incorporate things? It's always changing. So if anybody ever wants to, in your audience wants to reach out and just talk or grab a coffee, I'll, I'LL make sure we have the links. There's a, I literally have a link that says let's grab a coffee and you can grab a few minutes on my time, my calendar. And I'm always happy to meet and just, just chat and hear what's going on and you know, bounce ideas around.
- [69:53]
Host
Yeah, yeah, no, I love that. And for anybody that doesn't want to go into the show notes and find the links, what, what is the best way to get ahold of you?
- [70:02]
Zeb Dawson
Yeah, well, our main website, happypathmarketing.com is always a great place to start. I tell people, I said go on there. That'll kind of get you everywhere you need to go. You can also go to follow uppathway.com for our follow up pathway but that's, that's linked to Happy Path as well. And you know, we've got all of the links to the AI and everything on there as well. But you can also just shoot me an email directly if you want to get in touch. It's really simple. It's zeb happypathmarketing.com and so you know, shoot me an email, I'll make sure to respond. I try to get through all my emails every day with everything. So it's, you know, you can contact on my website, there's a contact us form. You can do a little bio about myself, my business partner and you know, you can, you can kind of find out more about us on there and ask questions or whatever. But we're super low pressure. We're just here to provide solutions and mostly just really talk about how we can, how we can help each other out and just be part of the small business community.
- [70:58]
Host
Yeah, no, that's great. You know, I would love to, if anybody calls you, I would love to be a part of those conversations and helping them think how they might be able to use, use this because it's, it's incredible technology and, and just, yeah, absolutely. You know, the, the problems that it solves of making sure that phone is getting answered and that customers are getting answers that, that are helpful to them instead of just a menu, you know, and just to leave a voicemail. That's just huge.
- [71:27]
Zeb Dawson
Yeah, no, absolutely. Love to have you on. We should do that for the few folks that could that be interested in learning more. We can do a little deep dive kind of together and get some good use cases and maybe then they can join the show later on at some point and share with the broader audience some of the success stories that they've had.
- [71:45]
Host
Yeah, that'd Be great. Well, hey, Ed has been fantastic having you on the show. You're, you're a joy to talk to and very bright guy and, and I love your, your focus on helping people and it comes back to you. So I'm sure a lot of our listeners are going to give you a call.
- [72:02]
Zeb Dawson
Well, thanks for having me on the show. I enjoy listening to the podcast. I'm excited to continue to hear the stories of others. It's always inspirational. No matter what I do, no matter what corporate I go to, I've always come back to my roots, which is small business. And I love being around small business owners. There's a small business expo going on here in Vegas next month. I'm excited to attend. So, you know, always happy to love the, a good excuse to travel. So if, you know, always good to, if I get a chance to get down to Alabama and, and visit, it would be great to, to catch up in person. I love to, to get around to see different parts of the country. So it's, it's been a pleasure. I'm, I'm excited to continue the conversation in the future. We'll be in touch and hopefully everybody here and the rest of the audience gets a chance to tell their story of how AI is, is helping them with their business.
- [72:49]
Host
Yeah, sounds great. Well, thanks, eb. Look forward to talking to you soon.
- [72:54]
Zeb Dawson
All right, thanks, Dave.
- [72:57]
Dave
Zeb's story really highlights how curiosity, service and persistence can open doors from corporate leadership to entrepreneurship. His journey shows us how innovation and trust go hand in hand and how tools like AI can free small business owners to do more of what they love while serving customers better and in. If Zeb's journey has sparked something in you, whether it's an idea of how you want to embrace AI or just building trust bridges or finding your own happy path, well, go ahead and take the next step and do it now. Check out Happy Path Marketing and explore a demo of all their AI tools. See what, what is in there that can help you grow your business smarter, run smoother. And I'm going to link everything in the show notes, so be sure to connect with Zeb, learn more about Follow up pathway and service path, and start exploring how you can bring this kind of innovation into your own business. Don't wait, because the businesses that adapt this first are going to be the ones that thrive.
- [74:10]
Zeb Dawson
It.