Special Ops with Emma Rainville

Episode: Automation Butterfly Effect: How One CRM Error Crashed a Million-Dollar Launch
Date: December 2, 2025
Host: Emma Rainville
Guests: Thiago & Richard, Shockwaves team

Episode Overview

In this focused, high-energy episode, Emma Rainville and her expert guests Thiago and Richard dive deep into the hidden risks of business process automation. Using a real-life CRM disaster as a case study, they demonstrate how seemingly minor oversights can trigger catastrophic failures—costing businesses hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of dollars. The central takeaway: regularly audit your automated systems, especially those tied directly to revenue, because the "butterfly effect" in tech can derail even the most successful ventures.

Main Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Butterfly Effect in Automation

• Richard opens with a stark warning: "The thing about automation is it is prone to the butterfly effect. There's tiny little change that shouldn't be affecting anything. This can have catastrophic effects." (00:00)
  • Minor, overlooked issues in automation can compound into major business problems.
  • Automated systems, once set up, are often forgotten until something breaks.

2. How Often Should You Audit Your Systems?

• Emma poses the central tactical question: “How often do you check systems that look like they’re working?” (00:08)
• Thiago suggests, "Twice a year, you’re going to be better than 95% of small businesses... Once a year is already pretty decent" (01:57)
• Emma challenges, “If the automation brings in any kind of money... it should be every three months. If your backend automation has a credit card captured... it should be looked at every quarter.” (02:20)
  • Consensus:
    • Non-mission-critical automations: Audit every 6 months
    • Revenue-linked automations (e.g., email sequences, payment gateways): Audit every 3 months
  • Every automation should have a date stamp for last check.

3. What Can Go Wrong: The Million-Dollar CRM Disaster

• Emma recounts a real-world meltdown:

  • A CRM system had automations scheduled far into the future (5-10 years out) with no recent audits.
  • On New Year’s Eve—prime time for direct response marketing—the automation crashed minutes after midnight (04:22).
  • Quote: "Midnight happened at 12:01... we just went to check our links... they're all down." (04:22)
  • The automated system that was supposed to monitor these links (Pingdom) failed to catch the outage.
  • The crisis wasted two and a half hours before it was reported and six hours to full recovery.

  Memorable moment:

  • Emma: "Thank God it was an off year for me drinking... because I was completely sober and I got a phone call at 12:01, 12:02..." (04:22)
  • Chaos and frantic escalation, including owner-level wake-up calls.

  Aftermath:

  • Clients lost confidence and left en masse—costing hundreds of thousands short-term, and potentially millions long-term.

4. Operational Best Practices

• Richard shares a standard operating procedure (SOP):
  • “When we come in for new clients, the first thing we do is this kind of deep dive for their systems. And we see this with pretty much every area we come in with.” (01:01)
  • Emphasis on preventative review over reactive firefighting.
  • Immediate access to an SOP playbook for automation auditing, available in their Visionary Vault.

5. Key Recommendations

• Check every automation at least twice a year; three times for revenue-critical systems.
• Stamp every change or audit with the date.
• Player vigilance: Emma notes, "Anything that brings in money needs a quarterly look, minimum." (02:20)
• Don’t trust automation blindly—test your systems, especially before major launches or blackout dates.
• Legacy issues will not announce themselves; you have to look for them.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Richard: “The thing about legacy systems is that you don't look for the problems. If you're not actively doing that, you will not see what is going wrong.” (01:01)
• Emma: “You need to go through the whole thing. The thing about automation is it really is prone to the butterfly effect... a tag that hasn't been properly updated. This can have catastrophic effects and you can't predict for it.” (03:05)
• Emma (on the fateful night): “Thank God it was an off year for me drinking... because I was completely sober and I got a phone call at 12:01, 12:02. Hey Emma, we just went to check our links... they're all down.” (04:22)
• Emma (on urgency): “It took them two and a half hours to report that it was down and six hours to get it back up.” (04:50)
• Richard: "How many hundreds of thousands of dollars do you think that that cost their clients and how many millions of dollars in the future did it cost them? Because the clients did leave in droves." (05:40)

Timestamps for Key Segments

• 00:00 – 01:01: Introduction to automation’s butterfly effect; why small issues cause big disasters
• 01:01 – 02:16: How often to review automations; differences for revenue-generating systems
• 02:53 – 03:44: Special case for launches, split testing, and incremental changes
• 04:21 – 05:40: Detailed story: Million-dollar CRM automation failure on New Year’s Eve
• 05:40 – End: Lessons learned, SOP announcement, and Visionary Vault plug

Final Takeaways

• Never treat “set and forget” automation as truly hands-off.
• Institute a rigorous review schedule with milestones and date stamps.
• Prepare for the unexpected—test and probe before crunch time.
• Practical tools (SOPs, checklists) are available for immediate implementation (see Visionary Vault).

This episode is a tactical wake-up call for every business that relies on automation, blending war stories with actionable advice—Special Ops style.