← Living Your Legacy
Loading summary
Transcript66 lines
- [00:00]
Alexi Vanari
If I'm going to spend my time or money as even myself, as a consumer, I want to have a great experience, you know, and I think so often we all get wrapped up in our own business or lives that maybe you don't take the time to really think about how you can stand out from the pack. And if we can use technology today, which we can with AI, to really make a difference, but still make it personal, you'll learn a lot from that and it takes you one step closer to success.
- [00:27]
Narrator/Announcer
Alexi Vanari is a pioneering and results driven technology executive and the co founder and CEO of Das Technology. Building on over two decades of tech marketing expertise, she helps thousands of businesses worldwide seamlessly connect with consumers and optimize their digital response, empowering them to maximize their ROI and setting a new standard for consumer engagement, technological innovation and sustainable business growth.
- [00:53]
Alexi Vanari
Let's not just monitor digital conversations and engagements with consumers. Let's help businesses strike and take action to make a difference and use our technology and AI to actually do that. That's what I love about being an entrepreneur, right? We're always finding new ways to create to make things better. That's also something I love doing. Just make things better for people in your business. As an entrepreneur, how can you think outside the box?
- [01:20]
Podcast Intro/Trailer Voice
It spans the globe like a super high cold Internet Elv. Ready. Today, Apple is going to reinvent the phone. It's not over until I win the Living your Legacy podcast. For those who live to leave a legacy that's extraordinary. The impossible has happened. Oh, that is sensational. Jordan, open Chicago with the lead. You said Paul is the fastest man on the planet. You can live your dream.
- [01:54]
Jason Tyler
Welcome back, ladies and gentlemen, to another episode of the Living youg Legacy podcast. I'm your host for today, Jason Tyler, and I am joined by a very special guest who is a heavy hitter and you're a double feature on the platform. We just finished recording two episodes. Alexi Veneri. Alexi, welcome to the show.
- [02:12]
Alexi Vanari
Thank you. It's great to be here.
- [02:14]
Jason Tyler
It's a pleasure to have you. Now we're on the other side of filming. Not one, but two episodes for you. First of all, how you feeling?
- [02:21]
Alexi Vanari
Feeling great.
- [02:22]
Jason Tyler
I feel like we blazed right. We blazed right through it. And one thing that I ask all of my guests here on the show after we finish filming is if you know for the viewers out there what's like the number one lesson that you'd like people to learn from your story,
- [02:37]
Alexi Vanari
I think that the lesson is it's okay to take Risks and try new things, adopt new technology, don't be afraid. Even if failure happens, you'll learn a lot from that and it takes you one step closer to success.
- [02:52]
Jason Tyler
I totally agree with you on that. I think one of the main things that we touched on throughout going through your whole story and going through the business journey for DAs was the gray area. We live in the gray and the ability to just kind of pivot, adapt. Life's gonna throw you curveballs all the time. For the business owner out there, our audience, they're super entrepreneurial, they're very business minded. For the entrepreneur out there, that's thinking like, ah, I kind of want to get into this thing, but I don't know. I don't know if I want to take the risk. What's your, what's your message to them?
- [03:28]
Alexi Vanari
You know, it's always better to try and fail than to wonder what if? And not try. I think, and I know that's cliche, but I really do think that, you know, every entrepreneur, just like in life, not everything works. So try a lot of things and at some point you will get that home run. So definitely don't be afraid. Also be a lifelong learner, Learn from other people. It's great to talk to people, get knowledge, try new things. As long as especially whatever you're doing has a good reason and a good outcome behind it. So how can you make a difference?
- [04:02]
Jason Tyler
How can you make things better?
- [04:03]
Alexi Vanari
Exactly. Always make it better.
- [04:05]
Jason Tyler
Always make it better. And another thing is don't be afraid of feedback. And I think that's a great segue to kind of talk about what you do with DAS technology, which is allow for businesses to get great feedback on making their processes better, making their different touch points for their customers better. So talk to me a little bit about just like what DAS Technologies is first and foremost and then how we're making these businesses better. Mostly in the automotive field, but along all of the different verticals.
- [04:36]
Alexi Vanari
Exactly. I've always been sort of a believer in like, we're only here maybe for one ride. We don't know what's after this life, so why not do what you're going to do the best way you can do it? And there has to be a way to make literally, I think, everything in your life better. Right. If you're always striving for that. So we like to find ways to help businesses do a better job in terms of the customer experience and the customer journey. Part of that is you have to ask questions, you got to be open to feedback we created one of the very first consumer surveys for automotive. So after you would buy or service a vehicle, you actually would get a survey from us same day. That didn't happen before DAS technology. We actually have a patent around that. It seems really commonplace today. But in the old days, how you'd get feedback or give feedback oftentimes is you'd wait for the manufacturer of the vehicle to mail. You physically mail or sometimes email a survey and It'd be like 17 pages and no one's doing that. Or if you didn't wait for that or you had a really bad experience, review sites popped up before we built the survey. And so some people that were really upset and maybe rightly so would go leave a bad review. Is that one out of 500 consumers with that business? Right. What about the other 499 consumers that had a great experience? So we kind of wanted to tell their story and I think you touched on it like I am a storyteller,
- [05:57]
Jason Tyler
you know, from, from early on too. It's not just she didn't, she wasn't just a storyteller, you know, just in business you were a storyteller, you were writing scripts, you were doing stage plays, screenplays, all sorts of things in like a creative capacity early on, even before you got into business. So it just goes to show like your whole ethos is built around telling that story and developing that story over the course of time with long term clientele.
- [06:23]
Alexi Vanari
Yeah.
- [06:24]
Jason Tyler
I think one of the, one of my biggest takeaways from being able to having the honor of doing your interview was being able to see just how much you care about not only your, your direct clients through whom you're touching hundreds of thousands, if not millions of people through different avenues, but just how much you care about like the consumer experience. Right. And I think not enough business owners really take into account the from point A to point Z of the consumer journey through interacting with their business. Talk to me a little bit about like where that, that care comes. Comes from.
- [07:07]
Alexi Vanari
Sure. And by the way, I love our day to day. Thank you for interviewing me and learning about our story in the company. It's been awesome. I don't know, I think that it goes back to when I was a kid and you know, I'm a Gen X. We kind of had to take care of ourselves and I always appreciated when you visited a business or a teacher took time with you. Right. Like it made an impact for sure. If I'm going to spend my time or money as even myself, as a consumer, I want to have a great experience, you know, and I think so often we all get wrapped up in our own business or lives that maybe you don't take the time to really think about how you can stand out from the pack. And if we can use technology today, which we can with AI, to really make a difference, but still make it personal. And also by doing that, we can free up the humans in these businesses to sit and have time like this. Like what a luxury. I've had a day with you talking about stories. I mean, this is a dream, right? When do we ever get time to do this, right? I can't even be on my phone. And you've been so nice and amazing and that never happens anymore. We're constantly bombarded with messages and texts and emails and, and Slack and all
- [08:19]
Jason Tyler
of these different platforms that were on Monday.com and this and that.
- [08:22]
Alexi Vanari
Well, actually many years ago I refused to be on Slack and now teams chat because it was too much. As a CEO, I'm like, I just, I can't, I want to put my phone down, not look at my email and have real conversations. And I get, there's obviously a time and a place and it's a quick way to message. It's like in a group texting through at your work. But I was just like, no, I think we all have to be protective of our time and use technology in the right way when it makes sense. But also like how do we engage with each other and do have a real experience. So we're just very unique. We do two things. We leverage technology to be more personal and get consumers the information they need while we're also freeing up time for the humans that work at these businesses so they can engage one to one, you know, in person.
- [09:12]
Jason Tyler
Now one of the things that we got to talk a little bit about, which I want to kind of just get your opinion on here, AI is this, you know, brand new frontier in technology. It's ever expanding. We talked about it a couple of times, like every two weeks there's a new development in AI. Now we're working on agentic AI and developing these different agents that can go off and actually do tasks independently of the actual user and come back and report on what they've done. And it's this whole huge thing we really have. I liken it to in Ironman, he's, he's got Jarvis.
- [09:48]
Alexi Vanari
Yeah, Jarvis.
- [09:49]
Jason Tyler
Search for what my groceries are going to be. You know what I mean? What are you most excited for with AI and how it can be implemented in these different businesses that you're working with.
- [09:59]
Alexi Vanari
Great question. And we are doing that and we are investing in agentic AI and we, we're definitely sort of in the mix of it, I think twofold. So we're excited because even as our own business, we intentionally created a committee of our own team members in every department to use it ourselves and be, you know, digest it ourselves and see how it can help every position you might be in, HR and accounting, whatever the role, sales, marketing. And so we're using it and learning from it and doing the best practices ourselves. Such as the biggest thing is protecting our own data. You can't just let any employee or anyone in your business, you know, sign up for any free tool and try anything or let a rogue agent do whatever they want fully. Now, that might be coming in the future, but for right now, we like to learn from it and protect it, but secure that data. So that's really important. But then I'm excited to see how much more it frees up our team and ultimately for our businesses when they use our AI platform. Frees them up from mundane things, right?
- [11:02]
Jason Tyler
Like the little background things.
- [11:03]
Alexi Vanari
Oh, my God, there's so many things, like something very, very basic that, you know, not that long ago, especially if you weren't working with us, if you submitted a lead to a car dealer and said, hey, I'm interested in this BMW, right? And they had a list of questions, maybe, you know, does it come with a warranty, whatever they might ask, you know, how does this size compare to this other maybe SUV I already have today, a human would have to get the message, would have to find the time, would have to look at it, would have to themselves go research. Maybe they would have to search their own inventory on their own business's website to find that. They would have to do comparison. Now, while you're doing all of that to answer one inquiry, what are you not doing? You're ignoring maybe the consumer in the showroom that really wants a test drive. And every minute you're spending responding to that one consumer, more emails are building up, more texts are building up, right? A customer you sold a car to last week is in the service lane. You know this from your own experience. And they're saying that, oh, the salesperson promised that, you know, this would happen or this just broke and maybe I want. There's so much going on. And that's just one example. In automotive today, we can now still understand kind of what the preference is from the business owner or that salesperson or. And how they want to respond. But we actually can go and use our AI technology to quickly, less than a second, know all the other options for that inventory, actually get the answers to that consumer's question and answer it with the right information quickly. And also alert the salesperson how we answered it and still give them the information. And at any moment, the consumer can still text or quickly engage with that human. But we freed up time on both sides. Right. And that's the beauty of it. It's so exciting, you know, to even relate it to something else. My husband and I, Dave, have a son, Griffin, who's amazing. He's 15, and we've. As technologists, we're very open to using technology. And he's now in a school where they, like, encourage them to use AI with certain rules. But I'm like, that's amazing. No, he doesn't have to go research in textbooks or even search online the way we used to in school. He can engage with AI to get him a lot of information, but then they challenge him to then make it his own and learn from it. But the amount of information he can get so quickly, first of all, he's learning more, but now he's also learning how to use AI, not just that subject that he's maybe writing, you know, a paper on. So I just, I think it's fascinating and amazing if used in the right way.
- [13:43]
Podcast Intro/Trailer Voice
Yeah.
- [13:43]
Alexi Vanari
Because then it can also free us all up to be more human. We might find out that the prior 20 years, we weren't human enough because we were so busy with a million Slack messages and chats and emails and all these systems and log into the CRM and go look at the inventory system and, like, we didn't have time for our family.
- [14:03]
Jason Tyler
Exactly.
- [14:04]
Alexi Vanari
We didn't have time to have real conversations. Right. You were back to. Back to back in meetings, and then you're somewhere trying to scramble and look at your emails, and that might have been the worst time. Not now. We're maybe finally able to go back to, like, when I was growing up
- [14:17]
Jason Tyler
as Jenna on the cusp, I believe
- [14:19]
Alexi Vanari
we talked to each other. We didn't have cell phones. We would go play, and our parents didn't know where we were and we'd figure things out. So in a weird way, I'm really hopeful that it'll give us back a little bit humanity because we'll have more time.
- [14:31]
Jason Tyler
You know, I. I feel like. And. And I actually had a conversation with somebody about this the other day, but I feel like we had sort of like, if you look at the Internet as a timeline, right? We had this timeline of from the start point to right up until now with the advent of AI, where we were just. The Internet was functioning kind of as this library for all of human data over time. Right. All of the knowledge that humanity is composed, compiled together, was in one place in this database. Right. And now AI comes in and is the interpreter.
- [15:03]
Alexi Vanari
Right?
- [15:03]
Jason Tyler
Data.
- [15:04]
Alexi Vanari
Exactly.
- [15:04]
Jason Tyler
It's an aggregator. It's able to quickly go through, peruse that data and spit it back to you exactly what you'd asked it for in record time. And I think that is where we're going with being able to kind of shift away from having to go search through this massive, massive library of data that we've created to now being able to just say, hey, all right, I need to find this thing. Cool. Found it. Bye.
- [15:28]
Alexi Vanari
Right. We were the librarians sifting through all this stuff, where now we actually all have our own virtual assistants or multiple assistants, and the agents doing the tasks for us to free us up. But ultimately, we still have that humanity, and we need that logic and the understanding and really the creativity and innovation might be unlocked a bit more with all of us, which that's what I'm looking forward to.
- [15:52]
Jason Tyler
Me as well. Me as well. Now, as we kind of wind down the pod here, I have one more question that I ask of all my guests here on the show. We're here at Inside Success. So I have to ask for the entrepreneur out there, what is Alexi's number one key tip for success?
- [16:08]
Alexi Vanari
Oh, man, you did not prep me at all for that. Oh, there's so many tips. I feel like, well, I'm all about the life hacks. Maybe that's my tip. I like to sometimes find the shortest distance between two points, and sometimes I say order off the menu or live in the gray. But I'm always a lifelong learner. And if someone can share a great life hack, just a business hack, and a lot of what you guys do include is to you for sharing all these stories of all these great entrepreneurs.
- [16:41]
Jason Tyler
Thank you.
- [16:41]
Alexi Vanari
Thank you. Yeah, Amazing. You know, if you can you get those, embrace it, try it, and then share, that to me is amazing. I'll give everybody a life tip that has nothing to do with my business. One of my very first. Not my very, very first. One of my very early jobs, when I was still in university and college, I worked at the front desk of a Four Seasons, and it was a job I can do after class. And I got the night shift right. I'm working 3pm to midnight. And I'm thinking, oh, this is so cool. They give me a suit or, you know, some business attire. I'm at the. Oh, my gosh. I quickly learned it was the worst job in hospitality because you're on your feet the whole shift. And when you're working the late shift, the night shift to midnight, you get all the travelers that maybe their flights were delayed. And hotels also overbook because there's a no show rate. And now sometimes you have people coming in and you may not have a room or you have the wrong room and you, you learn. Greatest job, though, because I learned to juggle a lot. Right. And I have so much going on all the time. Yet you are the face of the hotel. You have to smile and be presentable. You learn very quickly how to, like, not let them see you sweat. And you are just trying to create a great experience for usually a frazzled traveler or a business traveler or a flight attendant. And I was always amazed at some point, like, they didn't even see me. They didn't know my name, they didn't think about my day. Right. And I remember thinking, you know, one day I'm gonna learn from this. I'm gonna learn from this. And how. And I actually have, I guess, learned how to create better experiences for consumers using technology. But I'm like, I'm never gonna forget. And if I can ever afford every time I go to a hotel to tip the front desk and thank them
- [18:26]
Jason Tyler
because nobody ever does, they are least appreciated.
- [18:30]
Alexi Vanari
Yep. And it has not changed. I'm not young anymore. I'm no longer in my early 20s, going to school and at the front desk, and it hasn't changed at all. And you know, last night I tipped the front desk and sometimes they almost start crying and I say, like, I don't need anything from you. I just wanted to say thank you. I've had your job tip the front desk. So there's a life hack. So I think that in life, if you can find the shortest distance, you live in the gray, you appreciate people, you create great experiences. And sometimes how you get a great experience is you pay it forward. Tipping the front desk without asking, they will upgrade your room, they'll give you free water, they'll give you a late checkout. You know, they don't have to do any of those things, but it's because somebody took the time to learn their name and thank them for being on their feet all night or during the day. So those little things, that's a little life hack. And now everyone's gonna start tipping the front desk. Yay.
- [19:27]
Jason Tyler
Thank God.
- [19:28]
Alexi Vanari
But just those little things. But anyway, that's what I love about being an entrepreneur.
- [19:33]
Narrator/Announcer
Right.
- [19:33]
Alexi Vanari
We're always finding new ways to create to make things better. That's also something I love doing. Just make things better for people.
- [19:40]
Jason Tyler
Love that. I love that. And you know, it goes to. I think you just helped me identify kind of a gap in the market where I'm like, wait a minute, how have we not updated this system in I don't even know how many years?
- [19:51]
Alexi Vanari
Oh, the front desk is still so archaic. And there's people that'll do. I know people doing new software and stuff. And yes, there are self service kiosks. Yes. But half the time they don't work or people still want to go to the human, which is good for humanity. That's good. We still want that in person experience of the human, but also treat them like a human. You know, it's just such a fascinating, wonderful time we're in. We can use technology now to take care of the mundane things so we can all be more human.
- [20:18]
Jason Tyler
Yeah. Even if it's just a simple thing of like. Yeah, the kiosk is there. If you're a quick customer, you've got everything sorted. You just need to get a room key printed. Cool. The kiosk is there for that, but it frees up the human to not have to be on her feet and at the desk the whole time. If you need to speak to a human, just press a button on the kiosk and she'll come.
- [20:37]
Narrator/Announcer
Right.
- [20:37]
Alexi Vanari
Or have a conversation. A hotel. I was just. At first time ever. This is maybe a change. I don't know what they called this human. I still tip them. It felt like they were a bellman and they said, oh, we do the check in process at your room now. Like, why do you have to go to the front desk? They took the bags, put them in the room and they walked me to the room. And in the room, what you would call a bellman or whatever said, can we just verify the card on file? Because you give a card to make a reservation. And I did it all at the room. Wow. Amazing, right?
- [21:12]
Jason Tyler
I've not experienced that when just in a hotel.
- [21:15]
Alexi Vanari
Like last weekend. Yes. Ritz Carlton Dorado, everyone.
- [21:18]
Jason Tyler
All right, well, we're going to, we're going to bleep that out because we're not doing free promotion. No, I'm kidding, I'm kidding, I'm kidding, I'm joking.
- [21:25]
Alexi Vanari
But I mean really like super nice Right. Like, you know, just. Just again, in your business as an entrepreneur, how can you think outside the box, help everyone that's going to engage with your business have a better experience, and then everyone wins?
- [21:39]
Jason Tyler
And that is the key takeaway of all key takeaways, I think, for both of your episodes. Now, guys, if you're still tuned in at this point in the podcast, I want to make sure that you check out Alexi's episodes of both Next Level CEO and Legacy Makers, which will be coming out shortly after this podcast episode airs. So make sure that you guys stay tuned for that. You're going to get a full deep dive on her story as well as the story of DAS Technologies. So make sure you stay tuned for that. Now, Alexi, for the audience, where can people find you on social media? Where can they interact with your business? Where are you? Where are you located at on the World Wide Web?
- [22:11]
Alexi Vanari
Sure. Well, we originally started as Digital Airstrike. We still use that handle in all social networks as well as DAS Technology. And that is what the DAS stands for. It's Digital Airstrike. So the early part of the company was, let's not just monitor digital conversations and engagements with consumers. Let's help businesses strike and take action to make a difference and use our technology and AI to actually do that. So Digital Airstrike, we're out there. We're very creative, and we'd love to hear from you.
- [22:44]
Jason Tyler
All right, well, guys, make sure that you follow her. And for my editors here, guys, make sure that we put those somewhere on the screen. And you guys know, when you see me pointing around at the screen, just throw up a little logo there somewhere. But, Alexi, it has been an immense joy.
- [23:00]
Alexi Vanari
Love you. You're the best. Thank you.
- [23:01]
Jason Tyler
Thank you so much. Yeah, I cannot wait to see your episode once it has fully been realized and to keep up with your story.
- [23:08]
Alexi Vanari
Thank you so much. Well, hey, we're all just beginning, right? There's. There's. I'm sure, a lot more to come, especially with where technology is going.
- [23:15]
Jason Tyler
I love it. I love it. Well, guys, this has been another incredible episode of the Living youg Legacy podcast. Again, I'm your host, Jason Tyler, and I will catch you guys in the next one.