AI isn’t coming; it’s here, optimizing behind-the-scenes tasks like forecasting, inventory management, and CRM oversight. John Long, CEO of THYNK AI, says artificial intelligence is ready to take on client-facing interactions. His company has the ultimate tool for the job: Eric, an AI-powered agent. Jason caught up with John to discuss the evolution of the company’s Thynk Agent and the cost-effective advantages it offers distributors in an increasingly competitive environment.
“I got into AI six years ago, but didn’t have my a-ha! moment until about two years ago when I realized that AI could do my job,” says John, who was in sales before making a hard pivot into artificial intelligence. He found great success helping automate all sorts of workflows, but core customer service tasks––pre-sales, post-sales, prospecting––weren’t part of his initial focus. Then life experience met a promising solution. “I’ve been in sales a long time. No sales rep ever said, ‘I just love to prospect!’” he laughs.
An AI-powered THYNK Agent isn’t motivated (or distracted) by ego, impostor syndrome, or shortening attention spans. Instead, they establish unlimited connections with precision through prospecting calls, engaging in text conversations with dormant accounts, or responding to social media interactions. THYNK’s advanced AI ensures that every communication is seamless, consistent, and on-brand. Still, many fear the proliferation of AI. “I think there are a couple of things that are healthy for us to remember,” John interjects. “AI is a tool, and we need to look at it as a tool.”
THYNK Agents act as sidekicks to human teams, not replacements, says John. ”AI allows them to remove all of the drudgery, the things that they hate about their job, and focus on the things that give them energy, passion, excitement.” It’s also cost-effective tech. Paring a human with an AI partner can produce two, three, or even five times more than what a team member alone was producing alone “at fraction of the cost of an additional person,” says John, adding “The faster we can learn it, understand it, and start to employ it, the better off we’re going to be.”
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MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE
QUOTES
“We literally start to approach life differently as we understand and use AI more.”
“My philosophy is that AI should be a sidekick.”
“We have some domain expertise, some knowledge, some background, some understanding, some wisdom that even the very best AI is not gonna be able to completely replace that true human experience.”
“What we teach our customers is to treat AI like an Ironman and treat your employees like Tony Stark.”
“We have turned into this society that hesitates to make phone calls—and so having a tool that can do that? Fantastic! Let it do the job that you don’t love doing, and you focus on the parts of the job that bring you the passion, the energy, the excitement that you love doing.”
“It’s a major cost savings when you look at what you’re shifting to the AI and which tasks you’re shifting to them. And then it’s a major revenue booster as well, because of the outputs that it’s able to produce on the revenue-generation side.”
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Distribution Talk is produced by The Distribution Team, a consulting services firm dedicated to helping wholesale distribution clients remove barriers to profitability, generate wealth, and achieve personal goals.
This episode was edited by The Creative Impostor Studios
Special thanks to our sponsors for this episode: Connected Peers, providing virtual communities for wholesale distributors; and INxSQL Distribution Software, an integrated distribution ERP software designed for the wholesale and distribution industry.
