Bonus Episode- Will ChatGPT Disrupt Promo

Welcome to The SkuCast, the number one podcast for the promotional products industry. If you're a promotional products professional or just interested in learning more about this exciting industry, you've come to the right place. On The SkuCast, we bring you interviews with industry experts, tips and tricks for success, and insights into the latest trends and developments in the world of promotional products. Whether you're a seasoned pro or new to the industry, you'll find valuable information and inspiration on The SkuCast. So if you're ready to take your promotional products knowledge to the next level, tune into the SkewCast and join the conversation. We can't wait to share our passion for this exciting industry with you. If you're a regular listener of the podcast, you'll know that the intro you just heard was not our normal intro. That was a completely AI-generated script. It was written by ChatGPT. We asked ChatGPT, write us an intro for the SkewCast. And that's the intro it returned immediately. Not bad. Now the voice you heard was my voice, but as you could tell by the wooded, stilted sound of it, it wasn't me speaking those words into the microphone. We took ChatGPT's text of the intro script and pasted it into another AI program called Descript. Descript is an AI tool for audio and video editors. We then selected my voice option as the reader or narrator of that text. In Descript, I can use my voice as one of many options, just like you would change Siri's or Alexa's voice. Today's episode is all about AI and more specifically, the phenomenon of ChatGPT. As we like to do here on the SkewCast, we consider these developments on behalf of our industry. Are these new emerging technologies threats or opportunities? Hi friends, I'm the real Bobby LeHew, Commonsku's Chief Content Officer, and I'm joined by the real Mark Graham, Commonsku's President and Chief Brand Officer. Now, hopefully my explanation of the intro wasn't thoroughly confusing, but in case it was, regular listeners might remember that several months ago we had Paul Raetzer on the Skewcast. Paul's a pioneer in the use of marketing and AI. He's the creator of the Marketing AI Institute. And during our chat with Paul, he explained the difference between AI's machine learning and AI's deep learning, which is what ChatGPT uses.

So the best way to think about it is artificial intelligence is— the best definition I've seen is the science of making machines smart, meaning machines, hardware, software doesn't know how to do anything without being told what to do. So we've adapted that definition to marketing AI as being the science of making marketing smart. But AI is just this umbrella term for tools and technologies that make the machine smart. The primary subset of AI is machine learning. And what machine learning means is it takes data in, again, it could be any kind of data, it could be in your CRM system, your analytics, and then it makes predictions about outcomes. So it's the machine learning and then using this data to predict what's gonna happen, what's gonna get someone to open an email, what's gonna get them to click on a social share, what time are they gonna open emails, when should I send this email, when should I recommend this piece of content? It's using machine learning, taking in data to predict a behavior or an outcome. Deep learning is a subset of that that's actually trying to give the machine human-like abilities. So if you think about your iPhone, how it can be unlocked with your face, that uses facial recognition. So it's giving the machine the ability to quote unquote see. When you talk to Siri or Alexa, it's giving the machine the ability to speak and to understand language. So sight, language generation, movement. Those are all things that machines don't have. Deep learning is the way we do that, and that's by actually trying to teach a machine to think like a human brain.

Now, most of today's episode was generated through deep learning tools like ChatGPT and Descript. Mine and Mark's voices are real. It's us, not a generated version of us, but the other voices you'll hear are AI generated. We explore this idea. Will AI tools like ChatGPT disrupt our industry specifically? And if so, how will deep learning tools replace consultative salespeople or content creators? Will tools like ChatGPT disrupt traditional search methods like ESPN Sage? All that and more we explore on this bonus episode of the Skewcast.

Today's episode was brought to you by CommonSkew, the work from anywhere platform that powers your connected workflow, enabling you to process more orders and dramatically grow your sales. To learn more, visit commonskew.com.

Let's start with a basic definition of ChatGPT. Now, we're not experts on ChatGPT. This is brand new, but this is our reflections on what this means for our industry. So ChatGPT, if you're familiar with chatbots, you're already halfway there in terms of understanding what ChatGPT is, but it stands for Chat Generative Pre-trained Transformer, which is almost like a sophisticated chatbot, but more. And the word nerd that I am fixates on that word generative because it means to produce or generate as opposed to mimic. Mark, how would you define ChatGPT?

I think as you describe it, Bobby, it's like the chat that we all know and potentially loathe that we've seen on, let's say, an airline website or a bank website that where you're trying to get some, or maybe a, maybe your cell phone company where you're trying to get some kind of answer from the automated chatbot. It's pretty rudimentary. This is almost like a chatbot that magically works and almost reads your mind. And I think it's the power of AI before our very eyes. It's an example of bringing AI into literally the real world for regular people to understand what's happening and some of the business applications for it. It's quite staggering.

I want to share what Sam Altman The CEO of OpenAI who created ChatGPT recently replied to a few definitions of ChatGPT on Twitter by saying this, quote, I don't agree with it, but a calculator for words is an interesting framework for GPT. It's an interesting framing of the concept. And then he said in a few tweets later, ChatGPT is like an e-bike for the mind, which as a content creator, I thought that's a brilliant example because to me, which we'll get into, ChatGPT is not a threat. It's an opportunity. But let's get into that. That part of it, Mark. We defined ChatGPT. The best way to understand it is actually to demonstrate, which we're going to demonstrate here for you from a few examples that Mark tried on what it looks like. But we already use ChatGPT to some degree. Mark, you pointed out that another Mark Evans, a friend of yours and a Fractional CMO, said that this is a whole new world, but AI has been seeping into the content world for years. So for example, we use different tools. I use Grammarly, I use Wordtune, I use Copy.ai. I'm already using ChatGPT technology, the framework that has been built around this kind of technology. You've watched this for years being the technologist, fascinated person that you are. You've seen where technology enters the market and has this sort of initial spark just amongst the tech, techie people, and then all of a sudden it starts to take off and that's what's happened here. Is that how you would reflect on it?

Yeah, absolutely. And I think that's such a great point that many of us take AI in the real world for granted and copy.ai or Grammarly. Grammarly is huge.

Yeah.

There, you also think about autocomplete for people who use Gmail or other writing applications where it anticipates what it is that you're trying to say. And in a lot of cases, they get it right and you're like, okay, I'll be able to save some time here if I just accept Google's suggestion to autocomplete. And so that's AI in action. And I think this is the next step. I think what What's different about Grammarly is that it's almost like the technology is just so beautifully woven into the experience that you take it for granted. It's operating in the background. Whereas here, you're typing in a prompt and it's delivering for you this, in many cases, beautifully written and very articulate and oftentimes correct response. Now, of course, there have been many examples where ChatGPT does not get it correct, and we should point out that it's not perfect. That's for sure. But I think that's what seems to be so magical about it right now. It's almost like the early days of Google when you would type something in and Google in a clairvoyant way responded with these perfect search results. But what I will say now is after playing around with ChatGPT, it almost makes Google look ancient, like almost overnight.

Yeah.

Search results with links to blog posts and articles versus this versus what ChatGPT is able to produce. It's almost like day and night.

Yeah, and what we always try to do is we're always trying to bring this big topic that's entered the market in the world and taken by storm and provide that relevance and context for our industry because that's the world we live in. So let's do this by way of some experiments that you ran, Mark. You ran some experiments on what would this look like for the promotional products industry as ChatGPT is right now in its current form, but also with the mind that it's going there. This is going to be iterated on so quickly, so fast that it's going to get smarter and smarter. So let's talk about your experiments you did. Then we're going to talk about the danger and the opportunity just so So as we get into the experiments, people understand exactly what we're talking about here. Mark, you plugged in a few examples and just interject when you're ready, but I have these in front of me. You typed this into ChatGPT, this question. First one, I am the marketing manager for a beverage company. I am planning a customer meeting in Austin, Texas, and want to provide my guests with gifts that are specific to the area. My customers are executives and have fine tastes. My budget is between $50 and $100 per person. Can you give me some ideas? ChatGPT responded immediately with this.

Here are a few ideas for gifts that are specific to Austin and would be suitable for executives with fine tastes. A gift basket filled with local specialties such as barbecue sauce, hot sauce, pecans, and other treats. A gift card to a trendy Austin restaurant or a food tour of the city. A bottle of wine or craft beer from a local winery or brewery. A piece of art or artisanal product from a local maker. A music or entertainment experience. Such as tickets to a local concert or show, a book or guide about Austin's history, culture, or outdoor activities, a set of high-quality Austin-themed coasters or a decorative tray, a gift card to a local spa or wellness center, a membership to a local museum or cultural institution. Again, the best gift will depend on your customer's interests and preferences. You may want to consider offering a few different options so that each customer can choose the gift that they like best.

Wow.

I would do business with that promotional products distributor. And it was a computer.

What were your thoughts as you plugged that in and got this response?

I was trying to break it, to be honest. I was trying to, I was trying to be a wise guy and say, okay, there's just no way it's going to have this level of specificity. And of course it came back with what I would say beats a decent number of average promotional products distributors that whose their response might be, here's a website, or maybe a t-shirt, or maybe a hat, maybe some cowboy boots or something like that. And this was incredibly thoughtful. It was a very diverse range of suggestions. So there were things in there that were classic promotional products. I think that they mentioned coasters. Clearly we can get that as promotional products distributors. And then there was one other, a tray, and there, Might've been another one that I'm just forgetting, but I loved the other experience-based gift suggestions, the food tour or gift certificate or whatever. And I think that rounds it out. Obviously we would still like to get the promotional products business, but the very best promotional distributors are ones that offer the full experience and aren't necessarily just pushing a product. Certainly our friends Danny and Robert at Brand Fuel have been such great examples or have set such great examples around offering experiences and services and products all in the same package. So I think ChatGPT completely nailed it. Oh, sorry, it was the book. There was a recipe book and I was thinking of our good friend Ronnie Wright at the book company. So wouldn't that be perfect? But I find it very hard to find fault in what it produced. Obviously it could be more specific. I think the next evolution of ChatGPT might be some links that say, here's some specific examples. And it's only a matter of time until it gets there.

Yeah, Mark, do you think— I'm jumping ahead to something— do you think ChatGPT has the potential to upset the traditional way we see product search in the industry? Do you think that's the most disruptive piece of the technology?

Yes, I think search has been a huge part of our industry for decades. Yeah, you think about the evolution of search it would've been catalogs. And then we saw, we saw the rise of ESP and Sage, and they became dominant players with really effective tools in that pre-Google age. And then of course you saw the rise of Google and then the rise of social media and search is central to each of those experiences. And they've completely changed the relationship that distributors have to Sage and ESP. They're still powerful products, but they're different than they were before in the world of Google and social media. And I think this is the next frontier, right? Like you're typing in, you're not really using it as a search engine. I think OpenAI, the people behind ChatGPT are very clear that this is not a search engine, but it's clear that people are typing something in looking for an answer. So in many respects, that's like a search engine. And I think this is now, it has the capability of offering a more strategic solution than, say, ESP, Sage, or even Google have done, because that's a— those searches are a lot more transactional. I'm looking for a mug, I'm looking for pens, I'm looking for hats that are made in a union shop on the West Coast of the United States, that sort of thing. As you saw in this very simple example that we just read, it's not very transactional at all. It's offering this kind of experience and quite strategic, I think it's taking search to the next level. And of course, we'll talk about whether this is harmful or helpful to our industry.

It's almost as if it has opportunities on both sides, obviously with our product supplier search through, through as we're trying to source products as distributors, but then also just from a consultative standpoint. One of the examples that you typed in, a very basic example, but it's interesting how you said this has even taken the place of a Google search, but on a higher level is that you gave this example. I work at Ferrell Oil Company in OKC. I'm looking for some nice gift ideas with my logo on it for an upcoming customer event. Would my logo look better on an embroidered cap or a silkscreen t-shirt? The decision of whether to use embroidery or silkscreen of your company's logo will ultimately depend on a few factors, including the design of your logo, the type of material you're printing on, and the quantity of gifts you are ordering. Here are a few pros and cons of both embroidery and silkscreening: I thought that was a pretty sophisticated response, really, to say it'll depend on your logo, because that's what a human would say.

Yeah. And think if you're a salesperson and you're, you're not sure of the answer and you type it in, you get that response. It's giving you some validation. Now, of course, as you said a little while ago, ChatGPT doesn't necessarily get it right all the time. So you need to take it with a grain of salt. But, but I would say they get it right more oftentimes than they get it wrong.

Yeah.

And I think it's just so interesting as a way to be able to equip a salesperson with this additional piece of information that helps validate and helps, helps them just think in a more polished and more comprehensive way with their clients.

And the key, of course, all of this being just the high-octane speed at which it operates. That's what's astounding is the time factor. Let's speak to this a little bit. What do you think the dangers of ChatGPT and the, the concerns are. Are there any, or is there a disruptive threat here for our industry? Remember when Alibaba came on the scene, both distributors and suppliers were really concerned because suppliers, you could argue that Alibaba looked like a threat to take away their international sourcing, where distributors could be, or end clients could be, at a click of a button they could find something. But it didn't quite happen. And Alibaba, in a sense, even though it's still one of the biggest companies to my knowledge of the world, it's not really been utilized like we thought it would. It just dissipated. And in some ways, this similar kind of technology sits on the horizon as well. But what do you think? What's the danger or the weakness of this?

I think the danger of this, just like Alibaba, just like Amazon, just like 4imprint, just like any of these other disruptive technology companies, just like Google— we were talking about that before. Remember all the people who were worried that Google was going to destroy the promotional products industry because an end client could type in, where do I find That seems quaint right now, but back in the day, it was an existential threat. So I maintain, just like those other examples, that the danger is for the order-taking distributor, distributor that is transactional, the distributor that is a true middle person, and they're not really adding value beyond just being an order taker. We have talked about this. Many of our peers in the promotional products industry have talked about order takers in the past. Clearly this represents an existential threat and danger to anyone who is in that space. Yeah, I maintain there's actually not that many of those types of people in the promotional products industry now, given what we've gone through. By the way, after COVID, you're still in the promotional products industry after COVID, you're battle-tested. Yeah, which we've talked about before. But so I do think that's a danger. I think it's an incredible enabler an opportunity for everyone else in the promotional products industry that thinks creatively and strategically. And if you can involve your customers with this technology, I think it's a true, it's a true difference maker. I think it's something that really amplifies the relationship and the experience. I feel the same happened when we would talk about how Amazon was going to come in and take over the promotional products industry. I remember you and I had done presentations like probably the 10 years, we'd be asked to speak at the Expo or at ASI shows about the Amazon threat. They were always packed. The sessions are always packed. So worried about it. And I think the view, and I think that this has become true, is that what that does is it empowers the strategic and creative distributors to do even better work. I feel it's no different than what happened when the calculator was introduced in the classrooms of the world. Everyone thought, oh, would kids not know how to do math anymore? They'd be cheating on tests and whatever the case may be. And what would happen to times tables and all that stuff? And look, look at how advanced math is now because of the calculator and the things that can be done because of the calculator, or think things that can be done because of the spreadsheet that has been created. Think about how that has revolutionized certain pockets of the financial world or accounting world or the business world, and you're not having to spend time on all these low-value tasks. Yeah, no, I'm jumping between a bunch of different technologies, but I am incredibly optimistic that this is the kind of technology that as it matures, it's going to, it's going to be an incredible enabler for our industry. And the only people who have to be worried are those that are taking the orders and not thinking creatively or strategically with their customers.

I saw someone on Twitter say, if you think ChatGPT will replace you, you're right. And I thought that was a brilliant way of looking at it, right? If you think it's a threat, then it's a threat. The thing that you and I have seen in our industry is Amazon is a perfect example, is that we're often comparing a new threat on the horizon head-on as if it's us versus this new threat. What we don't realize is tangentially, and this is from other distributors who have been on the SkewCast that have taught me this. Is that what did that bring as a benefit? Amazon coming in and teaching folks to be more comfortable with buying online, to getting used to expediting orders, to minimizing the frustration of back and forth with processing. They actually did a whole lot of good to the buyer's psyche, and this has a lot of potential there too. There's going to be some tangential reward that we get out of this that's not a direct threat or a direct opportunity with ChatGPT.

He even talked about the world of e-commerce and how e-commerce initially was for Imprint and companies like Alibaba, the disruptors that were going to disintermediate the industry and get rid of the distributor. We have these direct selling relationships, and the reality is now that e-commerce is a reality literally for every distributor in this industry, whether it's for Imprint, pure e-commerce player, and they do a great job, all the way down to that, that, that boutique agency distributor that is high-touch, strategic creative work, a lot of in-person. They're also using e-commerce, whether it's company stores or pop-up stores or whatever the case may be, to amplify that relationship and offer that Amazon-style buying experience for the customer. And that's amazing to me, right? Like e-commerce before was like us versus them, or I go out and have lunch with my client and that's why they do business with me. I think that's the silly way of putting it. You still do that, but make sure that your offering includes that e-commerce experience because that's another dimension to your business, and it's something not to displace you, it's something that augments the sales and augments the experience.

And to your e-commerce threat example, again, we saw e-commerce as a threat, but then what actually happened is everybody doing shops used e-commerce as a sales tool, as an opportunity. It became an actual opportunity, but it looked like a threat head-on.

Yes.

To me, to me, the danger and weakness of ChatGPT as it is in its current form, because you know it's just going to get better and better, is big content creators would possibly see this as a potential threat. But like I said, if you think it's going to replace you, it probably will. I don't think it's going to replace me. In fact, because I've already been using content tools, I'm not threatened by it. It's going to make my life a little bit easier. Seth's comment about content was this, that you should be— it should be useful, insightful and urgent. And I want to add, if I can, to Seth's comment that it also really good content from essays to the best articles you write to even short-form copy has a perspective, a point of view, and an opinion. So one of the dangers of and weaknesses of ChatGPT right now is it's a fairly homogenized worldview. And this is not our territory, so you don't have to go down and stay in this lane. But this to me right now looks like it's a reflection of the sum total of human experience. And so you're seeing a lot of these. There are some phenomenal, amazing examples out on The Daily. They did an example of someone who the host actually said, I'm going to ask it a very deep question about why do I get irritated with people? And its response was a very sophisticated response that any high-paid therapist would give. So it was actually a brilliant response. But one of the things they ask on The Daily, and I think this is one of the dangers, is that, you know, these biases are fed, fed into the system. It has to have the output what's fed into it. And then it can't answer things like, Mark, you're a history major. Take ChatGPT and ask, what was the cause of the Civil War? Being a history major, you know that there are so many different viewpoints on that.

Absolutely. And I think to your point, it will— ChatGPT offer a balanced answer to that? Now, I haven't typed that into ChatGPT, and I think that when it comes to historical events, that obviously could be all sorts of issues there in terms of what kind of bias there is, or is it misleading you about who won, or conspiracy theories, all that stuff.

Right.

That may be a separate podcast episode that we could dive into that. As it relates to promotional products, the concept of bias with ChatGPT, it feels a little bit comical to think that there'd be bias around promotional products and whether that would have an impact, but Who knows, maybe ChatGPT would be big fans of apparel, but not maybe giving a focus to hard goods. Repeat, this is a silly example, but no, maybe I'm trying to take what you're talking about, bias, and thinking about what negative impact that could have on the marketing services industry which we're in, or add a positive to it.

So speaking of bias, perspective, and opinion, the thing that ChatGPT can't do right now is that it can't offer that strong opinion to you and your customers. Here, of those examples that you you cited earlier that were returned to you when you talk about, hey, I've got this event coming up. What it can't do is say, hey, look, here's why I think this piece right here is going to be the best option for you, and we're going to do a little bit different with this, and here's what's going to be the outcome. Right now it's, it's in that, in that phase. And so it's this perspective and point of view and opinion. And it's honestly the same thing we've been talking about for a long time. The strongest boutique agencies, the strongest consultative salespeople have always had, and this is your words, not mine, a very strong opinion and perspective to their And I think you make a good point there.

It, even though I was impressed with the options it was giving, you could tell that it was hesitant. And I don't know if this is the technology that's baked into it right now, but hesitant to have a strong opinion which way you should go. It feels to me where it's helpful to people in our industry and maybe even our end clients is it gets them in the door, gets them in the door thinking a little bit more about what they could do and inspires them, but they still need to have their handheld when it comes to coming up with the final idea, and then obviously all of the busy work around actually implementing and executing the campaign.

Yeah.

But I think we've talked about this, and many in our industry have talked about this, that, um, an inspired and educated client is the very best client to have. Yeah. A client that doesn't know anything, or a client that comes in and they're ignorant of all the details, or maybe they have a certain worldview that makes them difficult to work with. Is a really difficult client. And that's often where you just end up with, okay, I'll just give you the t-shirt. Whereas a client that's curious and has been inspired by some content, or which is why we're such big fans of content marketing, is a client that is more prepared to engage in a conversation with you as the distributor. And I feel that exchange on ChatGPT about that fictitious example of a marketing or beverages marketing buyer planning an event in Austin. It starts the conversation. And yeah, and I think it's fascinating, right? Because then you can— then there's so many different ways you could pursue that. And I think as a salesperson, that would be really helpful. I might even get that to— I might even, if I was a salesperson in the— as a distributor, if I was a distributor salesperson, I might even go through that exercise directly with my client. Hey, you're a beverages marketing manager that's planning this in Austin. Let's type it in together and let's see what happens, right?

Let's see what happens.

This, right?

Yeah.

Hey, how about that cookbook? Or they may say, oh, it's missing some pieces here. Maybe that's a wonderful way to start the conversation. Do that together. Lean right into it. Don't run away from it.

That's a really good idea, actually. It's funny because then you could take it and go, hey, you can have fun with it and say, here's what ChatGPT revealed that you guys should do. We actually added a few things to this, but here's how we— because we know your brand, we know your history, and because we have an opinion and we have taste—

exactly—

boost it up. It's fun. That's a good idea. You touched on content, and one last thing on, like, content and threat or opportunity. I've always said that content is deep work executed quickly. And what ChatGPT and things like Grammarly have enabled you to do is— Sam, again, the founder of OpenAI, said this. He said, aim high and do it faster. That's actually very close to the deep work executed quickly aspect of it. So when I'm doing an article or something and I run it through— Grammarly is a great example. We've all used Grammarly. You run it through Grammarly, I'll 30% of the time go, I disagree, Grammarly. I'm going to actually do it the way that I wrote it. Right? Or the other thing is I submitted something earlier to one of the other ones. I forgot which one it was, but I didn't take any of their suggestions. But you know what it did? It made me think. It made me think through the process a little bit more. And it gave me an editorial tool and almost a colleague in a sense to bounce this off of. And that forced me to think through it from a different, from another angle. And so that was kind of interesting.

Yeah. In that way, I think it's almost like this superpower that you're able to engage with to either help you by offering you suggestions that you may or may not even select, but I think it's forcing you to think in a different way. And I think that's important.

Yeah.

So Bobby, what did you say when I, because I've joked with you and this was a bit of the precursor to this episode where I'll send you like a provocative joke and I'll say, Hey Bobby, there's ChatGPT. We don't need you to write blog posts anymore. And then it's hot. And of course we both know it's total nonsense, but what's your response to that? Yeah, because there are different levels. So here's maybe a follow-up question. Sorry for the double-on question here. I think that there are a lot of blogs and content writers that are out there that are churning out content. For the purposes of SEO, clickbait.

Yes.

Very basic blogs. I'm going to say that what you produce at Common Skew, Bobby, is the exact opposite of that. It is multi-layered, it's complex, there's lots to it. But there's, as they say, there's a lot of content that's out there that's quite transactional, is being written by people that aren't really spending the same amount of time on it. Is that the kind of content that's going to be replaced? What do you think?

I love this question because I've thought of this exercise. You could take all the articles we've ever written, you could take the transcripts from everything we've ever done, and you could feed it into, say, an open— a ChatGPT-type tool and come out. And honestly, you realize the industry struggles with a lot of the same problems over and over in different ways. We struggle with scaling, we struggle with business development. So there are some common problems. You could take every article we've ever written feed it in a system and say, okay, every 2 weeks I want you to spit me out an article on these 3 or 4 different topics. And it could happen. And you could honestly, you could probably put that on autopilot and it would work for your SEO to some degree. Here's the difference is that right now, as we look at the precipice of 2022 to 2023, that we are dealing with sort of multiple threats and multiple opportunities. And so we have different options ahead of us. What it can do at this moment is foresee what people are struggling with in the next 3 to 6 months. The other thing it can't do, which is what we will be doing, is taking stories from entrepreneurs like that are literally in the moment and returning those and weaving those into the content. So for example, let's take the topic of scaling. Scaling is a big topic for everyone in the industry right now. It's probably the hottest topic. We'll be weaving that into our content as we go forward. How did this entrepreneur grow from $0 to $5 million? How did this entrepreneur grow from $5 to $10 million, $10 to $15 million? You could feed some of that back into the system and get that from ChatGPT. You get some basic answers. What you couldn't get is the texture and the tone and the story of that individual's experience. So that's the thing that sort of concerned me a little bit is ChatGPT can return a homogenized, very intelligent result that's somewhat homogenized. But I want to know what Susan's experience was, not what the homogenized viewpoint of a conglomerate.

I think the key word there is viewpoint. And there are two types of viewpoints in this world. There's homogenized viewpoints, as you just said, and there's specific viewpoints to a specific person or company. And I think in a services-based business like the promotional products industry, as a distributor going out selling your services to customers, the very best distributors, the most enduring most successful distributors in our industry are the ones who get paid for their opinions about their clients' businesses. And full stop. That's where it's at. That's why you work with any number of incredible distributor firms that are in our industry. It's because they've got a strong, creative, unique viewpoint and opinion, their end client's business, and they can execute and put together promotional products in a campaign to deliver on that particular client's marketing objective. If that viewpoint and opinion is homogenized, that's the same thing as throwing a catalog from PCNA or from SanMar, any of these great suppliers. That's homogenized and can be produced by anyone. So I'm not saying anything particularly original there. We all know this. But I think that— I think the key here is how do you take— how can you use the power of a homogeneous viewpoint to then build your own unique viewpoint? And I think that's what we're talking about. ChatGPT, I don't want to ignore it. It's like, how can it raise you up to here?

Yes.

And then on top of that, you're adding the whipped cream, which is your own thing. And that's where the margin is. That's where the loyalty is. That's what the very best end clients want to pay you for. Otherwise, they could just fire up ChatGPT and put the suggestions into 4imprint, and boom, there you go. And you know what? There'll be a lot of end clients that will do that, and those are probably not the ones that are the right fit for your more creative and strategically oriented distributorship. Yep.

We'll end on that because I think that's a great way to end on this. And I'll add that I again see ChatGPT as an opportunity, just like we have with Grammarly and all the other tools. I'm fascinated by how, as a content creator, I can use this. As Sam said, the founder, aim high and do it faster. I think that's a brilliant way to look at this is an actual tool in your toolbox.

Thanks so much for tuning in to this episode of SKU Cast. Be sure to keep up with our latest content by subscribing to SKU Cast on iTunes or to our blog at community.commsku.com. Until next time, friends, thanks so much for listening. Mm-hmm.