'Optimism with caution' key to using AI in about any business

Brice Wallace
Business Journal

Increased productivity. Disruption of job duties. Boosted efficiencies. Money wasted finding the right program.

That, and more, are what AI can bring to a company.

The future impact that artificial intelligence will have on the retail world was the focus of a breakout panel discussion at the recent Silicon Slopes Summit, but both the optimism and caution expressed by speakers could apply to any industry.

Jonathan Ruggiero, founder and CEO at Manly Bands, said AI is used in every department of his company.

“When we started talking about integrating AI into the business, it was like, ‘OK, are people going to lose their jobs? What’s going to happen?’ And I actually have a completely different view of it,” he said to the crowd in Salt Lake City. “To me, it’s an augmentation that we can give to every employee in our company that makes them 10 times as productive, if used correctly. Down the road, who knows? But right now, to me, that’s where we are.”

One example of the uses of AI is sending out customized videos to every customer, he said.

“I could not do over 10,000 videos a month, but this allows us to do that, essentially. … It’s a really great way to interact with our customers. … Honestly, if I had the time, I would totally do that. It’s not something we wouldn’t do, but it allows us to do things 10X what we’d want to do anyway.”

During the session, panelists suggested AI can speed the writing of video scripts, marketing, product development and market predictions to ensure companies are not sitting on excess inventory.

Blake Brown, in charge of brand strategy and partnerships at True Classic, said AI handles “the tasks nobody wants to do … the necessary tasks that you don’t want to waste your time on.”

Dan Griffiths, president and CEO at Lume Deodorant, said AI can shrink the time needed to create graphic designs and videos but can also serve as a source of inspiration for ideas that can be shaped by humans. Brown spoke in similar terms, saying AI can serve as “thought-starters.”

Mark Boothe, chief marketing officer at Domo, said AI can handle writing six video scripts within 30 minutes. But that’s only the case if the AI system receives the best input, known as prompts. “If the prompt is incredible, the output will be incredible,” he said.

Ruggiero agreed. “It’s like the greatest Swiss Army knife in the world, it really is,” Ruggiero said. “The most important part is that data has to be ready. It truly is ‘garbage in, garbage out.’ You have to be so careful.”

Rather than a Swiss Army knife, Brown used a hammer metaphor to describe AI. “You can bludgeon someone in the face, or you can actually build something. … To me, it’s like the efficiency of, I have a better hammer, [so] I can work faster. Or I can use it to pin my whole business, everything, on AI. Yeah, you could, but you’re only going to get to a certain point without bludgeoning yourself and your customers.”

Griffiths predicts that marketing will be the focus for AI in the near future “because that’s where the money is and that’s where a lot of the value is,” he said. “That isn’t to say you can’t use it in other places.”

AI will be able to make all employees more efficient and effective, Boothe said. Humans have a finite amount of information they can absorb and track. Meanwhile, AI can retain and remember vast amounts of information that humans simply cannot, he said.

Still, panelists said, humans will remain part of the AI process. They said companies would be wise to appoint a “czar” to ensure data remains high-quality and consistent. “If the data’s not accurate, it’s not going to help anybody,” Ruggiero said.

Griffiths said people are needed to write insightful questions and suggested that companies “let humans do things only a human can do and let the bots do things only bots can do, faster and better than a human can.”

That need for human governance remains, whether an organization has three people, 300 or 3,000, Boothe said. “The AI is just going to just take what you feed it, and if you’re not feeding it or updating the right information, you’re going to be in real big trouble, real quick,” he said.

Companies dabbling in AI, or considering it, can be left behind in the business world if they use only their brains, which operate in a linear fashion, while competitors grow exponentially with AI, speakers said.

Their advice? Try some AI programs and learn all you can about their capabilities in helping a company.

“Pick one. Identify some AI thing out there,” Griffiths said. “Don’t buy it; you don’t have to buy it. But just learn about it, and take one of them and like try it out and start to understand how these tools can be used.”

Boothe said companies need to be careful and wise “but don’t be afraid to use it to change your business.”

“Find your curiosity. … Stay really, really curious. That’s how you’re going to be successful with AI and any other technology that comes along,” he said.

Several speakers warned about “a lot of vaporware floating around out there,” referring to ballyhooed software that isn’t even available to buy yet because it remains only in a concept stage.

“What I’d say is, a little bit of ‘buyer beware,’” Griffiths said. “I wouldn’t get too far ahead of yourself in terms of just buying every AI tool that you find out there.” Some AI is “so techy” that it requires an advanced degree, leaving its use impractical without some very tech-savvy employees, he said.

But, speakers said, act.

“While AI is a lot of hype and it’s a lot of vaporware, it can help make your life a little easier so you can be more productive,” Ruggiero said.

AI can be overwhelming. Even the various categories can be confusing: agentic AI, generative AI, perceptive AI, physics AI and robotics AI.

“Don’t freak out about all the different things you could do, but start small, today, on figuring out what can make you more effective,” Boothe said.

“Decide what you will do and not do with AI,” he said. “There’s some real crazy crap you can do with AI today, I can assure you. So, be careful and be wise, but don’t be afraid to start using these technologies that can change your business for real.”