HERE ARE A FEW HOT TOPICS WE COVERED Did You Miss Our Client Dinner at SIMA?
If you made it to our Client Appreciation Dinner at the SIMA Snow & Ice Symposium this summer, thanks for being there — it was the highlight of the show for me! I loved hanging out with you at Peppercorn’s Grill in Hartford and eating steak, calamari, veal and ricotta meatballs, and more while we talked shop. It’s a good thing we booked a private room because with 15 landscapers, the discussion got lively. It was great to see Ramblin Jackson clients with $12-million businesses share their insights and tips with landscapers who run $600,000 businesses and vice versa. We all learned from each other. I almost felt like I was sitting in a mastermind! We also talked about some of the hottest topics in the industry, like the entrepreneurial operating system (EOS) software Ninety, how the Personal Histories Exercise can help with employee onboarding and relationship development, how cutting-edge landscapers are using AI to grow their businesses, and how to solve the challenges growing landscape companies face climbing the ladder to $5 million in revenue. We even had a heated (but respectful) debate on how commercial landscapers can handle the challenge of low occupancy in commercial grade-A real estate! This April, Axios reported office vacancies were at an all-time high — 12.9% of all office space was vacant nationwide, causing all kinds of problems for landlords and, by extension,
commercial landscapers. What can you do if a property manager wants you to landscape their building, but your prices aren’t in their budget? It’s a tough situation, and it’s happening all over the country. It was awesome to talk through the issue and workshop solutions. If you missed the SIMA dinner, I hope I’ll see you at our next one. Ramblin Jackson is planning another exclusive get-together with landscapers at The National Association of Landscape Professionals’ ELEVATE conference and expo in September. If you want to join us, check out the insert in this newsletter, then stop by our booth to learn more!
‘When Machines Become Customers’ Gives a Glimpse Into the Near Future
Artificial intelligence (AI) is everywhere, and it’s not going away any time
inventory of a specific product is low. We can see early-AI customers in companies like Amazon, where Alexa can purchase an item or its Dash Smart Shelf can sense when an item needs to be replenished and reorders for you. So, what are phases one, two, and three? Phase one involves machines being able to purchase items for a customer, but only from a single manufacturer or product type. Some examples are printers that reorder ink when it senses levels are low or coffee machines that purchase more pods when stock runs out. Phase two expands when smart assistants become widespread and can make knowledgeable purchasing decisions. The machine’s intelligence has increased, and it will be able to shop for various products from a range of companies. Suddenly the work of choosing what products to buy is being moved from the customer to the
machine. Machines will decide what items to purchase based on factual information alone, such as best value and healthier ingredients. Finally, phase three involves the machine customer becoming completely autonomous. The AI customer can predict the need for an item, replenish with the best product available, and complete the purchase with zero human interference. This new feature can benefit small-business owners by taking over the time-consuming task of calculating inventory, identifying customer preferences, and purchasing stock. While this may seem like a distant reality, it’s closer than you think. This shift in customer demographics requires an all-new approach to marketing and operations that you should be ready to tackle. Read more about how your business can better prepare for machine customers in this outstanding book.
soon. And while no one can stop how soon it will enter the customer market, you can prepare for it. In the new book “When Machines Become Customers” by Mark Raskino and Don Scheibenreif, the inevitability of AI shoppers becomes apparent, but what does this actually look like? Raskino and Scheibenreif describe AI-enabled customers as technology that shops for us and will overtake the decision-making process when purchasing products or services. In this surprising book, the writers describe three phases regarding the evolution of machine customers. Currently, we’re at “base zero,” where tech can inform us when an
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