Introduction
In this episode of Pathmonk Presents, we welcome Ken Herron, Chief Growth Officer at UIB, an API AI company revolutionizing human-machine communication. Ken discusses UIB’s mission to simplify interactions between people and AI across various channels and languages.
He delves into the challenges of communicating at scale and how UIB’s solutions, including conversational AI and retrieval augmented generation (RAG), address these issues. Ken shares insights on UIB’s client acquisition strategies, the importance of interactive demos, and his role in understanding customer needs. Listeners will gain valuable knowledge about the latest AI communication technologies and their practical applications in business.
Ernesto: Pathmonk is the intelligent tool for website lead generation. With increasing online competition, over 98% of website visitors don’t convert. The ability to successfully show your value proposition and support visitors in their buying journey separates you from the competition online. Pathmonk qualifies and converts leads on your website by figuring out where they are in the buying journey and influencing them in key decision moments. With relevant micro experiences like case studies, intro videos and much more, stay relevant to your visitors and increase conversions by 50%. Add Pathmonk to your website in seconds. Let the AI do all the work and get access to 50% more qualified leads while you keep doing marketing and sales as usual. Check us on pathmonk.com. Welcome to today’s episode. Let’s talk about today’s guest. We have Ken from UIB, chief growth officer with them. How you doing today, Ken?
Ken Herron: Great, thank you.
Ernesto: Its great to have you on discussing a little bit about what UIB is doing with the rag. But first off, lets kick it off a little bit for our listeners to know what UIB is all about. So in your own words, Ken can you tell us a little bit more?
Ken Herron: We help people to communicate. Boiling it down. We are an API AI company. A lot of acronyms, a lot of geeks speak. We want to make it as easy for people to talk to machines such as AI as it is for people to talk to other people. That means any channel, that means any language, and that means any system or device.
Ernesto: Okay, awesome. Great. I mean, that thing you simplified it for, like you mentioned, right? For not so tech savvy people. But thank you so much for that. And so that our listeners, to get a good understanding of your company, what would you say then is the key problem that you saw for clients?
Ken Herron: It’s communicating at scale. And I’d put a finer line on it. It’s being able to listen at scale, whether you’re talking about a customer audience or some type of internal stakeholder audience that a lot of companies have heard about, chatGPT, GPT, they’ve read about all the buzzwords. So it’s helping them to figure what is the right type of AI solution? Conversational solution. And that may include any combination of conversational AI, generative AI, conversational IoT, and now generative AI with something called retrieval, augmented generation or rag.
Ernesto: Awesome. And so then what would your clients usually be? Is there a vertical segment that you guys like to go for, or is there an ideal ICP for you guys?
Ken Herron: It’s a large group of customers. Think of it. Anyone, that needs to talk at scale. So a telephone company, a telco, for example, anyone that might have a lot of customer service or a lot of sales that are handled today, maybe by a traditional call center or people with hands on keys.
So that ability to take those frequently asked questions, when we look across the use cases, there is hundreds and hundreds of them. But often where a company has frequently asked questions that they can answer 60, 80% of people’s questions with the best possible answer instantly without having to wait to connect to a human.
Also, what’s different is that a chatbot can return the answer in the format that makes the best sense for the customer. Let’s say I’m trying to put together my, ikea bookshelf. Maybe for me, I want to see a video, maybe I want an illustration, maybe I want step by step instructions or audio is becoming increasingly popular.
I put in my ears and a friendly, calm, soothing voice tells me, don’t rid of heart, this is going to be okay. And walks me through step by step by step at the pace that works for me, and I can start and stop it.
If I’m on the phone with even a really expert phone rep, they’re not going to be able to spend 3 hours there, with me side by side, helping me to assemble a bookcase, as I have to stop to take out the guard or handle a child or make a phone call.
So that ability to be with me through whatever my process is, whether I’m purchasing a new pair of sneakers or trainers, or just trying to set up something on my iPhone.
Ernesto: That’S super important. Definitely. I mean, I’m glad that, we have something like that out there, and I’m glad to have you on here, and UIB is doing that. And so then how would somebody usually get in contact with you or find out about you guys? Is there a top client acquisition channel that you guys have?
Ken Herron: Our website, obviously Uib AI. But of course, anyone can connect with me directly. So quick plug Ken Herron. Herron AI. And that’s for people who are both interested. Hey, this sounds like cool technology. How can my company or organization use it? Or if this is something you and your business might like to sell?
Because we sell primarily through our reseller partners around the world, because they have those local relationships with people in all the different countries.
Ernesto: All right, awesome. And then talking about your website, so that way our listeners can visit, you guys, you mentioned it. Uiv aihdeende. What role does the website play for a client acquisition?
Ken Herron: Quite simply, it’s able to talk to our prospective customers and prospective resellers when we’re not in the room. So we may not even know that someone is a prospective user and they want to play around. They want to test it, they want to see what we offer, that they’re often in research mode, either to learn about the capabilities, learn about the technologies, or learn about us as a potential provider to them, will we meet their needs?
Do we have what they’re looking for? And because this is such a new space for many companies and this help them to make a better purchasing decision if maybe they don’t know all the requirements or they don’t know exactly what they want at the point they come to us.
Ernesto: Awesome. Would, there be any tools or methods that you will recommend to our listeners? As far as some website lead generation.
Ken Herron: The biggest one for us is find a way for people to play with whatever it is you sell. For us, it’s a live demo where they can go in and they can experience our technology, play with all the features, see what it does live, whether it’s on a laptop, on their Movo phone, that ability to try it before you buy it, to test it for free, and of course, just making it super easy.
If they had any questions along the way, that you’re there, not to be intrusive, not to stalk them as they’re trying to figure it out, but when they’re ready to connect, to make that as effortless as possible.
Ernesto: Definitely. Okay, awesome. Awesome to hear that. And, well, let’s switch gears a little bit, Ken and let’s talk about you being the leader there for UIB, you being the chief growth officer. What are some key tasks you focus on your day to day work?
Ken Herron: My biggest task on a daily basis is talking to customers, talking to the people who are purchasing and using the capabilities of our technology to understand what are the specific business problems that we are solving, how are they using it? What are their concerns, what are their fears? How do we help them to be successful?
Because we see our role not as, there’s a lot of players in our space. Many of them are racing to the bottom to sell the cheapest possible suit of. I see it more as we are bespoke tailors that because we have done this so many different times and been doing this for a decade now, we just celebrated our 10th year anniversary.
The ability to act as a consultant, to be able to go in and help them say, okay, you have this specific problem. People like you have solved the problem with this set of capabilities. Let us share those with you.
So you can figure out what is the right mix of things that will meet your particular meet for your particular timeframe for implementation and your given budget.
So it’s the number one task to directly answer your question, talking to customers, understanding where they are and what they need, both today and going forward, because the technologies are evolving so quickly that often they want to talk to us just to try and figure out what should they be considering, what should they be thinking about.
Ernesto: Definitely. And sounds like you have a full plate there on your hands as well. So thanks so much for sharing that with us. Let’s jump into our next section here, Ken which is our rapid fire question rounds. You ready for them?
Ken Herron: Sure.
Ernesto: Right, awesome. First, off, what is the last book that you read?
Ken Herron: Last, book, generative, aih, by Sudha Jamfy. Highly recommend it. I’m very biased. I’ve known Suda forever, and she really did literally write the book for people who are trying to figure out what all this nonsense is about and what it means for them and their business.
Ernesto: All right, great, Rita. Next is what is one single thing that your company is focused on at the moment the most.
Ken Herron: Right now? It’s helping companies to use one of the newest capabilities, which is called this rag or retrieval augmented generation, because it can be such a game changer in giving them the results they want faster, cheaper.
Very simply, with generative AI, companies don’t always have the control or the precision with the answer. Depending on the platform you’re using, it can hallucinate, it can make up fake facts, things that are not true, that’s not a good thing for any type of company or government.
So the ability for you to pull from a database, pull from a knowledge base, a repository that has your accurate, approved, legally signed off information and have that feed the answers to the chatbot, that is a significant advance in the technology.
Ernesto: Awesome. And, if there would be one, if there would be no boundaries in technology, Ken what would be that one thing that you want to have fixed for your role as a marketer today?
Ken Herron: This may not be the answer you’re expecting, but it’s really about travel. Even with all of the technologies we have, we still want and need to meet with people face to face.
And the time and resources that takes to go between Dubai and Germany and Singapore, it’s a lot. It’s a lot. So if I could magically, say, solve any business problem, any magical technology would be the ability to travel without it.
I mean, it takes so long. Zoom is great. It’s, better, maybe than a phone call, but it’s not the same as sitting face to face with someone, especially over a good coffee.
Ernesto: Definitely. All right, awesome. And, well, lastly, Ken you have a lot of experience already in the marketing world, but what is one piece of advice that you would give yourself if you were to restart your journey as a marketer today?
Ken Herron: When I first started my career, I worked for a lot of very large companies that had set ways of doing things, and sadly, that even extended into marketing.
So I think, if I had the chance to go back knowing what I now know now, I would be much more of a troublemaker. The idea that you get ahead in marketing by understanding the rules, but by then consciously breaking them.
I can’t imagine in my current role, my management, my board, anyone telling me there’s a certain way you have to do anything. I think, fortunately, that’s a very dated concept at this point, that we do trial and error. We rapidly innovate, we do a B2B testing, so we very quickly figure out if something is working or not.
But the idea that you can’t do something because someone says, we don’t do that, or we’ve never done that before, I’m very hopeful that that is now a historical item in most modern marketers, at least in 2024. Don’t take that very seriously.
So kind of give myself the permission to break the rules and not think I have to listen to people just because they’re older or a higher management level than I am.
Ernesto: Perfect. Some great advice there for myself and for, our listeners here. Well, Ken do want to appreciate you being on today’s episode. But before we go ahead and end this episode, I do want to give you the last word. If someone forgets everything about the interview today, what is that one thing they should remember about UIB?
Ken Herron: We enable people to simply communicate, come learn about us, play with our capabilities. Very simple. The website is Uib AI.
Ernesto: There, you guys heard it. Thank you so much, Ken for being, on with us today to our listeners. Check them out at UIB AI. They provide the solutions AI needs to work together with humans. Thank you so much for our listeners. Looking forward to our next episode at Pathmonk Presents. Thanks a lot, Ken