We cover last Friday's meeting, January 3rd, 2025. 

 

President elect, Marva Wisdom, filling in for President Brian Martin, began the meeting with a toast to 2025 and a toast to everyone in Guelph and around the world. 

 

She then opened the podium for announcements and happy bucks from the club. 

 

Barb Holmes encouraged everyone to signup for next Friday's off-site meeting at the Grove. Instead of meeting at the ICC, we will be taking a tour of the Grove, next to Luisa Del Rosario's shop, with Jeff Hoffman! 

 

Terrie Jarvis recognized the incredible work that the Sparkles Committee undertook over the Christmas holidays. She specifically highlighted Janette Hogan and Jules Croskill, the co-chairs, and Kerry Johnson for his incredible service.

 

Terrie also thanked Helmuth Slisarenko for the individual fundraiser he held prior to the holidays where he raised money for KidsAbility through coffee and chocolate sales. Helmuth doubled all proceeds that he raised. Amazing work! 

 

Nanita Mohan thanked the club for their contributions to her food drive. She also spoke of seeing the direct impact that our donations had on individuals who rely on The Bench for food and other necessities. 

 

Matt Webster, wearing multiple hats, made an ask for program suggestions. Anyone that knows someone who would make a good speaker, please put them in contact with Matt! Putting on his second hat, Matt asked that every Rotarian make it their New Year's resolution to register for meetings early in the week (this includes the editor of this Bulletin. 

 

Jules Croskill and Janette Hogan, co-chairs of the Sparkles Committee, thanked everyone who volunteered and was involved in this year's Sparkles in the Park. 

 

Lastly, Janette showed some of the more interesting coins and bills they received. Two of which were fake American bills used for movie props. 

 

After announcements, lunch was served. 

 

Following lunch, Matt Webster introduced our speaker, Jason Hunt. Matt first met Jason through a Facebook group that was made for dads living in Guelph. Since then, Matt helped to sell Jason's house and they have become friends. 

 

Jason is the CMO of Merged Mediad, a company that explores the forefront of the digital market. 

 

Jason began his presentation by thanking Matt and our club for inviting him to speak. Jason explained how he has had the wonderful opportunity to speak at conferences and events around the world, and, yes, he was the lead singer of a band when he lived in Japan.

 

His unsuccessful vocal gig made him realize he wasn't rockstar material, but that he liked marketing and speaking in front of crowds.

 

In this presentation, Jason focused on AI powered advertising that merges human creativity with AI efficiency.

 

Small businesses, Jason explained, face a host of different challenges. One of which is marketing. Limited resources make it difficult to provide 24/7 customer service and engagement.

 

Moreover, there's a high cost and inefficiency when you generate leads for a business that is followed by inconsistent marketing execution. 

 

So how does AI fit in? It is the future of digital marketing for small and large businesses. It's  very affordable, ensures consistent messaging across platforms and personalizes engagement for better results.

 

But in using AI, Jason warned, "there's something we need to focus on, and that's the bright, shiny object syndrome... you need to avoid that bright, shiny object syndrome, and understand, if you're thinking about implementing a new tool in your business, what's the strategic integration over the hype?"

 

Importantly, Jason explained, "We can't just omit humans. Humans need to be a part of the process with AI." As nice as AI is, it needs human involvement for it to be an effective tool.

 

There's also a risk that a completely AI generated item loses its authenticity. Jason explained how he, being someone that works in the space, can sniff out AI content quickly. An easy tell are the words that appear in an advertisement or article. For example, the words 'delve', 'unlock', 'navigating', etc.

 

Jason then provided an overview of his four favourite AI softwares. These included: Otter.ai (which this editor uses for notetaking during club meetings). Otter.ai is a notetaking software that turns recorded audio into written notes. It can then summarize these notes and create action items. 

 

Another software is called Topical Math.ai, "this is great if you're a content creator and want to come up with new ideas of content for your business." What it does, Jason explained, is generate 1000s of different ideas from key words that you input into its generator. So if you're suffering from writer's block this is a great way to get ideas flowing.

 

The next is Cuppa.ai. Jason is the owner of Cuppa.ai. What this software does is generate blogs/articles for businesses based on the content on their website. Blogs help to drive traffic to a company's website which in turn increases sales. 

 

 

Jason then covered Chat GPT. Chat GPT is incredibly useful in a number of different ways. You can create individualized Chat GPT accounts that will answer questions based on the role you have given the software. For example, Jason, as a digital marketer, has a Chat GPT that will answer as if they are a marketing expert. Similarly, if you are a professor teaching english, you can have the software answer your questions as if it is an English professor.

 

Now, the program has the same challenges and limitations as other AI software. It lacks human nuance and struggles with emotions, cultural context, and ethical concerns. It also raises transparency issues and content creation.

 

To this end, we must understand Chat GPT as a useful tool, but we shouldn't become over reliant on it. Jason worries most that we will lose our human creativity if we become too dependent on the software.

 

Understanding this issue, Jason's businesses created a hybrid formula that combines human creativity with the efficiency of AI. In a study that he conducted, Jason found that human generated advertisements were more successful overall than AI generated advertisements.

 

This is because the AI generated advertisements were unoriginal, less snappy, and less targeted to the audience that the business wanted to reach. 

 

 

What this study confirmed is that "AI speeds up the content creation process, which is important, but human expertise needs to turn those drafts into impactful campaigns. So it's important to have human oversight as a part of the process." 

 

So, after conducting this study, Jason's company saw a problem in the market. "How many leads and customer questions go unanswered after hours? How much business are you missing?" So Jason's company offers a service where they integrate Chat GPT into the website of businesses as an AI chat feature. Individuals that have questions for your company can enter them into a chat box that Chat GPT will answer using information from your website/business.  

 

Chat GPT isn't designed to answer every question, especially complex cases, but it provides an immediate response. Importantly, the AI answers don't sound like a robot. 

 

 

Ben thanked Jason for his informative presentation and presented him with our Speaker's certificate. 

 

As there was nothing more for the good of Rotary, President Elect, Marva Wisdom, called the meeting to a close. 

 

Notes taken by Otter.ai, edited and formatted by Aidan Harris.