#32. UNCUT: How A.I is disrupting content creation, with Suzette Bailey

BONUS: special ‘uncut’ episode.

Suzette Bailey is the founder of SimpleMarketing.ai. In interview she shares her story with Nerds of Business host, Darren Moffatt.

Guest Bios:

Suzette Bailey is the founder of https://simplemarketing.ai/

What to listen out for:

0.55 Suzette Bailey’s Journey to becoming the founder of a content AI company

11.54 When Humans & AI work together

16.24 The traits Suzette draws upon as an entrepreneur

20:21 Suzette’s Drive

25.07 The definition of bootstrap

25.51 Who Suzette draws inspiration from

29.23 Suzette’s one killer hack

34.55 Gut Reaction

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Transcript
Suzette Bailey:

So, we are a very new company actually, and it's what June 2021 at the moment, but we actually only launched in March of this year. So very new and the company itself has only existed since January. So, what we actually do is we help entrepreneurs and business owners to write the marketing content and other kinds of content that they struggle with each and every day using artificial intelligence. So, it's about putting in a few key words, key phrases, and it provides you content unique and original, so it's not templated or any of those sort of things, uh, or curated content. And it gives you unique content on particular topic that you're interested in. And now you can then actually, so it's about getting to your first draft. So, it's not about replacing people. It's more of a productivity tool and an automation tool.

Darren Moffatt:

How did you end up becoming the founder of a content AI company?

Suzette Bailey:

Well, it's an interesting journey and it started with actually being, being a quarantine officer for the Australian quarantines service. And, uh, at the time I was playing around with internet because I liked technology and internet at that time. And I had a boss, my boss comes up and would sort of say, oh, you can go on this sort of like go and look after us, you know, on the internet side of it and take care of us. I don't want to have anything to do with it. And from there, I actually developed a web development company with a few other people, and they fell by the wayside over the years. And what happened was I was sort of left being this, the person of this one company that started as a web development company over 21 years ago. And what it morphed into was an IT consulting company, working to for Australian federal government, and a lot of other big, large organizations doing around sort of services around information management, document content.

Suzette Bailey:

So, I've always been in the sort of the content, um, sort of realm for a long time and doing systems and making things, you know, really complex systems, Simple, well thing is, um, a few years ago I got a little bit sort of, uh, oh, well, tired of working with government and the larger organizations. And I really felt a passion to working with small businesses and entrepreneurs. And so, I tried a number of times to actually spin off a, uh, sort of a start-up from the company, in fact, a few other ones were, uh, a company or a business, sorry, called frog sense. And other one was auto pilot business systems. And I kept trying, and one of the things I kept failing and failing quite spectacularly at, was at, um, actually marketing these businesses because I was a trained scientist doing reporting and documentation work and that sort of thing with the Australian government, I never learned to write out of third person.

Suzette Bailey:

So, when I actually tried to a few years ago take, you know, sort of what I had learnt in this, this huge amount of expertise and be able to help small businesses, I actually bombed spectacularly. Um, I used to get really, really upset and frustrated by the fact that I could not sell a $500 course online, yet I could go and do a six-figure deal, walk in and do a six-figure deal really easily on the century seven side. And I actually felt quite felt like a failure at times, because it's like, it can't be this hard, anyone's doing it, they keep saying you can make money online. And, um, from there, what happened was I, you know, fast track a few years, once the AI, you know, it was sort of me being a nerd, and a geek, felt, you know, kept across a lot of technologies and changes and things.

Suzette Bailey:

And when I saw AI technology had gotten to a point where it could actually write distinguishably from humans, at least to that first draft level, I knew that there was an opportunity to take all of that experience that I had, you know, as being a small business owner and, and a, um, entrepreneur. And that, you know, what I thought at the time was a failure, but was actually really me learning the problem. And that's actually how simple marketing came about is because it came out of that real deep frustration that I had of not being able to write marketing content myself.

Darren Moffatt:

In some ways it conforms to the classic, uh, cycle, doesn't it because, you know, often entrepreneurs stumble across a problem themselves. They struggle with it, and they had that insight. It's like, ah, well, if this is so difficult for me, I wonder what it's like for other people, is this a widespread problem? And to that point, you know, what process of validation did you do? Like how you did, once you kind of, you know, discover the problem and you thought you had something there, how did you validate the, uh, hypothesis that the solution would be a viable business

Suzette Bailey:

Within twofold? I did the, the traditional market validation that you're supposed to do, which is go and talk to people and, and really, but I'd also been keeping a lot of in tabs with a lot of that community where I had been trying to, you know, move into the small business market for a long time. So, I actually would listen, not just sort of overtly going out, but actually listening to a lot of their conversations through Facebook, through LinkedIn, through their comments, through people's frustrations. But I wasn't the only one, um, there was a lot of people who had this problem. One of the other things I, you know, sort of earlier this year, um, some of you may or may not be aware of a new social media sort of phenomenon called, um, clubhouse, which is an audio-based sort of app for social media.

Suzette Bailey:

And for me, I loved it because it was the first time for social media that I, um, it didn't, it relied on me actually talking to people and solving problems as opposed to having to write content. Yeah. You know, I hated it so much. I actually entirely, you know, created an entire platform to avoid it. Great platform for if you wanting to test messages and that sort of thing, and ask in doing that market validation really, really quickly. So, I went into lots of rooms, and I asked people, so it's the same as going out and talking to people. But on the flip side, um, even that, even knowing that that was actually, the challenges occurred and everything, um, and honestly, we didn't probably do as much invalidating that people would pay for the service. So we knew that there was people who, um, that, and we targeted the wrong groups initially, and it's through pivoting that and listening and getting that feedback from the people that, over time over, when I say time the last few weeks or last few months, um, we've pivoted to a point now that we're actually ironically enough coming act to a lot of the same customer base that I used to have with sensory seven.

Suzette Bailey:

So, some are bigger organizations and some of the transformational, um, or the industry where people help online and that sort of thing. Um, so I think you can never stop validating your market really.

Darren Moffatt:

Well. That's right. I mean, when you take a new product to market, uh, it's inevitably, uh, a series of assumptions, you know, um, and, and you can, hopefully you've got some data to back, back up those assumptions, but, uh, if everything was a sure bet, it'd take a lot of the fun outta life. Wouldn't it.

Suzette Bailey:

Although we were not replacing copywriters, we were absolutely changing how people would work with a copywriter. So, we're actually absolutely working with copywriters and, uh, they see it, you know, the ones who are getting on board with the technology and embracing it are seeing it as a way of getting rid of the grunt work that they didn't really like anyway, so that they could spend more time and finessing content. And that absolutely is still valid. That is entirely true that we are doing that. But we're actually, um, some of the pivots that I mentioned that came out about, of us listening to our market and moving into that bigger market. Now, the bigger, the bigger area, uh, when I say bigger market, I'm talking about bigger businesses, you know, businesses that are that really having a one size fits all approach doesn't really work. They need it to realign to their business.

Suzette Bailey:

And one of our very big pivots that's come out of all of the listening to people is that we're now tailoring our, um, solutions to our clients. So essentially mass customization. So still being, making it very scalable from us as a SaaS provider, but from the from the business perspective, they get a solution that's tailored to them. In the area of so business analysis where business analysts will traditionally go in and they write huge amounts of user documentation, other kinds of proposals, all these sorts of things. So, there's a lot of content that's generated such in a project, but they're not actually necessarily billable. If you're a consulting consultant organization or based, you'll know what I'm talking about, or they're not necessarily, um, it's important, but not necessarily urgent in most cases. And a lot of clients won't pay for it. So, by disrupting that whole way, that business analysts and technical writers work and fast tracking them and making them more productive, it's an area of projects or IT projects in particular, that's really never been touched. There's not a lot of help associated with that particular industry. There is for project managers, there are for other, you know, for the developers and that sort of thing, but not so much the business analysts and tech writers.

Darren Moffatt:

These days, a lot, lot of the content and the social content that you you're referring to, uh, is produced offshore, you know, by, um, groups, uh, in India or the Philippines. Uh, and often the quality of the work is really quite good. It's produced offshore because there's a substantial arbitrage with the cost. It's a lot cheaper. So, it seems to me that that would be another logical market that you're essentially disrupting there.

Suzette Bailey:

Yeah, absolutely disrupting and, and changing. So, a lot of the really good quality ones, as you mentioned, they can get absolutely fantastic quality, uh, out of those people. Unfortunately, you can also get not so great content because a lot of them English is not necessarily their first language or whatever language that they're actually writing in, if it's not their first language. So, the ones who are good, and this applies with copywriters, be they outsourced in another country, or if they're in your own actual country, they are going, the good quality ones are going to find that they are going to change what they do, and they're going to providing high, higher value services. Unfortunately, the $3, $5 an hour type people are going to find that these types of jobs are not going to be available for them anymore, because already we're seeing businesses using these kinds of services to, um, fast track that, and then using, um, outsourced labour, to edit the content as opposed to creating it and editing it.

Darren Moffatt:

Yeah. So that leads me to the next question, you know, what do these entities that you're disrupting, you know, uh, what do they have to lose and what do you, and by extension your customers have to gain from this technology.

Suzette Bailey:

Yeah, it's interesting. Um, I'm, I'm a big believer of trying to look for the, you know, the glass half full, not the glass half empty. But I absolutely know. I mean, disruption in itself is a form of change and change can be viewed very positively or negatively. The ones who embrace change, and the reality is as much as people would like to stick their head in the sand, disruption from AI technology, not just our kind of AI technology, but AI technology in general, is going to really is already disrupting, um, how jobs are created, how jobs are and what kind of employment, um, opportunities and, and, uh, sort of things are around. And I think the ones who embrace it are going to change and adapt, and there will be higher value, um, particular task. I wasn't even talking to someone yesterday who was talking about how eventually we're going to get to a point where we have people actually, you know, people's roles are going to be to manage AI processes, doing different functions, as opposed to staff who previously.

Suzette Bailey:

And so, there's still a role for us humans. And in fact, I think the magic occurs when AI and humans work together, we get AI, do the grunt work and humans do the finessing and the thinking outside the box and other things around that. And so, the ones who can embrace that and actually adapt, will thrive in this area, the ones who can't and are unfortunately, then I think you, they're going to, they're going to find it more difficult moving forward. I mean, even an example of another AI application recently, I mean, you know, you think about things like fruit pickers, well, fruit pickers, like, you know, there's always going to be, you know, they'll be able to do fruit picking. Well, there's a company that's actually created, um, uh, a machine that uses AI to actually assess the quality of the fruit ready for picking. And then it has an arm that goes and picks the fruit. So, the person in that particular case is actually helping to, you know, is, um, moving oh, working with the machine and is monitoring the machine and monitoring the outputs and those sorts of things. It's not actually, you know, the person is not actually picking the fruit anymore.

Darren Moffatt:

And, and I mean, I agree with you that the AI will create some jobs, but it'll destroy vastly more jobs than it will create. And in fact, uh, I'm keen to see whether or not you're familiar with the book called rise of the robots. Have you read that book?

Suzette Bailey:

No, I'm not aware of that one. I'll have to go and have a look at it.

Darren Moffatt:

Rise of the robots. Uh, I think it's by, um, an author called Martin North, and it was, um, was published about five years ago, uh, five or six years ago. And I read it shortly after it came out and frankly, it's a bit terrifying. And when you, uh, if you go out and you talk to sort of average people out in the suburbs and you talk about AI, there is a lot of fear about it. I mean, it's not something that people understand, uh, and any, anything that someone doesn't understand, they, they will often be scared of. But one of the main arguments of the book is that yes, it will create jobs, but it will destroy many more than it creates. Uh, and that obviously a societal issue, it's, uh, a much bigger topic than our remit here today, Suzette, um, yes. You know, you, obviously your business is disruptive. Um, it will have an impact, but you know, positive, but over time businesses like yours will obviously mean that some people in current roles that won't be work for them. What are the key disrupt forces of your offer, whether it be your tech, your business model, your distribution, or what have you, what, what do you think are the key forces that are really driving this disruption?

Suzette Bailey:

The first one is the fact that, uh, where you may have needed actually human, um, and you may have paid as you, saying before alluding to, with the overseas outsourcing, that sort of thing. A job that may have taken two, three hours to do a single piece of content now takes probably 30 minutes, you know, a minute or so to write it with the AI. And then even, you know, if you spend another 29 minutes to actually edit it, you know, you're still, there's a significant productivity saving on time. And the reality is that that's going to equate to less people being employed for the same roles. Although there are going to, you know, I was talking to a business the other day that actually has three people employed writing content. Well, if you've got them now, one of two things is going to happen with using the AI.

Suzette Bailey:

They're either going to cut staff and have one person only on now to be able to edit, um, the content that comes out and manage that process, or they're going to be able to redistribute those staff members to other tasks and, uh, do absolutely take your point that it gets to a point where there are no other tasks that aren't being done or that they're optimize the productivity of that particular organization to the point where they can't do it any further. And that's where things like, you know, societal changes will need to come in. It's interesting that you, you mentioned about, you know, sort of the, that in that context of that book, for me, AI technology in general, and ours also will be contributing to this, we're essentially the next industrial revolution, the industrial, you know, the introduction of, of machines had a huge impact on the workforce and the, um, AI is that is the technological equivalent of.

Darren Moffatt:

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. We are in the fourth industrial revolution, um, so to speak. And I think, you know, it's a very exciting time, but clearly yes, you know, uh, rapid change does make some people anxious. What personality traits do you find yourself drawing on most in your journey so far, especially as it relates to simple marketing.ai?

Suzette Bailey:

Well, probably the first one is, um, perseverance and there's, and please don't put me on the, to ask me who the quote was from, because I can't remember, but there was, there's essentially a concept around that it's better to actually to persevere than it is to actually, and be persistent than it is to be smart. So essentially what they, and I, I know I, I sort of, I stuffed up the, the quote specifically, but as in essence, what it's saying is you could have somebody, you know, two people who are really, really, you know, one person who's really smart, and everything comes easy to, but doesn't have particularly a lot of persistence or a lot of, um, resilience. And the other person who may not be as smart as that first person, but is prepared to keep going, even in the face of adversity, that person is always going to beat the first person.

Suzette Bailey:

Obviously, if you you've got the intelligence and that sort of thing, that helps, but it's not everything. And in fact, perseverance resilience, the ability to keep going in the face of adversity is absolutely critical as both a business owner in general, but particularly if you're an entrepreneur and especially if you're an entrepreneur doing it in a disruptive, um, area, because you're up against people, as you say. I quite regularly hear, AI is scary and, you know, comments like that. And that can actually quite, can be quite demoralizing after a while that you're having to essentially educate people in the vantages of this. And the other qualities for me is collaboration. I built my first business through actually, uh, when I said that those three other founders left the business, and I was left on my own. I didn't actually know at the time that business owners didn't do this, they didn't go around asking their competitors for help.

Suzette Bailey:

And I did. I kept knocking on doors and going, can you help me. And that actually built a very collaborative, um, mindset over the years so that I now don't even know how to do business without actually being partnerships and helping and connecting people, because it always comes back to you in, you know, 10, 1000-fold. So, perseverance collaboration, knowing when to, um, ask for help also that you're not alone. Um, you are not the only person who's gone through this and, you know, it can feel that way. And absolutely there are times when you just want to pull doing doona back over, the blankets over the head and just go no more, I've had enough, but you got to get yourself back up. You got to keep doing it. One of the things that I suppose the difference between now and when I was doing, uh, you know, starting the business a few, you know, sort of 20 years ago, um, my other business is I'm now a lot more, um, forgiving of myself too. And I think people need to provide an ability to be forgiving of both themselves and the people around them, because we wear a lot of hats. Things are not always going to go to plan. Yep. It's stressful. And you are in a situation where you need to be able to just take a time out and go, you know what, I'm going to go and have that massage, or I'm going to have the afternoon off and don't feel guilty about it.

Darren Moffatt:

Yeah. Absolutely.

Suzette Bailey:

I joke about the fact that I'm an, a personality with a recovering perfectionist. Um, it's probably that much of a joke. Um, and so the drive and the passion and the, uh, the competitive nature is definitely there. There's no question about that. Um, sometimes I'm actually competitive with myself probably more so than I should be. Yeah. Uh, but the drive for me is twofold. Now. It's, it's absolutely all of that. But the other thing, and the more, the, for me, and the big change was I wasn't feeling that I was getting purpose out of what I was doing. It was absolutely a fantastic cash business, and it was built, you know, it was a multimillion-dollar business. It was, it was doing very well. And you know, it would've gone through to retirement, and it would've, you know, it would have been fantastic. And, but I had done everything that I could, and I wasn't really feeling that I was actually providing, you know, or doing what, what I needed to do.

Suzette Bailey:

So, my purpose was to be able to help other people. And so, for me, that I think was a big driver, is moving into simple marketing and frog sense and all the other ones in the prior was trying to take that and be able to help, um, business owners. Cause when all said and done, if you help business owners, you help businesses to grow and growing that means that helps the economy and it helps everybody. Um, it ultimately, even with disruption, it's still ultimately the underpinning thing of our economy. A big aspect for me is the purpose part of it. The other thing of it too, is I just like a challenge and I do like solving new problems and I had pretty much, I used to joke that I could do my job in my sleep. And I actually got very, very sick a few years ago. And I literally did it in my sleep pretty much. I would be, um, I wasn't able to work more than about 10% a day yet. I was still over delivering on the work, and I sort of went, you know what, this means that I really am being able to do this in my sleep. I need a new challenge, once I was obviously better.

Darren Moffatt:

Yeah. Wow. Okay. Well, yes. You know, there's, there it is people that's, that's, uh, that's where the drive comes from. And, uh, I think that's a really fascinating question. Everyone's different. Of course, everyone's got different drivers, you know, I remember when I was, uh, starting my first business and setting up, I used to go and jump on a squash court and play squash against myself and pretend that my main, uh, to be competitor was the squash ball. So, you know, it takes all types. Um, but, um, I guess here's another question for you. Um, it's, it's the sort of classic nature versus nurture question, you know, like I don't think that everyone can be a disruptive entrepreneur. I think it's a, it's a pretty small cohort. Um, what do you think, do you think, uh, disruptors are born that way, or can they evolve, and which applies to you?

Suzette Bailey:

Look, I agree with you. I think not everyone can be it and not everyone needs to be or should be. There are still even with disruption. There is always, you know, some kind of jobs and things or other things for people to do. Uh, and we are all kind of different and we, you know, um, that side of it. At the same time, I think there's some skills that people can learn. Um, but that's not the same thing I used to sort of use this analogy that when I was working in the public service, I could do the job. I absolutely could, but I was a square peg in around hole and vice versa, I see some people who are public servants who come out and try to do business, particularly because, for the people on the call, I'm actually in Canberra, which is the Washington DC of Australia.

Suzette Bailey:

So even not working in that industry, I still see a lot of people who are in that, public servant, and there'd be a lot of public servants who'd come out and try to do business. And they really, really needed to be in a in a role, like an employee role, not an employer or business owner role because they didn't have those sort of, those innate skills. And there's nothing wrong with that. There's absolutely both were valid, um, situations it's about recognizing who you are and being true to you.

Darren Moffatt:

What challenges do you foresee in sort of, you know, maybe medium term, uh, journey ahead for simple marketing and, and how do you think you'll overcome them?

Suzette Bailey:

Well, probably the, the biggest one we have at the moment is, uh, you know, us going up against our competitors in the US who are very well funded and us being an Australian, IT start-up, it's not as well funded. Um, in fact, we're, you know, investment for IT based, um, sorry, Australian based it start-ups is, much, um, harder to come by in smaller amounts. So, you know, we're, we're sort of like feeling a bit like the David and Goliath type, um, situation at the moment. So that's one big thing, but on the same side, flip side, Aussie's are very good at adapting and, uh, pushing, you know, sort of above our weight. Moving forward, um, some of the challenges for the business will be actually managing it as it evolves, and it grows. Um, so what kind of skills you need when you first start, you know, when you start a IT start-up or SAS business is very different to what you need to continue in growing a bigger one. So, it's being able to recognize when it is worth, you know, sort of bringing somebody else in to potentially be general manager and all those sorts of growth, uh, sort of aspects. But yeah, look, I think that's the biggest one at the moment is just getting that transition from being a boot strapped IT start-up into something that's investor ready and, you know, moving forward.

Background Audio:

That's nerdy.

Darren Moffatt:

So that's nerdy, Suzette, you've just used some jargon there. I know what it is, but I think we just need to unpack that briefly. You say boot strapped. Do you just want to explain to people what bootstrap are?

Suzette Bailey:

Apologies. I, usually stop myself. That's thank you for, for giving me the call. Um, bootstrapping means as a business, um, we have self-funded ourselves. So we, instead of actually taking investment from outside of the company, we have, um, it has been sweat equity, which means the founders actually putting in their time and effort and expertise and not at the time being paid for it, hence the word sweat equity, as opposed to most people being paid and also putting in actual money from the founders and that sort of thing. So when, when you take investors though, that's when you start, you are, uh, you're an invested, um, business, you know, you've got investment in.

Darren Moffatt:

Yep. No, that's a great explanation. Who's your most inspiring disruptor and why?

Suzette Bailey:

Well, that's changed over the years for me. And one that comes to mind for me originally, and, and was Alex Mandossian, who may or may not be very well known on this particular podcast, but he actually led a lot of the internet marketing and anyone who goes and googles, Alex Mandossian will see that he's been around for like 20 plus years in the internet marketing space. And, I actually had the pleasure of actually getting to meet him in Australia when he was presenting at one time here. And he was somebody that when I first heard him, this is a, an interesting story. I actually was at the three-day conference with him. And over the course of the three-day conference, I developed a very massive infection in my, what actually found out it was actually under my tooth and had to have, um, surgery, um, associated with it, later.

Suzette Bailey:

And I actually was an incredible amount of pain. And on the third day I knew I wanted to actually work with him. And I knew he was going to do an offer to work with him and that sort of thing at that point. And yet I was at the front of the room, and he was at the back, and he had made such a profound, um, impact on me with what he had been, you know, what he was talking about and how he presented himself. I actually met, um, I think I was the second person to the back of the room to, um, to sign up with him, even though I was basically almost delirious with pain because I was so keen to actually work with him. And I think the reason for that was because, you know, some of you will go online.

Suzette Bailey:

If you go and look at him, he, you know, he can be quite gregarious in the US market, but in the Australian market, he adapted for the Australian market and was very much more, uh, us Aussies, we don't particularly like sort of the real RA RA type conference people. Yep. Yep. And he, yeah, he spoke to me a lot of number of different levels, um, business ownership, around internet marketing, and a whole range of other things. And I think he was the first person who gave me the permission to be me in that sphere. And I had never really, and I think a lot of us don't take the note to actually, you know, when we're looking for mentors, we're looking for mentors and people that we want to aspire to, but we don't necessarily take into account the ones who are actually similar or on a pathway similar to ourselves already.

Darren Moffatt:

Wow. Well, I, I'm not familiar with that name. It vaguely rings a bell, Alex Mandossian. I'm definitely going to go out there and Google it. And I want to encourage all of our listeners to do the same, but that's a fabulous story. Thanks for sharing that with us Suzette. And I like what you said right at the end there, that he gave you permission to be, be yourself or be the best version of yourself. And I think, you know, that's ultimately, uh, that's a gift, isn't it? You know, there's some generosity of spirit behind that. We now turn to a very famous recurring segment here at nerds of business Suzette called...

Background Audio & music:

Nerd Under Pressure

Darren Moffatt:

Nerd under pressure. And, uh, today is Suzette from simple marketing.ai . You are our AI Nerd. We're going to frame you as the AI nerd today. And I think you might even be the very first AI nerd we've had on the show. So, it's super nerdy here at nerd of business and Suzette we're after one killer hack or tip, you can give to business owners for launching a disruptive tech start-up. I'm going to give you five seconds thinking time. Okay. Over to you.

Suzette Bailey:

I touched on it before and the biggest one even now is collaboration. I think it's, as you mentioned, it's a very understated skill and tip that people do. Yeah. Um, but it's a very powerful one because it's the basis of what all partnerships, including business relationships. It's like somebody, even though somebody described, um, investors, for instance, as a marriage that you can't divorce from, well, your strategic partners and, the growth of your business is built on the strength of the relationships. And so, the more you can be collaborative and the more you can work with others, the better that you are going to be able to get ahead.

Darren Moffatt:

Nice. I love that. I'm big on collaboration too. I think it's very, very underrated. And, you know, it goes back to that sort of classic tenant. You know, the sum is, uh, or the hole is greater than the sum of the parts. You know? I mean, you are bigger, you are more effective if you are collaborating with other people.

Background Audio & music:

Nerd superpower

Darren Moffatt:

Okay. So, this is nerd superpower, and we already know Suzette that you're a great collaborator. And we know, we know a fair bit about you already. We've learned quite a bit over the last, uh, 40 minutes or so, but now what we need to know is your nerd superpower. So that's where we want you to nominate one skill or attribute or personality trait above all others that gives you the edge in everything you do in business.

Suzette Bailey:

Well, it was actually quite a few years ago when I was working with century seven that I actually myself recognized the superpower as a superpower. Because before that, I just assumed everybody did this. I had been in, um, brought into a project that had been failing. I had two project managers prior to me and was working basically. I was a last-ditch effort to get this project over the line. And I walked into this, um, and it was a implementing a content management system into a very large organization. And when I walked in, she said, oh, I think within a few days they went, so, you know, how does this particular software work? And I'm like, I've never touched this software before. Cause the actual software, I'd never sort of thing. And they weren't, but you know like, and I am thinking to myself, but I'd give them options.

Suzette Bailey:

And I would give them, you know, this is what's going to happen. If you actually do this, you will actually have this result. And if you know, I could see the different pathways of what was likely to happen based on their, you know, their idea or, you know, what actions they took. And I would say, look, if you do this, this is going to happen. If you do this, this is going to happen. They're like, um, how can you see that? How can you say, you know, see those, I'm like, and I stood there and I'm like, but how can you not? I mean, you've been using the software for a while now, and this is all this sort of thing. And it occurred to me that most people's brains didn't work like mine. Long story short. My superpower is actually to be able to see patterns in how people use information and be able to adapt that problem to a scenario so that I can actually see what the implications or, and ramifications of actions is going to be.

Darren Moffatt:

Oh, wow. That might just be the best nerd superpower we've had yet. Pattern recognition. I love it. That, uh, that's pretty nerdy. And I'll tell you what Suzette, because that's pretty nerdy. I'm actually going to pull out a rarely used segment here at nerds of business. And I'm going to put you through what we call.

Background Audio:

The Nerdo-meter.

Darren Moffatt:

So, this is the Nerdo-meter right. We save this stuff. This is a very special segment. This one, we only bring it out to people that we think are really quite nerdy. And so, the Nerdo-meter Suzette Bailey is, uh, it's a very simple contraption it's, uh, where we ask you to rate yourself out of 10 for nerdiness. So, uh, if you, you, uh, if you had to rate yourself out of 10 as a nerd, what's it going to be?

Suzette Bailey:

Look, honestly, I'd have to say it's a 10 because I'm also a geek as well.

Darren Moffatt:

Oh, you heard it here first people, she's broken the Nerd-meter. We've got another broken Nerdo-meter. It's a 10 out of 10 rating here for Suzette Bailey at simplemarketing.ai. We love the nerdy stuff Suzette, thank you so much for that. All of my discussions with, you know, close to 25 top entrepreneurs, now that most of them are really quite deep thinkers and they've often got a very restless mind now, whatever it is, it could be walking the dog or it could be meditating, the occasional nice glass of red wine, whatever it is. Do you have a mental habit or process that you've used consistently over the years to channel your creativity?

Suzette Bailey:

Well, the first one is, is actually talking to other people funny that about the collaboration side. Okay. I find my mind when people, you know, give me problems or talk about things, it come up with things it's almost like I, it, you know, sort of rifles through the mental, uh, index cards and say, oh, you could use this piece of information. It's what I'm working with people. And I do find that I am really a much higher value output wise and outcome base when I'm actually working with people. The other side of it is when I'm going for a walk or I really, even things like showering and just having that downtime. And I think a lot of people don't give yourselves enough just me time. I was saying before around the, you know, going for a massage and those sorts of thing and not feeling guilty about it because it is actually quality time.

Suzette Bailey:

If you allow your brain to filter through things. And I'm a big believer that I do a lot of things on my gut reaction. And the first thing you think about gut reaction is like, oh, well, that's not, you know, it's not based in fact. Well, the reality is, and you know, it's actually your subconscious going through and assessing all the different, you know, sort of things that you've gone through. And, and you're using your experience and your knowledge based to come up with what's the answer and, you know, trusting your gut and trusting your subconscious to make the right decision and backing that can, I think can be very powerful too.

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