AI Is Already Impacting Your Business – Here are 4 Innovative Ways to Leverage It

Show Notes

AI isn’t just on the horizon - it’s already here, reshaping how we work, connect, and show up in our businesses, no matter what industry you’re in.

In this episode, I share how AI has fundamentally changed how I run Speaking Your Brand, well beyond using tools like ChatGPT (though I use that too!). 

I walk you through 4 powerful questions, originally posed by Wharton professor Ethan Mollick, that I’ve been reflecting on deeply and that can help you rethink your own services, content, and visibility.

You’ll hear:

• What I used to do in my business that AI now does better (and faster!)

• What seemed impossible a year ago that I can now do in a day

• How I’m democratizing access to our services with a new AI app we’re building

• The exciting (and slightly eerie!) launch of my new companion podcast, Confident Speaker, written and voiced entirely by AI, trained on my content and brand voice

Plus, you’ll hear about my new live online program, Automate & Amplify with AI, where I’ll teach you how to build the same time-saving, brand-building workflows I use every week - no coding required.

Whether you’re feeling excited, overwhelmed, or curious about AI, this episode will give you the clarity and inspiration to embrace what’s possible (and to let go of what no longer serves you).

Links:

Show notes at https://www.speakingyourbrand.com/432/ 

Check out my new companion podcast “Confident Speaker”: https://confidentspeaker.transistor.fm/ 

Join our Automate & Amplify with AI program: https://www.speakingyourbrand.com/ai/ 

Learn how we can work together on your thought leadership and signature talk: https://www.speakingyourbrand.com/work-with-us/coaching/ 

Article by Prof. Ethan Mollick: https://www.oneusefulthing.org/p/strategies-for-an-accelerating-future

Connect with me on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/carolcox

Related Podcast Episodes:

• Episode 327: From Expert to Thought Leader: 3 Key Strategies You Need Now in the AI Age

JOIN US: Our in-person Speaking Accelerator Workshop is coming up in Downtown Orlando on October 30, 2025. Create and practice your signature talk in one day using our proven framework, so you can confidently share your message and attract more opportunities. It's a fun, supportive environment where you get personalized feedback, professional photos, and more. Limited to 15 attendees. Get the details and secure your spot at https://www.speakingyourbrand.com/orlando/.

What is Speaking Your Brand: Public Speaking Tips and Strategies?

It's time to escape the expert trap and become an in-demand speaker and thought leader through compelling and memorable business presentations, keynotes, workshops, and TEDx talks. If you want to level up your public speaking to get more and better, including paid, speaking engagements, you've come to the right place! Thousands of entrepreneurs and leaders have learned from Speaking Your Brand and now you can too through our episodes that will help you with storytelling, audience engagement, building confidence, handling nerves, pitching to speak, getting paid, and more. Hosted by Carol Cox, entrepreneur, speaker, and TV political analyst. This is your place to learn how to persuasively communicate your message to your audience.

Carol Cox:
I will impact and is already impacting your

business and career.

Here are four innovative ways to think about

it. On this episode of the Speaking Your

Brand podcast.

More and more women are making an impact by

starting businesses, running for office and

speaking up for what matters.

With my background as a TV political analyst,

entrepreneur, and speaker.

I interview and coach purpose driven women to

shape their brands, grow their companies,

and become recognized as influencers in their

field. This is speaking your brand,

your place to learn how to persuasively

communicate your message to your audience.

Hi there and welcome to the Speaking Your

Brand podcast. I'm your host,

Carol Cox. I'm going to do a few episodes

related to AI because it has become a game

changer in my business.

Truly it has, especially this year,

and this is well beyond using ChatGPT,

which of course I use.

But this is about thinking about my business

and my content in an entirely new and

innovative ways.

I'm going to share some of that with you

today, as well as in next week's episodes.

Whether you've been using AI tools like

ChatGPT for a while, or you're just tiptoeing

into it, or you're not really sure if I has a

place for you in your business or the work

that you do. This episode,

I promise, is going to give you a lot to

think about. No matter what your business or

job is, no matter what industry you're in,

no matter what your business model is,

AI is going to impact you,

and it most likely already has,

even if it's not apparent to you that it is

AI. Now, you may not be a graphic designer or

a copywriter or a software developer.

Those jobs clearly see the impact that AI is

having on them.

Even if you're a coach or a consultant,

or you work in health care or HR or finance

or fitness, I will impact you.

Now, if you do run your own business and say

you are a coaching or consultant or

strategist or some type of service provider,

perhaps you've noticed that your social media

posts don't get as many views or as much

engagement as they used to.

A few years ago, if you have a podcast or a

YouTube channel, perhaps you've noticed it's

harder to get or retain your audience.

Maybe you're getting less traffic to your

website. All of that is because of I.

Why? Because it's now easier than ever to

create content.

And lots of people now are creating content,

not just AI generated content,

but using workflows to create content more

quickly, which means there's just more

content everywhere.

More social media posts more.

Podcasts, more YouTube videos.

There's also now this is not related to AI.

More well-known names are starting to get

into podcasting because they see that's where

people are spending a lot of time.

I know I've been listening to new podcasts

that have launched recently by Monica

Lewinsky, Meghan Markle,

Nicole Wallace, Amy Poehler.

So that is also taking people's time.

And SEO is changing because of things like

Google's AI overviews and people using

ChatGPT to get answers to things instead of

using Google Search.

Now side note this is why I say public

speaking is a great way to build your brand

and your business, because you have a captive

audience who is sitting there in front of

you, listening to you,

and you're building trust and rapport with

them. You don't have to rely on algorithms in

order to reach them.

But for this episode, I'm going to share with

you four for ways to think about AI and what

you can do to take advantage of what AI is

making possible.

There are so many incredible opportunities

for things that you can do with your

marketing, your business,

and your visibility.

I saw a post just a few days ago by Mustafa

Suleiman, who's the CEO of Microsoft AI,

and he said brand is going to matter more

than ever. He was referencing that people can

now create content so easily.

I can spin out content literally in seconds.

And so that's why your brand is going to

matter more than ever,

that trust that you've built with your

clients and your audience.

This is also why your intellectual property

is so valuable.

Your frameworks, your methodologies,

your content, your signature talk.

All those speaking engagements that you do,

either a podcast and videos that you create

or Your podcast that you go on as a guest.

All of that really matters to build that

trust and connection with your audience.

Now, at the end of this episode,

I'm going to share with you something that

I've just done why I decided to do this,

how I did it literally in one day,

and how you can do this as well.

Now, if you're new to speaking your brand,

welcome. I'm a former software developer and

tech company founder, and I started speaking

your brand, this business,

ten years ago and this podcast eight years

ago when ChatGPT launched at the end of 2022.

The tech side of me could not resist.

And so I've been integrating AI into so much

of what I do as speaking your brand,

because I know how powerful it can be.

Now, I know it can be hard to figure out what

to do. There are so many different AI tools,

so many people talking about AI.

So I've created a live online program called

Automate and Amplify with AI.

You get time with me, and I'm going to show

you how I've built automation workflows with

AI and without AI that you can use right now

in your business operations and in your

marketing and in your content production.

This isn't wish casting or theory about AI or

just simple ChatGPT prompts.

They are complete automation workflows that

I've built and I use every single week in my

business. As I like to say,

let AI handle the computer work so you can

focus on the human work that only you can do.

I want you to step into your role as a

thought leader and as a human focused

entrepreneur, not the technician who is

constantly stuck doing all of these things on

your computer. So that's what we're going to

do together. It's a four week program.

We have live group zoom calls.

Plus I'm going to give you all the automation

workflows you need and teach you how to make

them work for you. No coding skills needed.

You do not need to be a software engineer or

to be a techie to do this.

This is why they're so powerful.

You can get the details and you can apply for

this program as speaking your brand.

I agree that speaking your brand.

Now let's get on with the show.

Here are four ways to think about how you can

leverage AI, and how it's going to change.

How you think about your business and the

work that you do.

Now, these four questions I'm going to pose

are from an article by Ethan Malik.

He's a professor at the Wharton School of

Business. I'll link to this original article

from him in the show notes.

This came out a couple of years ago,

but since he posted that article,

I've been really thinking about these four

questions and changing how I think about the

business of speaking your brand and our

business model to leverage AI.

So here's the first question.

What useful thing that you do is no longer

valuable. What useful thing you do is no

longer. Valuable.

And he goes on to say,

I doesn't do everything well,

but it does some things very well.

For many organizations,

I is fully capable of automating the tasks

that used to be an important part of your

organizational identity or strategy.

I comes up with more creative ideas than most

people, so your company's special

brainstorming techniques may no longer be a

big benefit. I can provide great user

journeys and personas,

so your old product management or marketing

approach is no longer a differentiator.

Getting a sense of what I can do now and

where it's heading, will allow you to have a

realistic view of what might soon be

delegated to AI.

So what useful thing you do is no longer

valuable. So here's how I would answer that

question for speaking your brand.

Something that we used to do that is no

longer valuable or that is easily done by AI,

is helping clients create their speaking

proposals. When you submit to speak at a

conference or you pitch someone to speak at

their event, typically you create a speaking

proposal that has your title,

the description of your presentation,

your learning objectives,

your takeaways, and so on.

Chatgpt is fantastic at writing speaking

proposals. You can even give it a whole bunch

of information about that particular

conference, and it will customize a proposal

for you. So we used to teach our clients

here's what a speaking proposal structure

looks like. Here are examples of our own

speaking proposals.

And then we would give them exercises to have

them write their own.

And then we would give them our feedback.

I can do that even better than faster than we

can. So that is something that we used to do

that no longer has the same value.

The other thing is just answering kind of

basic questions about public speaking,

maybe like foundational 101 questions about

public speaking.

And these would be things that maybe people

used to do a Google search for.

But you know, you do a Google search for how

can I reduce my nerves and public speaking,

or how can I pitch myself to speak at a

conference and you get a whole bunch of

websites and blogs, and it would be hard to

sift through them all.

So a lot of times it would be easier just to

find a coach and ask that question too.

But now, of course, ChatGPT and similar tools

can answer that question very comprehensively

and ironically. I've been talking about this

idea of escaping the expert trap since 2020.

So before ChatGPT came out and when I talked

about it back then, it was about stepping

into thought leadership that your audience

doesn't just want information,

they don't want an information dump from you.

They want a transformation.

They want to understand what that vision is

that you hold and how they can get there as

well. Well, now I is the ultimate expert.

People can get answers within seconds to

basically anything that they have.

So this is why your thought leadership and

your frameworks and your brand are more

important than ever.

And that's why we work with you to create

this foundation and our Thought Leader

Academy online program.

So this is an example of a thing that we used

to do that is no longer as valuable.

Speaking proposal's answering 101 public

speaking questions.

But what we do that is just as valuable,

if not more valuable than it ever has been,

is helping you create your thought

leadership, your framework, and your

signature talk. Question number two what

impossible thing can you now do?

So this is the flip side of that first

question is that you can now do things that

were impossible before.

So here's Ethan Malloch.

He explains it this way,

which is having an infinite number of interns

or assistants get you.

How does giving everyone a data analyst,

a marketer, and an advisor change what is

possible? So if we think about for speaking

your brand, we work with our clients in a one

on one VIP day to map out their signature

talk using our signature Talk Canvas

framework. We've done this hundreds of times

with our clients and for ourselves.

What a possible thing can we now do?

We can take a client's signature canvas,

with their permission, of course, and create

multiple assets from it.

Literally within seconds we can have it

generate a speaking proposal,

social media, post video scripts,

copy further a website,

and so on. Now we could do that before,

but it would be time consuming to go and do

all those things. Now literally we can press

a button and have it done.

So think about for your own work and your

business. What impossible thing can you now

do? Question number three.

What? Can you move to a wider market?

Or democratize?

So think about how can you.

Democratize what you do and buy democratize

media. How can you let more people in to.

What you do. For example speaking your brand.

Our services are high touch.

They're premium services.

And so we're limited with the number of

people who have the budget and the means to

work with us. But we still want to help so

many, especially women out there.

Step into thought leadership,

create their signature talk,

and get that clarity and confidence to go out

there and pitch for speaking engagements and

step onto stages.

Now, here's how Ethan Malik describes this

question about how can you move to a wider

market or democratize.

He says. Prior to AI, companies were often

advised to put their effort into servicing

their most profitable customers.

But I has greatly changed the equation.

Services and approaches that were once

expensive to customize have become cheaper.

For example, prior to AI strategy,

consulting firms would only work for giant

clients for large fees,

but now they may be able to offer effective

advising to a much wider range of businesses

at lower cost.

Another example he cites is custom tutoring

and mentoring. So here is speaking your

brand. As I mentioned earlier.

When we work with clients to create their

signature talk, we do that in a one on one

VIP day high touch premium service.

But I'm now building what I call chat CIB.

So like ChatGPT but chat speaking your brand

chat CIB to be able to provide you with a DIY

service so you can use our specially trained

AI application that's trained on all of

speaking your brand podcast content,

our training content, our frameworks and it

will walk you through creating your talk from

beginning to end, using our methodology and

everything that it knows about how we put

together great talks, talks that have

millions of views on for Ted,

talks that are for international keynote

speakers, for business presentations.

So we're democratizing access to what we do

by creating this DIY service.

And I'll be talking more about that in

upcoming episodes.

So question number three, how can you move to

a wider market or democratize what you do?

Question number four what can you personalize

or move up market?

Ethan Malik explains it this way.

At the same time, your organization's

capabilities have increased.

If you were once a small marketing firm,

you can use AI to punch above your weight and

offer services to elite clients that were

once only available for much larger firms

with giant context windows and fast Answers.

Every customer being able to have a personal

AI agent who knows their preferences and

previous interactions with the company and

communicates with them according to their

preferences. Figure out the most exciting

thing you can do and see if you can make it

happen. Oh, I love that call to action that

he says there.

Figure out the most exciting thing you can do

and see if you can make it happen.

So what I just described with chat CIB,

that DIY service that is definitely going to

keep, we're going to keep expanding what it

can do. I have so many ideas for it.

I can't wait for you to see it so that I will

be coming in the next few months, so stay

tuned for that. But here's something that

I've also created and this idea of what can

you personalized.

So as you know, for this Speaking your Brand

podcast, I've been doing it for over eight

years. This is episode number 432.

So I have a lot of podcast content.

Now it takes me about a half a day a week,

so about four hours a week to produce one

episode. So that is everything from coming up

with the idea, creating the outline,

recording it, editing it,

putting together the show notes, the blog,

the graphics, putting it in the podcast host,

all of those kinds of things. And if I have

an interview with a guest and part of that

four hours, then instead of me doing the solo

recording, is the guest recording.

So between myself and my team members,

that is about four hours or so worth of time

for one episode.

What I have just launched is a companion

podcast to speaking your brand called

Confident Speaker.

You can find it in Apple Podcasts or Spotify.

Search for Confident Speaker. I've also

included a link in the show notes.

This podcast called Confidence Speaker is

100% I created.

It is incredible.

This is one of the things that I'm going to

show you in that automate and Amplify with AI

online program that I'm running,

because you can do this as well.

Now, I'm very transparent on the Confidence

Speaker podcast that it is AI generated.

But here's why I did it,

because they're very short episodes,

about 3 to 5 minutes in length,

and they address one specific question

somewhat. It would have the challenge with

Speaking Your Brand podcast having over 400

episodes is that when someone finds the

podcast, they have to go and find the

episodes that they are looking for.

So whether it's about speaking fees or

speaking proposals or confidence or their

signature talk or figuring out their idea,

they have certain questions in their mind.

But then they have to figure out,

out of all those episodes,

where to get the answer.

The other challenge is that because I've been

doing this podcast for so long,

I feel like I've just talked about

storytelling or I just talk about nerves and

confidence, but it's been a year,

or sometimes it's been two years since I've

addressed that topic directly.

So again, people who come to the podcast now

may not find those episodes.

That's the way I created the Confidence

Speaker podcast, because it's short episodes

that are about a specific question.

The Confident Speaker podcast has been

trained on all of my Speaking Your Brand solo

podcast episodes, and on the Speaking Your

Brand IP and frameworks.

Openai API ChatGPT writes the script,

writes the show notes.

I send it to 11 labs, which is a software

where I have professionally cloned my voice

based on my podcast audio.

11 labs creates the the audio file.

So my voice clone reading the script that was

written by OpenAI and then it puts it all

together, sends it to my podcast host,

and then I will review it.

So it's in draft mode,

I review it, make sure everything is good, I

listen to the audio and then I publish it.

I want you to go listen to a few episodes and

it is eerily good.

Of course, there's a few places where if I,

the human, were doing it, I would pause a

little bit more or I would have a sometimes,

you know, maybe a sentence or two runs

together a little bit tighter than I would do

it, but it really does sound like me.

So now these are on demand podcast episodes

that I, human Carol, don't have to spend time

creating, but I'm providing so much value to

the people who are finding that because they

can get their answer quickly,

and not just a generic ChatGPT answer,

but an answer based on my years of experience

in public, speaking on TV and working with

clients. The other thing you can do is that

if you are looking at the Confident Speaker

podcast and you don't find an episode that is

related to the question that you have,

you can send an email to On Demand at

Speaking your Brand. Com again,

that's on demand all together as speaking

your brand. Com send the question that you

have like what is a signature talk.

Or how should I structure my signature talk

or how much should I charge to speak.

Whatever your question is.

And it will generate an audio of my voice

clone, giving you my advice,

giving you my answer again,

trained on all of my speaking your brand

content. So that is a way that I'm

personalizing something and doing something

that's exciting that has never been possible

before. Let me give you a recap again of

those four questions to think about.

What useful thing you do is no longer

valuable. What impossible thing can you do

now? What can you move to a wider market or

democratize?

And what can you upmarket or personalise?

This is why I'm so excited about my Automate

and Amplify with AI live online program,

because I'm going to help you assess those

four questions for your business.

I want you to get out of the expert trap of

doing a bunch of admin tasks of the content

creation hamster wheel.

I want you to do the human work and let AI in

there. Robots do the computer work.

You're going to get my automation workflows.

The ones that I'm using right now.

These are not old.

And every week I'm going to share with you

what I'm building right now.

And I'm going to show you and teach you

exactly how to do this yourself.

And I'm going to answer all of your questions

along the way.

I really want to save you time,

to free you up for the other activities that

you want to be doing.

So again, you can get all the information and

apply at speaking your brand AI.

Again, that's speaking your brand AI.

And the next episode I'm going to share with

you more specifics about how I'm using AI to

power my business in operations,

marketing, and revenue.

So if you don't already follow the Speaking

Your Brand podcast, make sure to hit Follow

in Apple Podcast or Spotify and share this

episode with a friend or colleague.

Until next time, thanks for listening.