S2. Ep38 - 5 AI Automation Mistakes That Could Cost Your Business (And How to Avoid Them)

Katie (00:27)

Hello and welcome back to another episode. Hi, hello, I'm Katie and I've got Noah here with me. Hi Noel, how are you doing this week?

Noel (00:36)

I'm having a wonderful week this week, how are you doing?

Katie (00:38)

Yeah, all good, thank you. I'm quite excited to talk about this week's topic, but as always, we never jump straight into the podcast topic. I always ask you, are there any updates that we need to know about about AI automations that are relevant to those of us who are running a business?

Noel (01:04)

So yesterday we had, did Anthropic release another new model. You know, this AI slowdown is really slowing down.

Katie (01:12)

Yeah, I

was just about to say, hang on a minute. Wasn't everything supposed to be slowing down and weren't they trying to tell us that they're not gonna be just releasing these new models and Right. Yeah.

Noel (01:24)

Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's going really well, but they've done it,

I guess, at a clever time. So what they've released is sonnet 5.5 and essentially it's half the price of Opus 5.5. But really in the grand scheme of things, it's not actually that far off of the Opus level. It's only just under. So, you know, if you're

Katie (01:47)

Okay.

Noel (01:48)

using Opus 5.5 in automations and things like that, and you all maybe want to save a bit of money, use

similar intelligence then then yes on it 5.5 could be for you but the reason they've I guess they've been a bit naughty the reason they've done it is the open AI have their dev day which is Tuesday which is today's we we record this episode so you know trying to steal a bit of thunder maybe I don't know

Katie (02:15)

Maybe

Noel (02:18)

yeah because yeah it's been yeah it's been what I mean opus 5.5 the other week

was outstanding from a release perspective. So the leap in intelligence over anything that any other competitor provides is amazing. I've thoroughly enjoyed using it

Katie (02:36)

I

Noel (02:37)

for the last week. yeah, I'm sure sonnet 5.5.

Katie (02:39)

Glow in Review

Noel (02:40)

Yeah. Honestly, it's so good. It's like the glory days of Anthropic where it used to be, you used to blow your socks off every day. you're like, okay, this is

Katie (02:50)

Mm.

Noel (02:51)

this is a really good model. then yeah, they seem they took a

Katie (02:53)

Yeah. Those socks haven't

been blown anywhere recently. Right. I'll give it a go.

Noel (03:00)

Until now. Yeah Yeah, but yeah really good Yeah,

it's been really good. I guess there's other something worth noting is Meta released their well had an announcement for their next agent called muse which is coming out and then they released a whole load of AI AR VR glasses and stuff

you know, which you got quite excited about last year at the make conference. If I remember, there's lots.

Katie (03:31)

Yeah, I just thought they were

really cool, but as

Noel (03:34)

Hmm.

Katie (03:35)

always, there's pros and cons of these things and y yeah, there's people using them in, you know, a not so good way, but then there's people using them in really creative ways, which won't they're actually supposed to be used for. So yeah,

Noel (03:52)

Mm.

Katie (03:53)

but I think as well, like now people are more aware of them.

whereas before I think this time last year people were still like, p someone's just wearing glasses, whereas now I think more people are like, are those meta glasses? Or do you know

Noel (04:10)

Mm.

Katie (04:10)

are you recording? yeah, so I I I think it's still pretty cool.

Noel (04:19)

Hmm.

Katie (04:20)

would would I buy a pair myself?

No, just because I think of how I would want to use them.

Noel (04:33)

Yeah.

Katie (04:34)

I yeah. I mean if I was still creating a lot of content and I was going to events and then yes.

Noel (04:45)

Mm.

Katie (04:46)

but yeah.

Noel (04:48)

I think some of them actually don't have the camera on them, these new ones. I could be wrong. But yeah, some of them, don't think they do. So they've kind of, I think they've taken that feedback on board that not everyone wants a camera in their face. So it's still listening, I guess, but you know. I mean, yeah,

Katie (05:00)

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, of course. Of course it is. Like it's listening to us now.

Noel (05:13)

Metas recording this podcast for us probably.

Katie (05:15)

Yeah.

Yeah.

Noel (05:18)

Yeah.

Katie (05:20)

Maybe if we if I talk about a Caribbean holiday, maybe you'll get ads on your phone. So you know. right. I thought you were gonna take

Noel (05:27)

I do hope so. A free one would be fantastic. I'll take an ad.

Katie (05:34)

I thought you were gonna, you know, see these ads and then go, we should go to the Caribbean and I'm like, Yes, yes we should.

Noel (05:39)

Mmm.

Yeah. Yeah, we probably should.

Katie (05:43)

Ha ha ha

Okay, any other updates that we need to be aware of? No, okay.

Noel (05:49)

No, no other than

that it was quite quiet, but I guess you know keep an eye on the OpenAI Dev day which is happening later on and yeah report back whatever came out of that that session but from what I recall from last year we had loads of things about agents and widgets and not that sort of stuff but yeah none of it it was all it's all incredible at the time but I can't

Katie (06:13)

Yeah.

Noel (06:14)

recall anybody actually now using it so yeah

Katie (06:16)

Okay. Hmm.

Noel (06:18)

We'll see what they come up with.

Katie (06:19)

Well, we

always do say like technology moves really fast in the AI and automations world. Like it's it's a lot of updates and it improves on itself, you know, not within a year, but you know, within a few months. And we we were talking earlier today, weren't we? We were s saying about a podcast that we had recorded

earlier on in the year, I think it was in February and actually now how a a a lot of that is already outdated and we're

Noel (06:52)

Mm.

Katie (06:52)

in sept well, September end of September, almost October. So yeah.

Noel (06:56)

Yeah,

yeah doesn't take long.

Katie (06:59)

No.

But to be keep updated, just keep listening to our podcast episodes.

Noel (07:05)

Yeah, exactly.

Katie (07:07)

That's all you need to do.

Okay, so this week we are going to be talking about common pitfalls of implementing AI and automations into your business. Now, I have made sure that Noel is only doing five because otherwise this could have been a very long podcast episode. So we're doing the five, is it most common?

pitfalls or just five that you've chosen, Noel, that you think are important?

Noel (07:42)

It's five that I've picked and would possibly have the biggest impact on business. So I see them everywhere popping up in all sorts of things. So, I see people advertising certain services and things and, you know, I've got my ear to the ground in most cases, but yeah, these are some of the most common that I've come

Katie (08:04)

Yeah.

Noel (08:05)

across.

Katie (08:06)

And I think we see a lot of these on platforms like Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, that in

Noel (08:12)

Mm. Yeah.

Katie (08:15)

in particular I would say. Would would you say that? Yeah.

Noel (08:19)

Yeah, just started receiving sponsored DMs for some of this stuff as well and it's like come on guys do your own work.

Katie (08:25)

Yeah.

Noel (08:26)

You're selling it to somebody that's also in the same space, like come on.

Katie (08:31)

Yeah.

Noel (08:33)

Maybe I should counter sell these people.

Katie (08:35)

Yeah. W you should.

Noel (08:39)

That's this afternoon's job.

Katie (08:40)

Okay, great.

Okay, so Noel, do you wanna start off then with what you believe is your number one common pitfall?

Noel (08:54)

Hmm.

So yeah, my number one is basically going off either buying or starting to implement solutions before you actually fully understand the problems that you might have in your business that you're trying to fix. I see, I see this a lot, know, though people might see something online and think, that's really cool. We should have that in our business and then go off and then implement it. Maybe it doesn't quite work. Maybe it's not fully what they wanted, but

really what they really need which have the bigger impact is something which they haven't gone off you know and assess themselves or had somebody like myself assess for them you know go through and go well actually this has got a bigger return of investment over here compared to this shiny object that you saw on youtube yesterday you know yeah

Katie (09:42)

Yeah. I've

actually seen this on Instagram where it's like implement mu the funnel, the AI automation funnel that made my business a million pounds. I I've seen

Noel (09:56)

You

Katie (09:57)

something like that over and over again. so could you could you just kind of like talk through then? Like if you see something like that, why why you need to be a bit like

Careful.

Noel (10:14)

Yeah, I think for some of this, and this is actually one of my later points as well, but just to go over it now is kind of like, it's probably not tested on like a real use case. Are those numbers real? You know, there's a lot at the moment, which I see online where people will say, here's my Stripe. I'll do a refresh so you can actually see the numbers and you know it's real, but you could five code a Stripe clone in like 10 minutes.

with Claude code. So, you know, I would be very skeptical about what you see, you know, and I would look at it from like your use case, like, is this actually going to generate me a million pounds? Am I anywhere near creating that sort of money anyway? You know, like, is this

Katie (10:59)

Yeah. Yeah, 'cause if you're

only generating a couple of hundred pounds a month at the moment, maybe because your business is brand new

Noel (11:06)

Yeah.

Katie (11:07)

and you think, well if I implement this funnel then I'm automatically gonna get a million dollars or a million pounds and

Noel (11:15)

Mm.

Katie (11:15)

it it doesn't tend to work like that because l so like the account I saw this from, I think they've got like three and a half million followers just on their Instagram account.

Noel (11:27)

Mm-hmm.

Katie (11:27)

So of course if they put in an automated funnel then they are gonna generate a decent amount of money because they've got the following, they've got the audience, you know, they've had like 10 10 years of building up all of these previous clients that are probably then returning and purchasing. But if you've got

Noel (11:55)

Exactly.

Katie (11:56)

if you've got none of that.

then yeah this this funnel's great, but it's not gonna be the right funnel for your business because someone who's able to implement a automated funnel and make a million pounds from it, say in a month, is not gonna be the right p funnel for someone who's just starting out or I know has got an audience of say like five hundred followers.

Noel (12:21)

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Yeah. What works for them might not work for you, but these days it is for that sort of use case. There's plenty of ways that you could, you know, correct your own and things like that. So it's kind of figuring out what

Katie (12:35)

Yeah.

Noel (12:35)

would work for you. Maybe take that as inspiration and go, well, that's quite a cool idea, but how can I adapt that to, fit my particular use case? How would that work

Katie (12:46)

Yeah.

Noel (12:47)

for my business? That's

That's how I tend to look at these things.

Katie (12:52)

Yeah, I love that. It's kind of like see it as an inspiration and go, okay, you know, how how can I do that but for for my business and for the stage that I'm at right now.

Noel (13:07)

We're all at different stages, we're not all together.

Katie (13:09)

Yeah, and and it's cool and that's it's totally okay, like to be

at different stages and they always say like embrace the journey and the journey is part of the business and I would say, Absolutely.

Noel (13:23)

Yeah, definitely.

Katie (13:24)

Yeah.

and then this is something I know we touched on on last week's episode, which was where we talked about like can you build an app in 24 hours? But what I wanna talk about is actually building an app when you don't necessarily need one for your business. Again, I think it relates to that funnel that I was just talking about, like

You're seeing someone who's very experienced, been going a long time, has a big audience, has a big community that they need to serve, and then kind of thinking about it with your business in mind.

Noel (14:08)

Hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Not everyone needs or should have an app just because you are going to get this tattooed. just because you should, it doesn't, sorry, just because you can, doesn't mean you should. I should even get my own there. My own quote, right?

Katie (14:24)

Yeah.

Noel (14:27)

I'll get that locked in before I go to the tattooist, but yeah, yeah. Not everyone needs

Katie (14:29)

Okay, good, good, good, yeah.

Noel (14:31)

one. Yes, they're cool. They're easy to build these days, but yeah, there's lots of

hidden pitfalls in that which we went through in the last episode as well. know that most people that would hype going off and doing this aren't really, you know, being straightened up from about. So yeah, if you're thinking about that, then yeah, do check out our last episode. Yeah, we go through all of that in quite some detail.

Katie (14:58)

And if you aren't sure whether you need an app for your business or not, please come into our free LinkedIn group and le leave leave you know a post and Noel will tell you because Noel often tells me when I say, we could create an app for this and then like he goes into it in more detail and then like by the time he's finished explaining what we all involved, I'm like, Okay, I I'm I'm out. Like, yeah. Yeah.

Noel (15:24)

Yeah.

Katie (15:27)

Okay. Okay. And then yeah, I'll come back to him at another time. Like, what about doing an app for this? And then yeah. I don't think Noel's approved actually any of my app ideals.

Noel (15:46)

No, I have also had them independently verified by Claude, of course, you know, they were By trusty Claude. I'm already thinking no and he's like though. This is a hard no Yeah,

Katie (15:56)

No.

Noel (15:57)

I remember one idea you came up to me and there was like you're taking on a business Which has been doing this sort of thing since 1999 and you're starting from nothing. It's like me. That's a very good point Yeah, sometimes

Katie (16:10)

Brutal, brutal. Let's go back to chat

let's go back to chat GPT where they just agree with you. Hey, that's a great idea. Yeah.

Awesome. Yeah.

Noel (16:20)

Exactly, Yeah, come waste some tokens over here.

Katie (16:29)

Okay. Yeah. So if you want to know whether you need to build an app or not, you've you you've got a thought and you're not sure, come and pop it in our free LinkedIn group, which is called

AI automations for business. Every everyone's welcome to pop in there. tell us what you're working on. Tell us what ideal you have for an app. yeah, Noel's in there.

Noel (16:54)

Yeah.

Katie (16:55)

and he'll answer any questions or yeah. Okay, what's the second common pitfall?

Noel (17:03)

So this is something that I've heard going around in the AI and automation circles is, you're not, if you get somebody to go off and build these automations agents for your business is you're not, some of them, you won't actually own what they've created. So, you know, they'll kind of like force you into a retainer and then, yeah, if you're like, you know what? I don't really want to be paying this money.

And then that's it. All of your automations get turned off at the end of the month and you're basically back at zero, which yeah, I don't, I don't really like the idea of that. And yeah, I don't like the idea of people falling into that trap. So yeah, it's always worth noting if you're getting anybody in to do these sort of things, to understand who owns what, you know, if they disappear, what happens? You know, they could go bust. They could just decide that's enough. I've had enough of this and

Katie (18:03)

Yeah.

Noel (18:03)

and walk

away themselves, like what happens then and things like that.

Katie (18:07)

Well,

as well, like life life happens. People might set

Noel (18:10)

Mmm.

Katie (18:10)

these up for you and say, Yes, I'll run it for you and then something happens, whether to their business and their personal life and it just means actually then they just do not have the capacity to keep these automations going.

Noel (18:28)

Hmm.

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Because some of these as well, they'll also pay for your AI usage. So one thing you also got to keep an eye on is are they keeping that AI usage pop topped up? So when you pay your API, you know, you can automatically, you know, credit the account when it gets too low. But if they don't have that on, is that going to start impacting your automations? You know, are they going to start falling over and failing overnight because they haven't

their credit cards expired or whatever, or they've

Katie (19:01)

Mm.

Noel (19:01)

not ticked that option. So there's all kinds of things and it's really important that you get that nailed down very early on if you're working with anybody who's going to be doing this. But I had somebody email me this week and they were like, I want to own everything. I don't want to go off and you tell me to get all these 10 or 15 different new apps.

You know, I just want to use what I use and I would like to own it at the end. And I'm like, perfect. You know, you're your ideal client. Number one for me, you know, I don't want to be dealing or managing that myself either. You know, you know, that's a lot of effort and admin on my side.

Katie (19:42)

Yeah.

Noel (19:43)

and yeah, I'd rather they owned it. So if one day I decide I've had enough, I'm walking away. It's not gonna, you know, it's not gonna

Katie (19:52)

Mm yeah.

Noel (19:53)

harm their business in it in any way.

is yeah it's just what you want.

Katie (19:56)

Yeah. And they're all

yeah, and they're already used to like keeping up with payments or

Noel (20:02)

Hmm.

Katie (20:03)

yeah. It it belong

Noel (20:04)

Yeah, just make.

Katie (20:06)

and then essentially it does belong to them. You you maybe have built it, but then you're handing

Noel (20:11)

Hmm.

Katie (20:11)

it over, like you're you're kind of like going here it is, this is now

Noel (20:16)

Mm.

Katie (20:17)

yours. Yeah. And and you do and

Noel (20:19)

Yeah. Yeah, you can't go wrong with that.

Katie (20:23)

you do that with

like everything you build for

Noel (20:27)

Yeah,

Katie (20:27)

for clients, don't you?

Noel (20:29)

exactly. Yeah. Yeah. There's like I say, for like for me, there would just be so much admin that I'd be worried for me. I'd be worried. I'll do it. Am I keeping this up to date? Is this is this still working? Am I still paying for all of this? It's just like, I'd rather not have that on my on my plate personally. I'd rather, you know, the customer owns that part of the, you know, of the process. So, you know, if anything goes wrong, you know, they can't come.

come to my door, you know, with a lawsuit, it's

Katie (20:58)

Yeah.

Noel (20:59)

kind of like, well, that was kind of up to you to maintain it. Yes, yes, I can, you know, for me, you know, I would, I also sell or retainer, but that's kind of like just keeping on top of things, you know, is that are we hitting any errors and things like that in the automations and maybe going through and fixing those and things like that. So it's kind of like a maintenance fee almost, then yeah, I own it. And if you don't pay me, it all disappears us.

a shady practice. For me, I wouldn't do that.

Katie (21:28)

Yeah. Okay.

Okay. Yeah, that that makes a lot of sense. So it's really owning what

Noel (21:36)

Mm.

Katie (21:37)

what you've paid for to yeah, whether it's automation, yeah. I like that. Okay.

Noel (21:45)

Yeah.

Katie (21:46)

That makes a lot of sense. Okay, number three.

Noel (21:50)

Yeah,

so this one kind of catches a few people out. So it's pasting sensitive information into, you know, AI tools, whether that's supplied in like a platform that you already pay for. So that could be like your CRM. It could be whatever, you know, could even be co-pilot, you know, for in Microsoft tools is kind of like, where's where's all this information going? You know, is it secure? And, know, is is it

being used to train AI models, because a lot of people wouldn't want their sensitive company information going into these models to train future releases. And what we see from some platforms is they won't disclose what model they're actually using. So yeah, it's kind of hard to then figure out, where's my data going to? Some of these platforms might even use free AI models, which are

guaranteed to be training on your data. So yeah, it's understanding where everything goes. I think a lot of people kind of miss that step sometimes. They just think it's going to the platform that they pay a subscription for, but actually it might be going through, you know, two third parties with their data before it comes back kind of thing. yeah, something to watch out for.

Katie (23:16)

Okay, that's good to know.

Noel (23:18)

Hmm. Yeah. There's also issues as well. I guess around this is like with the meeting note takers and stuff like that. And yeah.

Katie (23:25)

right. I th I think they're really

great but also like I have real issues with them. Because

Noel (23:33)

Yes, yeah, because that's

all like data, you you're talking about business and that's all going somewhere else as well. yeah, it's something to be very much aware of, it?

Katie (23:46)

And it's also it's what you're talking about on those calls. Sometimes you are talking about personal information. You are talking about whether that is personal information about your business, about yourself. yeah, and I'm I'm guessing like when it comes to like therapists and counsellors, they they must have something within, you know, their contracts because obviously what they're allowed

to do and not to do is very, very strict. but I've seen like note takers on group coaching calls as well. And it's just like, well when is my time to talk about my business? Why is someone else's note taker taking notes

Noel (24:34)

Yeah.

Katie (24:35)

of what I'm saying? And I really don't like that at all.

Noel (24:39)

Yeah, so some of the AI communities I'm part of when I join their calls it's like, there could be like 20 note takers in there, you know,

Katie (24:49)

Yeah.

Noel (24:50)

and just like, hmmm, yeah, I usually stay quiet. Those sort of calls aren't there.

Katie (24:55)

Yeah. But I

would say I have stayed mm yeah, like quiet on those calls. I mean I d I don't do those calls currently, but I know in the past when like everyone's it was like otter AIs popping up and yeah, it

Noel (25:13)

Hmm.

Katie (25:13)

was almost it you know, it was like twice as many people on the call all of a sudden because everyone's got their AI note taker. And I do get

They're they're great and actually legal Lucy talks about this in her AI course which we will link below for you. and it's like where you stand legally with that information and I don't think enough people think about actually the information and you know what they're doing with it can impact them.

you know, and actually what that means to them when they're recording information.

Noel (25:57)

Yeah, I usually get asked, are you recording this? And I always say no. And I show them my notepad and pen. I'm like, if I'm going to make notes, it's going to be written down. You know, it's not going anywhere.

Katie (26:09)

Yeah.

Noel (26:11)

You know, if I then end up putting it through Claude, it won't be the full transcript of everything you've talked about over the weekend, you know. Because we will also

Katie (26:20)

Mm.

Noel (26:21)

try and build that personal rapport with somebody as well. But what have you been up to?

you know, how's this and that going and things like that. That's

Katie (26:27)

Yeah, yeah.

Noel (26:29)

all going through these AI models.

Katie (26:31)

I know,

I know, I know. That that's the bit that I concerned about. and then it's not necessarily that it's then going back through AI, it's actually what that person is doing with that information. Or if you're on a a group coaching call with 20 other people and you know, all those other people have got AI note takers, it's like what's happening to that information on their end.

Noel (27:01)

Hmm, yeah, they should pay for two seats.

Katie (27:06)

Yeah.

Noel (27:10)

yeah,

Katie (27:10)

Mm.

Noel (27:11)

it's a bit cheeky, isn't it? Especially if it's a paid for event. They should be,

Katie (27:15)

It

Noel (27:15)

yeah.

Katie (27:16)

it it's it's not that it's it I think then it makes people not want to speak up as much or

Noel (27:25)

Mmm.

Katie (27:26)

interact as much because they're like, Well, you know, if they're anything like me and you, I mean some people won't have any issues with the AI note takers whatsoever, but as soon as I know a AI note taker is on the call, I am very, very careful what I say and

Yeah, it it it does make me s you know, hold hold back.

Noel (27:51)

Yeah, definitely. I'm the same

Katie (27:52)

And

I I I would love to know for for you listening, how do you feel about AI note takers on like business calls or in group coaching programs? when it's not just the hosts that's got an AI note taker, how does that make you feel? Do you love them? Do you hate them? You know, have you like you know problems with them and you contribute just as much as you would, or does it make you hold back?

let us know either in like the LinkedIn group. Maybe Noel, you could do like a poll or something on a post. So that's

Noel (28:29)

Mm-hmm.

Katie (28:29)

AI Automations for Business, that's over on LinkedIn, that's our free group. Or come and send us an email, hello at makeautomations.ai, and we look forward to hearing from you one way or another. Very excited. Let me know. Let me know. Are you with us against

Noel (28:44)

Yeah. Yeah.

Katie (28:47)

us?

We love all opinions. you

Noel (28:49)

Yeah.

Katie (28:50)

don't have to agree with us, so yeah, do do do come and let us know.

Noel (28:54)

Yeah, definitely.

Katie (28:56)

Okay, number four. What's the fourth common pit for?

Noel (29:01)

So

the fourth one is, yes, you've maybe set up an automation, you've set up an agent, a chat bot, but then you can just kind of forget about it and just leave it to slowly decay over time. So yes, you've created it, you've tested it, it works, but it's making sure that it's working for the entire life of whenever you need it for. Like we've mentioned earlier in the podcast, the AI race is...

It's ridiculous, know, your whatever you've created can soon be outdated. And yeah, we just need to be very careful with, you know, monitoring errors, fixing errors throughout the life of your automation agent or chatbot. And yeah, I see a lot of people that don't and big companies have been caught out by it as well. So one big company was Air Canada. So this is a number of years ago, but the...

the precedence is set is still relevant for today. So somebody used their chat bot on the website to ask them a question about their policies. The chat bot came back with an answer, which was actually incorrect. So when this person then got a result that was like, well, this is not what I was told it would be, they obviously took them to court and things like that. And yeah, it was basically ruled in the claimant's favor. It was like,

whatever that chat bot says is you saying it. That's you the business. Yeah.

Katie (30:36)

Yeah, it's your company, it's your business. Yeah.

Noel (30:40)

I think a lot of people forget that. So yeah, you've got to keep on top of things. So if things change, maybe you have like your agent or chat bot is connected to your policies. It's connected to FAQs. If those change, those need to be updated within that chat bot. Otherwise, you you could end up in that same situation if that's...

something that you provide, but yeah. But even

Katie (31:02)

Yeah. I

Noel (31:04)

just keeping on top of automations as well, that's really important and making sure they're running efficiently and not falling over and things like that. It's really important to get that right.

Katie (31:14)

Yeah, for sure. Definitely. And I think I think people think to, you know, make sure that, you know, links are still clickable and, you know, i

Noel (31:27)

Mmm.

Katie (31:27)

you know, those automations are working. But I think chatbots I think people forget about them and hence,

Noel (31:36)

Yes.

Katie (31:36)

you know, Air Canada having that issue. So if you are using a chat bot on your website, make sure it's up to date.

Noel (31:43)

Yes, I would plan.

Katie (31:44)

Just a little reminder.

Noel (31:47)

I'd plan it in every couple of months if I don't actually have one. Yeah, we thought about putting one on our website a little while ago, but yeah, it kind of got to a point where just like, yeah, there was that maintenance thing. It's like keeping it updated, making sure

Katie (32:02)

Mm-hmm.

Noel (32:03)

it's working. know, I'd also

Katie (32:06)

Yeah.

Noel (32:06)

put under there as well. It's like,

check the responses that it's giving like over time. So yes, you've tested it in month one and it was working fine, but in a couple of months time, you know, go, back and re review everything. you know, that's something which people kind of forget and forget to account for, especially when it comes to like return of investment and things like that. And, know, is this actually saving the business money or costing and all that sort of good stuff, but you know, just triple check everything. And if it isn't.

then you've got that chance. You've caught it early. You're not three years down the line with an agent going rogue telling people all kinds of weird and wonderful stuff that you don't do. But yeah, just remember it is your business that is giving that feedback to the user.

Katie (32:56)

Yeah. Yeah.

And noel, the fifth and final common pitfall is

Noel (33:03)

It's the old one. It's falling for the hype and believing the hype and the numbers. So yes, we touched on it earlier, but we can't stress this enough. Like there are people out there, content creators and things like that that have maybe a motive for, know, getting clicks and ad revenue and all that sort of good stuff. They're just going to say, I've done this. It's incredible, but they don't actually really show you.

the true work behind this. So I never buy into the hype. I always look at stuff and go, yeah, that's cool. But

Katie (33:42)

Yeah.

Noel (33:42)

is it really what they're saying it is? I think at the minute also, it's not just like the numbers behind things. So it could be like, I'm saving hundreds of hours by doing this thing. They never tend to show you the workings out for that.

There's also a rise of fake demonstrations as well. Recently, they're quite easy to fake these days. And, you know, they'll show you, this is AI going off and doing this for my business. And, you know, it's doing something cool and fancy, but actually,

Katie (34:17)

Yeah.

Noel (34:18)

is it, you know, they'd never really show the receipts for that. So, yeah, just be very wary of any sort of hype content online. And I always go off and test these sort of things. So.

I guess recently there's been a big rise of Claude can create videos for your business and

Katie (34:37)

Yeah. Yeah.

Noel (34:39)

things like that. when I first saw that, was like, hang on, Claude can't create videos. You know, it's not like a seed dance model. You know, it can't go off and create those videos. So was like, how is it doing this? But this hype actually turned out to be...

Pretty true, actually. And it works really well if you get it right. But yeah, basically, can code like your website or whatever. You can give it your brand assets, and it can create those animations and then output it as an MP4 video at the end. Great. Some of them I've created are actually really good. And yeah,

Katie (35:19)

Yeah.

Noel (35:19)

I would recommend trying it out. Yeah, but some of the other things I've seen, they're just like, that's just nonsense.

Believe that for a second.

Katie (35:28)

Yeah.

I think as well it's with anything, isn't it? It's doing your own research. So if someone's saying

Noel (35:34)

Hmm.

Katie (35:34)

to you, like for example, you know, in last week's episode we were like, you know, we were talking about we we've seen a lot of people saying that, you know, build build your own app in a day. And it's just like, well actually do that research yourself. It's like you know, you can even ask AI is like, is it actually physically possible for me to create an app?

in a day and and this is my knowledge this is what experience I have you know a beginner an intermediate you know advanced I mean if you're advanced you probably wouldn't need to give ask AI but yeah and it's kind of just see actually how realistic is this because you have to think like a lot of this is marketing people want you to buy what you

they are offering, they want you to join something. so it's kind of like, yeah, just take a beat and just go, actually, is this really possible for where I am with the knowledge and experience that I have for where my business is right now? before going, yeah, that would be really cool. you know, and you might not even need it and you could be wasting days and, you know, lots of money on tokens and things like that. So it's kind of like

Yeah, sometimes it's kind of like just peeling back those layers of, you know, that the marketing hype or yeah, the the you know, yeah, whether it's time, it's money, just just really think, okay, this would be really cool. But like what Noel was saying is like, well, this is really cool, but actually this isn't suitable for where I am right now. So actually how could I take this and then implement it for where I am right now?

Noel (37:18)

Exactly. Yeah.

Katie (37:19)

Okay, so those were the five common pitfalls of implementing AI and automations into your business. We hope you have found them really helpful. And we have some exciting news of our own. Noel, I'll let you announce it. do you want a drum roll? can can we add a drum

Noel (37:37)

so we will be yes please well

Katie (37:41)

roll noise effect in?

Noel (37:44)

blimey I'll have to ask Claudette to do that.

Katie (37:47)

Okay, 'cause you probab you probably don't want my drum roll noises or me just banging on my desk. But

Noel (37:56)

No, true.

Well, that was a good one. So we

Katie (38:01)

Yeah.

Noel (38:02)

are going to be launching courses on makeautomations.ai and what they're going to allow you to do, you know, it's all going to be taught by me. So, you know, you can hopefully, if you're listening to the podcast, you know, you've you've heard us a few times and how we go about things. So we're going to be getting that advice.

One of the first courses will be basically going through pitfall number one on this episode. So we'll go through that planning phase and things like that. we've got like a really cool worksheet that you can work through and start noting it down and what should you be automating, what should be human and all those sort of things.

Katie (38:44)

I would say as well that's the most common question that we have. Like,

Noel (38:48)

Mm.

Katie (38:49)

you know, do do I need AI? Do I need automations? What can I automate? What can I use AI for in my business? Like wherever we go and people know that we have an AI and automations podcast, like that is the first thing that comes out of someone's mouth usually. Whether it's

Noel (39:07)

It is, yeah.

Katie (39:09)

at a networking event, whether we're out for

dinner with a group of people, you know,

Noel (39:16)

Mmm.

Katie (39:16)

honestly, yeah, as soon as they hear that's what we do, that is usually one of the questions that we get back, like

Noel (39:25)

Exactly.

Katie (39:25)

I can guarantee it. So I love that w you know, we're gonna have a course on this because I just know it's gonna be so helpful for everyone.

Noel (39:34)

Yes, exactly. And like I said, none of this is build off any hype or anything like that. know, this is just us, mostly me, guess, my honest advice and opinions as to how to go about this. But we're also going to have other courses as well. So a lot of them will be beginner friendly. So we'll have like beginners how to get started with make.com. We'll also look at Project Clyde, which is our AI agent platform.

how that could be used and things like that within your business. We'll also look at doing things for like how to get started with Claude, Claude code and get into some more advanced things as well within there. But yeah, it's all going to be on our website and we'll leave a link in the show notes so you can go and check them out. And yeah, they'll currently be on probably a wait list. But yeah, we'll get them up and running as soon as we can.

Katie (40:30)

And if you think I really, really would love a course on a particular subject, let us know. Either email us hello at makeautomations.ai or come and let us know over in our LinkedIn group, AI Automations for Business. Yeah. And we'll see what we can do. And by we, i mean noel Yeah.

Noel (40:50)

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, exactly.

I'll be tethered to my computer for the rest of my life.

Katie (41:02)

Yes, he's not allowed to leave

until he's done all the courses and he's yes, uploaded them all.

Noel (41:08)

Exactly.

Katie (41:10)

Well, thank you so so much for listening to this week's podcast. We hope you have really enjoyed it. And as always, we love to hear from you. So please do come and let us know your thoughts, your opinions. If you've got any questions, you know where we are, and we will catch you next week for another episode. Take care.