Latest / Stacked with Jennifer Laforge / Darrell Keezer - AI Is Changing How We Buy. Trust Will Decide Who Wins.

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Darrell Keezer - AI Is Changing How We Buy. Trust Will Decide Who Wins. · Stacked with Jennifer Laforge

• 0:00
  Jen LaForge: Welcome to Snap.
• 0:01
  Jen LaForge: I'm Jen LaFord.
• 0:02
  Jen LaForge: This is a show about how real people and real brands are stretching value in today's economy.
• 0:07
  Jen LaForge: Not theory, not generic money advice.
• 0:09
  Jen LaForge: We're getting into how rewards, loyalty, partnerships, and digital tools actually work and how they're being used in real life.
• 0:17
  Jen LaForge: Let's jump in.
• 0:18
  Jen LaForge: Daryl, I'm so excited to have you in here today.
• 0:20
  Jen LaForge: And for everyone watching, we do have Daryl Keyser here from Candy Box Marketing.
• 0:25
  Jen LaForge: He is a marketing strategist, deeply immersed in AI, and the number one person I thought to talk to about the consumer journey and how AI is changing that.
• 0:34
  Jen LaForge: So, Daryl, very excited for the conversation, but I don't want this to be AI as a cool tool.
• 0:40
  Jen LaForge: What we really want is a deep conversation on how AI is going to be changing the landscape for consumers as well as brands.
• 0:48
  Jen LaForge: And so to dive right in, I'm just going to ask you to kick us off with your thoughts on how AI is changing the consumer behavior today.
• 0:59
  Darrell Keezer: I think it almost matters which week we're in because every week it seems like there's just a new advancement.
• 1:04
  Darrell Keezer: I mean, you know, as of right now, what I think it's like May 26th, Google just had their conference.
• 1:11
  Darrell Keezer: They announced that they're essentially building AI into every single search that that's happening.
• 1:16
  Darrell Keezer: And I'm not even sure entirely if every consumer knows this.
• 1:19
  Darrell Keezer: You know, if you think back to, you know, 2012 when you used to like write into Google, you'd have to like type in the entire thing.
• 1:24
  Darrell Keezer: And then all of a sudden it just started completing your sentences for you.
• 1:27
  Darrell Keezer: That was actually like the first consumer facing AI.
• 1:30
  Darrell Keezer: And although it was revolutionary, I don't think anyone fully noticed.
• 1:34
  Darrell Keezer: They just thought, oh, that's that's interesting, right?
• 1:36
  Darrell Keezer: This is this is cool.
• 1:36
  Darrell Keezer: And they kind of continued.
• 1:38
  Darrell Keezer: And so, how is it like enhancing the consumer experience?
• 1:41
  Darrell Keezer: I think AI is now becoming ubiquitous between every platform and your operating system and Google and the tools that we use every single day.
• 1:49
  Darrell Keezer: That most consumers are just going to see it as like an enhancement on something that they were used to doing rather than like this big shift into AI.
• 1:58
  Darrell Keezer: All of a sudden our cars are gonna know, you know, what's happening around us and the appointments that we're going to, our Starbucks orders.
• 2:04
  Darrell Keezer: If we're ordering, they're gonna be more accurate in the time.
• 2:07
  Darrell Keezer: And so it's almost like what area is not gonna be impacted by AI?
• 2:11
  Darrell Keezer: That's a bigger question.
• 2:12
  Darrell Keezer: Like who's who's falling behind right now?
• 2:14
  Darrell Keezer: So yeah, I think uh I think the consumers are quickly adopting.
• 2:18
  Darrell Keezer: You know, years ago, you were like an early adopter and getting on ChatGPT, and now it's just becoming part of our language, just like we used to say how we'd search for things.
• 2:27
  Darrell Keezer: People are just saying, you know, I was speaking to chat, and all of a sudden that's now the verb.
• 2:32
  Jen LaForge: Yeah.
• 2:32
  Jen LaForge: It's interesting you say not that long ago when Google adjusted the search.
• 2:37
  Jen LaForge: Our consumers became really good at utilizing that search and finding great deals and using it to compare, and so it changed our behavior, in particular around online shopping.
• 2:48
  Jen LaForge: And so those behaviors that we take every day happened without us, as you said, even noticing.
• 2:54
  Jen LaForge: What behaviors in particular do you think might be changing through this shift in in AI where it's happening without us noticing, our behaviors are changing without noticing.
• 3:05
  Jen LaForge: Yeah.
• 3:05
  Jen LaForge: What are some of those behaviors do you think?
• 3:07
  Darrell Keezer: The behaviors that I I see that are most fascinating with AI is it's almost like we've gone from a knowledge era to a wisdom era.
• 3:16
  Darrell Keezer: And let me explain that.
• 3:17
  Darrell Keezer: So, you know, years ago, if you were gonna research something, if you're going on vacation, trying to book a summer trip or summer camp, it's a multi-tab experience, right?
• 3:25
  Darrell Keezer: You've got like, you know, 20 tabs open, 30 if we're being honest.
• 3:28
  Darrell Keezer: Yes.
• 3:29
  Darrell Keezer: And uh and you've got you know all these different browser windows, and your your CPU is trying to keep up.
• 3:33
  Darrell Keezer: And what's happening is that you as a consumer, you're you're taking a look at all this information, all this knowledge, and you are evaluating, you're comparing, you're considering, you're watching videos, you're having all these different interactions, and what you're doing is you're kind of collecting knowledge and you're using your own uh you know consumer wisdom to figure out what is the best option.
• 3:53
  Darrell Keezer: Well, AI is interesting because it is actually a, if I could call it like almost like a wisdom engine, it takes all the numbers, all the data, and your objectives, and it comes back and saying, you know what, this is the best solution for what you're looking for.
• 4:07
  Darrell Keezer: And that's a major behavioral shift because before, like, you know, we call it the blue link era where it's just like, okay, I'm gonna just you know, click and open all these different tabs.
• 4:16
  Darrell Keezer: And now we see AI narrowing the focus and saying, we're actually gonna do all the heavy lifting for you.
• 4:23
  Darrell Keezer: We're gonna find out what the prices are, we're gonna find out availability, we're gonna match it with your objectives, we're gonna make sure it fits your budget, and it's using you know, like applied knowledge or wisdom and understanding to kind of help your consumer journey, which is so vastly different.
• 4:37
  Darrell Keezer: And so instead of you know, being these multi-tab people and trying to figure it out, we can be a single, you know, even single browser window, single chat where we're having discussion and it's making all these decisions for us.
• 4:51
  Darrell Keezer: That's wild.
• 4:52
  Darrell Keezer: Like that's that's absolutely wild.
• 4:54
  Darrell Keezer: I believe consumer behaviors are gonna quickly adapt to this and they realize that before it was actually a lot of work to, you know, work all these things together to find out the right answer.
• 5:03
  Darrell Keezer: But it's almost scary that they are going to outsource their brains and just say, you choose the number one, maybe top three options, and then I'm gonna select from that rather than looking at everything.
• 5:16
  Jen LaForge: So as you're saying this, and I think we alluded into a conversation before we sat down as well to this idea of trust, uh trusting AI.
• 5:24
  Jen LaForge: And I think us as humans, at first we're gonna be very skeptical of it, then we see how much it works, we see how easy it gets, and we put far too much trust into it.
• 5:33
  Jen LaForge: And I think a lot of our conversation today outside of AI as a tool is is that trust for consumers and their agency and control over how they're purchasing.
• 5:43
  Jen LaForge: But initially, there's gonna be a lot of people who trust AI too much when it comes to shopping and making their decisions.
• 5:50
  Jen LaForge: So if you were to give a warning when you're first entering that this world is great, look at everything put in front of me, now I just have to make a decision.
• 6:00
  Jen LaForge: How can consumers be more discerning with that information and still control that agency over their purchasing?
• 6:06
  Darrell Keezer: I honestly think that's gonna get a lot more difficult.
• 6:08
  Darrell Keezer: I recently read a stat that it said that um AI traffic to a website is eight times more likely to convert, so which means like I'm gonna buy something, I'm gonna give it my information, uh, I'm gonna download something like I'm actually gonna use the site.
• 6:23
  Darrell Keezer: They said that AI is eight times more probable to convert a customer than traditional search, which also means that the customers that are coming through AI are, I can even just call it eight times more trusting, uh, which is a radical stat.
• 6:37
  Darrell Keezer: Like it's not eight percent, it's not eighty percent, it's it's eight hundred percent, it's eight times more trusting.
• 6:42
  Darrell Keezer: And so uh this has been a very quick evolution at the beginning.
• 6:45
  Darrell Keezer: You know, if we think of like you know, late 2022, 2023, uh everybody talked about, oh, you can't trust its answers, it's hallucinating, it's not giving the correct stuff, cite its sources.
• 6:55
  Darrell Keezer: Well, that was kind of like the infancy of AI, and it was it was just almost like a university research project that went wild.
• 7:01
  Darrell Keezer: And now as these companies are maturing, their systems are becoming more and more trustworthy.
• 7:06
  Darrell Keezer: And if you think about how people trust one another, what we do is if you if you prove me right and like I trust you with something, you prove me right, then I'm gonna trust you more and more and more.
• 7:15
  Darrell Keezer: And so as AI gets more things right, our trust is going to expand.
• 7:20
  Darrell Keezer: Now, the the question you have, I think, is really important for customers because let's say if it uh it lands you on, I don't know, like a trip at this specific hotel in Spain that you're gonna go to, and it's saying this is the best option for you, and you're you're really excited about it.
• 7:34
  Darrell Keezer: Well, the question is, is that gonna be a good hotel experience?
• 7:38
  Darrell Keezer: Um, where did AI get its information?
• 7:40
  Darrell Keezer: Is it actually reading the reviews?
• 7:42
  Darrell Keezer: Are those reviews trustworthy about the brand?
• 7:45
  Darrell Keezer: And hopefully these algorithms are getting it right, but we have to understand that when something even gives you a guarantee online, the guarantee is only as good as the brands that issue the guarantee.
• 7:56
  Darrell Keezer: And so I think customers need to become more aware of what are the brands in the company that I'm dealing with and in relationship with.
• 8:04
  Darrell Keezer: And even if AI is saying this is the best deal or this is the best option, who is kind of signing the guarantee behind that company, that product, that service.
• 8:14
  Darrell Keezer: That's why I think customers are gonna need to be more in tune with what are the brands that are out there that I actually already trust that I that I can work with, and what are the things that AI may give me that may just be you know a temporary good solution, but not something that's gonna, you know, fulfill the brand promise.
• 8:30
  Jen LaForge: It's fun that you say that.
• 8:31
  Jen LaForge: I will never trust AI to my hotel selection, but I'm a hotel snob, so I will always dig in a little deeper on those recommendations.
• 8:39
  Jen LaForge: But you mentioned a couple of words that I was tying together in my next question for you, which is perfect.
• 8:44
  Jen LaForge: Brands trust, eight times conversion.
• 8:47
  Jen LaForge: So as a brand, they're obviously gonna love this increase in conversion by using these AI tools.
• 8:53
  Jen LaForge: And they may assume that AI is going to build that trust and build those conversions, but what mistakes do you think brands could make or are making by trusting that initial conversion?
• 9:06
  Jen LaForge: Like what's the downstream implications that could happen from a brand?
• 9:12
  Darrell Keezer: I think in the last five years, brands have become way more obsessed on what I would call bottom-of-then funnel marketing.
• 9:17
  Darrell Keezer: And that is simply looking at are you looking to buy this right now?
• 9:20
  Darrell Keezer: Yes, okay, great.
• 9:22
  Darrell Keezer: Let's bring you into this area, let's sell you the product, and we're happy, right?
• 9:25
  Darrell Keezer: It uh it makes sense, it works.
• 9:27
  Darrell Keezer: Uh, it's good for a company to say, we just spent money and then we just made money, and so there's a correlation with this data, and we feel good about that.
• 9:34
  Darrell Keezer: But there's a problem where brands almost get too addicted to that bottom of the funnel, um cheapest prices is going to win kind of area because it's like a giant race to the bottom on pricing.
• 9:48
  Darrell Keezer: And when you race the bottom on pricing, you don't have as much money to kind of invest in your product or your services.
• 9:54
  Darrell Keezer: And then everybody just kind of becomes a commodity in the market, right?
• 9:57
  Darrell Keezer: Everybody is racing the bottom to try to trick AI or influence, let's just call it AI to give us the customer.
• 10:03
  Darrell Keezer: And what happens is they start ignoring that top of the funnel thing where it's just brand awareness, right?
• 10:08
  Darrell Keezer: Uh, I remember last year traveling in France and uh and there was an advertisement for Chanel numbered five.
• 10:14
  Darrell Keezer: And that's all it was.
• 10:15
  Darrell Keezer: It was just like, hey, this is this is what it is, this perfume.
• 10:18
  Darrell Keezer: This perfume that has been around forever, right?
• 10:20
  Darrell Keezer: That is in the area.
• 10:21
  Darrell Keezer: And all they're doing is just brand building, brand building, brand building.
• 10:25
  Darrell Keezer: Like, let's just get this in front of you, let's get that in front of that uh 16-year-old that maybe hasn't ever like, you know, purchased a bottle of perfume before.
• 10:32
  Darrell Keezer: And what happens is when you avoid brand, you lose out on the long-term brand value of building like a loyal customer base.
• 10:40
  Darrell Keezer: So if brands become way too transactional, then you're missing out on the people that will buy your Chanel number five for 20 years straight because that brand emotionally connects with you, me as a consumer.
• 10:52
  Darrell Keezer: So that's an area that is a bit of a concern.
• 10:54
  Darrell Keezer: And I actually read a report, it was just last year.
• 10:57
  Darrell Keezer: They published this report on saying, what are different ways that you can maximize return on investment with advertising?
• 11:03
  Darrell Keezer: Yeah.
• 11:03
  Darrell Keezer: Okay.
• 11:04
  Darrell Keezer: And there's different ways and there's different advertising tricks to do that.
• 11:07
  Darrell Keezer: But the number one way to maximize your advertising was your brand value, meaning that if you have a good brand, let's call you Apple, Apple could start selling, I don't know, they could start selling Kleenex tomorrow at 10 bucks a box, and they will have a billion dollar business overnight.
• 11:23
  Darrell Keezer: Why?
• 11:24
  Darrell Keezer: Because people just trust the brand and so they're gonna buy the product.
• 11:27
  Darrell Keezer: And uh, and that is years and years and years of brand advertising and helping people understand what the value is.
• 11:33
  Darrell Keezer: And so as people kind of play the AI game, they may forget to like let's play the long game here and and build a brand that people are still gonna love in 10 years.
• 11:41
  Jen LaForge: Yeah, I love that because that leans into the loyalty side and that loyalty of a customer could very quickly erode with that focus, that singular focus at the bottom of the funnel.
• 11:52
  Jen LaForge: Everything you've said just resonates uh with what we're doing here at Rackton to uh to create those loyal customers for our brands and our our partners.
• 12:00
  Jen LaForge: But before I go deeper into that, because I want to talk more, um, we've talked a lot about value here in uh in a few of our episodes, and value means different things to every person.
• 12:10
  Jen LaForge: And so I'm gonna stop and pause and ask you to define value in your life.
• 12:16
  Jen LaForge: What's it mean to you, Daryl?
• 12:17
  Darrell Keezer: So value is the promise delivered for me.
• 12:22
  Darrell Keezer: So what is the promise that yeah that you're committing to me as a customer?
• 12:26
  Darrell Keezer: And so when we're ever buying anything, we're exchanging money for that thing.
• 12:30
  Darrell Keezer: So we're thinking that the money that we're exchanging is gonna provide us the value that is equal to the money that I'm paying out.
• 12:35
  Darrell Keezer: Then the question is, did it deliver the value?
• 12:38
  Darrell Keezer: And that moves people out of um one-time purchases.
• 12:41
  Darrell Keezer: And uh, so for example, recently I bought a um, I bought a this is pretty lame, uh, and my kids will really hate me saying this, but I bought one of those stupid small like running hats, right?
• 12:51
  Darrell Keezer: Where it's like it can gather sweat, you can literally like wash it in the sink afterwards, it's not gonna ruin the hat.
• 12:56
  Darrell Keezer: Uh they look a little goofy, but it blocks the sun.
• 12:59
  Darrell Keezer: It's great, it's lightweight, you can pour water on it and it's fine.
• 13:02
  Darrell Keezer: And I got it.
• 13:03
  Darrell Keezer: And now I'd never bought a running hat before.
• 13:05
  Darrell Keezer: Um, my kids didn't want me to ever buy one again or see me out with one of these things, but like immediately I touched it, I felt it, I used it, and it delivered the value that I was hoping for.
• 13:16
  Darrell Keezer: You know what I did?
• 13:17
  Darrell Keezer: I immediately went and bought the exact same one because I'm like, I'm gonna lose this thing, and I just want to make sure I have this.
• 13:22
  Darrell Keezer: And so turning from a one-time customer, I actually don't need two hats, but recognizing the value that it delivered, I immediately was like, yes, I'm I'm fully sold in.
• 13:32
  Darrell Keezer: I'll be buying these things for years and years to come unless somebody provides me more value.
• 13:37
  Darrell Keezer: That's like where we want to get with customers.
• 13:39
  Darrell Keezer: It's never about getting one customer once, it's about getting somebody to try you once and then delivering on that value so that they buy you a hundred times.
• 13:47
  Jen LaForge: Great.
• 13:47
  Jen LaForge: I love it.
• 13:48
  Jen LaForge: Would you pay double for that hat now that you're I would.
• 13:50
  Darrell Keezer: Please don't let them know though.
• 13:51
  Darrell Keezer: Yeah, please don't let them know.
• 13:52
  Jen LaForge: We didn't mention the brand, so I think we're safe.
• 13:54
  Jen LaForge: We're okay.
• 13:55
  Jen LaForge: Yeah.
• 13:55
  Jen LaForge: Okay.
• 13:55
  Jen LaForge: And I'll put it on your Christmas list this year.
• 13:57
  Jen LaForge: We'll get you three.
• 13:58
  Jen LaForge: That's great.
• 13:58
  Jen LaForge: So everything is coming together in terms of loyalty and those repeat purchases and creating that value.
• 14:06
  Jen LaForge: Um, and so let's switch a little bit to how you think AI can help brands on that part of the journey.
• 14:12
  Jen LaForge: You know, the ones that aren't just stuck in that bottom of the funnel short-term conversion, those that are really looking to pair that with AI creating that loyalty in that journey.
• 14:24
  Jen LaForge: What do you think brands should be doing or could be doing wrong today?
• 14:27
  Darrell Keezer: I'm gonna answer that two ways.
• 14:28
  Darrell Keezer: So, first one, and this is a bit out of left field, but I think I think brands need to finally pay attention to this.
• 14:35
  Darrell Keezer: When you have an amazing product and you have an amazing service, and you're actually really, really good at at what you do and and what you're delivering, uh, people talk about it, right?
• 14:44
  Darrell Keezer: And uh I think it's the gosh, I want to say the it's either the sixth or seventh most visited website today is Reddit.
• 14:52
  Jen LaForge: Yes.
• 14:53
  Darrell Keezer: And a lot of brands, like they get Reddit or they they they understand that it exists, but they don't really play in that area.
• 14:58
  Darrell Keezer: But people really do, you know, talk about products there, recommendations, uh, share links, post reviews, and then they they go into a lot of detail on it, community groups to specialized groups, so I could be part of a running subreddit.
• 15:10
  Darrell Keezer: And when people start talking about you, uh there's a lot of content that goes there.
• 15:15
  Darrell Keezer: And if you take a look at where AI is grabbing its content, it's grabbing it from the internet.
• 15:18
  Darrell Keezer: But one of the like the top sources is Reddit.
• 15:21
  Darrell Keezer: And so my encouragement to brands is if you actually have a really cool product or you've got a really great service and you engage those communities to speak about what you're doing just organically.
• 15:32
  Darrell Keezer: So yeah, this isn't paid ads, this isn't one big sponsorship, but you actually engage the digital community, then when somebody goes onto AI and they're asking about, like, hey, I'm looking for a good whatever it is, running hat, water bottle, hotel, et cetera, and it scans all of Reddit.
• 15:47
  Darrell Keezer: If you can now come up to the top, you have just gotten authority in a space that your competitors cannot touch or can't touch easily, right?
• 15:56
  Darrell Keezer: You've kind of built that ecosystem, that entire sphere of influence of people that are really committed to your brand that doesn't show up as, oh, we just launched a campaign.
• 16:06
  Darrell Keezer: It's like, no, actually, we have five years of people talking about our product, and so that's gonna consistently deliver results on AI.
• 16:13
  Darrell Keezer: So that's one area I think I think brands need to just pay attention.
• 16:17
  Darrell Keezer: The thing I always notice about this one is that not everybody in the companies are Redditors, so it's almost like an unseen space.
• 16:23
  Darrell Keezer: Like they get Google, they get Meta, they understand, they understand loyalty rewards, but it's a bit of an underdog, right?
• 16:29
  Darrell Keezer: And so people need to pay attention to that.
• 16:31
  Darrell Keezer: The second area I would go towards um is people are not gonna be a loyal customer if they've never tried you first.
• 16:38
  Darrell Keezer: And so are you actually participating in being shown first in AI?
• 16:44
  Darrell Keezer: And now over the next year, we're actually gonna figure out how that's gonna look like for brands.
• 16:48
  Darrell Keezer: You know, ChatGPT is just launching ads.
• 16:50
  Darrell Keezer: Uh, we've got Anthropic saying they're not not doing ads.
• 16:53
  Darrell Keezer: We've got Copilot that'll Microsoft will definitely be bringing that stuff in.
• 16:56
  Darrell Keezer: But how are you actually appearing to the people that have buying intent that have never bought your product before?
• 17:03
  Darrell Keezer: And just participating in showing up and just saying, let's get our product out there for people that are looking for a solution.
• 17:09
  Darrell Keezer: And then once they try us first, they're gonna recognize a brand value, and then we can own them as a customer.
• 17:14
  Jen LaForge: Well, I love that.
• 17:14
  Jen LaForge: This is why I was excited to talk to you because I've I'm parsing now 20 questions that that you've just generated through through that answer.
• 17:22
  Darrell Keezer: Um there's a lot going on in AI.
• 17:24
  Jen LaForge: It's exhausting but exhilarating.
• 17:26
  Jen LaForge: Um so thank you for coming on this ride with us today.
• 17:29
  Jen LaForge: I'm thinking back, you know, late 1900s, early 2000s, like bad press was good press, as long as you were out there and you were mentioned, you know, brand celebrity, whatnot, it it helped amplify.
• 17:40
  Jen LaForge: But what I'm hearing from you um is that as much as creating those AI journeys for your consumer and and being first, it's generating that content as well.
• 17:52
  Jen LaForge: So I want to ask you in a bit of the idea of trust and maintaining that trust, brands need now to drive mass content for AI to be generating this.
• 18:03
  Jen LaForge: So they're likely going to be using AI to generate the content.
• 18:06
  Jen LaForge: Yeah.
• 18:06
  Jen LaForge: Um, do you see a risk there with breaking that authenticity or being able to uh note that it is AI generated if brands do it wrong and and how that will actually backfire in the trust aspect?
• 18:21
  Darrell Keezer: This um brings a term to mind which is called the uncanny valley.
• 18:25
  Darrell Keezer: And the uncanny valley is uh it's something I think they coined it in the the 70s where you're like watching a video of a person or you you sorry you see somebody that looks human, but all of a sudden you realize it's not human, and then you almost get that like sick feeling.
• 18:38
  Darrell Keezer: They say that the words that are associated with it is like uh disgust and feeling physically ill.
• 18:43
  Darrell Keezer: And I think that's that is something that brands need to be very careful about with AI.
• 18:48
  Darrell Keezer: And as customers are wanting to say, hey, I want you to deliver on your brand value.
• 18:53
  Darrell Keezer: If I believe that the brand value is not being communicated authentically or by a real person, by a real company, right?
• 19:01
  Darrell Keezer: There's concerns over, okay, you just said that this product, uh, let's say I'm buying a uh, I don't know, a carbon monoxide detector, and I feel halfway through the purchase that you're not a credible company.
• 19:13
  Darrell Keezer: You know, like if something were to happen, there's not gonna be somebody that's taking accountability there.
• 19:17
  Darrell Keezer: That's a big concern for for marketing consumers.
• 19:20
  Darrell Keezer: As soon as you start getting turned off a brand, it's not really good if your brand is identified with disgust, like like of just like mistrust, because then they're never gonna trust you.
• 19:31
  Darrell Keezer: Like they're they're not gonna come back.
• 19:32
  Darrell Keezer: The era of like any PR is good, PR, I think there's a lot of argument about like is it true or not?
• 19:38
  Darrell Keezer: But one thing that AI is very different with than you know what we we saw before, you know, Google search engines and stuff, they're always looking at keywords.
• 19:46
  Darrell Keezer: Uh and yes, I'm also gonna acknowledge right now Google's in the AI space, and so they're they're evolving, but for for the sake of this conversation.
• 19:52
  Darrell Keezer: But then if you take a look at AI, AI is about like semantic meaning.
• 19:56
  Darrell Keezer: What are people talking about this?
• 19:58
  Darrell Keezer: Yeah.
• 19:58
  Darrell Keezer: So it can take a look at all the, you know, Google may say all the keywords, but if you take a look at uh a post on Reddit with 400 comments, it can boil down and just saying, how do people feel about this mathematically, like you know, bringing this all together?
• 20:13
  Darrell Keezer: Is this good or bad?
• 20:14
  Darrell Keezer: And so if it recognizes a product that is recommended all the time, people really have terrible experiences with it.
• 20:20
  Darrell Keezer: It may start demoting it.
• 20:21
  Darrell Keezer: And now it goes into the wisdom engine of saying you are wanting a good hotel, and everybody is saying this is a terrible hotel.
• 20:29
  Darrell Keezer: So even if it's mentioned more, like 10 times more than any other hotel, it knows oh, you're not gonna like this place.
• 20:35
  Darrell Keezer: So it starts demoting it.
• 20:37
  Darrell Keezer: Uh so I think I think brands, we need to be very careful when we start using AI and saying, how do people like not did it work or are we getting our marketing out there, or even can we cut costs on our video production by putting in AI person?
• 20:52
  Darrell Keezer: The question is, are people gonna trust that that's a real person?
• 20:56
  Darrell Keezer: Right.
• 20:57
  Darrell Keezer: That's like, you know, applying the uh throwing in a fabric softener.
• 21:01
  Darrell Keezer: And if I don't believe it's a real person with a real family, we've we've completely broken the trust of advertising.
• 21:06
  Darrell Keezer: And then everything we're doing is eroding that trust with consumer.
• 21:10
  Darrell Keezer: So I think it's a very scary time for brands that are playing around with AI in the wrong way.
• 21:15
  Jen LaForge: You're making me think about the average consumer and their ability to spot AI and whether a brand is has generated the AI to promote their products or produce that ad versus a homegrown agency that's been, you know, filming locally and winning international awards.
• 21:31
  Jen LaForge: So how can consumers or can you easily spot AI when it comes to consumption of ads and and what you're looking at from brands?
• 21:41
  Jen LaForge: Is it easy to spot?
• 21:43
  Jen LaForge: I mean, you're a bit of a master, but how can our everyday consumers spot some of those inauthentic generated content and build that trust or be weary?
• 21:55
  Darrell Keezer: Like I can be honest to say it's getting harder every year, right?
• 21:58
  Darrell Keezer: Back in and if we look at the Famous, you know, Will Smith eating spaghetti.
• 22:02
  Darrell Keezer: Like every year we're getting, we went from like 60% looking real and 40% looking like garbage to 95% really quickly.
• 22:10
  Darrell Keezer: Then we got to 98, 99 yesterday, or sorry, I think earlier this week, uh Google Omni dropped.
• 22:16
  Darrell Keezer: And I'm like, what are we at?
• 22:18
  Darrell Keezer: Like 99.98?
• 22:20
  Darrell Keezer: Like we're getting so close.
• 22:23
  Darrell Keezer: And then you have to think about the actual consumer.
• 22:25
  Darrell Keezer: Like, is your vision good enough to spot the little things?
• 22:29
  Darrell Keezer: Yeah.
• 22:30
  Darrell Keezer: Is your is your concept of physics sharp enough to see if that water's spilling, it's not spilling like it usually does.
• 22:38
  Darrell Keezer: And so I think we've gone from this scary era of AI looking really fake to uh we just actually don't know what's real anymore.
• 22:45
  Darrell Keezer: I think for me, 2026 was a year where I'm like, I don't know.
• 22:48
  Darrell Keezer: I'm not sure.
• 22:49
  Darrell Keezer: And uh and the funny thing is like it's not just me as a marketer.
• 22:52
  Darrell Keezer: It's like, you know, we'll be driving down the highway and my kids are like, oh, that is so AI.
• 22:56
  Darrell Keezer: And I'm looking at it, I'm thinking, no, I think that's a real person.
• 23:00
  Darrell Keezer: It's just Photoshop, like, but it's a real person.
• 23:02
  Darrell Keezer: And now we both have different opinions on it.
• 23:05
  Darrell Keezer: I think now that's not to say like I'm not like you know, we we obviously do video production and commercials and all that stuff.
• 23:10
  Darrell Keezer: I'm actually not against using AI in commercials, but it's how it's being used.
• 23:13
  Darrell Keezer: And and as an example, like, you know, we've done commercials where we needed uh we needed zombies in the background to be coming uh into the commercial.
• 23:20
  Darrell Keezer: It's just part of the scene, right?
• 23:22
  Darrell Keezer: And people are okay with AI zombies, but then the people that were inside the house that were delivering the brand promise and speaking about uh the the product guarantee, those are real people.
• 23:33
  Darrell Keezer: And so, yes, I have a commercial where I have AI zombies and real people, and they're both used correctly to still deliver that brand value.
• 23:41
  Darrell Keezer: Now, I'm just concerned that brands are gonna say, well, let's just let's just run it all through AI.
• 23:46
  Darrell Keezer: And they lose that that like person-to-person touch, right?
• 23:49
  Darrell Keezer: They lose that human, like, I can actually trust you with my dollars and for your brand promise.
• 23:54
  Jen LaForge: And that ultimately is going to erode that long-term value for a brand and the customer because you're not creating that second purchase, you're not creating that loyalty.
• 24:02
  Jen LaForge: Yeah.
• 24:02
  Jen LaForge: So this is my segue into selfishly talking more about the loyalty space and how important brands like Rack Chin will be to brands who are learning to navigate, learning to be authentic but efficient, and looking to not only maintain that trust, but to leverage all of the content generated from customers of before.
• 24:23
  Jen LaForge: So uh knowing that that singular focus on those conversions and how precarious this place is to brands right now that could very quickly erode half their member base if they do it wrong, how important is loyalty and say sites like Racutin to the consumer today in that world?
• 24:43
  Darrell Keezer: Well, I I think, I mean, how important is loyalty?
• 24:45
  Darrell Keezer: It's uh I don't actually think that the principles of loyalty have actually changed that much.
• 24:51
  Darrell Keezer: Uh it's just that the technology delivering the loyalty is going to be changing.
• 24:55
  Darrell Keezer: So um, if I've bought a certain like brand of shoes for a number of years and they're the only ones that work, um, I actually want to find out how to be more loyal to that brand, right?
• 25:05
  Darrell Keezer: I want to uh be informed, I want to get the emails, maybe I don't want to pay full retail, I want to get some rewards.
• 25:12
  Darrell Keezer: And and so I don't think that that has changed.
• 25:14
  Darrell Keezer: Customers will still want to buy things that offer a promise and deliver every single time.
• 25:18
  Darrell Keezer: That's the same.
• 25:19
  Darrell Keezer: Uh there's no that's there's nobody saying, I am good to just throw every brand out the window and buy everything new all the time.
• 25:26
  Darrell Keezer: Uh as an example, they say one of the most stressful things of moving countries is going grocery shopping.
• 25:31
  Jen LaForge: Yeah.
• 25:31
  Darrell Keezer: Because you go into the grocery store and you'll quickly learn as soon as you go into a grocery store in a different country, they have all the same products and all different brands.
• 25:39
  Darrell Keezer: And people have literally like mental breakdowns because they they realize they don't actually shop by product name, they shop by brand name.
• 25:47
  Darrell Keezer: So they're going down the aisle and they can't they can't find anything, which is which is kind of a concerning experience when you're like, I just need food for my family, and I'm in a food store and I can't find like white flour.
• 25:58
  Darrell Keezer: Like that's a problem for me.
• 25:59
  Darrell Keezer: And so I think I think loyalty is actually going to increase over the next number of years.
• 26:04
  Darrell Keezer: But the place where I see loyalty actually come in here is when I'm actually shopping online, uh, I believe that the entire shopping experience is gonna start to change.
• 26:15
  Darrell Keezer: I believe people are gonna actually go to websites less personally in the future, where uh we're actually doing all things uh in browser, in app, and allowing it to do purchases.
• 26:24
  Darrell Keezer: I believe that AI is also going to be that assistant where let's say if I'm I'm shopping and I'm I don't know, I'm going on a trip somewhere.
• 26:32
  Darrell Keezer: I think we've used that example before, but we're going on a trip, and then you know, I'm I'm looking at different hotel options, and then all of a sudden it says, actually, Daryl, we have your personal finances.
• 26:41
  Darrell Keezer: And I know you're trying to save a little bit of money on this trip, and you can go back to the same hotel, but we would recommend actually going through this loyalty program, and it's gonna give you X cash back, and that's gonna help you with your monthly goal.
• 26:53
  Darrell Keezer: And so all of a sudden, it's just kind of like not interrupted, but come alongside me as a customer and said, Hey, by the way, I know you want to buy this one thing, but we've got a better way to do it, and and another another way to think about it.
• 27:06
  Darrell Keezer: And then I'm thinking, okay, I can actually go to that location, like I'm able to afford it now, or I've got the benefits there.
• 27:12
  Darrell Keezer: So I think that AI and loyalty and technology are actually gonna like come together to this wonderful unified consumer experience instead of being like, oh, I I need to remember to check this one thing, or I'm gonna search the brands all right here, um, where it it kind of unifies, and maybe I'll learn something through the process, or even sign up for a loyalty program that I was never part of before.
• 27:35
  Jen LaForge: I love that.
• 27:36
  Jen LaForge: And that I'm glad that was your answer and not the complete opposite, given it's it's our world here.
• 27:41
  Jen LaForge: But we talked a little bit earlier about um AI leveling the playing field.
• 27:46
  Jen LaForge: And we talked we were talking about it in terms of great marketers and how creativity and the human grit and persistence and and consistency will be the cut above going forward.
• 27:58
  Jen LaForge: But when it comes to those three aspects coming together, the consumer experience with the AI making that automated algorithm journey right there for you, I feel like loyalty will become that distinguisher.
• 28:11
  Jen LaForge: So AI is gonna level the playing field across the brands, they're all using the same tools, they're all generating things of a higher quality.
• 28:19
  Jen LaForge: Do you see loyalty programs actually becoming the differentiator in terms of I have two great brands with tons of great reviews and they own they're around the same price point?
• 28:30
  Jen LaForge: How am I gonna decide here?
• 28:32
  Jen LaForge: Oh, well, this one gives me cash back.
• 28:34
  Jen LaForge: Do you think there's potential for loyalty to become the next big differentiator in uh consumer choice in the future, once AI kind of levels that playing field?
• 28:45
  Darrell Keezer: Yeah, so personally, absolutely.
• 28:48
  Darrell Keezer: Uh I think that I think that AI uh is helping people actually narrow down their choice uh to things that they're predicting you're gonna like.
• 28:57
  Darrell Keezer: And so if you think of like AI as like what is AI, like just conceptually, it is a prediction engine and it's like a calculator based on all this data that it has.
• 29:06
  Darrell Keezer: So if it has all this data and it's trying to predict what are you gonna like, it's really gonna look at your history.
• 29:12
  Darrell Keezer: It's gonna look at what you eat, it's gonna look at what you wear, um, where you buy things, how you buy things, what are the prices.
• 29:19
  Darrell Keezer: And so it's trying to figure out what is the right answer for you to buy that next product.
• 29:24
  Darrell Keezer: And it's to AI's advantage that it gets it right.
• 29:28
  Darrell Keezer: Now, we're all creatures of habit, and we like buying the same things over and over again unless we're kind of interrupted, and and yeah, that's a wonderful world of marketing and advertising.
• 29:37
  Darrell Keezer: But AI is gonna be, I think it's actually gonna potentially get us uh stuck uh in a little bit more loyalty because it's gonna say, hey, listen, you like this before, we believe you therefore you're gonna like it again, uh, or you like something that that is similar to this, and it's gonna keep bringing it back.
• 29:55
  Darrell Keezer: It's gonna know when I typically, let's say, buy clothes.
• 29:59
  Darrell Keezer: It knows what type of clothes that I get, at what price point, and you know, where I want them delivered.
• 30:04
  Darrell Keezer: It's gonna combine all those things, and it's gonna send me the right email at the exact right time with the right offer and the right shirt because it actually knows me.
• 30:10
  Darrell Keezer: So I actually think it's going to drive repeat purchases really high because it's actually predicting, Daryl, you've done this every single year for the last 15 years.
• 30:18
  Darrell Keezer: Guess what?
• 30:19
  Darrell Keezer: You're gonna do it again, and we're just gonna fall into it.
• 30:22
  Jen LaForge: Okay, well, this music to my ears, and and likely music to uh our brands listening on how to leverage that.
• 30:28
  Jen LaForge: I wanna uh just take a moment, I'm gonna put you on the spot a little bit.
• 30:31
  Jen LaForge: Um I didn't prep you on this one, but um for our viewers, for our consumers who have tuned into Stack to take away tools on how to uh save more, earn more, shop more intentional in an AI-driven world today and what's going on, what's your one takeaway for those watching Stack today?
• 30:53
  Jen LaForge: Like what's that one nugget that you would just want everyone to remember?
• 30:58
  Darrell Keezer: Well, I'll I'll give a personal story behind this one.
• 31:01
  Darrell Keezer: Uh, and I fell on it by accident.
• 31:03
  Darrell Keezer: We're meeting with an accounting firm and just talking about AI.
• 31:06
  Darrell Keezer: And so I really quickly I was like, you know what, it can help you save money as a business.
• 31:09
  Darrell Keezer: So I quickly built a little bot, or you know, if we want to save, throw it in a prompt.
• 31:13
  Darrell Keezer: And make sure you you've got a private AI system.
• 31:16
  Darrell Keezer: Do not do this on public systems whatsoever.
• 31:17
  Darrell Keezer: This is a really bad idea, okay?
• 31:19
  Darrell Keezer: I took my credit card statement, all right, took all the purchases.
• 31:22
  Darrell Keezer: You can just even export the list of what you buy.
• 31:24
  Darrell Keezer: And uh now I run a company, right?
• 31:26
  Darrell Keezer: And I've got just over 50 people.
• 31:28
  Darrell Keezer: There's a lot of purchases, there's a lot of stuff that goes through every month.
• 31:31
  Darrell Keezer: Uh, I put it through AI and I just said, how can we save money?
• 31:34
  Darrell Keezer: And through a whole bunch of different things that it caught that we couldn't catch with 100 transactions, like right away, we experienced $3,000 per month of savings as a company, like overnight.
• 31:45
  Darrell Keezer: A lot of it was actually just foreign exchange that it identified.
• 31:47
  Darrell Keezer: It identified softwares that were billing us more than once.
• 31:51
  Darrell Keezer: It just like caught a whole bunch of things.
• 31:52
  Darrell Keezer: But think about this on a personal level.
• 31:54
  Darrell Keezer: Give AI, like, even if it's an export of your personal finances, this is where I shop, this is what I like to do.
• 32:00
  Darrell Keezer: How could I save money?
• 32:02
  Darrell Keezer: And it's a like, once again, it's not just a knowledge engine, it's a wisdom engine.
• 32:06
  Darrell Keezer: So it's going to take a look at your personal finances, um, how many transactions, where you're shopping.
• 32:10
  Darrell Keezer: Maybe you need to eat at home a little bit more.
• 32:12
  Darrell Keezer: I don't know.
• 32:12
  Darrell Keezer: Like, there's there could be all do.
• 32:14
  Darrell Keezer: But yeah, there's a whole bunch of, you know, maybe you don't you don't have to take the suggestions, but like they could be there for you.
• 32:18
  Darrell Keezer: And but it can just search a whole bunch of alternatives and just say, actually, I believe you can save 10% on all of your purchases, and this is how.
• 32:26
  Darrell Keezer: So give that a try.
• 32:28
  Jen LaForge: Wow.
• 32:28
  Jen LaForge: That is uh that's powerful.
• 32:29
  Jen LaForge: That is a gem.
• 32:30
  Jen LaForge: Um, we're gonna keep talking because I love this, but we are out of time.
• 32:34
  Jen LaForge: Thank you again, Daryl, for coming.
• 32:35
  Jen LaForge: Uh, we might have you back because things are evolving and changing.
• 32:39
  Jen LaForge: So uh interested to see how the conversation may evolve in the future as well.
• 32:43
  Darrell Keezer: Thanks for having me.
• 32:43
  Darrell Keezer: Of course.
• 32:44
  Darrell Keezer: Great, awesome.
• 32:45
  Jen LaForge: And that's it for this episode of Snacked.
• 32:47
  Jen LaForge: If you found this useful, follow along as we interview leaders shaping the future of retail and learn how value really works behind the scenes.
• 32:54
  Jen LaForge: And if there's a topic you want us to unpack, I'd love to hear from you.
• 32:58
  Jen LaForge: See you next time.