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Advertising & Marketing
George Miloradovich
Researcher, Copywriter & Usecase Interviewer
September 4, 2024
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Let's face it – managing your digital footprint these days feels like drinking from a firehose. Social media, websites, emails, calls, chat messages — it's overwhelming. Fortunately, the attention of business leaders has recently been clinging to new tools that use AI to simplify automation.
As part of a study to explore how Latenode solves these practical customer problems, the team reached out to Audax Group CEO Mike Kirshtein, a heavy user of the platform. They discussed Audax’s unique automation offerings, current trends in AI and automation, and its newest solution made on Latenode – AI Appointment Setter.
Key Takeaways: Audax Group leverages AI automation on the Latenode platform to drastically reduce business costs and streamline customer operations. Key savings include a 30-50% reduction in personnel costs, 80-90% time savings on tasks, and 60-70% reduction in client wait times. AI tools like appointment setters, chatbots, and inventory management systems enhance efficiency, allowing businesses to scale without significant staff increases.
– Could you tell more about what your company is doing?
– We sell a lot of AI Automation, and we partner with other businesses. If we like what a company sells, we can help boost their sales by automating and optimizing the process with AI. We replicate their workflow, enhance it with AI-driven automation, and make it even more efficient. We do it for the solar industry, insurance, real estate, CRM, and probably a few other industries. My company is not large. Basically, I figure out an automation or a workflow, sell access to it, then resell it.
– What are the specific services Audax offers?
- We make very specific things:
We could also set up AI that communicates with people online. A lot of life insurance agents don't respect their online presence. They don't even know it exists. They might talk to their mother and friends on social media, but they don't realize that their social media presence matters when somebody wants to talk about any business.
So, we can use AI to interact on your behalf, responding to comments and posts as if it were you. Such an approach actually creates a more personal experience between you and others—whether they are clients, potential clients, or just people in general.
In addition, there is a service called unlimited texting. It happens through cell phone. We start it on your platform, then it goes strictly to Google Sheets, and we do it on a local computer using a program called Zero Work, another robotic processing thing.
The central bots act pretty much like people, and they were originally made in Make, but we've brought them over to Latenode. These are starting to become more and more useful. We have email auto-respond, AI calls, cold email outreach, content creation, you know, these are all just different bots.
- How many clients do you have at the moment?
- Well, the total result would be hundreds. I’m an agency, and I work with other agencies. I work with their clients, which are my clients, like downstream. At least three times a week, we take on new people. We have meetings where we have 20 to 50 people trying to get in. Those are the bigger bursts, but we have stuff going on every day.
- What are the specific niches and types of businesses you're serving? Are those small to medium, or do you work with large companies?
-I'm working with clients ranging from a single realtor who just needs our assistance, to one of the largest insurance companies in the US that has been in business with a history spanning more than a hundred years.. We're working with companies of every size. I think it’s the point – AI and automation leverage the playing field. The average person can perform similarly to a Fortune 500 company with AI and automation.
Our average client is a business owner. There are two main niches we have:
There's no consistency in clients. Everybody needs it, obviously. It's a money issue. We're not cheap, but what we're offering is very cheap in comparison to hiring people to do it. We charge 497$ as a monthly subscription, but if the automation uses services like Latenode, clients need to fund them too.
- So, the AI appointment setting tools. What is their main advantage over traditional approaches? In other words, how is AI changing the scheduling process?
- Oh, it’s easy. We have a lot of industries that do outbound calls. If you go to the worst phone room, they're manually dialing on a phone. If they've got better than that, it’s some kind of automated dialer that is dialing number after number. You need someone there to answer every call. When you're making calls, you have closers, when people close the deal and bring in the money.
Usually, in front of them, there is somebody who sets the call, somebody who has to set the appointment for the closer. How many do you need per closer? Nobody knows the answer, it changes from business to business. Now imagine, you have unlimited settings. It means if you have 10 closers, you could keep them on calls all day long. No free slots, assuming you have the leads, or you're willing to purchase the leads.
- What led you to build a setter within Latenode instead of using other platforms?
- I've been using it since they were in beta, and what initially drew me in was that they were free and offered real support. Zapier, on the other hand, barely offers any support—maybe just some email assistance, but I’m not patient enough to wait days to get some stupid email response. Right now, we’re actively working within it to get scenarios running.
They offer much more support than Zapier through their Discord community. There are people there who try to assist, and I like them. I want to use platform more, but I’m having trouble getting some features to work the way I need them to, which is frustrating. Honestly, if we get this platform to work, it’s going to be really valuable to our operations.
- So now let's discuss your Latenode scenario. Can you walk me through your setup? What does it do and which integrations are involved?
- Sure. It’s very simple. You're doing a call. You're monitoring incoming texts.
All images are taken from Audax’s official web page about qualified AI appointment setters and home page.
- It’s the basic setup of formulating response texts. The other thing we wanted to do was add Google Sheets to the CRM. All of our new text messages appear on a spreadsheet in Google Sheets. We then have that updated in the CRM, triggering Latenode, which formulates a response. It’s pretty uniform.
- Essentially, these setters function like virtual assistants to schedule tasks, gather information, suggest convenient times, and log everything into your calendar. And it’s 24/7. Instead of manually managing a meeting or call, the scenario makes it instead of you. Does it sound about right?
Yeah, it's a machine. A person could only set as many calls every day—even on their best day—as whatever time allows for. Our system allows unlimited simultaneous inbound calls, and we can make as many outbound calls as somebody wants. We could literally call 334 million people at the same time. Humans only make as many calls a day as possible — AI is unlimited.
It does it in 12 languages. It does more languages, but we have 12 that we trained it on. It could do a hundred and something. I can't speak multiple languages, but we have clients who do. And it speaks all these different languages with a native accent. If you go to an office, their top reps outperform an AI in quality, but they can't compete in quantity.
Here are the lead breakdown results, including monthly lead generation averages, conversion rates, and database conversion rates.
- Let’s talk about the current trends in AI and automation. What trends are you currently observing in the field? How are they influencing your business and the experiences of your customers?
- It’s a lot. So, okay. Everybody regardless of their business, I think, would like to do everything better and cheaper. AI and automation go together to accomplish this goal. Let me bring an example: an email autoresponder. Can you make an AI assistant giving the answers somebody you hired would give? If the answer is yes, you just found a way to replace a person.
Communications automation—this is where we're most effective. In my company, anyways, this is the trend we notice.
- So, the biggest challenge companies are facing is to simplify and automate communications, right? Do you see a growing demand for different types of automation?
- If you articulate it, we automate it. It’s how it came into play. If you explain a process you do, we recreate it. What is a common everyday practice to me is not clear to the average person. The average person has very little understanding of AI and automation. They just know the effects of it.
If we do things right, nobody realizes how they were done. They just enjoyed what they got done. If you call one of the businesses we service, you're going to speak to a representative that has every answer, yet it's AI. It would take too much money and time to find someone absorbing such a flow of information like a sponge, but AI absorbs it instantly and gives answers.
In every business, they're selling something whether it's a product or a service to a client. All of these require communication from both parties. They know what they want and what they’re willing to give up in return. Imagine, we're getting into a situation where my AI talks to your AI, and they make an agreement. They come to terms with something. We might oversee it.
Here is an example, I'm a business. I use Latenode whenever I need it. Let's say I'm using it to work with a client. It's tiding with all the software making phone calls, emails, and texts on behalf of a business who is our client. So, you send them an email. What are the odds that they have an email autoresponder responding to our AI's email? So now the AIs are just talking with each other.
- Thank you very much, Mike. Can we stay in touch in our Discord community?
- Sure. It’s very all right, and I'm there if you have questions, just shoot them over.
Reflecting on the entire interview, the team placed him in the shoes of Latenode clients, considering the potential headaches they might face and how it and Audax could help address these challenges. Following this, the team conducted additional research, which proved to be a solution to many of these issues. See it yourself.
The report offers insights into how solutions like Audax Group’s setters help businesses save money and time, focusing on inbound communications, outreach, and other fields. Below is a table with the results, shown in percentages, along with their meaning. All insights are cited from the relevant sources as of 2023, and 2024, so they reflect the current market condition in the United States.
Automated workflows prove invaluable as businesses grow. In the past, rising sales and orders meant bringing on many new team members. Now, with Audax's tools made on the Latenode platform, companies tackle bigger workloads while keeping new hires to a minimum. Some even manage expansion without adding staff at all. The result? Smoother scaling and better use of existing resources as your business reaches new heights.
Ready to join the AI revolution? Don't worry, you won't be replacing your team with robots. Think of it as giving your human employees superpowers. They'll thank you for freeing them from mind-numbing tasks and refocus on what really matters - building relationships and closing deals. This setter can make calls in up to 100 languages, which is 100x more than most humans do!
If you'd like to set up such a workflow in your account, just submit your details through the contact form below. Your information will be passed on to Mike, who will assist you with your specific request. Or, join the official Latenode community on Discord to get a response from the developers or a quick tip from other users.
This scenario is a perfect demonstration of how Latenode automates routine tasks, like scheduling appointments, using AI. It’s available in the free account version after registration. Subscribe to get more active scenarios, concurrent activations, and linked accounts, up to unlimited. If you’re a business, consider an enterprise plan with custom support and usage terms for your workflows.
What is the main advantage of AI-driven appointment setting over traditional methods?
It automates the scheduling process, allowing unlimited simultaneous calls, 24/7 availability, and multi-language support, which significantly increases efficiency compared to manual methods.
How does Audax Group use Latenode?
Audax Group utilizes the tool to create a custom workflow that automates responses to incoming texts, updates CRM systems, and manages appointments through AI, reducing the need for human involvement.
How does the custom solution differ from services like Lindy or Expandi?
This custom solution offers greater flexibility, allowing more integrations and supporting up to 100 languages, whereas Lindy and Expandi focus mainly on large European languages and have limited integration options.
What industries benefit from Audax’s AI automation?
Audax Group serves a wide range of industries, including real estate, insurance, and solar energy, providing AI automation services that improve communication and client management.
How can I recreate this workflow using Latenode?
To recreate this AI-driven workflow, you can contact the support team via their official Discord community, where you can access the necessary scripts and get assistance from developers.
