Is marketing dead? Why creativity and data need each other.

Speaker A: Foreign.

Speaker B: Welcome back to the Banking on Digital Growth podcast. I'm your host, Derek Kraus. Today I am joined by Melanie Draheim, who I believe is one of the sharpest credit union marketers I know. So I've been excited to have her on the show and I'm, um, I'm excited to share this episode with you. Today, Melanie and I had a very interesting conversation. Uh, starting off with talking about death. Um, I think you'll find it interesting what we have to say on the topic of everyone talking about how this is dead. That is dead. And then we shift our conversation into talking about the relationship between art and science, performance and creativity. Do those things go hand in hand or are they in conflict with each other? Take a listen and hear what we have to say. Hey, Melanie, welcome to the show.

Speaker A: Hey, Eric, how are you?

Speaker B: I'm, um, doing well. Uh, you were just telling me about a backpacking trip that you took to Death Valley with your husband. So now I said don't tell me anymore until we hit record. So now I want to hear all about it.

Speaker A: Yes. So something we actually haven't done before. We hike a lot, but we've not backpack, like for four days, camp, stay out there. Right. So. So this was new, but it was amazing. And I think the most, at least the most surprising thing to me about it was like, you think of Death Valley as being hot, harsh, like dead, not a lot of life, but like the wildflowers were blooming. We saw this wildlife. There were canyons, mountains, and yes, the desert in that, but just the variety and the diversity of it was pretty cool to see. So we enjoyed it quite a bit.

Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. And we need to, uh. It's funny, I didn't think about this until just now, before we hit record as well. We were talking about other types of death that people. And that's going to sound really ominous to anyone that's listening, but, uh, so it's not as ominous as it sounds, but I want to come back to that. But, uh, yeah, I don't think I've. I've driven by Death Valley. I haven't actually been to it, but growing up in Southern California, I spent quite a bit of time in deserts and camping in deserts, and I did a lot of hiking in the Sierras and long backpacking trips. Like when I was a teenager, uh, we. We did a. With my church youth group. We did a backpacking trip to Mount Whitney and Langley because they're. So The Whitney is the highest peak in the United States. Well, okay. In in the lower 48, it's the highest. And then Langley is the third highest and they're pretty close to each other, so we were able to hit both of them. And it was a 65 mile backpacking trip over about a week. And I was like, that was, that was pretty um, intense.

Speaker A: Yeah, it's hard work, but it was worth it. And there was no cell service out there, so that was the best thing about it.

Speaker B: Oh yeah.

Speaker A: Connected.

Speaker B: Yeah. So that, so you, it sounds like you've done a lot of hikes, but this was your first like four day all out. Okay.

Speaker A: Yep, exactly. And it's funny you said like, you've driven. I feel like when I talk to others, a lot of people have driven through Death Valley, but not many people have stayed, so. So, uh, it was neat to just be able to experience that and. Yeah. Spend the days and nights in the park.

Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. Very cool. How were the stars?

Speaker A: Oh my God. Amazing. I've never seen, I guess like the darkest nights I've seen in a long time. And the fact that they're like, you're not on your phone. There is nothing else to do at night other than like look at the stars and because you're staring at them. Like one night we actually saw a shooting star which was really cool. So. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker B: I, huh, love that whenever we go out to somewhere that's away from cities, you get away from the light pollution and the uh, stars are just amazing. That's something we, we miss a lot of time living. Like there are a lot of benefits living in, in cities, which is why so many people do. But that's just one of those natural beauty things that I, I get a lot of enjoyment out of. I was actually. I don't even know what I thought of this. I think, you know, sometimes you're sleeping and then you just like you wake up in the middle of the night or you wake up in the morning, there's some thought in your brain, you don't know how it got there. I was, I don't know if this was in the middle of the night or in like right after I woke up, but I was like, huh. I haven't pulled out my telescope for a while to look at because I, my wife got me a telescope maybe 10 years ago for Christmas or my birthday or something. I like to get it out to um, you, you can, you can see the rings of Saturn, you can see the moons, moons of Jupiter and it, and it's cool to look at the craters on the moon. Um, so anyway, I didn't imagine that I'd be talking about that on this podcast today. Yeah. All right, now let's come back to death. So we don't. We don't leave. Yeah. We don't want to leave people hanging too long about. About death that we're talking about. So Death Valley. But you, um, were telling. So what we want to talk about today, we were talking about what, uh, what. What topic should we discuss today? And you brought up talking about, the way I put it is like data and science versus art or, uh, you can talk about in terms of, of creativity versus. What was the word that you used?

Speaker A: Um, creativity. Performance. Like data performance.

Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So I think it's a really interesting topic. Um, but then I said, all right, give. Give me the biggest thing that you're thinking about just before going into this, the recording. And, uh, I don't, I don't want to put. I want to. You. You try. Yeah. You recreate it. Because what you said, I was like,

Speaker A: yeah, just because what's been on my mind lately or what I feel like I've been seeing a lot is a lot of either posts or people just calling out pieces of marketing and that they're dead. So whether it be brand is dead, you know, SEO is dead, the AI, uh, email is dead, whatever the tactic be, or the, the channel or the fundamental marketing, it's all dead because AI and technology. So I feel like everything is dead. Exactly. And I don't, I don't. Obviously we all. I think most of us know that's not the case, but it's just, it's interesting to me. There is a lot of noise, but still a lot of the fundamentals do apply, and sometimes that we forget about those while, uh, we also need to keep looking and learning ahead at what's new and how to use that. So I've always just had appreciation for. Just because something is harder doesn't mean it's dead or we give up on it.

Speaker B: Yeah. And you bring up something really interesting that I realized at some point, maybe in the last 10 to 15 years, because there's so much. You know, technology has such a big impact on our lives. And I think it may have. This may have occurred to me because I, uh, like listening to kind of like economics books. Not like, not like super hardcore textbooks or anything, but like, uh, there are a number of economists like Milton Friedman or Thomas Soule that have put out really good, uh, where they teach, like, principles of economics. And so something that comes along with those Is a lot of them at some point end up talking about technology and its impact on, on economies and economics. And um, what I've learned from that and realized is that technology, like what's the definition of technology? Because we, we tend to associate it today with electronics and digital and the Internet. But. Yeah, but technology can take all sorts of forms and technology is just, it enables you to do like whatever you're doing today, technology makes it so you can do that thing with fewer resources. And if it, if it's a new method or technique or tool that enables you to accomplish the same thing with fewer resources, then that by definition is technology. Whether it takes the form of electronics or something else like that. The implication there is that technology itself is just a, it's a means to an end. It's not the end in itself. Yeah, ah, like it's a, it's a, often it's a delivery method or a creation method, but it's not the thing. So. And I think sometimes we can lose sight of that with technology. So I think what that means practically is if people say brand is dead because AI.

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker B: Like I actually, I don't agree with that at all. Um, brand is still brand. It's just a matter of how it gets delivered to someone might be different,

Speaker A: we're different and we may need to adapt. Yep. Yep. Mhm.

Speaker B: Yeah. So, so I, in, in the world of what I'm thinking about every day now, I think one practical takeaway from that is. Well, for the last 20 years, uh, the way that people become accustomed to more and more of experiencing a brand is you. A, a you go and visit someone's website and you, you, you see their logo and their colors and their, you know, all the brand feel type stuff and you, you read their content and you, you learn about them by that way. You, you're, you're experiencing it by going to the website. And now with AI, um, more and more people are using AI as an intermediary where instead of going directly to the website, someone will ask a question or research something and AI will go out to websites for them and bring back information. And so now AI is sitting as a layer in between experiencing the brand. It doesn't mean the brand isn't there or that it's irrelevant. It's just that uh, if, if AI like I guess a concern for brand is that if the AI doesn't, doesn't properly communicate your brand back to human on the other side.

Speaker A: Mhm.

Speaker B: Or, or yeah. Or can't find you at all to begin With. Yeah. So that's a problem. But it doesn't mean that that brand goes away or is no longer relevant. It's just a delivery mechanism has changed. So is that.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: Is that, Is that, Is that what you're seeing?

Speaker A: It is. And I. Another way I've been thinking about it a lot is just in, like, all the years I've spent in marketing. Marketing at its core very much used to be influencing people. Right. You're influencing people. You're trying to get them, most times to act, to do something. And now it's still that, but it's also influencing what influences people, which could be AI. Right. If that's where they're going. And do they trust AI, do they not? Like there's like, exactly like you said, there's this whole nother layer that we're having to think about and kind of strategize around and incorporating it into what we're doing.

Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. Which makes it. And so some people, I think, look at that. And, uh, sometimes. And this is true for everyone. Um, sometimes we look at change through a lens of fear.

Speaker A: Yeah. Right. Yep.

Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. Because change is hard. And other times we can look at change as opportunity. And, and I, and I know the overall topic isn't, uh. Doesn't necessarily mean we talk about AI the whole time, but everyone's talking about AI every day. Uh, so it's a good, it's a good case of this where, I mean, I, I hear all of the doom.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: Like AI is going to take all of our, our jobs and lots of concerns about AI. And, um, it's. It's not that. I mean, some things get a little out there, but it's. But a lot of what people are concerned about, it's not that it's not true or there's no cause for concern, but just personally, I'm so excited.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: About what's going on with AI.

Speaker A: Um, friend of ours, James Robert Lee, I think he said the only person who likes change is a baby with a dirty diaper. Right. None of us like change, but I

Speaker B: haven't heard that one.

Speaker A: Yeah, I know he said that. And I think a lot of it is mindset. Right. So how do you, how do you view it? Do you view it as something, uh, to panic and worry about? Do you view it as opportunity? Or can you, can you see both and think it's the opposite ends of the spectrum where I, I like, cringe, where it's like, yeah, it's dead. It's like, that was so dead. Like Most things in marketing, it depends. Right. I feel like most, most things, there's a lot of factors, there's a lot of things to consider and think about, but it's usually not black and white.

Speaker B: Hmm. And do you think, do you think some of that's coming from the fact that technological change does destroy something. It creates, creates something new and, and often destroys something else in the process, which can be, can be painful sometimes as markets are, are recreated. Like. So let's, let's talk about, uh, saying SEO is dead. Um, and I, I, uh, think where people are coming from with that is that SEO is being replaced by Geo.

Speaker A: How it used to function isn't the same anymore. Yeah.

Speaker B: Yeah. Yep. So instead of it being about showing up in Google search results at the top of the page, it's about being mentioned by AI and its responses. And so that's, um, that's happening. But to say that SEO is dead right now.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: Isn't accurate because there's still lots and lots of people that, that are using Google search. Not everyone has converted over to, to AI search for everything. So.

Speaker A: Yep.

Speaker B: Like maybe they're just calling the game before it's over.

Speaker A: Yeah. And it's a little bit of. I think, I think sometimes as marketers we really love a, like a eulogy of like, oh, it's getting really hard and frustrating and then all this. So let's, let's just do something else. Like, let's, let's, let's. That doesn't work anymore. Right. But these things, they, they do come around too. Again. So I think it's just a matter of looking at it differently. And yeah, um, one of my, one of my beliefs has always been, but we've always done it this way. Let's not, let's not do that. Like, let's respect the past, but also look forward to the future. Um, and just because we've done it a certain way doesn't mean there's not a better or another way we should consider. Um, so. Yeah, yeah, yeah,

Speaker B: yeah. Well, let's, let's talk more about. So let's thinking about this topic of, uh, creativity and performance art. Art versus science. Um, tell me more about what's on your mind with that. And you also, you've mentioned to me that sometimes those can be treated as, uh, things that are in conflict.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: But, uh, that they're not. But there's. They're not. Those things don't have to be in conflict with each other. In fact, it seems like ideally they should go together.

Speaker A: Right? 100%. Yeah. I think there's a, ah, there's this tendency of, to think of like the creativity and the art of marketing and the brand, and then on the other end of the spectrum, the performance, the data and the science and to keep those as separate things. But I've always been like, I've always loved both and appreciated both. Like, I paint, but give me the numbers and the results. We've talked about before, like, yeah, commercial people see like, oh, did you see that ad? It was great. Well, I don't know. Like, did it, what did it do? Did it, did it drive results? So, so to me it's very much an and, uh, more than an or. And the more we can blend those two things together, the more successful we can be. Um, but it's a lot about, uh, like using the art, the empathy, talking with real people and then applying the data and the logic and the learnings to bring those two things together.

Speaker B: Yeah. And you got me thinking about what is the relationship between those things, because I can, I can think of some cases where the art and the, and the data should always go together, but then in other cases where maybe they don't have to exist together. So for instance, you said, you said that you paint.

Speaker A: Sure. Yeah.

Speaker B: Right.

Speaker A: Yep.

Speaker B: So like, if you're, if you're painting something over the weekend just for fun, I don't imagine you require it to produce some sort of quantifiable result in your life. Like, like you don't go to your friends and say, yeah, yeah, so. So there are all sorts of things like, like that. But. And it seems like those things exist in personal life more than they do in, in business life. Because like the, the point of. I say business, I mean, including, including not for profits. Like where, where there's a.

Speaker A: We have goals, we have. Yep.

Speaker B: Yeah. Where there, there are tangible outcomes that you, that you do measure and that you have to measure in order to be successful. Like, I mean imagine, imagine a credit union trying to run without ever looking at numbers. It just wouldn't, it wouldn't function at all.

Speaker A: Yep.

Speaker B: Um, now a lot of, A lot of marketing departments operate that way, which is part a challenge. But I mean like, if you look at the finance side, it would just, it wouldn't exist or it would go out of business very quickly.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: If they're, um. So.

Speaker A: And I think as marketers are, like, to me, our job is to like, especially in a credit union, we have a, we have a core purpose. We really are about helping people. That, that drives us but purpose and performance don't have to compete. Like, they can compound. We can do what's good for people and what's good for the numbers. And that's, that's the win, win for everybody, our members, but also our company and the team and then our community, because we're helping drive that, helping people thrive and make progress.

Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. You've got it. Like, if you're doing this work to help people, but, um, you've got like no numbers on how many people you're helping, it becomes hard to quantify if you're being successful or not. And some people are like, well, I don't want to just be a number. Like, true. But again, you can count numbers and recognize that there's a person behind each of them. So what, what do you think is. What's the underlying principle for when, um, art is just art for art's sake, um, or creativity for creativity's sake? And when do numbers matter? Like when, um, and I don't know, maybe I suppose there can be, there can be numbers for the sake of numbers without creativity. But when, when, when must those things go together? Like if you don't have them together? It doesn't make sense.

Speaker A: Yeah, I think it, I think it gets back to the why, like, why are we, why are we doing what we're doing? Why does. Why do we need the campaign or why do we need the ad? Why do we need the website? Like, what is the, what is the larger goal? Because if it's just like, well, we think it would be cool to me, I don't know if that's the best use of time. Even if it is. Even if it is now, if we think it could be cool and it could really drive conversion and support a strategic goal and a plan. Okay, now let's talk. So I think for me, it's a lot of tying things back to. We can have a heart and a bottom line, right? So let's try not to just operate with the. Or the. Either, or, um, but to bring the two things together. Here's another example. In the digital space, we're always looking at, like, how to continue to improve usability, right? So if it is a human, let's say, how do we continue to make it easier? We're never done. We're always enhancing the website, the app, whatever that might be. I'm a big believer that, like, sometimes the least digital thing can improve your experience the most, which is talking to your people. So, yes, we should use the data. We should see what people are Looking at, But looking at the numbers isn't the same as watching someone open your app and seeing how they feel. Or like, is there a reaction, oh, this is super cool. Or is there. Or are they just kind of like, oh, or lost? Or like, like that feeling, that reaction you don't always see in the numbers. So to me, like, there's, there's this kind of juxtaposition, but when you can bring the two together of the people and then having the numbers in the data to support that and having the empathy drive it, to me, that drives the most successful marketing.

Speaker B: Yeah, I agree. Because so you're hitting on a few things that I've thought about a lot. And the first one is you were talking about why are we running this campaign? Or why are we doing this ad? He said, because it's cool. And, uh, working with, working with financial institutions, primarily credit unions, for a long time I've heard something very similar. Now, they don't say because it's cool, but, um, they'll say, and this, this is mostly in the context of like their website because that's what, you know, with, with Metrify doing, doing website designs and ongoing optimization with credit unions. Um, I think probably the number one biggest pitfall that I've noticed over the last 11 years of working with credit unions is that they, they don't measure, they don't measure the success, they don't, they don't measure conversion. They don't measure how many people are coming to the site and then actually open and apply for a loan or an account. And so then they're flying blind and be like, well, but yet a lot of people still have opinions about how the user interface should be designed and how the user experience should be designed. And I don't fault anyone for having an opinion. But if you have an opinion and you never make measure if your opinion is good or bad, then you're just, you're, you're operating, you're operating totally on opinion about how things should be. And so, you know, while they're not saying, I'm going to do this just because it's cool, they're like, I'm going to do this because I think it's a good idea. It's like, great, sure, do it because you think it's a good idea, but then measure it and test it. Yeah. If your idea is actually good. Because one of the things that we've learned once we. And like, I, I can't remember if I told you, like, our whole backstory of how we got started.

Speaker A: And I'm sure you have at some point all.

Speaker B: Uh, right. Well, yeah, well the, the, yeah, recap. The skinny is when we got started 11 years ago, that, that's basically how we operated was let's design websites that are pretty and that win awards. Yes. Yep. Yeah, that was, that was the goal. And so it was like all opinion based. Now we had, we had reasoning behind why we would do things a certain way and our clients were working with, they had reasoning for why they wanted things a certain way and a lot of those things made, made sense. And then if, um, if they were measured, maybe they would have been good ideas, but they weren't, they weren't measured. And so it was all, it was all just, it was all just guessing. And so once we, once we realized how big of a problem that was and we started measuring analytics and we really got into a B testing because that's how you, you know, if, if you do it this way versus this way. Well, this way is better. Um, with that comes you got to eat some humble pie. Because, um, because sometimes you have an idea for what you think is a better way and you believe in it, but then you put it to the test and you find out that you were wrong.

Speaker A: The numbers don't. Right. But that's how you learn. Right. So then you can use that.

Speaker B: Yeah.

Speaker A: Build another hypothesis and make it better the next time. Yeah, definitely.

Speaker B: Yeah. Which then feeds back into creativity. Because like my experience with AB testing is that actually it's very, it's very methodical, performance driven approach. Like if the numbers show that B is better than A, then you go with.

Speaker A: And then you remove the opinions.

Speaker B: Right, you remove the opinions. But to create B takes a lot of creativity. And sometimes where that new version of the experience comes from might come from data. Like the data shows we should do it this way. But a lot of experiments that we've won didn't come from that at all. It came from how should this be built? Like, if it were me experiencing this, how do I think I would want to experience? It came from intuition. Uh, but then the intuition was tested and that, I think that's, that's the key. It's like, you know, you're talking about creating a campaign or, or creating an ad and you could have a ton of fun and be really creative with making the ad and that in itself could be fulfilling. But then, you know, you put it to the test and find out if it was actually successful. And then that's, that's not, that's not Counter creativity or it's not failed, it

Speaker A: can feedback, you've learned. Right. So. Mhm.

Speaker B: Yeah. And it can feed back into future creativity because you're like well that didn't work. So how do we do it differently the next time so that it does work?

Speaker A: Exactly. Couple examples come to mind. I think we may have talked about one of them like with an auto recapture campaign. Like our hypothesis was we always talk about rate, rate, rate, rate. Okay, how much you're going to save on your rate. But then going back to like the human side, people don't like to do math. Like don't make me do math. Don't make it hard, just make it easy. So we tested, this is how much you'll save on your rate. Okay. Email campaign, another version. This is how much money per month you will save. So like doing the math for them.

Speaker B: You told me about that. I love that.

Speaker A: Enough people want to see the, the payment, the money. Don't make me calculate the rate. But that was a hypothesis until we tested it. Like it could have been exactly the same. We don't know. So now we've learned and now we can use that for future things. But also there's like how do we position that now as a message going forward?

Speaker B: Yeah, I love that. I'm, I'm curious. Do you know off the top of your head how much better the uh,

Speaker A: I don't remember a couple months ago. Um, but it was significant enough to say like okay, we're onto something. Right?

Speaker B: Yeah.

Speaker A: Yep.

Speaker B: Yeah. I love, I love that because there was the creativity of coming up with those two different concepts and then the acknowledgment that even if, yeah. How humans work. So it's, it's like you, you had like you, you had this insider, this belief about how humans work which led to creativity, which led to. Well, how how some marketing departments operate is. They would have that thought of like, oh well, just showing, just, just showing the amount of money they're going to save is for sure going to be better than showing the rate. So we're just going to start doing that for now. But you actually. Right, yeah, but you actually tested it so you could find out and not only did you find out that one is better than the other, but you found out how much better. So you, that gives you some idea of the value of making that change and then. Yeah, and then you can use that going forward and that could, that could be applied to um, all sorts of things. Instead of talking about rate, which is more abstract, everyone knows what a Dollar

Speaker A: means exactly to them. Exactly. Yes. What does that, what does that really mean? Mhm.

Speaker B: Yeah. Um, you know what else this is making me think of? Have I ever told you about the time when I sold $9,000 worth of bacon?

Speaker A: No, I don't think so.

Speaker B: Uh, so when I was in my, my last year of college, so I went to Brigham Young University here in, in uh, northern Utah. And uh, there was a crowdfunding class. Remember when crowdfunding was huge? A Kickstarter for sure. So I was like, that's pretty interesting. So I did a Kickstarter class. And this wasn't a typical class where you like, study stuff and then take tests and you get a grade. It was a class where you actually had to do a Kickstarter project. And so you have to come up with an idea and, and, and execute it and launch it within this semester. And uh, I don't know why, like, also at that time everyone was really into bacon.

Speaker A: I mean, well, I think people still love bacon.

Speaker B: Yeah, everyone's still into bacon because bacon's delicious. But I was like, it was, bacon was especially hot at that time. Like Burger King was coming out with like bacon everything.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: Bacon ice cream sundae. And everyone was putting bacon on maple donuts. Bacon, um, was especially hot right then. And, and I said, I'm gonna do a Kickstarter around bacon jerky.

Speaker A: Okay.

Speaker B: So it's like bacon that you, you've got in a little. And I'm going to make it portable, okay. So you can, you've got a little pouch of bacon jerky you can take with you everywhere. So anytime you need bacon, you can have bacon.

Speaker A: Just need more bacon in our life.

Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. So we ended up calling it Go Bacon and I'll, I'll have to send you the, the video, um, that we like, the promotional video for Kickstarter.

Speaker A: Great.

Speaker B: It was so much fun to make that video. So I, whenever I think about creativity and marketing, I, uh, think back on that because it was so much fun to make that.

Speaker A: Did you do an A B testing, testing ad?

Speaker B: No, sorry. This is before I was converted to ab testing. This is the. Before Derek. Um, and we had very limited resources, so I don't know if we could have made a B anyway. But um, I think about that because that's one of a handful of things in my life where I look back at. That was like maximum creativity for me in marketing because I wrote the script, I starred in the ad, I did the voiceover, but someone else, I, I like the editing quality Is very good. I. I didn't have any skills to do that, so props to the people that. That helped me with that. But it was. It was fun. Um, and the fact that it went on to. We had. People bought $9,000 worth of go Bacon.

Speaker A: All right.

Speaker B: In that.

Speaker A: In that campaign, we had some reality measures from it. So. Outcome.

Speaker B: Yes. Yeah. So I wonder, like, would I. Would I look back on that video with as much fondness if the result, uh, hadn't been tied to it? Or would it have just been a goofy video that nobody cared about? It didn't produce anything. And so it was kind of dumb. Like, if. If. Like, if I had. When I started telling you the story, I said, if I told you about the time where I sold $9,000 worth of bacon, you're like, no, what's up with. If I had said, have I told you about the time that I made a video about baking?

Speaker A: It's like, okay, not maybe as exciting,

Speaker B: but, yeah, like, okay, that's so. Yeah. It's like the creativity and the result go together. They complement each other, and one without the other. You've lost something.

Speaker A: Exactly, exactly. And sometimes it's, uh, like, creativity in the moment, too. Like, one of our goals, uh, is around differentiation and how we continue to create differentiation. But sometimes it's in the moment. It's maybe unplanned. So, example, we had a member that posted on social media, hey, Fox Committee's credit union. I got this pen. It stopped working. What gives? But he, like, it was a joke. And then people started posting. Oh, you can get better pens at such and such. Like, maybe better pens, but not better people. And it became this huge thing, like, people.

Speaker B: Oh, yeah.

Speaker A: Commenting and following it. So we were like, okay, well, this is, like, becoming something. We got to reach out to this member. Turns out he's, uh, a lead singer of a local band. So we had him come to the branch, got him some new pens, did a video and had him sing the jingle. And. And people loved it. But again, this is just like, when you see an opportunity, sometimes you take advantage of it. And we got some engagement out of it. But also, it's just. Yeah, it was fun, but it also created some awareness.

Speaker B: So, yeah, that's way fun. Um, so I was that recently. I haven't heard that story in the

Speaker A: past couple months, I think.

Speaker B: Yeah, okay.

Speaker A: It was winter. Because one of the comments was, it's so cold. You know, it's 40 below. That's why your pun's not working.

Speaker B: Everything stops working.

Speaker A: Everything stops working. When it's that cold.

Speaker B: Uh, so I'm curious, is there something in particular right now that you're working on creatively that you're really excited about that you hope will also end up producing some sort of measurable result?

Speaker A: Yeah. So I think going back to my kind, um, of point, like the human and human aspects of digital, um, about a year ago, a little over a year now, we worked with James Robert Lay on some usability testing and things related to our website which didn't involve like talking to some people. So something we're doing this year that I'm pretty excited about is more focused on our app, um, but in the same lens of like using our data of the most common things people do in the app, but actually talking with some people who both use it and don't use it to get their perspectives and feelings and reactions on it. So because we could ask the company or even leaders, what do you think it should look like? And we would get lots of opinions. Right. We just talked about that. So I'm excited about this process of both using our data, talking to people to help drive some of those optimizations in the experience and because we've got some baseline data we should be able to measure with, with some of the changes that we make. But I, I, yeah, I'm excited about that. I also, I, as a, even as a leader, as m. A marketer, like, I like listening and staying close to the member, um, because it's easy to, to get too close to the marketing. So I like having an avenue to be able to do that. Um, even last year, I think of another example, we started marketing our commercial product. Before we did that, I wanted to go sit down with members of businesses that we work with to understand what do they say about us before we just say what we think we want people to say about us. So I always get excited about that. It's just a good, it grounds you from. You're looking at the dashboards all the time, but getting, getting back to the people that, who are behind it.

Speaker B: Yeah. So what with the, the focus on the mobile app, like what, what, uh, what creativity aspects in there are you most excited about?

Speaker A: Um, I mean, I think I'll just throw this in on here because it, it could be one of those of like, oh, this is fun, like gamification or certain things like that. But do people really want that? Do they care? Is it just fun and cool and they don't really care and we're wasting our. So that's kind of, I guess that's one example. I, I'm curious. Yeah. To see both kind of from a people like aspect and is there, is there value in it? I don't know. I have my own personal opinions about it. But that could be different than our 140, 000 members. So we'll see.

Speaker B: Yeah. Okay, so you're, you're kicking off the survey to find out what people think about it and, and measuring that and

Speaker A: imagine, I mean we're doing ongoing surveys all the time. This is a more concentrated effort and like sitting down with people in a room, like face to face.

Speaker B: Yeah. Okay, so you do that and then you're going to find out how do we make this significantly better. And then that's probably where more of the creativity and the testing will come in. Yeah.

Speaker A: Yep.

Speaker B: Ah yeah. That's fun. That's exciting. Um, I'll tell you about something that I'm working on that I'm super excited about that I hope will also end up producing some, some great results. So um, have, have you heard of if, if I say open claw, does that mean anything to you?

Speaker A: The uh, term sounds familiar but I couldn't explain it.

Speaker B: So it's becoming the next big thing in AI. So I mean the best way to explain it is uh, but like what, what do you typically use for AI? What's your favorite AI?

Speaker A: Well it used to be ChatGPT, but I'm, I'm quickly being converted to Claude. I will say.

Speaker B: Okay. Okay.

Speaker A: I'm curious why I started using both a lot more and I like the results that I get and the more in depth analysis uh, I get from Claude.

Speaker B: Okay, cool. I, I just barely started using Claude a little bit more and I, I like it and I've used Chat GPT for a long time so I've, I've, I've wondered if I want to switch. The main thing that's driving that for me is um, so uh, going back to openclaw, up to this point most of the interaction that people have had with AI happens within an app. So within the Chat GPT app or within the Claude app. And uh, those agents can go out to the Internet and find information and like in, in um, remember a few months ago when I was like hey Melanie, try this, turn on agent mode in Chat GPT and have it go to your website.

Speaker A: Website, do some usability analysis. Yep.

Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. So that, that opened the door a little more to what AI can do and has, has access to. But still for the most part uh, the AI agents have been mostly Siloed, Yeah, into these apps. And then the, the next big development that happened from there that, that opened it up more so AI has access, uh, to do more things is when these AI companies started coming out with, with AI browsers.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: So, yep, yeah, like Chat GPT made Atlas and Perplexity made comment. And I, I, I've used Atlas for a few months now and I've been a big fan because it makes it so that Chat GPT can see whatever I'm seeing on a webpage and I can ask it questions about the web page I'm looking at. And then I can turn on agent mode and it can be doing things on that, on that page while I'm looking at it. Um, and so I think that's been really cool and it, it's expanded what AI has been able to have access to. But then as this always was happening over, I don't know, maybe like the last year or something, I've said, or six months, whatever, but I've said, uh, at some point AI has to be able to be at the, the way I described it was the operating system of the device, you know, like at the operating system of your computer, at the operating system of, of your phone. So that it's not just limited to an app and a browser, but it can, it can access all of the different applications, so it can do more. And I figured the way that would happen and this could still happen, we'll see. But I was like, man, OpenAI's got to be working on an operating system for computers and phones that are going to put AI, um, you know, at the heart of those devices because I'm built within it.

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker B: That's what, that's what Siri was supposed to be. But Siri is the worst.

Speaker A: Yeah, um,

Speaker B: you know what?

Speaker A: Siri, Sorry to digress. You know what Siri told me the other day, or Siri Alexa at home, she wasn't playing music, so I kind of, kind of got mad at her. And she said to me, I have enough digital attitude to power a server farm. And I was like, excuse me, why don't you start talking back what is happening right now?

Speaker B: Oh man, it's so funny that you bring that up because. Sorry, I, um, just, just this morning I was, um, I was chatting with my, my Open Claw bot and it was, it was saying something really, really funny, uh, that I was telling, uh, my co founder Harmon about that and he was like, yeah, Claude was like sassy to m me the other day and I was not happy about It. So yeah, like what if, what if, what if AI ends up becoming like uh, a moody teenager and it's like no, not gonna help anyway. But yeah, so what openclaw, um, the reason that's really exciting and, and there's some other alternatives that are like. So OpenClaw is an open source program. It's a uh, some people call it a harness or it's like a framework for AI. So it's not a model itself, but it's this full framework that AI operates within that you install on a computer. So then it has a whole computer to work from which then, which then opens up its capabilities. Um, way more than just being siloed into it.

Speaker A: Then it's essentially anything that it can access, right?

Speaker B: Yes. Yes. Yeah. So it's pretty crazy. So OpenClaw is an open source project for that and it's, it's got a ton of developer support. So it's almost, it seems like it's going to become something like. I almost think of it as like a, you know how WordPress is, is the most popular CMS in the world.

Speaker A: Okay.

Speaker B: And it's got this huge, huge backing with, with developers and uh, it's almost like not that openclaw is a content management system, but it's kind of that same sort of feel in terms of

Speaker A: potential influence or becoming a go to for. Yeah.

Speaker B: Yeah. So there's been ever since openclaw has come out and made this huge splash, um, AI companies are responding with their own similar solutions like Perplexity came out with a new solution called Computer. So Perplexity Computer and Claude um, has come out with, with Claude Cowork and, and um. Yeah. But for those that are running uh, Open Claw, it's, there are some security concerns because it can do so much and so.

Speaker A: Yeah, watch out.

Speaker B: Yeah. So the best, the best practice has become that you don't install it and run it on your own computer. You, you buy it its own computer.

Speaker A: Oh wow.

Speaker B: Yeah. And so Mac Minis have become uh, the go to device for that because they're cheap because there's, there's no screen, there's no keyboard, there's, there's no, there's no trackpad. It's a high quality Apple device. And so you buy a Mac Mini and you install OpenClaw on that Mac Mini and then you basically can create your own AI agent, kind of like

Speaker A: your own environment in a way. It's like.

Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. Are you a Star wars fan?

Speaker A: No, not really.

Speaker B: No. Oh, uh, dang it. All right. Well I was gonna make a reference for those. For anyone listening as a Star wars fan. It's like when anakin is building C3PO like his own protocol droid.

Speaker A: I'll take your word for it.

Speaker B: So anyway, all that background to say, um, here's my Mac Mini.

Speaker A: Okay.

Speaker B: And uh, uh, so a creative thing that I'm working on right now that I hope is going to produce really awesome results to go with it is I, I spent probably way too much time uh, over the weekend kind of geeking out over this. I was up till like 3am on Friday night, um, just setting this up and then a large part of Saturday. But it's so cool because like one of the first thing that I'm working on with it is uh, so Metrify's run about 135 A B tests so far on credit union websites. So we've got all of this great data that's sitting there but we've never, and they're all sitting in Google Drive folders. But we've never turned that into a good public facing content to publish somewhere. And there's, and part of the challenge is just like throughput producing content. And so yeah, so what I've set up is first I fed it all of the data from 110 of those a B tests and it, it churned through all of it. But then what makes openclaw and these other new agents special is you know how right now like in Claude or ChatGPT, it's like prompt response, prompt response. And if you want to keep getting responses for the most part you got to keep prompting it with a few exceptions with these new AI frameworks like OpenClaw, you, you can give it a long running job. Uh, like here's a job and it will do the job and then it will know in its memory what it did and then it will wake up again later and loop through the job again and again. Well, um, it has like sessions, uh, okay. And so, and so it will end a session because um, AI has limited context windows. If it just keeps running on one thing forever, it will uh, eventually get too much in its context window and it loses context for what it's doing. And there are cases where uh, you want a task to be done by like a separate session or a separate sub agent because uh, so, so what I, what I'm doing with this is so it's got those 110 AB tests that it now knows about and said all right, every, every, I've got it every five hours Right now just for initial test and like token usage because CLAUDE gets kind of expensive. Right. Um, so I've just got like the uh. For these initial tasks I'm just on the Claude $20 per month plan. And so I've kind of spread it out every, every five hours. Kicks off a new job where it goes in, looks at one of the AB tests, it writes an article about it and then stops. And then a second sub agent is spawned that doesn't have any. It's not the one that wrote it. So it's like separate. It does an adversarial review of the article and gives feedback.

Speaker A: No.

Speaker B: Yeah, but it's a separate.

Speaker A: And it insults the other agent.

Speaker B: Yeah. And it's. Yeah. It calls the other agent ugly and then it, and then it. And then it goes to sleep and then a third wakes up and uh, takes the initial article and takes the review and doesn't edit and then it's ready for a human review after that. And so uh, we should be able to get about 5 articles generated from a B test data every day. Um, so I'm, I'm pretty excited about that because.

Speaker A: Yep.

Speaker B: I'm hoping that will also. It's going to help us in our, in our marketing like to be able to. Because uh, just being able to, to publish at a higher volume and it's, and it's, it's not just AI making up stuff to write about. It's actually based off of our, our data set. So um, anyway, that's a, that's something I'm really excited about right now where it's, I'm having so much fun with the creativity perspective but I can also see you know, the performance aspect there.

Speaker A: It's so, it's so fascinating to me just in this short period of time how like we've gone from like uh, AI as a tool to like teammate. And then there's this transformation aspect and not everybody's in the same place, but it's really just fascinating to kind of.

Speaker B: Yeah.

Speaker A: See everything evolve.

Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. It is. Where I, I hope this ultimately ends up going is like treating it like an AI employee.

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker B: And I actually, I actually want to. We're just in initial testing right now, but my hope is that

Speaker A: we uh,

Speaker B: can, we can make geo. So I know you know what that is about Generative engine optimization for anyone listening, basically make that autonomous with, with a human in the loop.

Speaker A: Sure.

Speaker B: So yeah. So I'll let you know how it goes.

Speaker A: Can't wait to hear more about it. Yeah.

Speaker B: Yeah. Well, for Credit unions or banks or anyone that's listening when they're thinking about this concept of art versus science, creativity versus performance.

Speaker A: Yep.

Speaker B: What, what's the one thing that you would invite people to do as a result of. Of thinking about that and trying to, you know, make something actionable that's, that's going to sure make a difference for them.

Speaker A: I guess I'll say one concrete thing and then one more just kind of guiding principle that I've been thinking about a lot. Concrete thing is talk to talk, talk to people. Talk to your members. If you haven't in a while, just go. And it seems so simple. Like, just go talk to them. Like, I think most you'd be surprised just what you hear, what you learn, how it helps you level set. And then the second thing is more just been one. I'm just kind of more of a mindset thing, I think around just this kind of transformation. Everything is transforming, which is. Is one thing. Like transformation. Yes, but without differentiation, that just accelerates sameness. So how do we transform? Continue to differentiate at the same time so everything just doesn't become same?

Speaker B: Ah, I love that we could do another whole podcast about differentiation, because that's something I'm passionate about. And we kind of touched on that. When I talked with, uh, your CEO, Chris Allen, we had, we had a, uh. He's awesome.

Speaker A: Good, good, good.

Speaker B: Um, and I'm not just saying that because, like, I don't know Chris, if you're listening right now or not, but, um, yeah, he's, he's great. And, and uh, I think differentiation is so important for financial institutions.

Speaker A: I think it ties back to what we talked about and tying the creativity and data together, how that's how we can do it.

Speaker B: I agree. Well, thanks for coming on the show. On the show, Melanie.

Speaker A: Always enjoy talking and ideating with you.

Speaker B: Same.