How I'm Using AI to Grow My Global Emcee Business
Last week, I emceed the main stage of the inaugural DPW conference in New York. It's the most influential procurement conference in the world created by Matthias Gutzmann Herman Knevel Mark Perera, and your girl was front and centre hosting it.
The theme of this year's conference was 'Putting AI to Work' and through dozens of experts speakers and panels, the 700-strong audience discovered how AI might be change the procurement landscape over the next 5 years.
It was reassuring, in many ways.
There's a lot of fear-mongering with AI. Sensationalist headlines will have you believe that AI is taking away all our jobs and threatens the world as we know it. I was watching Bill Maher on Friday and Dutch historian Rutger Bregman said - and I'm paraphrasing here - that ultimately AI is the capitalist ideal, as we can finally free ourselves up to discover the meaning of life while robots do the work.
Now, I don't think the robots will totally take over.
I do think, however, there's an exciting opportunity with AI to free us humans up to do more creative, big-picture thinking, when we're not so bogged down with a mountain of admin and dull tasks that normally suck our time.
Perplexity can do in a few minutes things that used to take me all day - really because there's not in my zone of genius.
Take my emcee business.
The bit I love is being on stage connecting with audiences. I bit I love less, like many entrepreneurs, is all the work is takes before and after a speaking engagement to drive the business forward. The research, the admin, the outreach that saps my creativity and, frankly, my love for doing it.
I'm excited for what AI can do for my business, mainly because I'm excited for what it can take off my hands.
I want to be presenting as much as possible. The days that I'm not presenting, I try to focus on 'Revenue Generating Activities' for my business. AI helps me identify and streamline those activities quicker, so I still have time for hot yoga in a day.
For some reason using AI has become this hush-hush shameful thing, and we're all meant to pretend like we're not using it for our business. I'm not sure why that is - I like the opportunity it offers me as a business owner. I saw Alex Lieberman writing today that 'AI is the ultimate leveller' and I love that. We're all being encouraged to work a bit smarter now.
So, without further ado, here's how I'm currently using AI for my business (and where I choose not to do it). I will update this list as time goes on, but here's my current rota:
For Research: Perplexity
I'll be honest, I'm not a big 'cold outreach' person.
My vibe generally with work has always been to do a great job, post regularly on social media and be clear with your personal brand, and the right opportunities will find you.
However, moving to a new country wiped the slate clean for me, and I really had to build up momentum again understanding what the big players in the event scene were here in New York. I used to spend hours researching events, event planners and speaking bureaus online, and now I do everything so much quicker using Perplexity. It's currently the only platform I have the paid version of, and it's worth it's weight in gold. Cut my research time in half, couldn't love it more.
For Testimonials: CapCut
I edit all my video testimonials for my website using CapCut. I also use Descript more for Instagram content and tend to flip between the two. Big tip here: ALWAYS get video testimonials on the day of a speaking engagement, saves you the follow-up on email and much more likely to get glowing words when it's fresh in their mind.
For Transcribing + Meetings: Otter.ai
This platform makes it super easy to transcribe videos into text in seconds. I'll use this if I'm repurposing a video interview I did into a blog post, or want a written testimonial from a video. I also use Otter.ai for prep calls before events, especially if I'm getting to know speakers and use the transcript to write panel questions.
For Research: Google Notebook LLM
Before a big event, I'll always deep-dive into the topic and the latest research. I'm fairly topic agnostic as an emcee - I host everything from tech events to women's leadership - so I make sure to really do my research before hand. What I love about AI is it allows me to learn in a format that works best for me and multi-tasking better - recently I've been loving turning my research into a podcast using Google Notebook LLM and listening to it on a lunchtime walk.
Where I'm not using it:
Maybe controversial, but I don't use to ChatGPT or any AI software to write for me. I just don't love the way it writes - I like it's always a bit obvious and sounds robotic.
I know, I know, it could save so much time.
But as a journalist by trade, I actually enjoy the writing process and how it helps me put my thoughts in order. I used Perplex to write a small amount of copy for my website as I'm testing it for SEO, but I'll probably replace that in time as it doesn't sound like me. Just a reminder to make AI work for you - you don't need to use it for everything! Quicker doesn't always mean better.
Would love to know: how are YOU using AI for your business?
How I can help you: I'm New York's leading emcee, moderator & host for AI, tech & finance conferences, panels and events. If you're putting on an event and need an engaging host, let's talk: angelica@angelicamalin.com
Check out my website: https://www.angelicamalin.com/
