Today, I wanted to talk about how I am using AI to conduct business for my coffee company. You maybe say to yourself “Oh great another AI article!”. I agree with you that talking about AI is being over done but today I want to reflect on the struggles I am facing with my business and me using AI to assist me overcome these obstacles.
Time is the essence
My time is very valuable to me as there is not enough time in the day for me. Somethings that people without a disability do faster like typing. Do to some spasticity in my left hand my typing is slower as I use a one hand typing technique. I admit I am not to big on dictating to the computer for some reason I get the satisfaction of typing it out. Perhaps, it is me being a hands on person with the projects I do and feeling my creations come to life.
Not to long ago I spent all day planning and typing out something that was on a delicate subject I had to carefully execute for Marquette Coffee. I remember that night Jennifer catching me up at 3am writing it. That moment I said I could have used ChatGPT to write this as a regrettable moment in my life. As it could have saved me tons of time and help me keep a good balance between work, responsibilities at home, my family. I believe that day I neglected a few honey to do things because of that letter I was writing.
Do not want work to be my life
Another interesting fact you may not know about me. I work fulltime cleaning medical facilities or offices. Then coming home late night to work on things for my business as a way to kick my feet up after being on my feet all day at my fulltime job. I also have very limited time to work on things for Marquette Coffee in the morning as I often have to sleep in because of me being up late and me being physically tired or on the days off I have spend all day catching up on things for my business. With these time constraints leaves me finding ways to get things done efficiently.
The One Man Circus
When I started Marquette Coffee. I started it with one U.S. dollar. That is right, one dollar! The internet and technology has made it so easy to start a business but maintaining a business costs more than one dollar. This caused a bit of a challenge to overcome because I for one didn’t have a starting fund for it and still face this to this challenge to this day. The lack of initial funding has limited me on the purchasing power of Marquette Coffee. With that said I have to manage everything from accounting, sales, to marketing. Out of all my tasks marketing is to time consuming. I really need an assistant to help me with many of the tasks. Due to available resources I cannot hire people. I cannot find services willing to work with me or work 2 hours a week for a reasonable rate as those 2 hours could mean a lot of return so I can increase their hours. As last resort I was like ok lets utilize ChatGPT to help me do copy, research subjects I am in need of help with, etc. It turned out to be the best solution. I can ask it to do anything and it is cost affective.
It Is My Illustrator
Lets start to say I am an entrepreneur not an artist. I do not have a artistic illustrator bone in my body. The software and service has opened the door to illustrations I could have never obtain with out paying thousands to make such a creation as you see above. It also has helped me create the new blog series “Coffee Expeditions With Ben Aventurero” a campaign to educate, entertain, and encourage people to explorer our selection of products.
DAL-E being integrated into ChatGPT is a game changer! Though has some drawbacks and thought to share a tip that could save you some frustration. ChatGPT has taught me in probing the prompts that ChatGPT has created for DAL-E the attempt to prevent text that detracts from the illustration. DAL-E has a tendency to symbolize text so you should instruct it not to use symbolism text when generating images.
Conclusion
I will always advance my operations using technology helping me increase efficiency. As ChatGPT and other technology evolves I would take the time to explore the options it provides to make things easier and productive. With my background in web development I so want to jump on board with advancing technology but I hesitate as I know that my life and wife will suffer from the experience of the long hours developing. On the other hand AI can help me with coding efficiently. Making the idea tempting as I have some tools to make my day easier and maybe a source of income.
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