The "Oh Shit" Moment: When AI Finally Clicks for Nonprofit Consultants
"It shifted from the category or bucket in my head of an extra tool that's maybe fun to play with to, oh, if I don't start learning how to use this tool, my business will suffer." - Brooke Richie-Babbage
Ever roll your eyes when someone tells you AI will "revolutionize your business"? Yeah, our guest Brooke Richie-Babbage felt the same way. She was firmly in the "I don't need some tool to write weird poems" camp until one conversation completely shifted her perspective.
Now? Brooke has built an AI-powered business advisory system that's replaced expensive professional services, streamlined her financial reporting, and gives her marketing insights that used to take days to compile. And she's doing it all without becoming a tech guru or spending hours crafting perfect prompts.
In this candid conversation, Brooke pulls back the curtain on exactly how she went from AI skeptic to power user, sharing her specific systems for training custom GPTs that actually know her business, understand her clients, and deliver actionable insights she can trust.
Whether you're curious about AI but haven't found your use case yet (hi, Jess!) or you're ready to move beyond basic content creation, this episode breaks down practical applications that can actually transform how you run your consulting practice.
Highlights:
Stop starting from scratch every time. Brooke's custom "Business Advisor" GPT is trained on 15+ business frameworks, her specific goals, and detailed customer insights—so it gives advice that's actually relevant to her business model.
Turn raw data into actionable insights. Those monthly P&L reports and Google Analytics downloads you avoid? Brooke uploads them to AI and gets comprehensive business analysis in 15 minutes instead of spending three days doing it herself.
Your clients need this too. The same AI systems Brooke uses for her own business are helping the nonprofit leaders she works with get strategic insights without hiring expensive consultants or drowning in spreadsheets.
Training matters more than prompts. Forget perfect prompt architecture—the real game-changer is giving AI the right knowledge base to draw from, whether that's business frameworks, customer feedback, or your own proven methods.
Timestamp summary:
[00:01:31] - Introductions and the "floodgate moment" - when AI finally clicked
[00:02:47] - Brooke's transformation from AI skeptic ("I don't need some tool to write weird poems")
[00:03:41] - The Pat Flynn/Rick Mulready conversation that changed everything
[00:04:28] - First practical win: Using AI for ad hooks and email subject lines with Jackie
[00:07:05] - Cindy's breakthrough moment with Tarzan Kay's program and Claude
[00:08:05] - Moving beyond "perfect prompts" to knowledge base training
[00:09:35] - Jess's perspective as the skeptic who hasn't found her use case yet
[00:13:09] - Brooke's #1 use case: AI as a business advisor trained on frameworks
[00:15:32] - How to create a custom GPT business advisor (the 3-document approach)
[00:18:00] - Why training matters more than prompts - the pattern recognition explanation
[00:20:44] - Custom GPTs vs. regular ChatGPT conversations
[00:22:38] - How many documents to upload when training GPTs
[00:25:00] - The customer report GPT: Understanding your audience through AI
[00:28:00] - Replacing $700/month reports: AI as CFO and CMO
[00:31:26] - Monthly financial and marketing analysis in 15 minutes
[00:32:27] - What's next: AI tools for nonprofit clients
[00:34:03] - Cindy's exploration of automations and "pocket coach" concepts
[00:36:31] - Learning resources: Rick Mulready, Gemma Bonham Carter, and more
[00:38:24] - Using AI to write difficult emails and other practical applications
[00:39:00] - Next steps and potential follow-up sessions
Resources Mentioned:
Connect with Brooke
Brooke’s website: https://brookerichiebabbage.com/
Find Us Online: https://www.confessionswithjessandcindy.com
Connect with Cindy:
Cindy Wagman Coaching: cindywagman.com
Fractional Fundraising Network: fractionalfundraising.co/
LinkedIn: ca.linkedin.com/in/cindywagman
Connect with Jess:
Out In the Boons: outintheboons.me
TRANSCRIPT:
[00:00:00] Cindy: Welcome to the Confessions podcast. I'm Cindy Wagman.
[00:00:03] Jess: And I'm Jess Campbell. We're two former in-house nonprofit pros turned coaches and consultants to purpose-driven organizations.
[00:00:11] Cindy (2): After years of building up our separate six figure businesses from scratch, we've thrown a lot of spaghetti at the wall and have lived to see
[00:00:19] Cindy: what sticks.
[00:00:20] Jess: We're on a mission to help other nonprofit coaches and consultants looking to start or scale their own businesses past the six figure mark by pulling back the curtain.
[00:00:30] Cindy (2): Whether you're still working inside a nonprofit and thinking of one day going out on your own, or you've been running your consulting business.
[00:00:37] Four years. You understand that working with nonprofits is just different. We're giving you access to the business leaders who serve nonprofits as their clients, you know the people who
[00:00:49] Cindy: truly get it.
[00:00:52] Jess: No more gatekeeping, no more secrets. This podcast is going to give you an inside look at what running a [00:01:00] successful nonprofit coaching and consulting business looks like.
[00:01:03] Basically, we're asking people how much money they make. How they get paid and what has and hasn't worked in their businesses.
[00:01:11] Cindy (2): Listen in as these leaders share their insights, their numbers, and the good, the bad, and the ugly. When it comes to building a nonprofit coaching or consulting business, we're gonna empower you to make the power moves that give you the income and freedom you set out to create from day one.
[00:01:28] You ready? Let's go.
[00:01:31]
[00:01:31] Cindy: Yay. We are here with the one and only Brooke Richie Babbage. our dear friend and co-conspirator collaborator. and we are talking and AI user. And yes, we are talking, we're talking about AI today. Brooke messaged us a little while ago saying, Let's talk about this. Yes. So we finally managed to get her on the podcast.
[00:01:57] Hi Brooke.
[00:01:58] Brooke: Hi. I'm [00:02:00] really excited to talk about this. As my text indicated, I was like, we gotta do this.
[00:02:05] Cindy: Yes, we do. And we actually haven't really talked about AI in our businesses on the podcast yet. So this is a, this will be a good intro. Yeah. I'm, we might have alluded to it, but maybe even not. So let's start with, like Brooke, I'll tell you about my experience, which was like, I was like, eh, eh, eh.
[00:02:26] But then when it clicked. Yeah, it opened the floodgates and I was like, I get it now. Yes. Like I was like, this isn't working for me. And then it did. Yes. And now I understand how to make it work. Everything. Yeah. So I wanna know, what's your like floodgate moment? What was that moment where you're like, oh
[00:02:46] Brooke: yeah, okay.
[00:02:47] No, that was. 1000%. My experience, I was actually, I'm not gonna go so far as to say disdainful, but I was definitely one of those people who's okay guys, like I don't need some tool to like, write weird poems and do cat [00:03:00] images. Like I don't care. And and the three of us have talked about this with Ria and Rachel and everything.
[00:03:04] There are a lot of things that can be distractions for me. I listen to a lot of podcasts, as you guys know, in other spaces and. There was one podcast in particular with this guy Pat Flynn, that I've been listening to for years, SVI, and he had Rick Mulready on who was in the process, right? You guys are nodding of making a transition from being a business coach and I'd followed him as a business coach to just focusing on AI and there was one specific podcast conversation where basically Pat Flynn said what you just said, Cindy, which is.
[00:03:41] I didn't care that much about chat GPT or Claude. Like it was fine, but I didn't use it. And so Rick, you're one of my best friends, walk me through why I should care as a business owner. And there were like five points that Rick already made and they were just exactly what I needed to hear and how I [00:04:00] needed to hear it.
[00:04:00] So that for me in particular, chat, gpt which is the tool I use the most. Shifted from the category or bucket in my head of an extra tool that's maybe fun to play with to, oh, if I don't start learning how to use this tool, my business will suffer. that was the shift for me. And after that, I'm all in, the Virgo in me kicked into gear and I was like, okay, I gotta learn this.
[00:04:25] I gotta make sure, that I'm understanding how to use it as a tool.
[00:04:28] Cindy: Now there's a difference between understanding intellectually that this is important and it's an important skillset and, versus like actually using it. Yes. In a way that has worked and has saved you time. Because I think that's also the, when we internalize that, okay, so what were those first experimentations or things where, or what was the first output where you were like, oh.
[00:04:54] That's good or that's useful, or that saved me time.
[00:04:59] Brooke: That's a [00:05:00] really good question because I use it so differently now. Okay. Fair. I think, which I'll walk through, but I think Yeah. The first thing for me, and your point is exactly right. And actually, I just wanna pause for a minute. I think one of the biggest challenges that a lot of the folks that I talk to, both in the nonprofit space and just in the sort of business space that we're in have is people tell them how they should use it and it just isn't a fit for them.
[00:05:23] And so they're like, okay, then I don't really need the tool. and so other people may use it in ways that just don't, aren't relevant to me. And that could feel like a, could create some dis dissonance for me. The first thing was I was. Using, I was part of this program. I know Cindy, an agency in your pocket with Jackie and around ads.
[00:05:46] And Jackie was the ads coach, and she pulled up her screen and we'd been trying to come up with a hook. And I am not great at writing hooks. I know I'm not supposed to narrate negative things about myself. That's not a [00:06:00] strong suit of mine, subject lines, hooks. And so I was really, I'm very literal.
[00:06:04] I'm a lawyer, I'm a Virgo. And she literally pulled up her screen and just showed me, she pulled up chat, GPT, and she's like. Here's how you talk to it. And this is a year and a half ago. early Chad bd. Here's how you talk to it so that it's your voice, it's your content, but it's giving you back ideas.
[00:06:23] And my mind was blown. I was like, this is amazing. And it took, I don't know, four minutes and the hook worked. Like it was one of the best performing ads I had for months. And so from there I started doing that with email subject lines. I would literally just give it my email and say, give me 15 subject lines.
[00:06:44] What I want the subject line to do is this, this, and this. And I would say, Nope, I don't like any of those. They're too clever, or they're too boring. And I would just go back and forth. And so my first use case was very tactical and very specific.
[00:06:58] Cindy: Love it. [00:07:00] I know for me that like first time I actually got it to sound like me Yes.
[00:07:05] Was the changing point. So I did a program with Tarzan Kay. Who Yes. is hilarious online, but I really like her writing, and where she's talking about, 'cause she has such a distinct voice. I was just gonna say she, and she's saying yeah, I use ai. I was like, wait a second. Yeah. Show me your secrets.
[00:07:25] And so I did it for 500 bucks and I was using Claude, I still love Claude. For writing. And I was like, I use Claude to write all my email newsletters now and sales letters and all that kind of stuff. And I was like, whoa. It sounds and people love it. People are like responding to my emails.
[00:07:46] Yep. and so I was like, okay. Now what?
[00:07:50] Brooke: Now what?
[00:07:51] Cindy: yes. Yeah. So now, so this is working, this is interesting.
[00:07:55] how do I get, what do we do next? Yeah. And the one thing I'll say before we [00:08:00] dive into that, is I remember when I started, everyone was like, it's all about the prompts.
[00:08:05] It's all about the prompt. Architecture. Yeah. Architecture. Yeah. And I was like. that's not how my brain works. I do not want to sit there crafting the perfect fucking prompt because then you're like, I might as well just write the email. Yeah. that's nots not helpful for me at all. And now you've like everyone.
[00:08:25] the people that I'm following are basically like, yeah, we're progressed past the prompt. Yes. So yes, you have to feed a good information. And in my experience so far that good information has been in the training of it, or Yes, exactly. Just like the knowledge base that has it has access to.
[00:08:42] and now I'm like literally exploring how else can I use this in my business? and which is what I texted
[00:08:48] Brooke: you about. I will say, and for those listeners for whom this resonates, I am not one of the people who's like always looking for new things to add to my business.
[00:08:59] Cindy: [00:09:00] No,
[00:09:00] Brooke: so that's not me.
[00:09:00] I'm not like tech forward in any way. I'm not afraid of it, but I'm not like I have the newest iPhone, whatever. And to Cindy's point, once I realized that there's, there are like 20 rabbit holes you can go down. And I start to hear, this will actually make my business more cost efficient, more time efficient.
[00:09:24] Like when you start to say that to me, then I'm willing to be a little more tech forward. And get past whatever discomfort I have because I want to do what I'm doing better if I can. Yeah. Yeah.
[00:09:35] Cindy: Okay. I wanna create space for the people who are less on board. And I know Jess, I feel like you're like.
[00:09:45] Intellectually onboard. But you haven't found that use case that unlocks it for you yet. You're like, not opposed to ai, but you're like this, I have no evidence that this is helpful for me at this point. Is that fair? And can I just think [00:10:00] one
[00:10:00] Brooke: thing before Jess answers?
[00:10:01] Cindy: Yeah.
[00:10:02] Brooke: I have made it one of my life's missions in 2025 to get Jess to love AI or chat GPT in particular.
[00:10:10] Yeah, I just. that's one. I, it's
[00:10:13] Speaker 3: like I want you to make that because Yeah. so I am not one of those people that like I think that you are super smart and talented. I think that you are super smart and talented and you're both here telling me like how amazing this tool is, right?
[00:10:29] Like, I'm not. A person that needs convincing that this can and it's just to date it
[00:10:36] Brooke: how, yeah,
[00:10:36] Speaker 3: it, I haven't had the use case, so that was like such a helpful example because every, we all have our gifts and talents and like I, ideation is not the thing I struggle with writing fast or good copy.
[00:10:49] And you are, yeah. It's just not so many people.
[00:10:52] Cindy: Sorry, go ahead. but I know that I'm,
[00:10:53] Speaker 3: I know that's like a unique. Thing. I can't tell you how many, that's why people pay me is because they don't [00:11:00] No, that's right. Don't want to, they can't do what I can do. That's right.
[00:11:03] And just to date, it hasn't been faster or more creative or replacing me yet. and I don't
[00:11:10] Brooke: think it will, but I don't think that's gonna be your use case. Like, content isn't the thing you need it for.
[00:11:15] Speaker 3: Yeah. And so I need examples of the other things, which is why I'm so excited to talk to you, Brooke.
[00:11:19] And I also think that If anyone listening has done their Clifton Strength Finders My number one strength is activator, which means if it's slower than me. Yes. I am going to get frustrated because I'm just faster than the thing. So yeah, I need, like today I was actually just listening to a podcast on my walk around how using ai, can help you grow an agency.
[00:11:45] And the way that they were talking about it was. Like nothing to do with content, nothing to do with writing. Yes. Yeah. it was all these other systems and workflows and automate, which is the actual stuff I'm terrible at. So I'm like, [00:12:00] yes, if I could figure out how to do all that, my life would be so much better.
[00:12:04] I just need someone to like either aid do it for me. Because the way I feel about AI is the way I feel about ads. Like I don't wanna get good at everything. Do you guys feel like that? And you shouldn't?
[00:12:15] Brooke: you shouldn't get good at everything. That's not what you,
[00:12:18] Cindy: don't you have to be kind of competent?
[00:12:20] Like it's actually not that hard to be competent once you understand it. Yeah, the question. So I think for me personally, I like to understand how things work so that when I offload it to someone else, me too, that I know that they're doing the right things. Like one time I had someone do Facebook ads for me and I was like, she didn't set up conversions and I was like.
[00:12:43] Ooh, I fucking know you're wrong. Like that's, yeah. That's ridiculous. That's my biggest fear is yeah,
[00:12:49] Brooke: the whole like delegate. I'm a very good delegator. I do not wanna be an expert in everything. Yeah. But I need to know enough to know if I'm to know that you're not fucking enough. Yeah,
[00:12:58] Speaker 3: yeah. Exactly. yeah.
[00:12:59] Because [00:13:00] we had let's do it though. Let's talk. Prove
[00:13:02] Cindy: it to me. Okay. So Brooke, let's start. What's your like favorite use case right now?
[00:13:09] Brooke: so can I actually just walk through the ones that I have and then we can dive in wherever, yeah. Is most interesting maybe to Jess. Everyone love it. So I definitely use it for content.
[00:13:19] I will talk about that last because I think that's what we hear the most about. The first way that I love using, and I mostly use check GPT, and I'll talk about some other ones, is as a business advisor. I used deep research, which is one of the tools in chat GPT, that just pulls up information at much greater depth.
[00:13:44] It's like a, it's like just an amazing research assistant. So I use deep research to create these really robust book summaries and framework summaries of business models that I really admire. So these could [00:14:00] be. taking, for example, Tarzan Kay as a business person, or Dan Martel or Alex Hor. Mariah K is someone that I followed, Tamsin Webster.
[00:14:11] Cindy, did you wanna
[00:14:12] Cindy: Yeah, I wanna ask. Oh, so do you have the book that you feed to chat GPT yeah. Or is this using information on the internet?
[00:14:21] Brooke: It's so deep. Research will pull from all sources that it can, so I, these are not books. I've read most, many of them, but they do not have to be. for example, Dan Martel has like so many books.
[00:14:31] I've not read all of them. I like 10 x is better than two x. But basically I started with, and I use a prompt generator that I've trained to help me with prompts. 'cause I don't wanna spend time on prompts. I'm like, look, I wanna understand, I. Some of the best and most effective business frameworks and models for solopreneurs, right?
[00:14:52] People who do not wanna big build, build big teams. I'm not like I describe my business model, I'm like, what are the books that I should read? And it gave me [00:15:00] like 12 of them. I was like, great. Okay, chat GPT now give me really robust. And I got 10 to 20 pages. Summaries, detailed walkthroughs of each of these books.
[00:15:13] I was, I said, pull out the frameworks. Walk me through as if you are a college professor trying to help me understand this. Or an MBA. And then I took those summaries and I will admit I did not read them because that is not the point. Go. That is not the point. I do not need to be an expert. I did not get my MBA, I got my law degree for a reason.
[00:15:32] I li I just. Downloaded them and then put them right back into chat. GPT and I trained a GPT and it's called my Busin Business Advisor. I trained it on those frameworks, and then I created a two page Google Doc where I brain dumped my own personal business goals. This is how much I wanna raise or bring in.
[00:15:51] These are the things I like to do. These are the things I don't like to do. I don't want a big team. Here are my marketing goals, all of that. I train. I uploaded that, and [00:16:00] then the last document that I added. And I'll walk through. How I did this too is a really, I keep using the word robust. I'll think of a different word, a really detailed customer report, like who my customer is.
[00:16:16] I also use chat GPT to create that, and I'll talk about that in a moment. But those are the three core pieces of information that I train this business advisor on. And the way that I use it is because it knows me. It knows what I care about. It knows what I, I don't wanna build an agency, I don't want a marketing department.
[00:16:34] it knows who my customer is. Now I can say to it, Hey, I am thinking about doing this kind of launch, or. I'm really stuck with this, or I tried this campaign, and I'll upload the emails from ConvertKit. I ran these emails and it didn't work. my goals, you know what I'm trying to build, the best, you're the best business advisor in the world.
[00:16:56] Give me some sense of what went wrong, what I might tweak, et cetera. So [00:17:00] I can really use it as a coach and advisor, in. In both small and big ways. So that's one of the most exciting, and I would say most effective ways that I've used it. And because it's trained on my business goals, I don't have to worry about it trying to advise me on building a marketing team or give me strategies for people who have, a 15 person team, which I know the three of us have talked about a lot.
[00:17:25] Not everybody's trying to do what you're trying to do. And so that has been really effective. Yeah.
[00:17:28] Speaker 3: can you give an example only because again, like the skeptic in me Has also heard about chat, GPT, like it doesn't think on its own. It basically pulls information and aggregates information is my understanding of it.
[00:17:42] And so like how do you. Assess that the advice is sound.
[00:17:49] Brooke: So I like that you used the word advice. I call it advice too, but If I give me 15 [00:18:00] frameworks. Then ask me to analyze those frameworks and say what they have in common and what the patterns are that I see.
[00:18:07] I can do that. I'm pretty good at that. It's going to take me a very long time. chat gpt looks for patterns and analyzes patterns like that. So it's giving me advice, but it's. Not thinking. It's looking at, and this is why what you train it on is very important. If I just go to chat gpt and say, with no training and none of the documents they gave, what do you think I should, what went wrong with this marketing campaign?
[00:18:36] Or What do you think I should do for my next campaign? It's gonna draw on things that aren't relevant, but if I tell it, these are the frameworks that I want you to analyze. Look for the patterns that are most likely to lead to a successful campaign based on all of the data that I've given you and tell me those patterns.
[00:18:57] That's what we're calling advice. So [00:19:00] it's pulling information and organizing essentially patterns in ways that tell me what is most likely to be true given what it has analyzed.
[00:19:13] Cindy: And is that.
[00:19:14] Brooke: Human
[00:19:14] Cindy: brains are not that different from that. Like we, it just does what we do. But faster Creativity. Yes. Yeah.
[00:19:21] Creativity is not necessarily creating new things. the margins of creativity. Maybe most of it is putting things together in different ways or Yes. pulling from past experiences to inform new things. And so I think exactly, and
[00:19:35] Brooke: you can ask chat, GPT, and I think I got this from you, Cindy.
[00:19:39] 'cause we were doing one of the coaching things I have often said with this business advisor. Tell, walk me through why you gave me that analysis. And it'll say, your business goal is this, and you have said that you have a very small team and that you get your data from the, it'll walk [00:20:00] me through and it makes sense or it doesn't.
[00:20:02] And then if it doesn't, I'm like, do it again.
[00:20:04]
[00:20:09]
[00:20:09] Cindy: Biggest thing is you have to give it the knowledge base That's right. That you want So. Whether it's the books and your brand and your business, like Yeah, I, and a lot of how I provide that knowledge base is through custom GPT.
[00:20:25] So I create, so this is my custom. Yeah, exactly. So you're not just like starting a random chat with chat GPT, you're saying like you're actually creating your own. But exactly. And then its draws on that space. Here's all the things, but then you go back to it over and over again. Yes. And you don't have to retrain it.
[00:20:43] And at large.
[00:20:44] Brooke: Yeah. And to your point, Jess, so I think about, for example, some of the professors that I had in law school that, or graduate school right, that had read, I did a lot of anti-poverty work, right? And so one of my professors, for [00:21:00] example, might have read everything by William Julius Wilson, right?
[00:21:03] Who is just like one of the leading sociologists of the 20th century. And this professor is the expert. On this person has read everything, so if I ask him a question about. urban poverty in the 20th century. He knows he's read, he's thought, he's analyzed. What I'm doing with chat GPT is I'm saying you are an expert on these 15 business frameworks, which is more information than a human can hold.
[00:21:29] But it's to Cindy's point, it's what a human does. I'm going to this chat GPT, and I'm saying you're the expert. On these business frameworks in the same way that my professor was an expert on urban poverty. And I'm gonna ask you some questions, and you're gonna draw on your expertise. You're gonna draw on the facts that you know, and give me information based on those facts so that, the training matters, right?
[00:21:51] You have to tell it what you want it to draw on. and then I'll go into the customer thing. If you give it information. Not wrong information, but if you give it [00:22:00] information that you don't want it to draw on, you're not going to get quote unquote advice that is relevant. If I'm just like, tell me what the best businesses do, it's gonna draw on like Amazon and,
[00:22:09] So that, so I'm very particular about who I train it on.
[00:22:12] Jess: And when you all are training your GPTs, like you could go down a rabbit hole, right? As far as like uploading. So like How, what's a good reference of number of things you're inputting and again? I understand that you continuously add to it so you, especially if you're trying to train it in your voice, but if you're just trying to get it going, are you pulling five things?
[00:22:37] Are you doing one
[00:22:38] Brooke: thing? So that depends a lot on what you want the GPT to do. To do. I don't. Tend to add a lot more unless I'm training it on my voice and I'm giving it examples. Once I've trained the GPT, I don't find the need, at least the way that I use them to like constantly be adding them.
[00:22:59] I have, so [00:23:00] this particular business advisor probably has, I dunno, 10 documents that I've trained it on.
[00:23:06] Cindy: But yeah, I would agree. Like I, so I'll give you a different example. I use one for curriculum development for my. Signature program, which is being renamed in the next year. so what I've trained on, so first of all, I have one, it's called like a brand book, but basically it's like My business. Yeah. It's a really big document that goes in every single custom Yes. GPT. Exactly. Project and Claude. Yep. And then from there, it depends on what it needs. So for my curriculum. Assistant. I have my past curriculum, which I had my actual VA take all the transcripts and create a big document from that.
[00:23:51] They're probably, anyways, but because it's such a big project, for me it was worth doing. So I had, I have all the past curriculum [00:24:00] and then, I take transcripts from our office hours so I know and understand what people are asking to make sure that either it's in the curriculum, 'cause maybe I missed it, and I can ask, I can say based on office hours, what's missing from the curriculum.
[00:24:15] Where do I need to add? And then also, going forward, because I'm tweaking some things, like we, we now have a new outline and so I have that outline, so it has like a summary of the curriculum. And then from there I'm literally like, great, let's create a lesson. And it does be. Purpose, the outline of the lesson, resources.
[00:24:36] And then I'm like, great, let's actually create that resource for me. Yeah. And it will create the resource based on all the things that it knows. So that's an example. That's not a business strategy, one of The kinds of information that it needs. And it's all based on my program.
[00:24:52] And
[00:24:53] Brooke: so I have a similar one that is this, and I mentioned it in the business advisor. And this is [00:25:00] similarly Cindy, a document that goes in everything. It's a customer report. And so I, and to your question, Jess, this is one of the gps that I am constantly adding to, so I do coaching calls with the folks in my program and they're all recorded on Fathom.
[00:25:17] And so every week I add. Two, my trained GPTI have two, one that is a coaching call minor, and it just goes through the coaching calls so that I can identify the core questions that keep coming up. just across like these are the core questions, core pain points that. Even if I'm reading through, back through the transcripts, which I don't, in any meaningful way, I might not see the connections, but I have it look for core questions, core pain points, aha moments.
[00:25:52] So things that people that I've worked with, and these are both my group coaching and my one-on-one clients and [00:26:00] onboarding calls that I do and. Email exchanges and Slack exchange. So anytime I'm getting information from the people that I work with, I upload that to chat GPT and I'm like, help me understand what they need to hear about, where they're getting stuck, what is and isn't working.
[00:26:21] and that becomes the content for my podcast that becomes the content, for my coaching. I. Absolutely. We'll go back to the people that I work with and say, this keeps coming up in different ways. You're talking about it in these different ways. So that is one way. The other thing that I did, and this is just a core document that I upload, I, adjust every quarter, but it's this core customer report and I had chat GPT look back through all my coaching calls.
[00:26:49] I take applications for my program. So I get a lot of information about like where people are stuck and. I had it create this report. it's a [00:27:00] comprehensive customer audit. It has core themes and challenges. Outcomes and motivations, emotional and psychological language. So what actual words are people using?
[00:27:10] That helps me understand what they're afraid of, what they're afraid of, that they're not articulating in that way. So that document then goes into everything that I train because in order for tat to give me. Advice, it has to know who I'm trying to connect with and what I'm trying to do. And so that document I do keep adding to and I adjust every quarter.
[00:27:32] I wanna just highlight one or two ways that I use it that are not about, advice. So one of, so I. Really love reports. I like understanding what's happening in my business. And before I started using chat GPT for this, I would spend three days at the end of every quarter doing it, like looking at my numbers, blah, blah blah.
[00:27:56] So I use, I have a CFO [00:28:00] project in chat, GPT. So there's a train, GPT, and then I also just have these monthly CFO reports. chief finance officer reports. I. Upload my p and l from 2024, so for the whole year, broken down by month. It's just a PDF that I have. And then every month I upload that, my monthly cashflow and my transactions, which I use Kick, but some people use QuickBooks or zero whatever, just raw data.
[00:28:28] I upload them and then I have. Model report. Basically it's the same. So I just cut and pasted in chat GPT, and I say themes, comparisons year over year, comparisons quarter over quarter and month over month. Where am I over and underspending, how strong is my core business framework? So you know, what is my net profit?
[00:28:48] What is my gross, how is that comparing to where I was last year? Where are there red flags? which parts of my. Product offer suite are [00:29:00] the strongest, and where have are their dips? Which campaigns have been the most successful? So those sort of finance reports. I will say I used to spend $700 a month to have my bookkeeper and my sort of finance firm produce those reports.
[00:29:16] This is not $700. This is free. And they're really helpful, right? So within it probably takes me 15, 20 minutes to upload because I have the standard report. Within 20 minutes I can look and say, oh, I've been thinking my sales are going down, but actually sales from the core product that I care about are going up.
[00:29:37] Like that analysis is really helpful for me. The second way that I use it is, and we talked a little bit about this at your summit, Jess. I also use it as a chief marketing officer, so I run a monthly report looking at my email campaigns, my podcast performance, Google Analytics for [00:30:00] Traffic and LinkedIn, and that's just Shield Does that ConvertKit?
[00:30:06] Again, I just download the raw data. I don't do anything with it. And then I get these reports on best performing and worst performing themes, right? Best performing and worst performing, email campaigns and what they have in common. And because chat GPT is trained on this really in depth like 20 page customer report, it can say, based on what you trained me to understand about.
[00:30:34] Who you're trying to connect with and help with. It's not surprising that these four themes did really well. When you talk about this theme, it falls flat because actually it's interesting to you, but it isn't speaking to any of the core desires that you've, so it helps me to understand at that level, I look at traffic comparisons, so where's most of my traffic coming from?
[00:30:59] I will [00:31:00] tell you, I hate Google Analytics. I find it to be. Very overwhelming. And so being able to download the raw data and just put it in chat GPT, and basically say, what do I need to understand here about what's working and what isn't? It does an SEO report which keywords are working and not, and it's all in 15 minutes.
[00:31:18] And so I get this business information that then helps me lean in where I need to lean in and not.
[00:31:26] Speaker 3: Okay. That sounds amazing.
[00:31:28] Brooke: I know. I'm like, I need a video walkthrough of that.
[00:31:30] Speaker 3: I was gonna say,
[00:31:31] Brooke: what's your training? I just send you the prompts. It's literally I just cut and paste the same prompt every month.
[00:31:36] Speaker 3: I know and just 'cause like when you're talking right now, like I do that, like I. Manually, not manually, but like manually. Not just for me but for my clients.
[00:31:45] Brooke: Exactly. No, it's been really helpful for the nonprofits that I work with, teaching them how can you look at your quarterly finance reports and I try and teach them about KPIs and their eyes glaze over 'cause they're just like, that's so much work.
[00:31:59] not if [00:32:00] you use chat, you take Absolutely. Totally.
[00:32:03] Cindy: okay. 'cause we don't have that much time left. and we literally could talk about this for days.
[00:32:09] Brooke: Oh, I have so many more that I use.
[00:32:11] Cindy: Okay. Wait, I need more. I need more. I know we're gonna need to have a whole like workshop on this, but what are you most excited for next?
[00:32:20] What is the thing that you're working on building or exploring? using ai. In your business. It's
[00:32:27] Brooke: absolutely how I can help the nonprofit leaders that I work with integrate AI into their work. So I've been creating, I actually have already created a number of custom GPTs just for the nonprofit leaders that I work with.
[00:32:42] So I have a lot of folks, again, in the ops space, that, or that are overwhelmed by ops and they don't have the money to. Hire a whole ops team. They don't have a CFO, they don't have, so I'm taking what is working in my business and creating these very [00:33:00] specific, usable GPTs that the folks in my program can work with.
[00:33:05] And the other way that I'm, the other thing I'm really excited about is, and I think often about you, Cindy, I have so much curriculum content and one of the things that I have been playing with and it's working really well is how can I. Make it easier for the folks that I support to use the content I'm giving them.
[00:33:28] How can they get from a, to the transformation that they want more easily using ai where I do that thinking for them. So there's content, curriculum, and then instead of giving them a worksheet, there's a GPT. Instead of giving them, it's like a prompt. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Or a prompt or GPT. Just a lot of folks are trying to figure out how to get their board engaged. I'm like, here's a GPT that will actually give you an agenda and content that you can send your board based on your impact report. So I'm just trying to help create tools that make the [00:34:00] nonprofits that I work with make their lives easier.
[00:34:03] Cindy: Yeah. Love it. What about you, Cindy? Just same question back to you. Yeah. So I'm exploring automations more. Yeah. So how I can have my hands off Yes. Of things. Honestly, my biggest hurdle right now is knowledge base creation. I wanna try find some help to take all this information that I have in various places and put it into something that is easily allows me to create these different use cases.
[00:34:32] That's right. and yeah, so automation. And. Also, like I've been exploring this idea of I call it a pocket coach, where I have coaching clients that I've worked with for a long time. Hanney is one we all know, where I can like, feed it all of our old transcripts and like Slack messaging and see if it can replace me. So far I've heard
[00:34:53] Brooke: a lot about people trying to do that.
[00:34:56] Cindy: Yeah. So far I can't, which I think is good. Yeah. Yeah. like [00:35:00] I tested it with a client, but like I hear people talking about. preparing for a client meeting. So being like, it has all, all of the history and I can be like, what do I need to ask Kel about?
[00:35:13] what do I need to follow up with her about? or check in. And it could be like simple, like, how did that pitch go? Or it could be like, how's your dog? Because last week or last session we spoke about your dog who needed surgery or whatever, right? Like that kind of memory. I find very intriguing.
[00:35:34] so I'm looking at that as well. Yeah,
[00:35:38] Jess: the possibilities are just I know, so endless and yeah. I guess too, like I think, I love that you two are like a hundred million steps ahead of me because, like I can tell you both have fun playing in this space. Mm-hmm. And I think that is a requirement to be
[00:35:57] On the forefront or cutting edge, [00:36:00] I'm less interested in that. So I'm super happy to just take what you all figure out and then apply it to my business.
[00:36:08] Brooke: Do you know what I mean? I will say I am, I do have fun because I like thinking about systems, but I am nowhere near the cutting edge. it's almost everything that I just shared with you.
[00:36:21] I got from someone like I have a, okay, well let's end on,
[00:36:24] Speaker 3: let's end on that. Like where do you two learn from in this space? Because I like, you wanna go first? I don't know anything. Sure.
[00:36:31] Cindy: So I have to say it's been a little random and haphazard for me. so really Tarzan Kay was the first, and this is not what she teaches.
[00:36:39] Someone else actually teaches it with her. Rick Mulready program I am enrolled in and I'm actually about to cancel 'cause I. Feel I've gotten most of what I can from it. I just, there's one more section that I wanna learn, which is around automations.
[00:36:54] Brooke: yeah. He's big into the with make.
[00:36:55] Cindy: Yeah.
[00:36:56] Yeah. So that's the thing I have on my list to do this week. [00:37:00] Gemma Bonum Carter, I think is name I'm obsessed. Yeah. She has
[00:37:03] Brooke: the AI Dream team, which is where I get a lot of money. Yeah.
[00:37:06] Cindy: Yes. I just, invested in that. And yeah, I'd say that's where I'm at right now. and there's still so much, like she had an online summit where she was like, have an affiliate bot.
[00:37:19] So when you have a program launch with affiliates, you can have a bot where they can be like, help me write an email or help me do, yes. you know what, remind me what the bene, what the deadlines are, and you have this spot for that. So I, there's so much to create there. That, that's where I'm at right now, just wading through all the content.
[00:37:38] Brooke: All right. How about you, Brooke? Yeah, Rick Gemma and my business coach is a woman named Maggie. She is, I. She just keeps pulling back the curtain on how she integrates AI directly into her business. And so that's so helpful. Things like, there's a certain kind of ad that I run called, power content, which is just very high level called [00:38:00] audience, educational.
[00:38:01] I now have a GPT that just creates the ad content for me. and. So I just get a lot of really great ideas from her. Oh, and Rachel, one last thing, so I know we have one more minute. Rachel gave me a really great idea about how to use chat GPT to write emails that I'm afraid to write. if I have to say no to someone, or like I don't quite know how to tell them that what they wanna do isn't gonna work.
[00:38:24] So little things like that. I'm just trying to absorb very concrete ways to make my life easier. Love it. Love that. Okay. I should try something. Yes. I'm gonna send you my prompts for my like CFO. Yeah, yeah. Please start there.
[00:38:41] Jess: Please. Or your marketing reports. And the marketing reports. Yeah. Yes. And I should, because I'm such a good Guinea pig again, because I'm like, again, a hundred.
[00:38:50] Steps behind both Cindy and Brooke on this. And so if anyone is in my kind of preschool play area, and [00:39:00] you're like, curious but not sold, let us know. And I really appreciate this. I'm, I think, Brooke, you should come speak to GPT, about, I would love that. Or do an over the shoulder session where you like, bring your screen up and show us, because that's the other thing, I'm so visual that I like, hear what you're saying and then I'm also like logistically step by step, how does that work?
[00:39:22] Brooke: Yep. and I think it would help people see how quick it, yeah. We're using a lot of words to describe something that's actually like a two minute quick. Yeah.
[00:39:30] Speaker 3: Totally. so yeah, we might have to do a round two. I'm in. Okay. thanks Ru for opening the door to all of this. I, this is a great, I love that this is your mission.
[00:39:42] We, you've got seven months, six and a half
[00:39:45] Cindy: months. I we're on it for progress, We, yeah, we should totally dedicate a day to AI building. Yeah, we're in Montreal for sure. Retreat. Yeah. Yeah.
[00:39:55] Speaker 3: Okay. Very cool. It was
[00:39:56] Cindy: so great talking to you ladies. I
[00:39:57] Speaker 3: always
[00:39:57] Cindy: love seeing you. Alright, have a great [00:40:00] afternoon.
[00:40:00] Speaker 3: Bye. Bye.
[00:40:01] Cindy: Thank you again for listening to the Confessions podcast for nonprofit coaches and consultants. If you enjoyed today's episode, which I sure hope you did, you can show your support
[00:40:13] Speaker 7: in one of three ways. Number one, post a screenshot of this episode to your Instagram stories or LinkedIn profile. And text Cindy, India and I so we can repost you.
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[00:40:48] See you next time.