Foundations of Generative AI Midterm
What is an informational interview?
"Coffee chat" to direct the "interview" to ask questions about their educational and career path, current or past positions, and the industry or field they are in
Customer mindset
"What's in it for them?" Internal customer focus = team members are internal customers Customer needs first Feedback and improvement
Harvard negotiation model
4 principles: separate people from problems, focus on interests, multiple options, use objective criteria Avoids the win-lose, lose-win, compromise, lose-lose, win-win scenarios
How much time does arecruiter/hiringmanager spendreviewing a resume?
6-8 seconds
Ethical considerations
AI biases (source data), human oversight (validity), data privacy, and devil's advocate
What is Gen AI?
AI systems capable of creating new content based on patterns learned from existing data
Chain-of-thought prompts
AI to"think aloud" and detail reasoning steps before final output
Model: Customer-centric approach
Active listening, data-driven insights using customer interests, customer-first culture putting customer at the center
Claude Sonnet
Advanced reasoning, coding assistance, data analysis
Value-based communication - key elements to contemporary selling
Articulating clear benefits and ROI
Proactive follow-up - key elements to contemporary selling
Maintain ongoing relationships
Additional negotiation concepts
Midpoint rule, lowballing, competition
Evaluators
More data orientated person who provides recommendations, analyses, and risks Ex: friend with allergies/restaurant pickiness
ChatGPT overview
NLP, content generation, problem-solving
Resume sections
Name, education, headers, context, skills section
Price-driven strategy
Offer lowest possible prices to attract cost-consicous customers Ex: generic-brand medications; private labels
Decision-making roles
Owner, evaluators, implementors
Competition
Play competition off of each other (or even perception)
Negotiating win-win solutions
Prepare/plan, anticipate, no negativity, listen and validate customer concerns, value the value proposititon
Transactional selling
Price-driven with ST customer engagement and limited post-sale follow-up
Meta prompting
Process of creating prompts that tell AI to generate its own chain-of-thought reasoning
Product VS. College marketing
Product decisions = shorter and sells a tangible product College decisions = longer and sells an intangible promise, engaging with stakeholders
Marketing Mix (4Ps_
Product, price, place, promotion
Ex of marketing mix: college marketing
Product: education Price: tuition/fees Place: location Promotion: marketing, brochures, social media
Marketing Goals (Reddit)
Reach and impression & engagement
Perplexity
Real-time web searching, research, data synthesis
What is networking?
Relationship building
Customer concerns - do I trust your company
Relationships based on respect / trust and how to handle pre-exisiting relationships with other suppliers
Context - prompt engineering
Relevant background information and context to guide AI Ex: xyz needs to be done/presented/written
Value creators
Sales people relate to the customer or tag team selling (bad cop, good cop) = CREATE VALUE
Drawing a scope map
Scope changes map (always start with scope)
Product marketing
Selling tangible goods with clear value by focusing on features and benefits
College marketing
Selling transformative educational experiences by building LT trust
Give and take
Sharing risks and benefits between client and company
Unique selling proposition (USP)
Something unique to the business like customer service priority
Anchoring
Starting point of ideal buyer WTP
Market segmentation
Strategic dividing of a massive market into specific consumer groups using demographic precision to gain a deeper understanding of consumer psychographic insights Ex (splitting): demographics, geographics, psychographics, behavioral
Sales management
Strategic team development (sales techniques), performance management (metrics), AI integration and training, compensation structure (incentives)
Targeting
Strategically selecting target audience through demographic tailoring dependent on assessment potential with brand LT marketing objectives
Foundations of business strategy
Strategy planning, SWOT, AI in market analysis
SWOT
Strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats
Decision mapping
Structured framework for analyzing and navigating complex business decisions to foster a SYSTEMATIC APPROACH
Targeting (Reddit)
Subreddits, interests, location
CustomGPTs
Tailored version of GPT designed to handle specific tasks or domains Helps bridge the gaps between generic AI responses and domain-specific expertise
6 components of prompt engineering
Task, context, exemplars, persona, format, and tone CT FE(e)T P(ic)
Hierarchical
Traditional, top down structure (pyramid) Structure: CEO/manager to supervisors to entry-level Ex: Microsoft
Leadership styles
Transformational: motivational Transactional: clear rewards/consequences Servant: well-being of employees Autocratic: centralized decision-making with strict controls
Focus on interests, not positions -harvard model negotiation
Understand the needs, desires, fears, and concerns of both parties
Value Creation (B2B)
Understanding total cost and creating lasting value -- total investments beyond price
How to meta prompt
Use ChatGPT-o3 model to create a CoT prompt and use ChatGPT-4o to attach and process files
Strategic prospecting - key elements to contemporary selling
Using data to identify high-potential customers
Scope of decisions
Vision, mission, strategy, goals, and objectives
Features
What "it" does = all about the business
Benefits
What "it" does for the customer = what the customers care more about "...so you can..." model
Collaborative negotiation - key elements to contemporary selling
Win-win solutions
ZOPA
Zone of possible agreement; Overlap in interests in a negotiation for the deal to occur Range where both parties could reach an agreement = range of max buyer WTP and lowest seller WTS Shifts perception of zone through anchoring
Format - prompt engineering
desired format of the output Ex: give this to me in table format, write me a report...
NotebookLM
organize and analyze data, generate insights, audio overviews
Tone - prompt engineering
set the tone for the content Ex: professional, informal
Lowballing
version of anchoring = lower ZOPA = benefit buyer, hurt seller
External customer
Customers = LT strategic assets Customer lifetime value over time, strategic partnerships for value-added solutions, and relationship investment (Needs, challenges, and growth opportunities)
Owners
Decision authority and accountability, makes the final decision responsible for outcomes Decides overall scope Ex: friend who initiates dinner plans
Task - prompt engineering
Define the specific task for AI to perform Ex: do xyz
Use objective criteria -harvard model negotiation
Develop a criteria that a solution or condition must fulfill
Competitive advantage
Differentiate company or service
Why meta prompting?
Efficient, customizable, and transparent
Value-driven strategy
Emphasize premium value through quality, service, and customer experience Ex: name-brand medications; luxury goods
Social media metrics
Engagement/rates: internal (awareness, community) Awareness: impressions (posts) and reach (people) ROI: CTR, social referrals (channels), conversion rate (sales)
Consultative closing - key elements to contemporary selling
Ensure alignment with customer needs This is NOT hard closing
Exemplar - prompt engineering
Examples of desired output Ex: do something to create a product such as....
Implementors
Executes and carries out the decision Ex: friend who makes the reservation
Social media's role in marketing
Expansive audience reach, direct engagement, community platform Consists of storytelling, influencer, engagement, and achievements (in some cases)
Internal types of sales
Features and benefits internally with investors
Example of features and benefits: Skidmore College
Features: campus, small class size, college town, liberal arts, business program Benefits: near Saratoga Springs, one-on-one relationships, education quality
Flat
Few management layers Structure: enables rapid decision-making Ex: Netflix
Separate the person from the problem - harvard model negotiation
Focus on the issues at hand and understand where the person is coming from like they are your partner
Marketing content (Reddit)
Focused on engaging users, using native content and articles
Resume basics
Formatting: clean, all the same, one page, consistent
Organizational structures
Framework defining how a company is organized and how its different department interacts
Types of organizational structures
Functional, divisional, hierarchical, matrix, flat. and network
Creating value beyond price discounting (Dunder Mifflin)
Give and take, USP, value creators, competitive advantage
Methods of negotiation
Harvard model, BATNA
Multiple options -harvard model negotiation
Have various solutions before deciding what to do
Persona - prompt engineering
How AI should behave as a persona for generated content Ex: act as a/you are a expert in...
Customer concerns - do I need your product?
Identify customer needs, match product solutions, and ensure satisfaction
Internal VS. External environment
Internal = company factors (culture, resources) External = environmental factors (competition, trends)
Relationship selling
LT partnerships with value-driven solutions and regular follow-ups/ongoing engagement Ex: pre-launch partnerships, exclusive access, regular performance reviews
Brand strategy
LT plan to develop brand identity and emotional connections by focusing on brand values
Marketing strategy
LT plan to reach and persuade target audience by segmenting and categorizing different needs and wants
External types of sales
LT relationships with LT sales cycles OR ST word of mouth/eat what you kill relationships
BATNA
Best alternative to a negotiated agreement; Alternative after the walkaway point where the deal dies (max buyer WTP or min seller WTS)
Midpont rule
Best predictor of
Branding VS. Marketing
Brand = promise and trajectory/big picture (macro - What is that promise and why? Marketing = promise to an audience (how) and tactics (micro)
Positioning
Brand differentiation through strategic messaging to articulate consumer value proposition
What are the different AI tools?
ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity, Notebook LM
Selling with features and benefits
Communicating the real value on why a customer should care = focusing on benefits too not just features
3 Cs in an AI leadership lens
Consumer trends, competitive innovation, channel/customer evolution
Future of AI in business
Continuous learning, job roles, AI-human collabs, multimodal AI
How can ZOPA increase without adjusting the price?
Could increase in marketing = max buyer WTP increases because seller increased investment into marketing
Matrix
Cross-functional teams with multiple reporting relationships Structure: CEO to manager to different departments Ex: Starbucks and Amazon
