Action COACH St Louis West

Action COACH St Louis West Helping business owners in St. Louis, MO grow profits, build better teams, and reclaim time. Let's turn your dreams into measurable success! 🚀

09/03/2026

Small and medium-sized companies should really focus on who you are hiring and why you are hiring them.

Large enterprises freezing hiring in the fourth quarter gives them an excuse not to rehire and move it into next year.

That is a very different decision than yours.

When you are a company of ten and you hire one more person, that is a ten percent increase in your workforce.

A bank can automate a process and get rid of 400 people because they have 25,000 people working for them.

Most small businesses are trying to scale, and it is a much more intimate customer relationship.

If the hire is out in the field, they are generating revenue with a truck every day.

If they are in the back office, ask what job they are actually going to do.

Keep growing and keep hiring, because people still need services at the local level.

In small businesses, the phone either rings or it does not.It is five calls at one time, or there are no calls for two h...
09/01/2026

In small businesses, the phone either rings or it does not.

It is five calls at one time, or there are no calls for two hours.

And you cannot hire somebody to sit there and cover the overflow for a couple of hours a day, so those calls go unanswered and that customer moves on to the next company until someone picks up.

That is where I have implemented AI with clients, and it works because we go through and train it first.

The bot sounds just like you or I.

It asks the questions, it gets their name, address, phone number and email address, it validates their address, and then it gives you a message to call them back.

Then a human being calls and says, hey, I heard you are at 123 Main Street, and I understand you have the following problem.

Are you available next Tuesday for us to send somebody out there?

That to me is the best way to use AI.

Some big companies have gone in and eliminated their whole online support groups, so it is AI and a chat bot and you are lucky to ever find their phone number.

That is not the way to implement AI.

Use it as a force multiplier to answer the phone and get the basic information, then let your people close the relationship.

Where in your business do calls get missed most? Share your thoughts in the comments below 👇

08/30/2026

You are going to blame a system that has ones and zeros.

It is only doing what you told it to do.

Before you replace the software, go check what you asked it to do in the first place.

08/28/2026

Define the use case first, and do not just run out and get an AI tool.

That is the biggest thing I can tell everyone.

Small businesses today are very confused about what to use.

Do you use Copilot? Do you use Perplexity? Do you use ChatGPT?

Then layer on top of that, a lot of the systems they are already using have AI built in.

So we write the use cases up, and then we go look at the software.

It is really what do I want to do, and why do I want to do it.

From there we map out how you can get that done, and hopefully we find one or two tools that will do almost all of it.

Remember, AI is the least intelligent it will ever be today.

What is the one task you would hand off first? Drop it in the comments 👇

I would be very careful about raising prices, and I would be even more careful about who you raise them on.I would incre...
08/26/2026

I would be very careful about raising prices, and I would be even more careful about who you raise them on.

I would increase prices on the new customers who come in versus the recurring ones.

Then you can move the existing ones up CPI plus one, or whatever is reasonable, and most people would agree with that.

What happens is businesses really hold back on doing that.

Their costs go up, they do one inflated price increase, and it hands them to your competitor who is the startup in your market.

If you just send a letter and an email out saying products are going up three point one percent and services are going up two point eight percent, most customers will not even think anything about it.

But go from an eight ninety-five appetizer at happy hour to eighteen ninety-five after, and it is really surprising when you walk in there.

People are willing to pay a fuel surcharge, because they know it is going to come off at some point.

What they are not willing to absorb is being moved up too fast.

Your margins go up, and you lose the customers who stayed with you.

Take the intellectual rigor against the decision before you send the letter.

How do you handle annual price increases with long-term customers? Would love to hear your thoughts in the comments 👇

08/24/2026

About eighty-five percent of all businesses are small and medium size.

People still need services and products at the local level.

Whatever the enterprise headlines say this quarter, that floor is not moving.

You have to get it into a repeatable process.That means people under you who can get the work done, people who are fixin...
08/22/2026

You have to get it into a repeatable process.

That means people under you who can get the work done, people who are fixing the processes, and people who are driving it.

That is when private equity or other investors are actually looking to invest in you.

Until then, be cautious when people come selling magical formulas.

Could your business run for a week without you? Share your thoughts in the comments below 👇

08/20/2026

Be real sure that when you are using AI, you are using it in a strategic manner and you know the effects of doing that.

Some big companies have gone in and eliminated their whole online support groups, so it is AI and a chat bot, and you are lucky to ever find their phone number.

That is not the way to implement AI.

In small businesses, the phone either rings or it does not.

It is five calls at one time, or there are no calls for two hours.

So use AI as a force multiplier.

Let it answer the phone, get the basic information from the customer, and set up a callback as soon as you are off the phone.

Keep using it for the graphics, keep using it to expose your business, but be careful when you are trying to replace people with AI.

Where have you seen AI used well in a small business? Share your thoughts in the comments below 👇

Go look at the processes you have before you turn anything on.It is not the people there who are doing things wrong.It i...
08/18/2026

Go look at the processes you have before you turn anything on.

It is not the people there who are doing things wrong.

It is people not being familiar with the process that was set up.

You may have had a vendor set it up years ago.

Do the root cause analysis and fix those steps, and once you fix the step it works wonderfully.

Wishing you all a Happy 4th of July!Be Safe and Enjoy Your Family!🎆
07/04/2026

Wishing you all a Happy 4th of July!
Be Safe and Enjoy Your Family!🎆

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O'Fallon, MO
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