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#81 · How to Choose the Right AI Model for Your Automations

youtube ↗Agency Operations

How do you apply the principles from The Goal to a service agency or automation business?

The Goal teaches that a business is a pipeline of stages (marketing, sales, onboarding, fulfillment, retention). The principle of focusing on the bottleneck applies: identify the narrowest stage—right now it's sales—and invest effort to widen it. Improving the bottleneck by, say, 20% increases overall output by 20% (e.g., $100K -> $120K). Then move to the next constraint and repeat. This continuous bottleneck-widening drives growth.

the goalpipelinebottleneck

Related answers

youtube ↗AI & Automation

How do you develop AI‑based automation systems that businesses will actually pay for, and what process do you use to identify and build them?

Lead‑generation and client‑onboarding systems make up roughly 70% of my revenue, so I focus on those bottlenecks first. The flow is: generate leads, close the sale, onboard the client, fulfill the work, then retain the client with follow‑up. AI agents are getting better, but the real money comes from solving concrete bottlenecks, not fancy chatbots. My process is simple: look at an average business’s pipeline, identify the biggest bottleneck, and ask how you can do that step faster or better. I often reference the Theory of Constraints (see "The Goal" by Eli Goldratt) to frame this. Most bottlenecks are at the top of the funnel—lead generation—so start there. For each bottleneck, map what’s currently being done and brainstorm ways to automate or accelerate it. Specific tools help, but the core is understanding the pipeline and continuously removing constraints.

ai automationsystemslead generationprocess
youtube ↗Mindset

How would you apply systems thinking to scope a client's business needs and determine where AI automations fit, given that most businesses have five departments (marketing, sales, operations, customer support, finance)?

Systems thinking means understanding the whole system, not just optimizing one part. Think of your business as a pipeline: you put in leads (raw material) and get out money. The goal is to spend less to acquire a lead than you earn from it. Most people mistakenly focus on optimizing a single stage—like using AI to automate operations—thinking it will boost overall output. But if earlier stages (marketing, sales) are bottlenecks, widening later stages does nothing because you can't feed enough work through. The real improvement comes from identifying and widening the current bottleneck, wherever it is. In most businesses, the bottleneck is early in the pipeline—sales or marketing—because those are hard and often under-resourced. Once you fix that bottleneck, move to the next narrowest point and repeat. As for leads: sending DMs doesn't make them valuable; you need to stand out so your message gets noticed among the noise.

systems thinkingbottleneckpipeline
youtube ↗Agency Operations

How do you run a business through their own pipeline to understand bottlenecks?

I treat every lead‑gen method—whether Upwork, cold email, or organic social—as feeding into a Disco (discovery) call. On that call I ask why they responded to me, what the first and last touchpoints with their business are, what they’ve tried before, and what didn’t work. This gives me the keys to their kingdom, allowing me to run a consultative sales process. I also do quick research—like using ChatGPT to outline the average customer journey for a local HVAC business—so I can speak knowledgeably and make the prospect feel I understand their space.

discoverypipelinebottlenecksconsultative sales
youtube ↗Agency Operations

If you're running a marketing agency, what does your thought process look like and how do you structure systems to manage teams and projects?

All agencies share the same fundamental shape: lead generation at the top (via ads, cold emails, cold calls, etc.), which funnels into a sales event (typically a discovery or closing call). From there you onboard the client, fulfill the promised service, and manage the client—checking in on progress—before delivering the project, possibly with a revision cycle that leads to another transformation event where you resell them. I’ve documented this shape in the three automation agency sales flows and a roadmap to $25k/month automation that you can download for free. The real key to success isn’t becoming a top AI or automation specialist; it’s becoming a good business person who understands the container (the agency model) and what you put inside it. This mindset can be learned in a couple of weeks, and you don’t need to be expert at the specific service you’re offering.

agency structurelead generationfulfillmentclient management