Rolan Reichel, Founder and CEO of Arrow AI
Rolan is the founder and CEO of Arrow, a company that leverages artificial intelligence to manage social media posting and boosting for solopreneurs and small businesses. With over 10 years of experience in online marketing and advertising, Rolan has built audiences of hundreds of millions for some of the biggest brands and people on the planet including Ford, Ryan Seacrest, and Microsoft.
Rolan’s mission is to enable people who hate marketing to be great at marketing, by providing them with a simple and effective solution that generates new leads and frees up their time to grow their business. Rolan is also passionate about social welfare and food justice, and serves as an advisory board member for Food Forward, a PBS documentary that showcases the stories and solutions of food heroes across America.
When not in front of a screen, Rolan is usually hanging with family, camping, being just “meh” at tennis, imaging himself as a fantastic chef, eating out, and being in love with his wife.
About Arrow AI
Arrow AI automatically posts business content for the cost of a large pizza each month.
Powered by Artificial Intelligence, Arrow will save you an average of 6.5 hours per week posting on social media profiles while boosting your business’s visibility and credibility. Plans start at $9.
Table of Contents
Where Did Arrow AI Begin?
“Doing Social” the Right Way
How Does Arrow Work?
How is Arrow AI Different?
What’s Next For Arrow?
Rolan, thanks for joining us. We’ve had some interesting conversations lately about where we are in the AI adoption life-cycle overall and more particularly by solopreneurs and non-tech enabled firms.
While ChatGPT (in partnership with Microsoft) and Google’s Bard battle it out for dominance in the “Generative AI” space, Arrow is one of a number for firms that is using AI in a different way, and we’re excited to learn more about that.
You also come from a heavy marketing background and define Arrow as a top-of-funnel tool. We look forward to learning more about your target audience and the value proposition Arrow delivers.
Now let’s get to the good stuff…
Where Did Arrow AI Begin?
Q: What was the inspiration for Arrow? If it were a comic book character, what’s its origin story?
A: Wow! The inspiration was really how I grew up. My parents were the “OG” hippy generation in Austin, Texas. Long hair, VW bus, the whole thing and they had a small store called “Under the Sun” where we sold leather goods and jewelry they made by hand! I lived in that shop, so I understand small businesses and how important they are.
Q: A lot has changed in 5 years. Back then the potential of AI to disrupt or dis-intermediate business and life as we know it wasn’t really talked about outside corporate circles or “futurism” news articles. Now we have grade school kids submitting AI-generated homework…What has changed about your original thesis? What is the same?
A: Not much has changed from our original vision, which is to automate the type of work that is time consuming and low value. The big change is now with AI, the front end of all these tasks can be conversational, which is pretty awesome. Our users really don’t need another SaaS platform in their life, ya know?
“Doing Social” the Right Way
Q: We’ve written about the challenges and benefits of social media as a top-of-funnel in the past. In the SFP consulting practice, it’s not uncommon for firms to come to us who have paid tons of money to agencies or used lots of internal labor hours “doing social” without ever getting meaningful economic benefit. Using a Facebook business page as an example, what are the characteristics from a sales funnel perspective that would lead you to believe that a company is doing it right?
A: This is great question and the answer depends on how you see the value of content.
Our philosophy is that there are 2 buckets of content:
- Important but relatively low value content. This is product information, brand story, industry news, sales and promotions, informative posts that need to be done every day in a constant stream. The benefits of posting this content daily are increased visibility, credibility and searchability (how easy it is to find your business). This content is more about awareness and not direct sales but is a requirement.
- High value content that drives revenue. This includes big promotions and offers backed by ad budget, direct communications with customers. This content is high stakes, high value and needs a lot of attention, especially for businesses that want to grow FAST.
Arrow handles #1 so that businesses can focus on #2.
Q: So why don’t more companies “do social” correctly?
A: Lots of reasons but most of them relate to being human. A lot of business owners are intimidated by social or feel it has to follow a formula. There are some tips to being successful, for sure. And if you are looking for high volume scale and growth, then understanding the algorithms and cracking the code becomes super important. But for millions of businesses who just need a nice, steady stream of customers, the rules are less important than being off the bench and in the game which means posting every day.
Arrow’s message is relax, have fun, let Arrow make it great!
Q: With solopreneurs and lifestyle businesses, there are even more challenges to making social media a strong top-of-funnel source of business. What are the unique challenges there?
A: I think the key is see it as a requirement, like the way you need an “open sign” in the front of your shop. The challenge for these businesses is time. The average small business owner spend 6.5 hours per week or 16% of their total work schedule posting content on social media business profiles. 16%!!!
Professor’s Note
A solopreneur is a person who sets up a business, of which they are the sole employee.
A solopreneur is both the owner and the workforce of their business.
Q: How does personality influence success in social media for small business? Do certain types do social more naturally?
A: The thing about personality is that we all have one, which is cool! Just be yourself, be authentic. Let your personality come through and you will be fine.
How Does Arrow Work?
Q: With your wealth of knowledge, you set out to build an AI solution to solve the problems mentioned above. How does Arrow work?
A: The value proposition of Arrow is super easy. Posting on business profiles is a requirement but time consuming. Arrow connects to your business’s social media and posts every day.
Arrow is 80% AI and automation and 20% social media experts, so every post is perfect and 100% customized to your businesses.
Arrow will post sales and promotion, informative and educational, inspirational type posts plus automate your reviews and blogs into social media posts as well, all for the cost a few large pizzas every month.
Professor’s Note
A common finding when we audit sales funnels that start with organic social is that posting is lumpy.
A bunch of posts come out in a very short period of time and then there is silence on the airwaves for weeks or months.
Blocking and batching social or using a too like Arrow is great to put some structure in place.
Q: What was “training” your AI like? What are you training it to do better in the present?
A: Training involves feeding the AI with social media content which is limitless. In some ways, we have to be more careful about what we don’t put in versus what we do.
How is Arrow AI Different?
Q: Social media schedulers have been around for quite a while. Hootsuite was an early leader. More recently, those tools have become embedded in broader software suites such as HubSpot. How is Arrow different from Later, Buffer, etc.?
A: You’re right! Those platforms are essentially posting and scheduling tools with analytics and the original market was marketers, that is, people who do marketing for a living.
Q: How do you set Arrow up?
A: 3 easy steps.
- Go to our website, www.getarrow.ai and choose the plan that is right for you.
- Fill out the onboarding form. It takes about 2 minutes and will help Arrow get to know you or set up an onboarding call. The more we train the Arrow team and tech, the better!
- 24 hours later, Arrow starts posting business content.
Yep, it is that easy!
Q: What networks does it connect to at present?
A: META (Facebook, Instagram), LinkedIn and Google Business Profile.
Q; We’ve watched dystopian movies for years where AI “takes over” from Terminator to The Matrix. There’s a lot of fear in the media, even calls to halt software development on next-gen AI tools until the regulatory side can catch up. To what degree does Arrow take over a client’s social media?
A: We don’t see Arrow “taking over” anything, other than taking off 6 hours a week of time consuming work. What makes Arrow different is that we are 80% AI and automation and 20% social media experts. Every post has to be perfect, no mistakes and we do that by having our social media team review every post that goes out.
Q: For a typical client of Arrow, how would you describe their social media transformation. Where are they at day 0, day 30, and day 90?
A: A new user typically see a 300% increase in engagement and reach within 90 days.
What’s Next For Arrow?
Q: Arrow is already a robust platform, but there’s plenty of opportunity to create even more value for clients. What’s around the corner? Any parts of the product road-map you feel comfortable sharing?
A: Yep, our focus at Arrow is rolling out a conversational interface. In the next 6 months, we will deliver on the promise of not having to log into anything, but rather direct Arrow through chat, text or even talk and Arrow will post on your behalf.
Q: Setting the purchase of an Arrow subscription aside, any tips or tricks you’d like to share with companies that are struggling with social media as a business driver?
A: Start today. Starting is always the hardest part.
Q: Lastly, we continue to develop our Sales & Marketing Jargon Encyclopedia to help lower the barrier to entry for young and foreign professionals to have success in related fields. What’s a term you would like to add?
A: “Value added content” this is where you as a business owner delver insights, tips, tricks, or just plain helpful information to your customers as a way to build your business.
