Matthew Adam Smith Podcast Transcript
Matthew Adam Smith joins host Brian Thomas on The Digital Executive Podcast.
Welcome to Coruzant Technologies, home of The Digital Executive Podcast.
Brian Thomas: Welcome to The Digital Executive. Today’s guest is Matthew Adam Smith. Matthew Adam Smith is Founder and CEO of MAS Commerce, the world’s first consultancy, guiding retailers, brands, and platforms to simultaneously increase profitability and sustainability through AI and advanced tech.
He drives commercialization as board advisor for tech startups, Centric AI, and Gift Hint, and is a founding member of both the Retail AI Council and the Core Site Research AI Council. Passionate about social justice. Matthew co-founded Commerce Cares, a nonprofit uniting professionals within retail marketing and technology to drive positive change for our workforces, communities, and society at large.
Well, good afternoon, Matthew. Welcome to the show!
Matthew Smith: Good afternoon. Great to be here.
Brian Thomas: Awesome. Appreciate you making the time. I know traversing the globe. We just talked about it both Midwesterners, but you transplanted in New York right now. So again, making time zone changes. I certainly appreciate it, and so does my audience.
Matthew Smith: Yeah, for sure. I mean, I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t on calls with China, India and Australia. Oh, and the West coast today. So, New York’s a good sort of midpoint for that.
Brian Thomas: Yeah. If you’re doing global for sure. So, I appreciate it. And Matthew jumping into your first question here, your journey spans from leading advertising and marketing for iconic media brands to driving commercial trans transformation at Walmart.
And now founding MAS Commerce, what inspired the ship for media to read and retail to launching a consultancy focused on the intersection of profitability and sustainability in commerce.
Matthew Smith: Yeah, well, you know, I’m old enough and I don’t know if you are, but when I got into this racket I kind of fell into it because it wasn’t the kind of thing that you went to school for.
Right? I mean. I was in my undergrad just as I’ve got my 1st email address, you know, in undergrad and still use that username to this day. And, you know, advertising, even at that time was very, very upper funnel this performance marketing thing, you know, was really something that shopper marketing budgets, you know, took care of in the form of events.
This, this thing called retail media and you know, search and, and all this really, really increasingly, just, you know, data focused attribution models. I mean, what didn’t start there? I mean, I was sort of on the tail end of the, you know, the wheeling days, not, not quite mad men, but, you know, working for publishing companies like Conde Nast and Men’s Health and you know, great, great sort of transformational business brands like Wired and Fast Company always got to be on the cusp of like, Transforming, you know, sort of, iterating iconic media brand as it was changing platforms, like going from print to digital or going from digital to social or, you know, taking the whole brand apparatus and going mobile.
And so that was a really fun wave, and that was my door into Walmart to launch the retail media network. It was 1 of the launch leaders there. On the commercialization side, which was just thrilling, as you can imagine, I mean, the world’s largest legacy retailer trying to take a stab at what really only Amazon, you know, in the West had been doing using this massive data lake and trying to.
Trying to pull insights out of it that we could use right to help the customer and help the suppliers help the customer. And that was drilling in so many ways from just the shoulder to shoulder rubbing, you know, with talent the likes of which, you know, I have yet to see, you know, since those sorts of early days.
I mean. So much great talent that we plug from all the great media and technology companies and then bringing that into, you know, the world’s largest retailer. And thinking about how you create a brand-new innovation business in a legacy brick and mortar retailer, where the power centers are legacy power centers, right?
I mean, this is before Walmart merged the P and L’s. We had separate digital and store P and L’s. It was before the launch of the mobile shopping app, you know, as we know it today. It was before 2 or 3 site flips and, you know, you know, reskins and just total redesigns that we’ve done today. And so, it was really a thrill.
And then I got into e commerce more deeply. The last half of my tenure at Walmart being on another launch leadership team, but this time for the 3rd party marketplace. So really, you know, getting dirty and the problem of, well, how do you not just How do you accelerate and scale, you know, sales in the e com channel, but how do you do that across channels?
Right. For an omnichannel retailer, again, focused on the acquisition and go to market side. And so, the last few months, particularly the last 18 months of that stretch, I got really close to the e commerce community, you know, the sellers who had really, you know, staked their claims and made millions on Amazon, but also just this.
Growing and really already vast ecosystem, right? From technology players, solution providers, agencies, influencers, educators. At the same time, you know, as we were trying to scale and sort of come to parity with solutions like Amazon, AI was in the tip of everyone’s tongues. And, you know, it’s kind of funny.
Now, looking back, I mean, when I was at wired and fast company, our partnerships with Cisco and Intel and, you know, on down the list, we’re all about machine learning and the Internet of things. Right? And reaching that business decision maker and CTO kind of target. But I think a lot of folks in retail and certainly within the culture have really been kind of teased and excited by this new thing called.
You know, generative AI, ChatGPT know, or remember really that we’ve really been at machine learning for decades. Right? And so, I think being able to, you know, really work specifically on product market fit for some of Walmart’s latest offerings, right? Which is to say, use that voice and that ear on the ground in e-commerce and broader commerce and technology spaces.
You know, to figure out what are the new solutions that we can be bringing, you know, to Walmart’s offering and that invariably involved, you know, certain kinds of immediate use cases. Like, well, how do I port my catalog over from Amazon and, you know, do it in a way where I don’t have to hire a team of interns or a team of folks to work for weeks and weeks and weeks to, you know, get it over and optimize or, you know, how do I just create better imagery and scale it?
Or how do I just get really tighter on supply chain and making better decisions about where to source ingredients based on, you know, data about who we think is going to buy it and when and where and how. And so that just really got my, my wheels spinning. And so, after 5 years, they’re really being an entrepreneur within the largest company in the history of the planet and seeing it where this flexion point of AI is I hit the age of 45, which is the average age of a 1st time entrepreneur and said, you know what?
It’s been a real gift what I’ve learned, not just in the past five years, but, you know, in the whole career. And wouldn’t it be fun to kind of take this out and see what we can do with it. And so, yeah, MAS Commerce was, I think, the product of a moment in time and just a lot of, frankly, a lot of luck, also a lot of hard work, but just, just hoping and really excited to capitalize on what it is.
And what I think it is, is. Helping retailers and brands really get their arms and their heads around what is AI and, and, and not all solutions are AI. And that’s okay. Sometimes it’s just advanced tech. And, you know, how do we think really pragmatically and really use case specifically, right? About how we can get really, our whole organization around this and in front of it, and just really focus on where we can use AI and advanced tech to drive our business. And, you know, sort of personal passion of mine, not just in a way that drives profit, but in a way that also drives impact and impact is, you know, can be a catch all for all things, but a lot of it is sustainability focused.
So, probably half mission focused and passion focus as well as just an opportunity to take, you know, the great gift that I’ve been given over the past few years and apply to something super exciting, which I think is going to just radically transform the world and everything we all do.
Brian Thomas: Thank you, Matthew. I appreciate that. Love the back story. That always helps our audience. Every guest here has a unique story and you’ve obviously garnered a lot of great nuggets of wisdom over time, and have applied that in your new business.
Matthew Smith: So continued success on that portion. A lot of wrong moves to, you know, failing up or failing forward or failing fast as we say, right?
Brian Thomas: Absolutely! Matthew jumping into the next question here. MAS Commerce champions the simultaneous growth of profitability and sustainability in practical terms. How can retailers and brands leverage AI to achieve these seemingly divergent goals?
Matthew Smith: Yeah, you really stuck your finger on it there. I think we’re at a time where I hope coming out of a time where they really have been in kind of two camps, even a company as large as Walmart, which is just, I would say, an example of all large enterprises.
Sustainability typically doesn’t sit in the profit center, right? Or, or it’s not hardwired as a core business KPI. It tends to sit in places like corporate affairs or brand marketing. Constituent relations investor relations, you know, which is a place where. Companies can point to it and point to work they’re doing in it.
You know, oftentimes to, to virtue signal, I think to investors or to shareholders, certainly to end customers, right. That we care about this. We know it’s important to you, but I think the reason that it hasn’t really been hardwired is that there’s just so much data and there’s so many complexities and variables, right.
That go into. A sustainability outcome. Right. First of all, just defining what it is, right? What is carbon impact? What is water usage? What is energy usage, right? What is responsible sourcing? And, and then, you know, once you’ve arrived at some sort of a, a definition how do we push on it? And, you know, the tech just really hasn’t been there.
And I think that’s, that’s what we’re coming out of. And that’s, that’s the, the, the rationale and the, and the impetus for. Kind of staking our claim, you know, as MAS Commerce has in this duality between profit and sustainability, right? Or impact because there’s a lot of examples of where, you know, you’ve, you’ve had paradigm shifts in certain lines of business.
Advertising is 1, you know, where I spent time where, you know, for the longest time you know, legacy advertising relationships were based on an expected C. P. M. and expected level of brand awareness. It’s going to be produced and fast forward today. Retail media networks are stealing share left and right, and it’s because they own and command so much dexterity with this 1st party data, which just allows.
Suppliers, brands you know, agencies, solution providers, certainly retailers to get better and closer to the customer. Right? And that’s, that’s, that’s an important shift, right? Because sustainability, then, you know, for us, we have to, we have to make sure that, like, do we have the tech now to actually do the same thing with this other very big, important outcome?
Because until now, I think it was a giant math problem, right? That we couldn’t even attempt. And so, this is where I think I really unlocks the door for us because. You know, we finally have this tool, this technology that can really chew on the, the kind and the amount and the variability and complexity of data, you know, these inputs that are really critical.
I mean, if you say sustainability because we’ve been trained to think of that as a sort of marketing thing or a green thing, or sort of a, you know, do unto others, or we need to protect the earth for the future we’ve escaped the view that it really is about also. How do you sustain business right?
And how in an ecosystem, you know, in a culture where These standards aren’t going away. They’re only going to get stricter. Right? Governance is going to get, you know, greater. And I think the thing about our businesses, we’re not really here to argue, you know, the ethics or the morality or the politics, you know, around sort of where you fall on that equation as much as just acknowledge and recognize it’s where we’re headed.
Right? And any business that wants to be. Doing business in a profitable in the future. It’s going to want to be paying attention to these in a bigger way. You know, an example is like, if you had known you know, that Spain’s crop of olives Spain is 1 of the major producers in the world. If you had known that crop was going to be off by 50 percent last year, right?
As a result of climate change. You would have made a lot more in different business decisions further upstream, right? And you would have hardwired those into your approach to profit and margin. And so, I think there’s countless examples of that where, you know. I think we’re getting sustainability out of the back of the bus, because ultimately what lets us do is.
Really approach things from a posture of reducing waste, driving efficiency, driving productivity. These are all the hallmarks of a sound business decision that drives profit. 9 times out of 10. they also have really important and positive goals and outcomes when it comes to things like carbon, water, energy.
Et cetera, and so I think there’s, there’s a phenomenal opportunity to actually do good for business while doing good for the planet and for society. And for us to sort of raise all ships in that way.
Brian Thomas: Thank you. Matthew. I appreciate your insights on that. Really do. I know business is going to have to look, you know, in various directions to be successful and.
You know, sustainability also means staying in business, right? Exactly. Exactly. I appreciate the share. And Matthew switching gears, looking ahead, what emerging technologies do you believe will have the most significant impact on real retail and e commerce in the next 5 to 10 years?
Matthew Smith: Yeah, well, I like to start with a couple of quotes.
I’ll quote Stacy Shulman, who’s a executive SAP, who says, you know, when thinking about how companies should approach this don’t have an AI program, like, use AI tools to drive your existing programs. And that’s just, I think, alluding to this idea of we have this sense now that AI is this giant complex thing, you know, fully formed, very complex.
And now we need to go figure out and learn about it so we can use it. It’s actually the opposite, right? There are very specific micro slices of tech of tech, right? To be used. And you just need to start from your core KPIs and figure out, let’s not try to blow the ocean, right? Let’s try to focus on a few use cases.
And so, I think anybody who says they know what the next five years or greater, you know, version of that will be. Is getting themselves, but I think as a construct, the way I think about it is the near term being. AI and advanced tech tools that will allow us to do our existing things better, right? Faster or doing them in different ways or doing them with a greater efficiency, greater productivity at lower energy costs, et cetera.
Right? And then there’s the other bucket, which is really the mid to long term, which is where we shift from. Okay. These tools have been, like, giving us ideas about how to do things better. Now we move to automated decision making, right? Where we’ve sufficiently trained AI to the point where it can actually automate a lot of these tasks.
So in the 1st bucket, I mean, I think. You know, what you’re seeing in retail are again, the sort of what do I need to do to drive conversion and reduce you know, returns increase customer satisfaction. So, you know, use cases like better search results are training the algorithms to, you know, Mary.
Search inputs, and you’re seeing a lot of new releases from the search companies on you know, queries and prompt technology. That is more human language base. That’s a great example. You no longer have to sort of decide. Well, let me see. I want you know, red shirt in season. Now I can actually say, what should I wear to the party tonight?
Right? And, and it can increasingly kind of understand that. And so, Lily AI is doing a lot in that space, which is great. You know, I mentioned product listings and content optimizations. Infinite is a great company for just being able to send, like, 4 static images and it’s, it’ll spit out, you know, full rendering of your product, which is great and apparel and home where the more the customer knows about your product, the more likely they are to convert and the less likely they are to return.
Right? And these are again examples of. That’s a great dual outcome of driving a business good while also eliminating carbon footprint right from reverse supply chain from, from, from returns. There’s a lot happening at pick and pack right now with robotics as a service and really an advertising marketing.
I mean, Allison AI is a great tool that does real time AB testing. So, you know, that, that long, long, you know, runway and sort of, time period, right for a creative shop and an advertising agency. To be testing multiple variants of an ad creative. Now we can do it in real time, right? Because is actually not just running the scenarios that the customer is seeing.
It’s running millions upon millions of other scenarios in the background, right? And using predictability and probability to decide which ones to show the customer as we look further out. I think this is where we start to see those channels become more seamless. So I think computer vision here has a really big role to play.
As does data privacy and these questions about how much will, you know, shoppers in various environments allow. You know, their every move to be monitored so that we can turn around and deliver that back to them in the form of value. Right? So, you know, the, the ideal sort of omni case, you know, use case is.
Brenda is standing in the laundry detergent aisle, and we know that through computer vision and we have a digital plan a gram map through it was through 1 software provider and then. You know, we have, she’s, she’s got the app open and we have a you know, some sort of a beacon or other technology provider that knows Brenda’s in the aisle.
We know where she is in the store. We know what’s near her and we know how she’s interacting. Right. And we know whether she has, you know, recently interacted with the drip marketing communications that we sent her. So you start to get a full picture of customers interaction. Such that you can provide really meaningful guidance and so, you know, you start to think about, well, I’ll get a different push notification right from retailer X.
If I’m standing here, then I would, if I’m standing over there, right? Or if I, they know that I put 3 products and they know what they are right into the basket, but not these other 2, those 2 are on my list, you know, my shopping list from my member, you know, account with whoever, or these sorts of examples of.
Really a seamless journey and kind of an endless journey. And the key question just, just remains, you know, how do we continue to safeguard that data and, you know, deliver that back to the customer, the more value and experiences. There’s also a lot of stuff in supply chain with what we call just in time, fulfillment centric AI, where, you know, I have a role an advisor role.
Is really about marrying real time demand sensing. What is customer looking at? How are they again reacting in the store? How are they responding to emails right to deals promotions? And what is the variability of that in real time such that you can use that to make predictions and increasingly auto decision things like.
Where should we be sourcing raw ingredients to make which shades of lipstick and how many of them right? Because they have to be sent to this distribution center somewhere and where and how soon such that, you know, we get really, really better and better at making the right products at the right amounts and getting them into the right places and spaces for the right customer at the right time.
And I think that’s just Mind blowingly exciting and complex, but, you know, that’s I think where we land 5 years out is where so much of this tech is running in the background and really 90 percent of the tech probably is sitting, you know, in the part of the iceberg. That’s not visible in the part.
That’s under the hood. But that’s required to make the operations, you know, super snazzy, such that it just generates a customer experience like we haven’t seen. And I think that’s just wherever you fall on that equation, whether you’re in the B2C part of the B2B part, or you’re just the customer who benefits from it.
I mean, it’s going to be a wild ride, but it’s also just, I think, going to be incredibly profitable. And if we can do all that in a way that also allows us to monitor the sustainability and impact inputs, and then increasingly. I think we’ll see software that allows us to look at those things together, right?
And say, look, I want to drive a 10 percent increase in margin this quarter. But I also want to reduce my, you know, my carbon footprint by X, or we really want to do better and more efficient marketing targeting. But guess what? 2 percent of the of the power of the Internet is spent on advertising. And if we could advertise and market better, more smartly, right, we could serve fewer ads, use less cloud computing, which uses less water, et cetera.
So, I think super exciting, you know, state to be in now for business and also for impact.
Brian Thomas: Thank you. I appreciate that, Matthew. And we’ve seen such a leapfrogging of the technologies, you know, we talk future of 5 to 10 next year’s, but. Prior to that we started as he’s some of the elite frog, and I think it’s going to be just exponentially much faster as we move forward in the future.
I mean, I just heard a term. Gosh, yesterday. I think it was AI-as-a-Service, you know, you mentioned robotics as a as a service. What? I never knew that could.
Matthew Smith: be possible. It’s kind of what MAS Commerce is doing honestly. But, yeah, Yeah. Yeah,
Brian Thomas: absolutely. So, I appreciate that. And Matthew, if you could briefly share as a board advisor for tech startups, like centric AI and gift hint, what critical advice would you give entrepreneurs looking to innovate in the retail technology space, especially those aiming to balance commercial success with sustainability.
Matthew Smith: Well, the 1st, I would say is if you think you even have an inkling, or there’s any spark in you to want to be an entrepreneur, I can’t think of a better time than now.
And I say that as someone coming out of the largest company in the history of the planet, right? Who was really privileged to be on the rocket ship, you know, with a seat on the 2 largest innovation businesses. And so, I, I see the way and I feel the way the wind is blowing. Also by, by virtue of just being on several AI councils with core site research and the retail AI council.
I, hear and I learned a lot from academics from, you know, leaders in technology from folks in ethics and philosophy. It’s just very, very clear that we are on the precipice of something the likes of which and the sides of which we have not seen. So, I would just say really just give yourself the, you know, the emotional space to sit back and ask yourself, you know, take a day off from the day job and really think about don’t even you don’t even have to know what it is yet.
Just think about. Do I want to do this? Right? And that’s where I found myself is after trying to be, you know, an entrepreneur within big companies, which sometimes works. And sometimes, you know, you get friction, but it’s always throwing. That’s where I found myself. So number 1 would just be like, figure out if you want to be an entrepreneur.
And if you do it now, right? Because much like, you know, when https: otter. ai When you could put your grandmother’s cane up there and it would sell immediately. This is a, it’s not just a 1st mover advantage because the tech is going to continue to iterate and there will always be opportunities to get in.
But I don’t think the getting in will ever be quite as good as it will be in the next few weeks and months. The 2nd piece of advice, I would say is just. Again, think about it really pragmatically and think about AI, particularly now where my friend Steve Simonson would say think of AI as the intern and you are the manager, right?
We, we haven’t hit the singularity. We’re not being booted out of jobs because of AI, you know, just yet. Certainly there will be some transformation there, right? And the economy will, will change. And we’ll, we’ll, you know, iterate as to what we are as humans doing, but. Yeah. AI right now is just a really, really great advanced tool.
So, boil it down to just what are the, you know, one or two or max three parts of my business where I think I want to experiment and, you know, depending, depending on your, on your cash position, you know, maybe that’s. Your core business, because, you know, you got to make it rain and let’s just throw this spaghetti on the wall and see what sticks.
Maybe you’re in a good position. You’re having a good year and you can afford to do some, some testing on multiple lines of business. Right. But, you know, wherever you fall on that make sure that you are very intentional in the way you signal and communicate that up, down, and across your organization, because.
We’re all, all of our associates, right? All of us are touching AI. Now, whether you’re using it to make coloring books for your kids, right? Or, you know, choose recipes for, for cooking over the weekend or make an S. O. P. or a PowerPoint that your boss asked for. We’re all using right? And you can’t put that genie back in the lamp.
So know that and get in front of it. Be very intentional and be very prescriptive and then involve Your associates in that process, make sure that it’s touching every associates day job in some way. Right? And that the way that it is not just they’re doing it at the bubbler or on their break.
They’re doing it in a way that tracks to the KPI that you have handed them. Right? And so, the last point I would say, then is it’s really incumbent upon leadership to make sure everyone understands not just how the company is using AI and advanced tech and why, but. What is their piece in that puzzle?
Right? How does their remit really roll up to the larger mission? Right? Because in particularly large enterprises, you know, you’ve got 3-to-5-year plans. You know, you’ve got, and you really got to look at that now through the lens of. We don’t start with an AI strategy. We have a strategy as a business.
Let’s look at the lens and the layer now of like how AI can help us do it faster or better, and let’s follow that down all the way to the intern and make sure everyone is super clear from a go to market, from a day to day, how am I helping our company’s mission of, of hitting our goals and execute on our strategy better through AI, right?
And I’ll credit that to Janice Wang of Alvin on who says, just make it a part of every associates everyday task. But again, I’ll say, you know, from the, from the former Walmart lens, make sure it starts with leadership and be really thoughtful and intentional about how everyone is touching this giant, you know, frisky thing called AI.
Brian Thomas: For sure, Matthew thank you so much. I appreciate you extracting those gems especially around entrepreneurship. I know it’s not for everybody, but you’re right. I think not now is the time is best as any to get in. Just know you need to have a good value prop. It’s something that the market needs and be willing to work some hours.
Matthew Smith: I totally get it. Exactly. It is dark. The lights are on.
Brian Thomas: Yep. Yep. For sure. Matthew, thank you again. It’s such a pleasure to have you on today and I look forward to speaking with you real soon.
Matthew Smith: Really. Pleasure. Thanks so much!
Brian Thomas: Bye for now.
Matthew Adam Smith Podcast Transcript. Listen to the audio on the guest’s podcast page.
