Grower Stories #156: Jerry Abiog

Jerry Abiog, Co-Founder and CMO at Standard Insights talks about his data analytics brand

The AskGrowers team chats with Jerry Abiog about the ethos behind Standard Insights. Jerry talks about the company’s focus on using Artificial Intelligence to assist cannabis brands to utilize their customer data to create more personalized marketing campaigns and improve inventory and sales, among a lot more. He also gives his advice to new cannabis brands and mentions his top rule to be successful in this space.

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Tia: What or who inspired you to get into the cannabis industry?

Jerry: Standard Insights has been around for three and a half years. We started off in the e-commerce space - not really thinking about getting into cannabis. I mean, we had a handful of CBD clients, and all these CBD clients were mainly handled online. But as Standard Insights grew and we got more CBD clients, it was suggested to us and the other co-founders, ‘did you ever think about looking into cannabis?’ Because the clients could benefit from our AI or our data analytics solution and that's how we got started. So cannabis is one of our strong verticals.

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Tia: What’s the main goal of your company? Tell us a bit about what Standard Insights is and how it helps others in the cannabis industry.

Jerry: First and foremost, it’s about helping the customer and who our customer is. It could be the dispensary, the grower, or the brand. And what we do is help them leverage their first-party data to help them drive growth and improve their market share.

For example, if you are a dispensary and maybe you have five to six hundred products that you're selling, and maybe you have 10,000 customers in your Point of Sale system, and maybe you've got over 40 to 50,000 purchase orders - we take all of that data. In this case, we're a Point of Sale system. We run it through our AI engine and from there, we can predict what is the potential profitability of Jerry or Tia. Maybe we can predict what Tia or Jerry is likely to buy.

So maybe Tia likes pre-rolls but Jerry likes edibles, that dispensary can target Tia with pre-rolls and Jerry with edibles to make their marketing dollars more efficient. Not only that, but the more targeted you and I are with products that we actually like, the more our chances of buying will increase.

This is similar to what you are seeing with Amazon and your product recommendations and with Netflix’s movie recommendations. How does that help the dispensary? Well, we help dispensaries or dispensary owners target the right person with the right product at the right time. And how do we do this? Well, we help them execute Data Campaigns.

We can also help predict for a brand how much of a given product will sell in a given day week or month. So, for example, in the case of a CBD product, we can help predict if either 10 or 20 will sell and given day week, or month, so it helps that business better manage their inventory.

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Tia: How do you think your company is different from the wide range of others similar to yours?

Jerry: There are lots of data analytics companies out there but I think what makes us unique and what makes us different is that a lot of those companies only focus on Business Intelligence. And Business Intelligence gives a historical perspective of what happened in the past. We are using Artificial Intelligence and it's the ability to have a computer think and act like a human.

What we do is we can analyze data in real-time and make predictions on what Jerry or Tia's likely to buy. And not only that but a lot of other competitors just give you the data sets but we actually take that data and within a few clicks of your mouse, you can execute data-driven campaigns. So now if you are a dispensary owner that's using our software, you can send your customers an email or text about the products they are likely to buy.

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Tia: Can you tell us what are your best cases while working at Standard Insights?

Jerry: So one of our customers actually had a booth at MJBiz and they sell CBD-infused pillows or neck wraps. And what we were able to do with the help of Artificial Intelligence is that their average order value was $30 - I’ll have to double-check - and by helping them market to their customers with products that they were likely to buy, we were able to get the customers to spend an average of $10. That may not sound like a lot but it’s 33% and if you can do that over and over again, that could have a significant impact on one's bottom line.

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Tia: What industry would you choose to work in, if not the cannabis one? Why?

Jerry:  I would probably be working in the fitness industry because I have a passion for fitness.

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Tia: What’s the number 1 rule when you’re in the cannabis business?

Jerry: It's just to be honest with anyone you're dealing with, whether it's related to Artificial Intelligence or telling someone what you're able to do for them,  or even if you can't help them out. Just treat everyone that you're dealing with, you know, honest and fairly.

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Tia: What’s your advice for someone who starts his own canna-business?

Jerry: I think my one piece of advice for anyone wanting to get into the cannabis space is to build brand recognition either for yourself or for your company. A couple of ways to do this include writing articles for cannabis-related publications, maybe appearing on some podcasts, or even getting interviewed by professionals like you just to build your name and brand awareness.

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BLITZ:

> Why was weed made illegal? 

William Hearst (owner of Hearst Newspapers) felt that hemp would threaten his interests in the timber industry.  He launched propaganda campaigns promoting the ill effects of hemp that included racist messaging towards Mexicans and African Americans.  These actions led to the passage of the Marijuana Tax Act of 1937 making it illegal across the US.

> Will weed be legal federally? 

Yes.  America is a capitalist country. There’s too much money to be had in the cannabis industry.  I’m 50 years old and growing up; there was the “war on drugs.”  Those who smoked weed were called stoners who were deemed lazy and failed out of college.  Now, the cannabis gold rush projects to grow to $198 billion by 2028.  Perceptions are changing.

> Indica or Sativa? Why?  

Indica.  I’m an old man.  It helps me get a good night's sleep.

> Why should weed be legal? 

Two reasons.  First, therapeutic benefits.  It helps with insomnia, PTSD, insulin regulation, anxiety reduction, to name a few.  Second, monetary benefits.  It provides economic opportunity for those directly involved with the seed to sale process and those providing ancillary services like Standard Insights.

You can follow Jerry at:

LinkedIn

Thank you so much for taking the time to do the interview. To learn more about them, head on over to their website.