Adam Torres and David Rivero discuss the AI Vibes Summit.
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Show Notes:
Listen to coverage of the AI Vibes Summit in Santa Monica, California. In this episode, Adam Torres interviews David Rivero, Serial Entrepreneur, Investor & Founder of The Growth Talks. Explore The Growth Talks, entrepreneurship and AI.
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About David Rivero
Over the past 15 years David has built businesses that have done hundreds of millions in sales and has employed thousands of people. He learned to scale & grow businesses in EVERY industry. Through his experiences he has learned to use every platform to promote products, services and brands online.
David has an entire suite of services to help E-commerce companies scale & grow their businesses. From manufacturing, to fulfillment, call center services to online marketing and beyond. Helping entrepreneurs & businesses succeed is his passion.
Full Unedited Transcript
I’d like to welcome you to another episode of Mission Matters. My name is Adam Torres, and today I am at the AI Vibes Event in Santa Monica, California. And I was walking out there looking for my next victim, I mean guest. And David was in the audience. Man, David is good to see you. It’s good to see you, man.
Oh, so what brings you to AI vibes today? Uh, I actually met Tal. Yeah. At, uh, you actually introduced her to me at that bar in downtown LA. It was like, Oh, Sampa. The, the, the Sampa over there at that event, I went to that event. You introduced me to that Tal. Yeah, I never, I never met her before. And she was like, Hey, I’m having AI vibes.
This is a conference in a couple of weeks. I’m like. I’m in, I just showed up. So what, um, I do need to, at least we’re going to get into your platform, your events, and you have some mastermind coming up with some other things, but I do want to start off with some, with some AI. What, what’s interesting to you right now in AI?
Like, what are you, what, what, how does it affect you, your business? Otherwise? I’ll be honest with you. We’re using it all day, every day. So I have a big development team. So my developers, I like said. Yeah. Use it all the time. We use it on social media content. We use it on running ads. Uh, I use it on international websites, uh, to have it in different languages.
We do it for SEO. I mean, we use it for fricking everything, titles, descriptions. You, I mean, you name it, it’s getting used all day and we automate it. Right. So we just do things to make our lives easier. Like something that I would have to have an army of copywriters to do. Literally my developer goes, Oh, we just did a, you know, 12, 000 descriptions.
And we just finished in like 30 minutes. I’m like, yeah, that would have took. Forever. So it’s a crazy, it’s, I use it all the time in all my businesses. I’m in e commerce, you know, so an e commerce where we’re always running ads and we’re always competing with a lot of sharks, right? We’re a shark. Yeah. So to stay ahead of the competition, you got to use it.
What excites you in e commerce right now relative to either AI or technology in general, like what excites you? What excites me is that this new technology, if you don’t embrace it, you’re so much ahead of your competition. Yeah. Like I’m dealing with competitors, right? And then there’s, they’re like, that’s a thing, right?
So if you’re fighting it, like great, keep fighting it. Cause you’re going to, you’re going to progress based off of that. Yeah. I mean, we started using it over a year ago, year and a half ago when it was starting to get popular. And now we just, it’s in our daily lives and everything we do is like, how could we automate it?
Can we use AI? Can we use chat GPT? What can we do to make our lives easier? And we’re all in it. I mean, we’re in it every day. I, before I came here, I was talking to one of my developers and he’s working on some code and I’m like, Hey, how’s the backend? He’s all I’m integrating right now with AI on the backend and.
I’m like, freaking awesome. No, so we’re using it all day, every day. Yeah, and one of the things I see about it too is that, um, as, at that, that space and that gap for those that are, I mean, early adopters and, and can fit in. figure out where it makes sense in their business and then continue to progressively increase.
It’s kind of like in back in the day, like you hire an employee, right? You’re hiring an employee. So that employee, the training, all the other things, and then they come up with those ideas or those other things that progress, the progress, the business further. So thinking about AI from that sense, um, it’s exciting to me.
Oh no, it’s like, it’s awesome. To me, it’s kind of like the internet 20 years ago, you know, when like, Oh, you got mail or, you know, when, when I wish I would’ve known what it was, I wasn’t excited. I didn’t know. So I didn’t, man, I would’ve been building websites or something else. I don’t know. I’ve been doing something.
I didn’t know. Right. Like this one, I know. So I’m watching it, but that one, I didn’t know. Yeah. Like when the internet first came, I’m like, wow, this is a game changer. And that’s where I made a lot of my money. Right. I was one of the first adapters online e commerce. And then we did over 300 million in sales.
So we were, we were a good adapter and we took advantage of internet and there wasn’t as much competition. Right. So now, yeah, there’s more competition. So now you need to, you got to be better before it was easier because there was less people in the game. Just, just imagine now three years from now, how many more people are going to be adapted to AI and now it’s going to be so much harder, right now it’s easier because it’s like, It’s kind of like the wild, wild west.
Not many people have adapted yet. Only, only the sophisticated so far. Yeah, yeah. You know? So, um, switching topics slightly here. Um, I know that you also have a community as well. You’re in, you’re in e commerce of course, but you also have a community of entrepreneurs and thought leaders. Maybe talk about that a little bit.
Yeah, I actually have a monthly mastermind. It’s a mastermind networking event. I have it at my house in Beverly Hills once a month. Yeah, I do it every month. It’s, I’ve done it for only nine months. It’s not like I’ve had this for 10 years. And I was like, I was never on social media by the way. Yeah. I got on social media a year and a half ago.
And I was like, when I started getting on social media, I’m like, how am I going to build my community and kind of provide value? And I’m like, I could have a mastermind network, even at my home. So I started invite a whole bunch of successful entrepreneurs I know in the area, uh, and then it just kind of started growing and growing.
And I love it because I usually have. Five guest speakers and they’re all experts in their field, right? One guy might be an expert in social media marketing. One might be an expert in AI. Solar might be an expert in taxes, how to save you money on taxes, uh, real estate, investing, right? All these different core topics that.
We’re going to be using our whole lives, uh, and they, they’re experts. They’re providing value. And then an hour before that is networking. So people are having a drink, having appetizers, exchanging phone numbers, doing deals together, and then there’s networking afterwards. So it’s, it’s kind of a mix of networking, good speakers where you get value and people just doing business deals and, and growing.
What, I want to go back to that early part of you wanting to even bring together a community or bring together and do these masterminds. Why was it important for you to start bringing together community? Like, what does that mean to even bring together community? Yeah, what I’ve, number one to me, community is, your circle, right?
The more you surround yourself with successful people, like minded people, ambitious people, hungry people, not people that are lazy, only good things happen, right? And it’s my way of kind of giving back, help putting a place together where everyone could kind of meet and do business deals and learn and help each other grow.
So for me, it’s a good thing. It doesn’t, this thing doesn’t make me any money. It’s like a nonprofit for me, but it’s great for you. value and people love it. Like I have people that like, this is like what they look for every month. Like David, you’re having it, right? I go, I go, of course it’s on the date.
It’s all lined up, you know, but people love it. You’ll see, guess what? Yeah. You are going to be a speaker soon. Next week. Oh yeah, I’m in, I’m in, I’m all in. I’m, I’m for it. Fun. I love to support. I love to go out and see what’s going on. And I also saw, I didn’t know that it was that new by the way. So kudos to you.
Like I’ve seen, um, and not disrespecting anybody else’s community, but I see the traction you have. And I was, and when, even when I kind of was doing some digging, um, before we accepted the commitment, I’m like, yeah, this is like special. People are being, are attracted to it. They’re attracted to the energy, the speed, whatever it is that you’re doing.
Like, what do you think the success comes from in that? I think It’s different. Nine months is different. I know people that have been trying to do it for years that can’t fill a room like you. Yeah, yeah, it’s because It’s about value, right? If you provide value, right? You’re going to go, you’re going to keep on coming back.
And then you’re going to tell your friends. There is not one person that’s come, that’s gone and said, that wasn’t worth it. Or I didn’t have a good time. Or I didn’t get a, I didn’t get a good phone number. I didn’t meet anyone successful. I didn’t learn something. You come, you’re going to get value for sure.
And you’re going to be with successful people. Like last month. I had a billionaire in a room with a B with billions of billions of dollars in telecom. Mm-Hmm, . And then I had someone that sold his company for $1 billion. Yeah. So I had two billionaires, pretty much. And I’m supposed to follow that up. Come on.
What’s that? Okay. Thank you. Thank you. There goes our promo. Thank you, . And now you have Adam. I appreciate that. Come on. No, but I’m just saying, right? I mean, when you have billionaires in a house Yeah. Don’t you want to learn from people like Elon Musk? Of course, of course. You know, I mean, people that are billionaires, right?
People that have been there and done it. Yeah. So, uh, it’s exciting. You get, you get a good crowd, you get successful people. One of my friends, he’s, he does loans, right? He landed a client at my growth talks and my mastermind networking, and he, he made 250, 000 in commission off that one deal by meeting a guy that wanted to sell his house.
He got the deal. And he’s all, David, I made 250, 000 commission off meeting one guy. Sounds like you got a sponsor. You said this thing ain’t like up and going, man. You better kick it back into the pony. Come on, man. You gotta, you gotta feed the kitty over here. What’s going on? Yeah, I know. So it’s great.
Right. So when you could like. Broke. I mean, I didn’t get one penny on that, but I’m just happy that when he hears this, he knows he owes me some damn money. I’m looking right at the camera. Sponsorship. You better sponsor that. That cougar board. No. Yeah. Yeah. Appetizers are on you. Bottle service, too. So what’s your, like, let’s, let’s, I know nine months in you, you have more coming up.
Like, let’s just have our crystal ball for a while. We’re all entrepreneurs, a lot of entrepreneurs, a lot of business owners, a lot of executive watch executives watch this. Let’s dream for a moment. What’s your vision for this going forward? My vision for this. Honestly, it’s just to grow it. Like I would like to have it with thousands of thousands of people.
Wow. Right down the road where I’m going to have to, God, my house is pretty big. I could probably have 500 people, but after 500, I got to go to a different venue, 500 people is probably my max at my house. Right. And then, uh, and then if it gets bigger, you know, rent out locations and then go internationally because I think internationally in different countries would be great because.
They don’t get this, right? Like I travel a lot for business and there’s no like mastermind networking events with. And someone’s home with, you know, 150 people, it just doesn’t make sense. I’ll throw this out there for, I tell the, so the LA and New York people all the time, I agree with you on this one, but even within the United States, there’s so many states that don’t get like, there’s big cities that are other that aren’t New York or LA where they don’t, they’re always flying in or otherwise, like there’s so much demand, even domestic and not saying not international, but I’m just saying there’s opportunity, man.
Oh yeah. Domestic. Yeah. Like I said, for me, this is. This isn’t, I’m not really doing this to make money. I’m doing this to provide value network. Cause let’s say, you know, let’s say you, me are talking here and all of a sudden, let’s say I wanted to start a business and you were an expert at AI and real estate.
He’s like, David, I have this amazing technology. And because you came to my master, my network, we do a joint venture, we do some business together. You were the piece, the puzzle that I needed. And now all of a sudden. You and me are, you know, doing hundreds of millions of dollars in sales and now we could sell our company for a billion dollars.
Just because of just being at the right place, networking, going, Oh my God, that’s what I was looking for. Right. And that’s, what’s happening. Like I’m starting a couple of new businesses right now. And a lot of these were just by meeting someone at this mastermind networking event and doing a joint venture.
And that’s what excites me. Like I’m like a serial entrepreneur. Like I, I own a lot of companies and I’ve had thousands and thousands of employees throughout my years and I have a big staff and big teams and that’s what excites me. I like starting businesses. This, this growth talks is amazing. It’s like, think of, I think of it as providing value and a lead funnel.
For a whole bunch of different entrepreneurs. Yeah, I, I like your approach. And when you connect people together like this, like magic happens, like magic happens, things happen, ideas happen. I mean, I’m a fan of, of course, online, things like that. But to me, it’s still about getting in the room. Like it’s still about getting in the room.
Yeah. Like, I mean, people are asking, Hey, I want to, can you make it all virtual? Am I going to? Yes. Yeah, of course. It’s there’s iterations. Of course. Right now I’m just like, I’m making it like. Um, you know, Hey, people in the local area get a benefit. You got to fly in right now. There’s Ted talks. You’re in the room.
There’s Ted you’re in the room. Then there’s Ted on, you know, YouTube. It’s fine. Like there’s a lot of different ways to connect. And I like to say people will meet you where they’re supposed to. But to me, that online component, I don’t know if it’s just post pandemic or what, but I’m like, man, this is amazing.
Like getting out there and getting to people again and seeing their receptiveness, wanting to be somewhere, learn something, go to the conference, go to the mastermind. I love it. Yeah, no, I’m, that’s why I’m here today. Yeah. It’s funny because I literally, half the reason I came here was to learn something.
Maybe I was like, maybe I’ll learn one nugget from one of these AI speakers. Wait, you didn’t come for this interview, David? Come on, man. Such disrespect. First the billionaire leader and now this. I thought you, oh yeah, I came for that too. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. I was counting the days and the hours. No, but, uh, no, I’m happy to be on, but that’s why I come to these things.
Right. I’m happy. I’m happy. We’re doing this interview. It’s fricking awesome. Totally spontaneous off the cusp that we’re just talking and having a good time. Hopefully you guys are getting some value and number two, it’s just networking, right? I’m going to see you. I’m going to build a better relationship with you.
I’m going to build a better relationship with maybe Tal out there and some other people or I’ll meet someone for the first time. And maybe we, maybe we’ll just be friends. Maybe I’ll meet one of my next best friends here because we just got so much good energy. So for me, it’s like meeting good friends, meeting people to do business with providing value.
Maybe I’ll teach someone here tonight, something in my brain. And all of a sudden they’re like, David, like six months, a year later, they go, dude, when I saw you, when I met you here at this AI event, You taught me something and now I’m a multimillionaire. Yeah. I’d be like fricking awesome. You know, so that’s why I like coming to these things.
You never know what’s going to happen. Yes, I could be home or I could be at the office on my computer, but I’m doing that every day. Yeah. So when there’s kind of events like this and you can step out out of your comfort zone where you’re, you know, we’re comfortable being behind a computer or working beyond the phones and in the office, but.
I like coming to this stuff. Yeah, that’s great. David, I want you to look into the camera. How do people learn more about Growth Talks? How do they look more about your businesses? How do they follow you? Go to, if you want to go to one of my mastermind networking events, it’s in Beverly Hills every month.
Uh, the next one is Wednesday, August 7th, but I have them every month. So just go to the growthtalks. com and you’ll be able to see the calendar when the next one is. If you want to follow me on social media, I’m on every fricking platform, everything. Uh, but you could go to the David Rivera on Instagram or the David Rivera on Tik TOK, or just pretty much.
If you type in David Rivera on Google, I come up everywhere. So you’ll find me if you want to get me. Uh, and you’ll, you’ll, you know, I’m all about providing value on entrepreneurship, business, marketing, sales, investing. Those are all the things I’m an expert in. Uh, I pretty much provide free content, free value all day, every day.
And, uh, I would love to meet you. Feel free to DM me anytime I answer everybody’s questions. When people ask me questions about business or sales or anything, I give answers for free. So feel free to ask me questions. And, uh, thank you, Adam, for having me on your show. You’re an awesome host, and I’m super excited to have you as a speaker coming up.
But thank you for having me. Awesome, man. And to the audience, hey, if you haven’t done it yet, and just so you know, we’re going to put the, um, we’ll put the links to the website, all that good stuff in the show notes, so you can just click on the links and head right on over. And if you haven’t done it yet, Done it yet, meaning hit that subscribe or follow button.
Make sure you do that. This is a daily show each and every day. We’re putting out new content, new interviews, and hopefully new inspiration to help you along the way in your journey as well, so that you can grow and thrive again, hit that subscribe or follow button. Because guess what? Tomorrow you’re going to get that notification.
If you do, David, looking forward to it, man. Appreciate it. Thank you.
