Sam Collin

Early Stage Startup Sales Specialist | 3x exits to Medallia, Zoom and Meta | Helping change the sales stereotype | Currently sales leader @kustomer

[Sam Collin @sgcollin20]

Can someone track down the gate agent who didn’t let @balogun mom on the flight back to England cause she looked too pregnant? After last nights performance they deserve front row seats to every @USMNT match this World Cup.

[Sam Collin @sgcollin20]

@TheFootballFeed He was open and transparent about this process and documented it on his instagram. He had a hair piece glued to his head. He’s not trying to hide anything

[Sam Collin @sgcollin20]

Best half of soccer I’ve ever seen from a @USMNT and I’ve watched a ton of us soccer

[Sam Collin @sgcollin20]

Like most things in life this is a much more nuanced argument than what the Polymarket tweet outlined. Are AI AGENTS in customer service better than previous generations of automation. Yes. Are they replacing significant headcount at otherwise health companies, no. Check data on customer service hiring, BPO data or any other metric. Regarding CSAT outperforming humans consider this. The AI agent is constructed to handle the easy conversations. Leaving for the human the hard and emotionally difficult convos. It makes a ton of sense why the AI would have a higher CSAT in that equation

[Sam Collin @sgcollin20]

@USMNT @truly He dribbled it out of bounds. Why are we celebrating this?

[Sam Collin @sgcollin20]

I just went 74-8. How is this squad not going 82-0? https://t.co/9oKI2SDfJP #NBA #82and0

[Sam Collin @sgcollin20]

@DavidSacks You know it’s a good article if @DavidSacks is quote tweeting @nytimes

[Sam Collin @sgcollin20]

Kustomer Architect Aims to Replace CX Deflection Metrics With Business Outcomes https://t.co/AzWBKATSms

[Sam Collin @sgcollin20]

For all the AI will replace all the customer service jobs, riddle me this

[Konstantine Buhler @Konstantine]

And in case you have a "this is transient" pushback, Frank has another great point: "However a thoughtful pushback was that perhaps increasing demand for software engineers reflected a short term dynamic in which engineers were hired to integrate AI into workflows, which would then allow displacement thereafter. To investigate this we can turn to daily job posting data in the remainder of the top five AI exposed industries. We find that job postings in customer service are up 9% from when software postings started to inflect higher in May-2025, in banking and finance postings are up 9% and in accountancy are up 18%."

[Sam Collin @sgcollin20]

Another example of why I agree with @DavidSacks on AI driven job creation, not @Jason’s prediction that it’ll be net negative.

[Shay Boloor @StockSavvyShay]

$AMZN AWS CEO pushed back on the idea that AI is killing software jobs by saying Amazon is hiring as many developers as ever.

He said AI agents are “exploding” across every industry & moving faster than expected changing the developer job rather than eliminating it.

[Sam Collin @sgcollin20]

I have been cold calling for nearly 20 years. That is a lot of accumulated knowledge on what works and what does not. What if you could clone my brain and produce my best cold outreach in seconds?

That is basically what I have been able to do after Kustomer doubled down on our investment in Claude.

I have been at Kustomer for nearly 7 years. In that time, a big part of my pipeline has come from cold outreach. The challenge is that the tactics that actually work are not scalable. Writing something thoughtful, relevant, and worth responding to takes time.

And pipeline is the lifeblood of any sales org, especially right now.

Earlier this year, I ran a training for my team and shared examples of messaging that has worked for me. It helped, but it was not durable. It still required a lot of effort to replicate.

That changed this weekend. I went deep on Claude and built a custom skill in Claude Code. I fed it years of my highest performing emails and LinkedIn messages. I also fed it a number of my LinkedIn posts about Kustomer’s value so it could learn how I communicate our messaging. I layered in existing skills created for Kustomer positioning, case studies, and marketing content. I connected Salesforce data to understand current customers and history. I also pulled in public signals like press, podcasts, and posts.

Now I can drop in a prospect’s LinkedIn profile and it identifies the same triggers I have historically used, synthesizes relevant context, and writes a hyper personalized message in my voice. What used to take 30 plus minutes now takes under a minute. Most of the time, the first draft is strong. This is AI done right. Not cold outreach slop (I get 50 of those a day), but something that captures what takes someone's superpower and scales it.

Next step is layering in the Claude in Chrome extension which will be able to pull common connections and read through LinkedIn posts pushing personalization even further. This skill is now made available for my whole team.

No more stale trainings but an actionable tool that can be used to drive immediate value. Exciting times.

[Sam Collin @sgcollin20]

If you follow AI conversations, you’ve probably heard “human in the loop.”

In theory, it means a human can step in, review, approve, or take over when the AI falls short. It’s supposed to reduce hallucinations and improve outcomes.

But in CX right now, I’m seeing the opposite: human out of the loop.

Two big reasons:

1) Disconnected systems
Most bolt-on AI agents aren’t deeply integrated with where humans actually work. The AI runs its course, then hands off a ticket. Now the human has to reverse-engineer what just happened. By the time they catch up, the customer’s already moved on.

2) Asymmetry in tools and knowledge
Your AI agent might be hooked into APIs, internal systems, and rich knowledge sources. But when it fails? The human gets a stripped-down ticketing system with none of that context. So the handoff doesn’t just slow things down, it guarantees another failure.

We’ve all felt this:

You interact with an AI agent, don’t get the answer, get passed to a human… and have to repeat everything.

That’s not “human in the loop.” That’s broken.

Context is the unlock.

Without a complete view of the customer journey, across both AI and human, you can’t deliver a seamless experience.

Most tools today fall short here.

At Kustomer, this is exactly what we’re built to solve.

[Sam Collin @sgcollin20]

For those trying to return their @Allbirds for AI compute, unfortunately they haven’t included this a refund option

[Sam Collin @sgcollin20]

Looks like @claudeai is down right now. Luckily, they can buy more compute from @Allbirds

[Sam Collin @sgcollin20]

If seeking pain is what makes a great startup employee @Alfred_Lin, consider me the @davidgoggins of software sales

[Sam Collin @sgcollin20]

@anothercohen My first reaction as well. The idea that AI is just going to automate a highly regulated / complex industry like health tech business.

Also I can guarantee 100% he is not automating all of his customer service with AI. Maybe he's not counting his BPO staff as employees

[Sam Collin @sgcollin20]

@CoachDanGo Agreed. You gotta check out https://t.co/Llm9X4rU4A if you make it at home. It’s been a Gamechanger

[Sam Collin @sgcollin20]

@barstoolsports That’s the wrong U. He just dissed Utah for no reason

[Sam Collin @sgcollin20]

Last week I had a great conversation with my friend who’s been in the BPO space for 15+ years.

A few trends from our discussion stood out.

The AI headcount narrative doesn’t match what he’s seeing.
Based on conversations across his BPO network, Taylor isn’t seeing the mass support layoffs the AI headlines suggest.

AI ROI calculations often miss key variables.
When you add AI to your site, you’re often introducing an entirely new channel. That frequently increases inbound volume by 30%+, which must be factored into the ROI.

Many CX leaders are being asked to deliver outcomes tied to AI hype cycles. That can put them in a difficult position when expectations don’t match operational reality.

“Resolution rates” don’t tell the full story.
Metrics often miss channel switching to human agents, drop-off, or silent churn. What’s the hidden cost of a frustrated customer who has a bad AI interaction and simply never comes back?

Jevons Paradox will likely apply to CX.
I’ve never spoken with a company that thinks they’re delivering too much great customer experience. Most want to do more, but cost is the constraint.
If AI reduces Tier 1 issues, my bet is we’ll see more human support focused on higher-value interactions, not less.

[Sam Collin @sgcollin20]

@YahooSports @CBSSportsCBB Nobody calls BU Boston U