Listen to today’s podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/silk-logic-small-business-daily/id1841930957
Today’s podcast episode was created from the following stories: a mix of leadership moves, practical AI how-tos, platform comparisons, and M&A shaping the tools small businesses rely on. Here’s what you need to know, fast.
Vendasta Adds SurveyMonkey CEO Eric Johnson and Cloudflare CMO Brent Remai to Board of Directors
Source: Financial Post
By GlobeNewswire • 2025-11-26
Vendasta appointed SurveyMonkey CEO Eric Johnson and former Cloudflare CMO Brent Remai to its board as it accelerates an AI ‘employee’ strategy for SMBs. The company plans to expand its lineup of autonomous digital workers, unify tools into a single intelligent system, and grow its partner ecosystem. For small businesses, this signals more practical AI for sales, service, and customer engagement—without stitching together a dozen apps.
Using AI to Convert More Leads and Save Time
Source: Duct Tape Marketing Podcast
By John Jantsch • 2025-11-26T06:30:00-07:00
John Jantsch talks with Rainmaker CEO Joe Gagnon about AI-native sales workflows, 24/7 phone agents, and automation that still feels authentic. They break down how AI can improve inbound conversations, overcome objections, and deliver more predictable growth. If you’re short on time, the takeaway is clear: the right AI can lift conversions and customer experience while streamlining your sales motion.
Cegid Acquires Shine to Accelerate the Path of Becoming Europe’s Leading Financial Copilot for SMBs and Accountants
Source: Financial Post
By Business Wire • 2025-11-26
Cegid and fintech unicorn Shine are joining forces to build a unified, AI-driven financial hub for European SMBs and accountants. The combined platform will cover invoicing, accounting, payroll, business accounts and payments, and tax—serving over 1 million SMBs and 15,000 accountants, pending approvals. Expect faster workflows and easier compliance as Europe moves toward mandatory e-invoicing.
5 Excel AI Lessons I Learned the Hard Way
Source: KDnuggets
By Rachel Kuznetsov • 2025-11-26
Practical guidance for teams running analytics in Excel/XLMiner: use multiple methods for outlier detection, always set random seeds, adopt a three-way train/validation/test split, monitor training–validation gaps to spot overfitting, and enforce data validation on categorical and numeric fields. None of these require advanced statistics—but skipping them can wreck trust in your results. It’s a solid checklist for reliable, reproducible analysis without new software.
ChatGPT vs. Gemini vs. Claude: What Are The Differences?
Source: Search Engine Journal
By Ludwig Makhyan • 2025-11-26
A hands-on comparison finds ChatGPT strongest for everyday answers, shopping, voice, and desktop use; Gemini for deep research and video; and Claude for writing and coding. The piece flags ongoing hallucination risks and notes shifting traffic patterns as AI answers change how people discover content. For SMBs choosing tools, match the assistant to the job and keep a human-in-the-loop for critical decisions.
AI Excellence Awards 2026: Most Effective Implementation Of AI For Talent Development And Management
Source: eLearning Industry
By Christopher Pappas • 2025-11-26
The awards spotlight vendors using AI to deliver measurable results in skills mapping, adaptive learning, and predictive talent insights. Recognized names include SweetRush, 360Learning, CommLab India, iSpring, TalentLMS, and more—chosen for innovation, impact, ethics, and continuous improvement. For HR and L&D leaders, it’s a vetted shortlist to jumpstart skills-first strategies in 2026.
In today’s lineup, a common thread emerges: AI is moving from hype to help—powering sales, finance, learning, and leadership with concrete, time-saving outcomes. Whether you’re choosing the right chatbot, leveling up your analytics discipline, or consolidating back-office finance, the goal is the same: simpler workflows, smarter decisions, and better customer experiences at small-business speed.
