AI Queens: Smart AF AI Tools, Automation, & Business Tips with Erika Stanley

Queens, what would it take for your business to keep running without you in the room? Alisha Esmail spent seven years in international development before she founded Rode Coffee, a Canadian coffee company with fully female supply chains in Costa Rica, Kenya, and Peru. Along the way, she built an AI business brain in Claude Code that holds 11 years of company knowledge. That brain gave her the free...

Rebecca Liao has been building AI companies since 2014, back when getting a computer to understand plain language was still a struggle. Today she is the co-founder and CEO of Saga AI Labs, which turns well-known characters from games, sports, and consumer brands into AI agents that talk with fans around the clock. Before Saga, she led growth at a SoftBank-backed unicorn and co-founded a crypto com...

If you woke up to headlines saying AI has a 10% chance of ending humanity, take a breath. This episode breaks down what actually happened: a high-profile resignation, a CEO calling for the industry to slow down, and the major labs agreeing that guardrails need to happen at a global level, not company by company. The bigger conversation is about what all of this means for you as a woman using AI in...

Queens, a marketer invented a deodorant brand that does not exist, and three weeks later ChatGPT was recommending it above real products. That story opens this week's roundup of four AI updates that matter for your business, each paired with one move you can make this week. AI is quickly becoming the front door to your business. It decides whether your dream clients find you, how your writing soun...

Queens, if you're still using AI to check the weather or rephrase an email, you're leaving the good stuff on the table. Sarah K. Heeter of PodFox Media is back for round two, and this time we're pulling back the curtain on what we actually text each other about: the apps, dashboards, and tools we're building for ourselves instead of paying for someone else's almost-right software. Sarah built her...

Queens, what if you could cancel $1,200 in software subscriptions — not by cutting corners, but by building the replacements yourself? That's exactly what Erika did during the Claude Fable 5 preview, and she's breaking down all five builds: what they replaced, what they cost (or saved), and the one mindset shift that made it possible. The big unlock? Stop telling AI how to do its job. Give it a go...

Queens, if you've been using Claude just to write captions or brainstorm content, you're only scratching the surface. Claude can read your emails, check your calendar, pull from your meeting notes, and brief you before a client call — all without you lifting a finger. In this episode, I'm walking you through the five connectors that completely changed how I run my business and how you can set them...

Your lead magnets are sitting in a folder somewhere, forgotten and unused. We've all been there: spending hours creating PDFs, guides, and freebies that people download once and never touch again. But what if you could turn those dusty resources into interactive, engaging experiences that actually convert? In this episode, Erika sits down with Sarah K. Heeter, CEO of Podfox Media and host of the B...

AI can be the executive function partner that neurodivergent entrepreneurs have been waiting for. If you've ever felt like traditional business systems just don't work for your brain, or if you're constantly battling overwhelm, time blindness, or that voice that says you're "too much," this episode is for you. In this episode, we explore: Why AI isn't just another shiny object for ADHD brains—it's...

What if the way you found your next big opportunity was by building the tool that found it for you? That's exactly how this episode came to be. Janay Trevillion — AI educator, travel curator, and founder of Empire Creator Lab — didn't just Google her way onto the AI Queens podcast. She built a Claude skill to find the exact podcasts she wanted to guest on… and AI Queens came back ranked #1. That's...

Everybody wants you to pick a team. You're either all in on AI, building bots before breakfast, or you're all out, swearing a robot will never touch your emails. In this episode, Erika hands you a third option: the grey area. Yes, Erika runs an AI consultancy and uses these tools every single day. And she still thinks your skepticism is valid, smart, and necessary. She walks through the loudest cr...

Queens, this one is all about getting your whole day sorted before you even roll out of bed. Fresh off the Buildathon, Erika walks you through the Claude Command Center she built using Claude co-work. It's one central spot that pulls in everything coming at you, your email, calendar, Slack, Notion, all of it, and uses AI to prioritize your day so you know exactly what to tackle first. If you have...

Queens, I just spent 10 days in New York City, and AI was not just in my phone like usual. It was on every billboard, in every subway car, in the shop windows, and even at the brunch table next to me. The whole trip I kept bouncing between two feelings: is this all hype, or is there real hope here? I think it's both right now, exciting and uncertain at the same time, and I have a feeling I'm not t...

Last week you built your AI COO. Now it's time to meet the other half of your executive team. In part two of this series, originally recorded for Jordan Gill's Systems Saved Me podcast, Erika walks you through building your AI Chief Marketing Officer. Think of her as a marketing powerhouse with decades of experience who just walked in on day one. She knows marketing cold, but she doesn't know you...

You know you need systems. You've maybe even built a few SOPs. But what if you had a team member who actually ran those systems for you, handled the backend chaos, and never asked for a break? That's exactly what Erika is building in this episode, originally recorded for Jordan Gill's Systems Saved Me podcast. It's part one of a two-part series on turning AI from a scary tech tool (or a glorified...

Queens, my guest today is Blume Bauer, a fine arts illustrator, creative business educator, and founder of The Yellow Studio, where she's spent 30 years teaching artists how to turn their craft into real income. Her whole vibe is slow living and big money, and she came in ready to challenge some of the things you might believe about AI and art. Here's the part that got me. Blume teaches artists to...

If you've made the jump from ChatGPT to Claude and keep slamming into the token wall mid-project, you are not alone. It's the conversation Erika keeps having at AI Business World, after workshops, and in networking event side chats. Claude is genuinely one of the most powerful AI tools out there right now, but if you don't know how it actually uses tokens under the hood, you'll burn through your u...

This week, Erika sits down with Jasmine Schwarz, founder of Schwarz Strategic Services and an AI stewardship consultant who helps nonprofits adopt technology responsibly, ethically, and without losing sight of the people they serve. Jasmine came to AI through sociology, healthcare, finance, and nonprofits, and she brings a perspective that cuts straight through the influencer noise. The two of the...

Fresh off the stage at Social Media Marketing World and AI Business World in Southern California, Erika is bringing you straight to the conference floor. In this episode, she sits down with a handful of attendees to ask the one question that matters most: what is the real problem you're most excited to solve with AI when you get back to work? From a restaurant marketer using AI as a strategic soun...

If your AI outputs feel generic, off-brand, or just not quite you, the problem probably isn't the tool. It's the foundation underneath it. In this solo episode, Erika walks through the Brand to Bot Blueprint, the exact framework she runs every single client through before touching a single automation, custom GPT, or content system. Recorded fresh off Social Media Marketing World and AI Business Wo...

You've probably used ChatGPT to write a caption or brainstorm some ideas. But are you actually building with AI? There's a difference, and it's a big one. In this solo episode, Erika breaks down why women entrepreneurs need to stop treating AI like a novelty and start using it as the serious business tool it is. The stats don't lie: women are underrepresented in AI research, underusing AI in their...

What if the problem with AI isn't the technology itself, but how little we know about our own thinking? In this episode, Erika sits down with Vanessa Chang, self-described champion of "unhyped AI insights for overthinkers." Together, they dig into something that doesn't get talked about nearly enough: the relationship between self-knowledge and how well (or badly) AI actually works for you. This o...

If you're running a business, managing a household, and trying to keep up with everything in between, chances are your brain is doing a lot of heavy lifting that it shouldn't have to. Erika gets into exactly that this week, sharing the real story behind a system she built inside Claude that has genuinely changed how she starts her day. This isn't a pretty dashboard. It's not a color-coded widget s...

If you've been thinking about adding AI to your business, this episode is your permission slip to slow down first. Rachel Njiru, founder of Kavoo Studio, is an AI strategy and governance consultant who works in some of the most complex, regulated industries out there. And her number one message? AI amplifies everything, the good and the bad. So before you automate, you've got to know what you're a...

64% of teens are using AI. But only half of parents know about it. High school teacher, AI consultant, and mom of three Stacy Kratochvil joins Erika to pull back the curtain on what's actually happening with kids and AI right now, and why the answer isn't to ban it. This conversation goes deep on digital literacy, confidence, and what it actually looks like to raise kids who use AI well. Whether y...