Elon Says “Hang Onto Stock”, Auto Auctions Boom, Consumers Prefer AI In Review Replies

Paul J Daly  0:02  
There you go. Friday time, march 21 we three quarters of the way through March. I think our soda cuts coming in. Elon's telling us employees to hang on to their stock. And we're telling you whether or not consumers like aI responses to reviews. Elon

Kyle Mountsier  0:20  
is like, Hold on to your stock stock. Park your cars in your garage. Yeah,

Paul J Daly  0:23  
hold on your stock. Century mode on. I know, I know. What a while, what a wild world. You know, three Episode Are we three episodes away or

Kyle Mountsier  0:32  
two? Unbelievable today, three

Paul J Daly  0:38  
episodes away from episode 1000 Kyle and I have been doing this show for 1000 episodes, driving our producer, Nathan nuts, for 1000 episodes, and

Kyle Mountsier  0:47  
actually more like 200 of them. The first 800 it was like, you know, you're cool. The last 200 is when we've driven him crazy. I'm kidding. We're working on

Paul J Daly  0:57  
it. Well, he he's actually been, been at work in the back channels, putting together a really rip roaring, 1000 show. So we're gonna, like, make a deal of it and have a we have a LinkedIn event. So if you go to ASOTU on LinkedIn and just click on Events, you can now join the live stream event. Kyle's flying into Syracuse. We're gonna set up in the studio. We're gonna have a lot of fun. We have some special guests, some throwbacks, some really fun stats about how many times we've said certain words and done certain things or mentioned certain OEM so it'll be a real a real walk, and it all of it, all of it, all 1000 episodes are really in our minds and hearts. A tribute to you who are actually out there every day work in the industry, taking care of the people, paying attention to the information, helping one another so we can get better. So it's really about a celebration of 1000 episodes of that

Kyle Mountsier  1:45  
of this community. That's exactly it. That's exactly it. Uh, also, we got a sodu con coming in hot. Obviously, we are like 52 days away from that thing. If you don't have your tickets, get your tickets now, because we, we bumped the prices up, just like everybody in the known universe when it comes to events. So you don't want to, you don't want to hit the price, the price jump, and you definitely don't want to miss out on the primary hotel room block. We've only got a few rooms left, so get in on that. Obviously, if you don't get that, if you, if you, you know a procrastinator, we have other hotels on the docket, but make sure. And some great ways

Paul J Daly  2:17  
to get you around from hotel to hotel.

Kyle Mountsier  2:20  
Oh, we're about to tell you about, yes, exactly.

Paul J Daly  2:23  
It involves Nathan and a motorcycle with a side car. That would be a great publicity stunt. Like, we just get some motorcycles with some side cars and, like, Hey, if you're like, we can only take one. I'll do it. I'm volunteering. I will do it. I will do it. If you fight a motorcycle with a sidecar. I will go to the other hotels and pick people up, one at a time. Oh, there's so

Kyle Mountsier  2:49  
many people I want to see in a sidecar with a half helmet.

Paul J Daly  2:52  
I volunteer. I volunteer. Bob Lana for number one. Could you picture Ben stock doing that? I see it in my mind's eye. It's unbelievable. If you think of all the partnerships that have just come up, I think we should just do a thing right like now Vin Kyle and Ben stock are working together. So we got Ben stock on the bike with Danny in the side car.

Unknown Speaker  3:18  
Unreal. All right, we do get

Paul J Daly  3:19  
AI on this ASAP. Upload some headshots and let this get this. Oh, side cars. Sidecar. Everybody's taking their side cars. Here's the last magical component of this.

Kyle Mountsier  3:30  
Okay, give it to me. I'm ready. This is

Paul J Daly  3:33  
a critical component garbage in the background of any sidecar extravaganza. I really, oh man, the ideas just come to me. They just, they're just, they just flow, unbelievable, super dumb, but every once in a while you hit some magic. And that's what, all right, let's talk about some news. Shall we speaking

Kyle Mountsier  3:54  
of super dumb, and every once in a while you hit some magic.

Paul J Daly  4:01  
Oh man, it's a Friday. Yeah, you can tell a surprise. All hands meeting at Tesla's Gigafactory on Thursday night, reassuring employees amidst a steep stock drop in value, he urged employees and investors to, quote, hang on to your stock, while prompting Tesla's cyber cab and optimists, or promoting the cyber cab and the optimist robots, he addressed the stock drop, which has lost roughly half of its value since December, attributing future success to autonomous driving. And AI the operations team being tasked with ramping up cyber cab production, which Musk says will use a high speed electronics style manufacturing process. So basically, he said these were pushing the limits on manufacturing. I read. I read through most of the meeting. He said, we're going to manufacture these cars much more like a consumer electronic would be manufactured, not a car, and we're going to push the limits of how big of a stamping machine we can actually build, and push the limits of physics. Now this is a. Crazy. Elon Musk statement, he said, I imagine a world where we can get close to producing a cyber cab in, oh, say, five seconds. Excuse me, uh, yeah, that's what he said. Okay, keep moving. Test some plans to build. Yeah, I know I gotta read it twice, but when you look at how they make, like sophisticated electronics, they make them in like five seconds. It's like they do one, stamp, 234, drive yourself to the dock. Uh, Tesla plans to build that. It seems so impossible, but they plan to build 1000s of humanoid optimist robots, aiming at producing, guess this, at least one legion. They're using the word a legion of robots. I don't love it. I don't love it. I think that they got a messaging need them. They get the PR department back a little on that one call. Will Smith about that, right? Literally, like conjures all those images, but it's basically a legion. They're saying they have the capability and the parts to manufacture 10,000 robots as of right now, in their in their possession, they, he said, but I think we'll probably be able to manufacture 5000 by the end of this year, which is the size of Roman legion. Musk admitted he stretched pretty thin, saying, I have like, 17 jobs at this point, obviously, managing multiple companies and couple, two, three government advisory roles. So there you go, yeah.

Kyle Mountsier  6:22  
I mean, I think there are people like this. You look at a Gary V you look at an Elon Musk, you look at even, you know, any like Zuckerberg, right? Entrepreneur, any purebred entrepreneur, they are just juggling so many things. And I think some people look at that and go, there's no way you can do all that. It's just a different type of human right? You know, I it is interesting to see a CEO, kind of pulling employees aside and being like, hold your stock, right? It's, it almost seems a little bit like fearful for the first time, like he's like, He's hanging on to something that doesn't,

Paul J Daly  7:04  
it doesn't. I don't feel that way, because I feel, I feel like, No, it's not I think what he means. And again, I don't know the man, but I have read the the really long biography, which helps me understand how he thinks and why he makes decisions. And the holding your stock, I truly believe, is his belief that, like, hey, if the employees dump their stock, right? It doesn't make a massive difference, right overall, because it's a small amount overall. But I think he's like, He wants His people to be like, no, no, hold it like it's gonna go. Because he was just like, it's gonna go like, ties are gonna turn way higher. And even some of the like, very well, reputable stock analysts still put Teslas target at like 2200

Kyle Mountsier  7:44  
I'm sure it is, without a doubt, it's not just about

Paul J Daly  7:47  
the cars and the teslas. He, you know, he obviously spoke about the Teslas and but didn't, didn't talk at all about politics. Employees were allowed to ask questions. And so it's really interesting. If you click through the link on the article, the Business Insider article gives, like, a lot of insight and detail on it. So it was open floor for employees to ask question. No one to ask any questions about politics. And there you go. So that's just one instance. I think he said, like, I pretty much work, go to sleep, wake up. Work, go to sleep. And I do that seven days a week, which is something I've heard in the book, right? It's not out of the ordinary. It's just

Kyle Mountsier  8:19  
a different type of human, and these different type of humans, like, you look at x stock right now, it's, it's rebounding fabulously, different types of humans also just find a way, right? And I think that's, that's like, where I get we come back to, like, Elon's a car guy, right? They just find a way. The entrepreneurship of a quote, unquote car guy. Car Guy is just, I'm gonna find a way. So I think, I think Tesla is going to rebound and this cyber cab. I think if they pull it off, it will be insane. It'll be a mess if

Paul J Daly  8:51  
they can pull it off. A lot of questions still, but you know, there you go. I wish I had a better segue for this segue. A lot of people are trading in there, Tesla, speaking of trading, the National auto auction Association reports that 2024 saw the highest number of vehicles sold at auction Since 2020 marking a strong recovery for the wholesale market. Their member auctions moved nearly 7.6 million vehicles in 2024 which is a notable rebound of the 12 million vehicles offered 61.3% were sold, the second highest conversion rate ever recorded. So these vehicles are rolling. Wow. Average wholesale price fell 5% to 13,009 21 but volume gains help drive the total sales to over 105 billion. They credit auctions as quote, the backbone of vehicle remarketing, offering vital services, redistribution, logistics, reconditioning, titling and all those services. Here's a quote from Larry Dixon, Vice President of auction data solutions, says our members reported year over year growth despite all the headwinds. Well, you

Kyle Mountsier  9:57  
know what I think this actually points to? In my opinion. The the heighten the the increase in wholesaled vehicles is because, I think that dealers are getting a lot more savvy as to the type of inventory that works for their lot, right? We haven't seen like massive increases in day supply. So it's not like there's a lot of offload and 6090, day teams that are going to that. It's, I think it's actually a bit more strategy. When people are saying that's not the right car for my lot, that's the right car for my lot, and they understand profitability, they understand their their buyer base, a bit more. And so that's just going to increase the wholesale market transactions happening because dealers are trying to find the right car for the right lot.

Paul J Daly  10:37  
Well, look, I think dealers are definitely getting smarter about the inventory. This is just another indicator. I love seeing this high since 2020 you know that part where everyone, like, sent their stuff to the ocean, everybody I still one of my, one of my greatest accomplishments, I think, was buying a vehicle right at peak panic mode.

Kyle Mountsier  10:57  
That's so smart as I was like,

Paul J Daly  11:00  
I hit that. I hit the dial. I bought him. Just got a sick deal on a fully loaded navigator with 45,000 miles. I got it for 58 grand.

Unknown Speaker  11:09  
So silly, I

Paul J Daly  11:10  
flew it. I've had a flood fly to Milwaukee to get it, but there was no one on the plane, so that was fine too. Yeah, and the totals were all closed on the way home. So

Kyle Mountsier  11:16  
oh my goodness, you just got out of it so easy.

Paul J Daly  11:21  
I know. I know. All right, what are we talking about? We're talking about reviews. Talking about reviews reviews.

Kyle Mountsier  11:25  
Who should respond to online reviews? Is a question that bright locals consumer review survey has been trying to answer. They found that consumers actually prefer an AI generated response over those written by humans. Very interesting in two separate tests, a restaurant in 2024 and a vet clinic in 2025 58% of respondents preferred AI generated responses over human written one, so just slightly tipping

Paul J Daly  11:49  
the 5050 scale, right? This isn't saying that they knew it was AI,

Kyle Mountsier  11:53  
right? Exactly. It's just like they preferred it. They Yeah, exactly 89% of consumers are more likely to shop at a business that responds to reviews, while 56 hesitate. 56% hesitate if a business ignores them, so that review response is extremely important, while con consumers prefer AI written responses. 46% also say reviews quote, feel fake if they seem NSA, review responses feel fake if they seem AI generated. So just, there's, like a sniff of it, yeah, similar kind of interaction with social media, posts, ads, all of that type of stuff. I think, you know, I was actually talking to a buddy yesterday that there's, there's a growing audience that understands, like, what to look for, you know. And the the wider the adoption rate of AI, the more people are going to be keen to the like, what to watch out for with AI. So I think that this, this may change over the next year.

Paul J Daly  12:52  
Yeah, it will. So here's here a couple sample responses, right? You're like, well, how different do they sound? So I'm going to read a response, the human response first that was generated than the AI response they tested up against, seeing which one humans responded to better. Here's the AI, here's the human version. Denise, we appreciate the confidence you have in Dr Evans and the entire team at Animal Hospital. We value seeing your dogs as much as young pups, and do everything in our power to keep them all healthy. Thank you so much for your kind remarks and terrific five star review. It means so much to us. That's the human. Here's the AI, okay, sup dog, I'm just kidding. That was well, played No, written by AI. Thank you so much, Denise, for your kind words and trusting us with the care of your senior pup. Dr Evans and our entire team truly enjoyed being here for you both. We're so happy to hear that you feel comfortable with the care we provided. Supporting pets and their families is what we're all about, and it means the world to us to know that we've earned your trust. We look forward to many more happy visits with you and your furry companion. Warm regards, Animal Hospital. The AI,

Kyle Mountsier  13:53  
one's better. It absolutely feels more human. So I asked, I when, when we were going to do the story. I asked GPT, I said, Why would people prefer AI responses to to reviews over human responses? And I think that there's a couple things in here. One was consistency and tone and quality. So when you think about, like, just okay, review after review, and when people are like, looking at these review responses, is there quality? Is grammar, there is professionalism, there speed and responsiveness always on availability. I think that this is the big one, and this is the one that like this is hard to do as a human but emotionally neutral and professional. AI, doesn't get defensive, sarcastic or flustered, which is especially valuable for responding to negative reviews, it keeps things calm and constructive. And I think that that can be balanced on both sides. So it may even be a place where, like, if you want a human response, hey, hit GPT for is this emotionally neutral and proficient professional before you respond to something, even if you want. Actually type the words to make it feel more human, because that's where people can, like, really sniff out, you know, a review to a negative response that has some, you know, vindictive nature to it or something. Yeah, you

Paul J Daly  15:11  
get this. I just dropped both responses into GPT, and I said, which one was more likely, written by a human. Says the second one? Oh, it's fooled itself, pulled it. It says it feels more genuine and conversational with phrasing like so happy to hear being here for you both and for your companion. It uses empathetic language like you mean the world to us. It says the structure and flow sounds more like a spoken note or a tone and subtlety in expression. So there you go. Ai thinks, well,

Kyle Mountsier  15:43  
because I think, like our, like our native human instinct when writing professional elements is to over professionalize it sometimes, and that's, that's where we get major turn off.

Paul J Daly  15:55  
People are like, this isn't real. This is fake. Hey, we hope we delivered on episode 100 997, I mean, we just try to give it our best swing every day. Episode 1000 cover up the three episodes, but go to ASOTU CON com and be with us in person in May you.

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