VENICE, Fla. — A Florida entrepreneur is using artificial intelligence to help his company work faster and smarter.

In the world of technology, things are always moving fast. And that’s how Matt Ackerson likes it.

“I’m going to put it in self-driving mode now,” he said.

Ackerson has spent years thinking about the future.

“I think as a kid, I would always just see my dad fixing things and programming things, and I was just obsessed with the future and what it would bring, or what it would look like,” he said.

Technology seemed destined to become a big part of Ackerson’s future.

Ackerson started Growbo, a marketing agency, in 2010. His company offers a variety of services, including web design and project management. He is the founder and CEO.

"Started with less than $200 in the bank. I started from my childhood bedroom," he said. "Being 15 years in business now, we’ve serviced thousands of clients all over the world. We’ve employed hundreds of people. A few years ago, we became a $1 million company for the first time. And then the next year, we became a multi-million dollar company," he said.

Going all-in on artificial intelligence has helped him reach new heights.

“I wasn’t sure if I was actually smart enough to build AI from scratch. So I started doing that and it actually started to work,” Ackerson said.

He first integrated his own AI format in 2022.

“What we’re trying to build with Growbo and the Growbo Human + AI platform is something that’s going to be able to help the entrepreneurs and businesses of the future to create and accelerate their marketing success by having a team of both human professionals to guide the AI,” he said.

On this screen, he shows an example of how his team uses AI.

“So,let’s say that we want to write a blog article for like a local landscaping or dental company. Basically — similar to how we used to need three or four people and planning involved — we can do it with one person just clicking a button,” Ackerson said.

Since incorporating AI, he’s calculated the results it’s had on his company.

“Over 700 hours saved in the last four months, or $12,000. And that’s what we estimated it would have taken a human worker if it was just us doing it the regular old way without AI technology,” Ackerson said.

And as the saying goes, time equals money.

“We were able to actually grow our traffic by about 120%, and it’s led to an increase in revenue by about 150%,” he said.

As fast as technology is evolving, Ackerson knows he needs to stay wired to continue on the path to success.