📈 How Tushy Boosted Sales 85% Without Hiring a Single Rep

Hey everyone,

Welcome back for another bite to chew on.

Picture this: It's Black Friday week. Your customer service team is drowning in tickets. You're scrambling to hire seasonal help, knowing you'll have to let most of them go in January.

But what if we told you there's a better way?

We recently sat down with Ren Fuller-Wasserman from Tushy and Alex Plugaru from Gorgias to talk about how AI is transforming customer experience. 

Ren went over how Tushy just had their most successful holiday season ever, and with fewer people than the year before. 

No seasonal hiring. No training new reps in July.

Just a 17-second first response time during peak traffic.

Here's how AI completely transformed their customer experience (and why it's working better than anyone expected).

🍽️ On the Menu: 

• The 85% Sales Boost Nobody Saw Coming

• Why AI Sells Better Than Humans 

• The Implementation Playbook

• Skeptics Guide To Getting Started

Want the full conversation? This is just a taste of what Ren and Alex shared.

Listen to the complete episode for even more insights on AI implementation, team management, and the future of customer experience:

Or listen on:

• Apple 🍎

• Spotify 🎧

• Youtube ▶️

The 85% Sales Boost Nobody Saw Coming

Let's start with a crazy number: AI agents are converting 85% more sales than human agents at Tushy.

Not just handling tickets faster. Not just reducing costs. 

Actually driving more revenue.

Here's why this is happening →

The Awkward Human Problem 

As Ren puts it:

But AI doesn't get awkward. 

It smoothly transitions from education to selling without the social friction that holds back human agents.

The 24/7 Opportunity 

Your website visitors don't work 9-to-5. They're browsing at midnight, making decisions on weekends, and asking questions when your team is asleep.

Alex from Gorgias (the platform Tushy uses) sees this across 15,000+ merchants: 

"If you're paying dollars to get visitors to your website and your team isn't there to respond immediately, you're probably losing conversions."

The Trust Factor 

Here's the counterintuitive part: customers are more comfortable asking AI certain questions. They know it's a bot, so they'll ask about sensitive topics they might feel judged for with a human.

This creates better data collection and more personalized responses.

💡 Quick Takeaway: Look at your support tickets from the last month. 

Look beyond the basic questions (but definitely automate those too) and consider where a bot interaction might actually be better (quicker, easier, less, um, embarrassing) than a human interaction. 

Why AI Sells Better Than Humans

The biggest insight from our conversation was that AI and human agents excel at different parts of the customer journey.

Where AI Dominates: 

• Immediate response (17 seconds vs hours) 

• Consistent product education without fatigue 

• Seamless sales transitions • 24/7 availability 

• No judgment on sensitive questions

Where Humans Win: 

• Complex problem-solving 

• Empathy for unique situations 

• Relationship building 

• Handling edge cases

The magic happens when you let each handle what they do best.

The Tushy Strategy 

Instead of replacing humans, they repositioned them → 

AI handles: Basic FAQ, product education, initial sales conversations

Humans handle: Returns, complex installs, relationship building

That lets human agents focus on high-value interactions while AI handles the volume.

💡 Quick Takeaway: Don't think “replacement”, think “repositioning”. 

Map out your current support workflow and identify which tasks drain your team's energy without adding real value. Those are your AI candidates.

The AI Implementation Playbook

Based on what we learned from both Tushy and Gorgias, here's how to implement this without breaking things:

Phase 1: Start With the Obvious Stuff 

• "Where's my order?" tickets 

• Basic product questions

• Simple FAQ responses

For many brands, this covers 60-70% of support tickets and gives immediate ROI while you learn the system.

Phase 2: Set Up Smart Guardrails

 Create automatic escalation rules for other categories: 

• Health-related concerns or side effects 

• Angry customers (sentiment analysis) 

• Complex technical issues 

• Refund requests over certain amounts

Phase 3: Sales Integration 

Once customer service is dialed in, layer in sales functionality: 

• Product recommendations based on customer questions 

• Upselling complementary products 

• Converting pre-purchase inquiries

Team Buy-In Strategy 

Ren's approach worked because she positioned AI as elevation, not replacement:

Measuring Success Beyond Cost Savings 

Don't just track cost reduction. 

Monitor: 

• Conversion rate on pre-purchase inquiries 

• Response time improvements 

• Customer satisfaction scores 

• Revenue attribution from AI interactions

💡 Quick Takeaway: Set up tracking from day one. 

Create UTM parameters or tags for AI-assisted sales so you can prove ROI. 

Many brands implement AI and then struggle to show the business impact because they didn't plan for measurement.

The Skeptic's Guide to Getting Started

We get it. AI feels risky. What if it says the wrong thing or goes off the rails?

Alex's perspective: "Humans hallucinate too. The difference is you can't (immediately) ask a human, 'Hey, why did you write this?' when they make a mistake."

Risk Mitigation Tactics: 

• Start with low-stakes inquiries 

• Set up topic-based escalation rules 

• Review AI responses regularly 

• Use confidence thresholds for automatic responses

💡 The Reality Check 

You're probably already losing conversions by not responding fast enough. The risk of not implementing might be higher than the risk of implementing imperfectly.

🧰 Operator Toolbox

Gorgias - Our customer service homebase, which allows us to take care of thousands of tickets a month with just a handful of agents. Their range of functions and integrations for Shopify stores is second to none. Upgrade your CX now →

Proxima - Helps us find scalable audiences on Meta, even beyond the typical broad targeting setup. Take their Efficiency guarantee Trial → 

Upcounting - Our go-to DTC accounting and bookkeeping agency. No standard services, just brand-focused dashboards and solutions. Get your books in order → 

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