Dan Lee is the Co-Founder and CEO of Nooks, an AI Gross sales Assistant Platform (ASAP) that automates busywork so reps can give attention to the human a part of promoting. Previous to founding Nooks, Dan held machine studying roles at corporations like Scale AI and Cerebras Programs and studied AI at Stanford.
Are you able to stroll us by means of the journey of founding Nooks? What impressed you to start out the corporate, and the way did the thought evolve over time?
My cofounders, Rohan Suri, Nikhil Cheerla, and I had been shut associates from Stanford. All of us studied AI and did analysis collectively. In the course of the pandemic, we began hacking round with “digital workplace” concepts. It appeared like the proper time—everybody was distant, and collaboration instruments had been changing into important. We had been significantly excited concerning the thought of constructing the digital workplace “sensible”. At all times-on collaboration generates a lot knowledge and engagement, and we noticed a chance to leverage that to automate work and assist individuals get higher at their jobs.
We seen that gross sales groups, significantly SDR groups, had been our most engaged customers. They’re inherently social, and being early of their careers, they benefited quite a bit from the tighter collaboration these instruments enabled. Spending extra time with them, we noticed how a lot of their time was spent on duties that AI may simply deal with—writing emails, researching prospects, updating CRMs. It made us surprise: would AI ultimately change these roles?
However the deeper we bought, the extra we realized how human the SDR job is. It’s not nearly duties; it’s about understanding individuals, constructing relationships, and adapting in real-time. That’s when it clicked. AI wasn’t right here to switch them—it may empower them.
For me personally, I’ve at all times been fascinated by human-AI interactions. Constructing a product that enhances what individuals do, reasonably than changing them, felt fulfilling. Gross sales turned this pure extension of our digital workplace thought, and with the market alternative aligned completely with our pursuits, Nooks was born.
The pivot from a distant collaboration platform to an AI-driven gross sales assistant was a daring transfer. What had been the important thing indicators that satisfied you it was the fitting determination?
Not solely was there big demand for Nooks from gross sales groups, however there was additionally an unlimited market alternative, influence, and actually attention-grabbing human-centered AI issues to unravel.
Over the previous few years, basis mannequin corporations like OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google have competed to push the boundaries of intelligence with LLMs. However the sensible functions to unravel actual enterprise issues stay under-developed.
Gross sales is without doubt one of the greatest alternatives for AI to rework hundreds of thousands of jobs. Within the U.S. alone, there are ~3 million inside gross sales reps, spending a lot of their time on repetitive duties. These actions are time-consuming and distract from higher-leverage actions. Now that AI can automate a lot of this busywork, it’s turn out to be clear that AI will rework the function of the gross sales rep. AI-powered groups will be capable of promote orders of magnitude extra successfully than conventional groups. Main corporations know that this type of funding in gross sales is most corporations’ key lever for progress.
We not solely constructed conviction available in the market, however we additionally discovered the utilized AI issues in gross sales significantly attention-grabbing. In contrast to domains like help or compliance, the place duties are extra deterministic, gross sales is about dynamic, high-stakes human interactions. Success depends on nuanced engagement: figuring out the fitting stakeholders, incomes belief, and persuading consumers of a product’s worth. This complexity makes AI “assistants” the best software for gross sales, amplifying human efforts reasonably than trying to switch them.
Nooks has remodeled gross sales processes with instruments like AI Dialing Assistants and Prospecting Assistants. What makes your know-how stand out within the crowded AI gross sales assistant market?
The gross sales AI house is tremendous crowded with new entrants day by day. And gross sales reps already use dozens of gross sales instruments of their day by day workflows—CRMs, e mail platforms, LinkedIn, prospecting databases, enablement instruments, and extra. No person needs simply one other AI gross sales software so it’s actually essential we’re intentional about standing above the noise.
- Quick, tangible ROI. Most AI gross sales instruments don’t work or don’t ship clear outcomes. In a two-week trial of Nooks, we’ll double your conferences booked per rep. Demonstrating our worth up-front has helped us stand out towards different instruments which might be little greater than a cool demo. We energy 70%+ of gross sales pipeline for a few of the world’s fastest-growing corporations like Deel, Webflow, Verkada and Fivetran.
- Gross sales reps love Nooks. Traditionally SDRs & BDRs haven’t gotten a lot love from software program instruments and infrequently don’t command the finances. However issues are altering, and end-users are empowered to assist form shopping for choices. We’ve been very intentional about constructing for the rep, our end-user. Nooks offers reps superpowers whereas different instruments can really feel like a chore to make use of. The typical rep spends 3hrs/day utilizing Nooks. And we’re on the prime of the leaderboard in evaluation websites like G2.
- Human-first. We’ve began with human-centered duties like calling as a result of it’s essential that, as know-how progresses, prospects use your product increasingly. Different corporations that begin with issues like e mail or analysis will discover that gross sales reps use these merchandise much less and fewer over time as a result of these gross sales duties might be largely automated with AI. We’re excited to construct human-AI hybrids that may out-pace one of the best human reps and out-smart one of the best pure AI gross sales brokers.
Might you share extra concerning the function AI performs in optimizing gross sales groups’ effectivity? For instance, how does your AI Parallel Dialer skip widespread ache factors like answering machines or spam?
Gross sales is each an artwork and a science. With Nooks, human reps grasp the artwork—constructing relationships, empathizing with buyer challenges, and crafting artistic options—whereas AI helps with the science. Nooks assistants analyze each entry within the CRM, scour the net for related insights, and deal with repetitive duties like inserting calls, writing emails, and updating information.
For instance, take into consideration the everyday course of for making a name: trying up a prospect’s quantity, doing a little pre-call analysis, dialing, and infrequently reaching voicemail or no reply. Multiply that by dozens of calls every day, and it rapidly turns into a serious time sink.
AI transforms this course of by automating the tedious components. It may possibly dial a number of strains without delay, depart voicemails routinely, and join reps immediately when a reside prospect solutions. This lets sellers focus their vitality on conversations, not guide duties.
When a prospect does reply, AI goes a step additional by offering related analysis and context, enabling reps to have extra impactful discussions. The end result? Extra significant conversations that drive pipeline progress.
Coaching bots and name scoring are intriguing. How does Nooks guarantee these instruments are correct and really useful for gross sales reps and managers?
Name scoring and coaching bots are shaping how gross sales groups reinforce and scale finest practices. Historically, managers needed to sift by means of name recordings, selectively scoring and figuring out areas for enchancment—a time-consuming course of that left reps with restricted suggestions and progress alternatives.
AI adjustments the sport by analyzing each name and correlating efficiency with success metrics. It offers scalable, complete suggestions for all reps, making certain constant enchancment throughout the staff. Managers can customise scoring standards, specializing in key levels or objections within the gross sales course of to align with their technique.
Coaching bots take this additional by utilizing real-world name knowledge to simulate conversations with prospects. These bots determine profitable behaviors and challenges, permitting reps to follow limitless function performs based mostly on actual situations. Managers can fine-tune these simulations so as to add complexity or goal particular objections, creating tailor-made coaching experiences.
Nooks allows managers to audit and optimize each coaching bots and name scoring to make sure accuracy. Combining AI’s scalability with manager-driven customization, gross sales groups can elevate their teaching and coaching applications to drive higher outcomes at scale.
What developments in AI and machine studying do you foresee taking part in an important function in Nooks’ future improvement?
Developments in AI like enhancements in reasoning, speech fashions, and looking fashions reminiscent of Anthropic’s computer-use and OpenAI’s upcoming “Operator” mannequin are an enormous profit to Nooks since we’ve the richest knowledge and highest consumer engagement on the top-of-funnel. Improved intelligence means we will reduce out extra busywork extra rapidly and our assistants are in a position to develop a deeper understanding of shoppers’ gross sales processes.
Nevertheless it’s actually outstanding what AI fashions can already do at the moment. And the sensible functions of this intelligence to unravel actual enterprise issues are nonetheless catching up. We’ve got a number of thrilling product updates deliberate that may really feel futuristic to reps, however don’t actually require mannequin intelligence past what we have already got at the moment.
We’re significantly excited to construct AI workflows that span throughout our AI assistants, serving to them work collectively seamlessly and remove the necessity for reps to behave as “human glue” manually connecting disparate instruments. This may assist bridge intelligence and workflow gaps throughout at the moment’s fragmented software stacks.
The gross sales trade is valued at $3 trillion, and legacy gamers like Salesforce dominate the house. How does Nooks plan to carve out a bigger share of this market?
We’ve got tight integrations with platforms like Salesforce. They’re unimaginable for CRM and managing deal pipelines, however they don’t resolve the day-to-day challenges reps face within the trenches of promoting. That’s the place we are available in. On this new world of AI, changing legacy instruments will not be very thrilling. The true alternative lies in redefining individuals’s jobs.
AI-driven instruments usually face skepticism about changing human roles. How do you deal with considerations about automation changing jobs versus enhancing human productiveness?
Gross sales is basically a human-centered problem. In contrast to different domains starting to leverage pure AI brokers—reminiscent of help, coding, or authorized—the output of a gross sales rep will not be a simple, deterministic process. Relatively, it’s a fancy, dynamic human interplay.
In lots of different AI domains, the “shopper” is actively searching for the outcomes. For instance, a buyer asking for help or an engineer is producing code. In gross sales, nevertheless, the client is the buyer. They’re most likely not actively trying to be bought to and their inboxes are already flooded with AI-generated outreach. In consequence, being human stands out.
Gross sales AI should give attention to amplifying human creativity and belief. Thus, the best AI functions for gross sales are “assistants” that empower people reasonably than AI “brokers” trying to switch them. AI-assisted reps will out-pace one of the best human reps and can out-smart one of the best pure AI gross sales brokers.
Trying forward, the place do you see Nooks in 5 years? What bigger influence do you hope it’ll have on the gross sales trade?
There are hundreds of thousands of gross sales reps within the US and their jobs are about to evolve. Nooks is poised to steer this transformation. Automating the “busywork” and enabling reps to give attention to what they do finest—constructing relationships and driving top-line progress—we envision leaner, AI-powered groups attaining orders of magnitude extra effectiveness than conventional groups. AI assistants will turn out to be indispensable, identical to prime gross sales reps, as a result of they gained’t simply help the gross sales course of—they’ll be executing it.
On this future, AI-powered gross sales groups is not going to solely ship unprecedented progress for his or her corporations but in addition set the next bar for what gross sales can obtain as a self-discipline. Past productiveness good points, we hope to empower gross sales reps to ship extra worth to their prospects.
Thanks for the nice interview, readers who want to study extra ought to go to Nooks.