The AI Opportunity Most Entrepreneurs Are Missing Right Now | Kim Doyal
In this episode of Pivot to Profit, Pam Jordan interviews entrepreneur Kim Doyal about business reinvention, AI innovation, and the growing opportunity for women in tech. As a longtime online business owner, Kim shares how her career has evolved from retail management to WordPress education, content creation, and now building AI-powered tools and custom client solutions.
Kim’s story begins with a major life shift. After losing her husband in a car accident and realizing that traditional employment could not give her the flexibility she needed as a parent, she set out to build a business from home. That decision led her into the world of online entrepreneurship, where she became known as the WordPress Chick and later co-created a content planner that generated nearly half a million dollars in sales.
Today, Kim is focused on helping creators and business owners use artificial intelligence for business growth. In her conversation with Pam Jordan, she explains that AI is not just a trend or a shortcut. Instead, she sees it as a powerful tool for solving real problems, streamlining operations, and creating custom solutions that support both business efficiency and creativity. From building apps and automations to testing new offers and platforms like Substack, Kim is embracing AI as the next natural evolution of her work.
A key message from the episode is that the current AI space feels like a modern-day gold rush—but not in a “get rich quick” way. Kim emphasizes that the real opportunity lies in understanding a customer’s problem and using technology to create a unique, useful solution. She also highlights the importance of bringing more female voices into AI, noting that women need a stronger presence in shaping how these tools are used and developed.
Pam Jordan’s interview with Kim Doyal is a reminder that profitable business growth often comes from adaptability, curiosity, and the willingness to keep learning. For entrepreneurs looking to navigate the future of AI in business, Kim’s story offers both inspiration and practical insight.
For more conversations about entrepreneurship, profit strategy, and building wealth through business, explore more episodes of Pivot to Profit on Pam Jordan’s website.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
Pam Jordan (00:52)
Hello and welcome to today's episode of Pivot to Profit. I have the amazing honor of speaking with Kim Doyal today. How are you, Kim?
Kim Doyal (01:02)
I am fabulous. Spring is springing. Sun is out. No complaints.
Pam Jordan (01:06)
Amazing. Let me formally introduce you to everyone. Kim Doyal is a long time online entrepreneur, creator and storyteller who has spent nearly two decades helping people build businesses online. After unexpected changes in her personal life led her to step away from a traditional career path, she set out to create a business that allowed her to work from home with her kids, eventually becoming known as the WordPress chick.
and co-creating a content planner that generated nearly half a million dollars in sales. Today, Kim focuses on helping creators find their voice, tell better stories, and use AI tools to amplify their ideas while keeping the human connection front and center. This is amazing. I
to share your very heartfelt story with everyone. But before we dive in, hey, listener, if you're a business owner who wants to
better understand your numbers, increase your profit, reduce your taxes and grow your wealth. We would love to help you at Pivot Business Group. We're a financial strategy firm. Just go to pamjordan.com to schedule a call with my team. All right, Kim, are you ready to jump in?
Kim Doyal (02:18)
Let's do it, let's go.
Pam Jordan (02:20)
My first question is, what did you want to be when you grew up?
Kim Doyal (02:25)
Once I got past the I wanna be a rock star, right? Like at eight and nine, I decided, I was in a children's choir, you know? And it's like, I like to perform, let's be famous.
design,
I did a lot of art growing up and I really thought I would do, go into a traditional graphic design career. in
a way, it's a part of what I do, but you know, that was what I wanted it to be.
Pam Jordan (02:45)
I love it. And what was young Kim taught about money? Was it good, bad, evil? What was it?
Kim Doyal (02:51)
Not a lot, to be honest with you. And I have to pre-qualify this. I jokingly say it's the recovering Catholic in me. I adore my parents. They were amazing. I had a wonderful childhood. But you know, my dad was a police officer. My mom got married thinking she wasn't gonna have to work. So it was hard work, really. There wasn't a lot about money other than you work hard to earn it.
Pam Jordan (03:10)
Got you.
let's talk early career. So you started off in corporate. What did that look like? What did that smell like? All of the things.
Kim Doyal (03:17)
I guess corporate, it was retail management and I just kept scaling up and I was a district manager in San Francisco at 26. I was really driven, but it's not a quality of life, end of story. Like I kept opening stores and yeah, I'll be a training manager and I'll fly here and I'll go there. And it's just, you know, if I could go back and tell younger Kim, I'd be like, girl, use your voice, don't put up with the bullshit.
you know, a lot of patriarchal misogyny in that space. And so I just I was a hard worker, right? I did what I was told I wanted to be the star employee and I kept getting promoted. And at the time it was great. But again, it is a horrible quality of life. No life, you know, at least for fourth quarter.
Pam Jordan (03:58)
Yeah, it's
nights, weekends, retail is not ideal.
Kim Doyal (04:01)
No, no, even though the companies I worked for, I loved great companies, but like, it sucks.
in California, when you're a store manager, you're the only salaried employee, everybody else is hourly. So you're the only one that can work six, seven days a week and not cost the company a ton of money. So yeah, it sucked.
Pam Jordan (04:18)
Isn't that convenient? And then, life-lifes, and you had two young boys, and you realize this is not the quality of life. So how did you pivot from
six, seven days a week, days, nights, all the things, into I need an online business? What did that look
Kim Doyal (04:36)
Yeah, and not to correct you, but I have a daughter and a
I was widowed in 2003. I lost my husband in a car accident and I was 32. And it's just something you think happens to other people. So I kept working and whatnot. it just, had a small lawsuit settle around his death. It took five years, but it was enough of a cushion. And I always knew.
I was supposed to do something else with my life, not just be an employee. Like I opened a retail scrapbook store in 1998 with a business partner. And if it had been solely up to me, I would have just kept opening stores. This was before Michaels was selling everything. But it was just I knew that there was no it was no way to really be there for my kids. I was very determined to find something I could do from home. I went to a wealth expo in San Francisco in 2008, 2006, excuse me. And
funny because it was Tony Robbins, Kiyosaki and Trump are the keynote speakers. But we'll leave that alone. I went to this little offshoot. It was an internet marketing and this guy was making like eight grand a month selling ebooks and I was like, what? What is this? And girl when I tell you I was not technical, I couldn't even attach something to an email at the time. I just I wasn't. But I'm like, you know what, if I can put together IKEA furniture, I can figure this
Pam Jordan (05:33)
Ha
Kim Doyal (05:52)
So I jumped
Pam Jordan (05:52)
love it.
Kim Doyal (05:53)
I had a little bit of cushion in 2008 and I jumped in. like, this is it. I'm doing this.
Pam Jordan (05:57)
So what was the first offer that you had that you brought to market as an entrepreneur?
Kim Doyal (06:03)
Well, it was, know, once I decided ignorance was truly bliss, right? I claimed the WordPress chick name, which eventually WordPress is like, hey, you can't use that. So as the WP chick,
it was again, ignorance. I created, I did a webinar and then I sold the physical DVD, right? There's a company out there called Kunaki. I can't believe they're still there. Shrinkraft, I still have it. And then I shipped people the DVD. It was 24.95, but I swear the second somebody bought,
the webinar, was like, it was like 2495, right? This is before I knew that everything on the internet has to be sevens, being funny. But yeah, I just, was like, this works, this works. So it blew me away.
Pam Jordan (06:42)
And what was the webinar about? Building
Kim Doyal (06:45)
It was setting up Google Analytics and God, what was it called? It was Webmaster Tools at the time. I'm drawing a blank right now. Anyways, but to set up your Google Analytics and your site map and everything connected to WordPress, you know, because obviously at the time you needed to be indexed in the search engines, you still do, but it was very techy and it's again hysterical because I'm kind of one of those people that I'm like, I announced something, I'm like, you better dial this in now, so.
Yeah, it was a ton of fun.
Pam Jordan (07:10)
tell me in those early years about a financial win where you were like, you know what, Kim? I think this is going to work.
Kim Doyal (07:16)
I think it was probably the first website that I did for somebody and it wasn't and I swear if I look when I look back at that what I used to charge I would spend three hours with people on Skype, screen sharing and changing colors and all of these things and but it was probably the first site but at the same time having been in retail it's like there's a time for money trap for sure and in that type of service work
And that was never what I set out to do. Like I really thought I'm gonna be an info marketing millionaire, right? Like I'm gonna just sell digital products and eBooks. But yeah, was just the websites probably
the
thing that got me really excited.
Pam Jordan (07:55)
And you also have a content planner, because you said you like to put pen to paper. help explain that. That's amazing.
Kim Doyal (08:01)
So that was a ton of fun because when I pivoted from the WordPress chick to just my personal brand in 2018, again, having had a scrap bookstore, like I designed the graphic design stuff, I had designed stickers that got published. So I just had this idea, I'm like, there's nothing out there for planning the content. And every time I'd map out a funnel or I would do something online, I took pen to paper. And so I reached out to a friend of mine who is an actual graphic designer and brilliant at everything she does. And I'm like, hey, do you wanna...
Do this with me or can I hire you? And she was like, yes. I'm like, well, which one is it? So she jumped in and we even tried to kick-starter, which we didn't really need it in December, which failed. But because I'd built up an audience, we shared the journey of creating the planner. So I drew the pages out. I sent them to her. She did it all in InDesign. And that was wild. And we knew right out of the gate that I said, we are running paid traffic for this. I'd had some success with paid ads.
And I said, I'm not doing just the constant organic, it's a grind.
And
Pam Jordan (09:02)
It is.
Kim Doyal (09:03)
we did and it knocked it out of the park. Like once we started the ads and it was so fun to do, we just did like 10 bucks a day at first. Once we started though to see that converting and I think we could have dialed in the backend better, but six of one. And so we had an upsell of like, here's a course on how to use it, did a lot of those, but.
right before COVID, had scaled to $1,000 a day in ad spend. And so we hit, I think that one of the most fun months was, I think we spent like 29,000 on ads and we did 67,000 in sales. once you see that there is a machine that this works well, it's a little bit addictive. Fast forward and we're still great friends today, but it's a grind. E-commerce is a beast. I don't ever wanna touch it again. And honestly, like who would, I don't know, planners and journals still sell, but.
I'm way more into what I'm doing now.
Pam Jordan (09:55)
that's a great segue. So explain to us what you are focusing on now.
an evolution of where you started. So explain.
Kim Doyal (10:01)
Mm hmm.
Yeah, so it was funny because I jumped into AI and like 2021 when Jasper first came out and it was Jarvis. I don't know if anybody remembers that. I was amused. I'm like, like you weren't going to get a cease and desist letter from Disney. Anyway, so Jasper jumped into that and was kind of blown away. I was using it a lot for copy. And at the time I was really focused on content marketing and email marketing. You know, I would do courses and coaching and I was still building and I would do
I could do copywriting, so I then studied a lot of that. And I kind of thought last year that and I spent a couple of years living in Costa Rica in between all of this. And so it was it's been an adventure, but the AI piece of it was last year, the second I tried vibe coding. I'm like done because there was a little bit of I want to say imposter syndrome, like is everyone going to think I'm jumping on a bandwagon? It's a very natural evolution. But truly, when I was able to
build something that I wanted using natural language. I was like, that's it. I am, I'm going all in. I don't care what people think. That's another beautiful thing about women and men life. I do not give a shit, but sorry. But honestly, it
it waS
Pam Jordan (11:12)
Thank
Kim Doyal (11:12)
I was hooked. was completely hooked as soon as I saw an app come to life.
Pam Jordan (11:16)
So what is the offer these days? It's not websites. It's not graphic designs. It's not content
us understand.
Kim Doyal (11:22)
it's been, for what it's worth too, the other piece of this, Pam, that I would say is that I've taken my time to figure out the offer.
And
Pam Jordan (11:29)
Love
Kim Doyal (11:29)
as I got better with my skills, and it's funny, being the WordPress chick, right? Like, I'm completely off of WordPress. I've totally vibe-coded my site a couple times. I just relaunched it. And so, was, got to, it's client work right now.
But the piece with the client, I moved over to Substack too. It's probably one of the best organic traffic channels right now, honestly, in the community, especially the women in AI. It's so much fun. So as I've started to scale that, I'm going to do a paid subscription, which people can pay. There's nothing gated right now. And I do have paid subscribers. But to a community where we're not doing chit chats and forums, there's enough of that. But it'll be.
training and upsells and whatnot. So I've got a client that I originally just did a site for and what was really fun, she's a controller in Canada, she's a little bit older than me and she said,
is it. And she's worked with like multi-million dollar companies and she goes in and says, here's where's your PNL, the numbers issues, like where they're struggling. And she said, where are businesses gonna be in five years if they don't start adopting this? I said, I know Lynn.
Like I said, I've built a couple different apps here and there testing and playing the first thing besides the websites I have built like a personal hub because I I'm not a database person right notion I've tried to use them all and It is amazing when so I've actually started building agents So I'm duplicating this for her and so right now I'm not really attached to the offer to be honest with you because I know it's gonna sort of present itself I can do workshops. I feel like the core space is completely shifting
And so honestly, it feels a little bit like this is probably what the gold rush felt like, that if you can solve genuine problems for people, truly, and I'm on a mission to help women use this technology. We need more female voices in the space, training these models on female voices. I'm not married now, right? But I can't tell you how many images I generate and I'm like, why'd you put a ring on my finger? There's a lot of assumptions with little things like that. And so it's kind of working one on one to finesse
the offer, to be honest with you.
And it's great because I'm building agents, the data that I'm able to pull in, it is blowing my mind. And so also on YouTube, I've thought about relaunching, I had the WordPress check podcast, but I'm just kind of enjoying the journey right now, to be honest with you. I am probably gonna sell, I have an app that I'm building called Stack Rewards where it is kind of like a viral or one of the apps like a giveaway app, but it's specific to Substack.
And with every action that you take, you get a reward, not just points. And I think that that audience is a hundred percent there on Substack. So it's kind of like whatever somebody wants. Like I'm going to test building a website and agents for somebody that's got a Costa Rica rental property. like, let me see if I can automate this process. I'm well, it's fun, you know? And so it is, it's which maybe it sounds very ambiguous to people who are like, look, how do I earn money doing this? But the
Pam Jordan (14:11)
Let's figure it out.
Kim Doyal (14:20)
is,
you know how to solve a problem,
for somebody, the tech is there to support a unique solution. And I think the bespoke solutions right now within the AI space is kind of the gold rush, for lack of a better word. And I don't mean it like a get rich quick, because there's work involved and you have to be present with clients and support people. But anyway, there's a ton of opportunity. If you pull in your skill, your experience and really step back, it's that age old problem. What is the customer's problem? Can you solve it?
If there's kind of a bunch of things, kind of not anything definitive, and I'm good with it, but I do have plans for this, I think that first app. And again, it's the ability to scale and run traffic because at the end of the day, I will run paid traffic. I love Substack, but paid traffic, especially with Meta's new Andromeda, the AI tends to nail the conversions in the audience. You don't have to do all that stuff. So yeah, I'm just kind of sorting it through. And I would, so I've actually created an agency site.
it's
of like a boutique agency is what I'm looking at. But I only want three or four clients. And so I've got another client that I'm going be starting with. But it's fun, the amount of work. It's crazy, right? AI can save you time. And I'm
up till midnight. I'm like, I just could do a little bit more. I can just code a little bit more. And I'm not a coder and I'm not a
Pam Jordan (15:28)
much.
Thank
Kim Doyal (15:33)
And if someone had told me a year ago, the language that I would understand, the tools that I would be using, I would have thought, no, but same. You can figure out IKEA furniture, you can do this.
Pam Jordan (15:42)
AI
changing every day. And
Kim Doyal (15:45)
Mm-hmm.
Pam Jordan (15:46)
how are you helping people navigate which tools to use, how to get started? Because it really is, I love your gold rush analogy. It really is the wild west in AI right now. And people are building tools. I mean, I've created softwares. Like it's amazing. We use
Kim Doyal (15:58)
Mm-hmm.
Pam Jordan (16:04)
every day
our agency. So like, how do you, how do you help people navigate that?
Kim Doyal (16:04)
⁓
So I did a couple, like my site, I've got this huge directory of language and terms and whatnot, and I write just like I'm talking. And so a piece of this for me is the foundational work, because honestly, here's a great example. So I used to send out, my newsletter was the Spark, it used to be F the Hustle, so that tells you kind of where my brain is, but it was the Spark. And so I grabbed this local software that reads data, because Substack does not have a public API.
And I looked and I was like, my God, my individual posts are totally outperforming the newsletter. And my point with the newsletter was that I was sharing tools every week, which is noise to a certain extent. It's a little bit of a distraction. And so it's, am such a, here's a behind the scenes. Here's what I did. I did this very long in-depth post about rebuilding my site. I built a whole backend. I've got an LMS in there. I've got the community. I built a CMS, which I don't necessarily need it because I can push stuff from my hub
But the whole thing is in teaching people this one, I do that everyday examples and I'm constantly reminding people that you don't have to be technical to do this. So I relaunched my YouTube video and I've got a YouTube team now that I'm working with and they want to do a lot of the, you know, the stuff that grabs the engagement. I'm like, I want the stuff that grabs the customers and truly helps. So it's going to be more longer form step
And so I think showing people different examples and I literally give the prompts.
in. So here's another example. when I write, I you do a lot of personal stories, I like to integrate them. But we all call them the greatest hits, right? It's like, God, I've told that like 12 times, I don't want to tell this again. And so I did an exercise where I called a life inventory, and I dictate everything. I kid you not, I'm almost at a million words with whisper flow
a
because when I'm
Pam Jordan (17:51)
goodness.
Kim Doyal (17:52)
right, it's beautiful to be able to be like, man, and I talk just like I
so
to be able to use these tools and break it down simply is what is helping people. And I just show the work, but the life inventory exercise that I just did, I went through it and I just had Claude, I said, come up with questions. I want you to
questions, Pam. We had seven
of
Pam Jordan (18:16)
thought.
Kim Doyal (18:16)
questions.but it's like, and how long would that take you to type that out, right? And so I just answered, blah, blah, blah, blah, right? And.
Claude came back and says, here's your patterns. And so was really fun to see patterns that I had as a kid that stuck with me, like, don't tell me what to do, right? Kinda, and I was a good kid, but it was like, I was always in charge. I want to be in charge. So to see that, and I created this story bank. And so now I've got this, and so I just did the full post. I gave the questions, I gave the prompts, I gave the direction on how to create the story bank, you know, so how to categorize it and tag it.
So helping people, really think it's the demonstrating of it. And here's a little rule of thumb in my experience is that
you're marketing and you're sharing content, it's tough because again, there are some incredibly brilliant women that I've connected with on Substack, but yet some of the stuff is gonna go over my avatar's head. They don't wanna hear code or even see Markdown, right? Like I hate reading Markdown personally. I'm like.
I put it in Google Drive, I'm like, put this on the canvas, need this, or know, Gemini, but, and so you have to be careful about creating content for your peers or creating content for your audience. And so I'm really, because I did that with WordPress. I had this great community, I had a ton of friends, I had the podcast, but I'm
it was the content that drew the customers to me. And
just, long story short, it's really behind the scenes and showing examples.
and I share the shit show, to be honest with you. I built a ton of apps that broke or it was not understanding, you know, having master constraints. And so with the simplification and what tools to use, the best advice I could give to anybody is learn to build the foundation. Learn to build the foundation with your voice skills and you're all the same stuff that we would do without AI. It's just way faster to do it and you can iterate. So whatever tool you're doing, you're using, I adore Claude.
is to build that in, build the rules and the skill voice. And if you're not sure how to do it, you ask it and it'll tell you. I
it's just that simple. So
build a foundation and don't be afraid to try stuff. There's nothing you're gonna break. I mean, for what it's worth, even if you're building stuff, as long as you're connected like to GitHub, you're secure. And so there's a handful of things, but really get clear on
what it is you wanna do with AI because some people may wanna write.
Some people may wanna get into design or images or build apps. I think building is the most fun ever, but not everybody's gonna wanna do that. But I also see apps and the static lead magnets kind of going sideways because yes, somebody may opt in and download it, but if you can get them engaging and going through a quiz or what I built my own quiz, like all of these things, it's gonna shift. So try it, don't be afraid to break it and talk.
I swear it is the fastest path to learning is to talk. And when I'm building things, I've actually created an AI learning folder in my desk so that I'm like, remind me what we did here so that I can come back and reference this and
Pam Jordan (21:14)
I love is you're learning in real time and you're sharing what you're learning. And that brings so much value because AI for lot of female, a lot of founders is, is unknown and it can be scary. And so just seeing someone like yourself, look, I built this and it didn't work. Here's why it didn't work. Here's what I changed here. I have, here's how I got it to work is the huge difference because AI is not going anywhere. It
here. It
staying. And we all just need to embrace it at whatever level we feel comfortable. But I do.
love you being authentic and saying, look, this part works and I broke this and here's how we fix it. So I love it. So Kim, what's on the horizon for you? What's next for you?
Kim Doyal (21:49)
That's a great question. it's probably launching stack rewards is a big one. And like I said, I've, built a chunk of apps, right? And I'm like, then you look at it too. And I would tell anybody this is look at where you this fits into the quality of your life, right? Like I really require a lot of personal time to myself also. And so I'm like, this is a simple app that I can get going. And it's, it's gonna be like a once a year, like 49 bucks or something, people aren't running giveaways every month. So
is launching that and really scaling my audience. I'm going to start running paid traffic. And so, you know, it's creating these cohesive tests also, even the paid substack getting the Spark Lab, which is the community launch. So kind of just rolling with it, having a ton of fun.
Pam Jordan (22:32)
Kim, this has been amazing. Thank you so much for sharing your prophet story with us. Where can people connect with you?
Kim Doyal (22:37)
Kim Doyal.com or you can go to kimdoyle.substack.com.
have both, I do similar writing on both, And then in terms of social, I'm on YouTube, I'm launching a YouTube channel. I'm not super active on a lot of other social at this point, but
probably those three places are the
Pam Jordan (22:53)
Okay, amazing. Awesome, awesome. Thank you, Kim. That is all for today's episode of Pivot to Profit. If you are ready to understand your business numbers, increase your profit and reduce your taxes, just connect with us at pamjordan.com. And remember, it's not what you make that matters, it's what you keep.