Keynotes · Workshops · Executive Briefings · Virtual
Carl Taylor helps small business owners and entrepreneurs make the shift from operator to orchestrator. Not with predictions about 2030, but with the AI systems already running his own company today... shown, demonstrated, and often built live in the room.
Keynotes from $10K + GST (AUD) · Australia, NZ & international · Virtual available worldwide
The short version
Carl Taylor is an Australian AI keynote speaker and the founder and CEO of Automation Agency, which has served 1,340+ businesses and delivered around 700,000 marketing tasks since 2014. He deployed AI in his business back in 2016, rebuilt the entire company around AI agents when large language models arrived, and now teaches business owners to hire AI team members the way they'd hire staff. He's the author of two books, a former podcast host, and he's at his best in front of a room with a live problem to solve.
One thing to be clear about: Carl speaks to small business owners, entrepreneurs and the teams around them. He's been a business owner since he was 15, and a tech guy the whole way through... which makes him the bridge. He takes non-technical audiences into AI without losing them, and can go as deep as the technical people in the room want to go. He's not a machine-learning researcher, and if your event needs one, he'll tell you straight and point you to better fits.
Keynote topics
Every topic below is drawn from systems Carl runs in his own business. Each one is tailored to your audience on a briefing call before the event.
AI is everywhere, yet most business owners' weeks look exactly the same as they did two years ago. This keynote names the real problem: they're still operating when they should be orchestrating. Carl shows what it looks like to run a business where AI team members handle the inbox, the design queue and the follow-up... including the true story of personalised emails going out to every event attendee while he was on the floor playing trains with his daughter.
Best for: conference main stage, business owner and franchise audiences, association annual events.
Most audiences can't act on AI advice because they don't know where they are. Carl's 5 Levels framework gives every person in the room a map: where they sit today, what the next level up looks like, and the single move that gets them there. Simple enough to draw on a napkin, sticky enough that attendees reference it for years.
Best for: mixed-sophistication audiences, leadership offsites, industry conferences.
The reason most AI purchases disappoint: businesses buy tools and expect employees. Carl flips the frame... you don't program an assistant, you hire one, brief it, and let it earn trust. He demonstrates his own AI staff working on real tasks, live, and shows the audience the exact roles most businesses should fill first.
Best for: hands-on audiences, professional services firms, teams evaluating AI adoption.
Why does every AI tool feel generic? Because it has no context. Carl shows how a business captures what it knows... its voice, offers, customers, and quirks... into a brain any AI can use, turning off-the-shelf models into team members that sound like you and know your business. This is the foundation piece behind everything else he teaches.
Best for: workshops, executive briefings, audiences past the "what is ChatGPT" stage.
Formats
Keynote (30-90 minutes). The big shift, with live demonstrations. Main stage energy, practical spine.
Half-day or full-day workshop. Attendees don't watch... they install. Real AI systems set up in the room, on their businesses. Carl has run hands-on AI install workshops and multi-week sprint programs for business owners since 2026.
Executive briefing. A closed-door session for founders and their leadership teams: where AI genuinely saves time, where it doesn't, and how to sequence adoption without burning the team.
Virtual keynote or webinar. Broadcast-quality studio, worldwide, without the airfares.
Fees
Final fee depends on format, customisation and travel. Workshops, executive briefings and virtual sessions are quoted per engagement. No games... tell Carl your budget in the enquiry and you'll get a straight yes, no, or "here's what would fit".
A pre-event briefing call, examples tailored to your audience's industry, a promotional video or social clip for your event marketing if useful, and Carl staying past his slot to answer the questions people only ask off-stage.
Audience fit
Carl's home ground is small business owners, entrepreneurs and the teams around them. Mixed rooms are his specialty: the owner who's never opened ChatGPT sitting next to the operations person who lives in it... both leave with their next move.
Industry associations and annual conferences in accounting, mortgage broking, real estate, allied health, trades and professional services.
Franchise conventions, mastermind communities, coaching groups and chambers where members run their own P&L.
Coaches, consultants, accountants, brokers, real estate, allied health, agencies. Carl spent twelve years running a marketing company for exactly these businesses... he speaks owner, and he speaks marketing.
Not the right fit: big-corporate leadership programs, academic AI conferences and machine-learning research audiences. Carl's world is founders and small business, not the enterprise org chart... and he'd rather tell you that here than on your stage.
Social proof
Having engaged Carl to speak at our event... I was thoroughly impressed with the way he held the audience with his expert but easy to implement advice. It was a pleasure working with Carl from start to finish.
Scott Chambers Event organiserCarl is an engaging presenter and has plenty to share... He presented with our trade business audience at Lifestyle Tradie Boot Camp. Thanks for opening our eyes Carl.
As a speaker, Carl is inspiring and focused on providing the audience with Results in Advance content that is leading in the industry.
Thomas Reid Executive & Business CoachI thought that project would take me years, if not months. With what I learned in the Lab I knocked over 128 years of the association's history in less than a day. Mind-blowing.
Adam Franklin AI Keynote Speaker & CEO, Bluewire MediaI couldn't make Carl's workshop live, but the recording was just as good. By the end I'd built a whole custom AI brain... If you're a business owner who feels like you're falling behind on AI, this is the perfect, non-overwhelming place to start. Highly recommend.
Byron Dempsey AI Install Workshop attendeeI'll admit, I was kind of resistant to AI when it first came out... Coming into today, all the possibilities felt kind of scary. Three hours later... definitely less scary. This is going to be next level.
Byron recorded this himself after building his AI Business Brain from the workshop recording.
Carl has been speaking to business audiences since 2010. Since 2026 he has run monthly AI install workshops, multi-week sprint programs and a hands-on builders' lab for business owners, alongside conference and event keynotes.
Booking questions
Keynotes typically start at $10K + GST (AUD). Workshops, executive briefings and virtual keynotes are quoted per engagement based on format, customisation and travel. Every engagement includes a briefing call and tailored examples.
He's a practitioner. His company runs on the AI systems he presents: an AI executive assistant, AI designers, a multi-agent delivery platform. The talk is a tour of a working machine, often with live demonstrations built in front of the audience.
Central Coast of NSW, about an hour north of Sydney. He speaks Australia-wide and in New Zealand, travels internationally for the right engagements, and presents virtually worldwide.
Yes, every time. The briefing call covers your audience, industry and event goals, and the examples and demonstrations are rebuilt to match. An accounting conference and a franchise convention do not get the same talk.
Yes, and it's where he does his best work. Half-day and full-day formats where attendees install real AI systems on their own businesses during the session.
Current focus: Claude Cowork (Anthropic), which Carl rates as the best fit for non-technical business owners. He also has hands-on experience across Claude Code, OpenAI Codex, Google AI Studio, Viktor, Hermes, OpenClaw and more. The talks are tool-agnostic at the core... the operating model (hire AI team members, give them a business brain) matters more than any single tool, because the tools change monthly and the model doesn't.
Yes. Business owners who want to go beyond the keynote can join Carl's hands-on AI install programs... see Work With Carl. Some events bundle a workshop stream or attendee offer into the booking... ask on the briefing call.
Standard conference setup: screen, HDMI or wireless presenting, lapel or headset mic, and reliable internet if the session includes live AI demonstrations. And one analogue request for any physical room: a flip chart and big fat markers. Carl thinks out loud on paper, and some of the best moments happen there rather than on the slides. Details are confirmed with your AV team before the event.
Yes, from a professional studio with broadcast-quality audio and video. He has run webinars and online training for business audiences for years.
For prime conference dates, a few months ahead is safest. That said, Carl is at his best responding to what's live right now... and because his talks are rebuilt per audience anyway, shorter lead times are workable more often than you'd expect. If your event is soon, ask anyway.
A role shift (operator to orchestrator), a map of where they sit on the 5 Levels of AI, and at least one AI capability they watched happen live that they can replicate the same week.
Send the date, location, audience and budget. You'll get a straight answer, fast.
Enquire now