Hands-on AI for small businesses · UK
You know AI could help. You don't know where. I work that out with you, set up the right tools, and build the ones that don't exist. Costs shown up front. You own everything.
What I’d set up and build for a business like yours
Examples and case studies. Much of this is showing you tools you haven't tried, and what the ones you already pay for can do once AI is connected to them: meeting notes that file themselves, a CRM that fills itself in, invoices chased for you. Each one is scoped and priced on the call. The case studies are already built.
Case studyClaude · ChatGPT · your files
Case study · How this consultancy and the services at a SaaS startup are run.
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What we do
01
A half-day workshop, or a walk through your business on a call: what AI can and can't do for you, the tools you haven't heard of, what the ones you already pay for can do once AI is connected, how to prompt them for your work, and where the hours go.
A shortlist, a cost per item, and what to do first.
02
Claude, ChatGPT, Copilot or Gemini, whichever you already pay for, set up properly and connected to Shopify, your CRM, Gmail, Slack, your accounts. Plus the tools you haven't met: Granola or Quill for meeting notes, Fastlane for short videos made, scheduled and posted. Training for the team, and your Playbook: the repeatable tasks written down once, so they run the same way every time.
You leave with your Playbook: how you work, the jobs written down, an always-and-never list. Every correction you make goes in, so it gets better instead of fizzling.
03
When nothing off the shelf does it: a bespoke service (an agent) that runs the job, or a small internal tool built the same way, a dashboard, a stock view, a booking form, a website. Weeks, not months.
Working in about two weeks, on your real data. Nothing it drafts goes out until you approve it.
04
Every build comes with its monthly running cost shown before we start, handover notes you can follow, and 30 days of support while it beds in.
You own the code. No platform fee, no lock-in.
Or tell me about your annoying manual process. If it repeats and has a clear input and output, it can probably run itself. Tell me about it
Tools, by the kind of business
Pick the one closest to yours. These are the tools I set up, connect and build on for a business like it. It isn’t the whole list. The ones that would make the biggest difference to you are the ones we talk about on the call.
Pick a kind of business
The tools nearly every small business already has, and the handful worth adding.
Everyday AI
Enquiries and bookings
Documents and admin
Money
Meetings and notes
Running the business
Getting the most out of ChatGPT, Claude or Copilot
Most people open ChatGPT or Claude, type what they want, and get something nearly right. Then they type it all again tomorrow. Everything it knows is what is in front of it, so the fix is structure: a folder of plain-English files it reads every time, with the checks it runs before you see the result. Set up properly, it does the job your way, and every correction stays made.
One short page on your business: what you sell, who to, how you sound, what matters, and the words you use for things. Read first, every time.
Each repeatable task as a recipe with a definition of done: what goes in, what comes out, and the checks it runs before you see the result.
The rules. What needs your approval before it goes out, what it never says, what it never touches, and what it must ask about first.
When it gets something wrong it is logged like a fault report: what was asked, what came out, what was expected. The fix goes back into the job.
What you tried, what you decided, why. So next month, or the next person, doesn't start from zero.
Your Playbook, as a folder
The bit nobody tells you
When it gets something wrong, the correction goes in the file, not in your head. Logged once, fixed in the job, checked from then on. That is the difference between progress and the same frustration every morning.
This is the Playbook. It is what you leave the workshop with, set up in whichever tool you already use.
How to work with it, day to day
The files are half of it. The other half is method: how good software teams work with AI, translated for a business that has never written a line of code.
A one-page brief you approve before any work starts: what, for whom, and what done looks like. Bigger jobs are broken into small tickets, each signed off on its own.
Before the brief, it asks the awkward questions: what happens when the data is missing, who signs off, what must never happen. Five minutes of questions saves an hour of fixing.
Every job carries a short list of checks it runs before you see the result: the figures add up, every row is filled, nothing goes to the wrong person. A job with no checks isn't finished.
One past run with the answer you were happy with. When the instructions change, run it again. If it still matches, nothing broke.
What you asked, what came out, what you expected, in a list it can read. Fixes go into the job, and the list shows you what keeps going wrong.
The faster you can check, the faster it improves. One step, looked at, then the next. Big asks get big mistakes.
Everything it knows is what is in front of it. A short front page it reads every time, and the detail in each job's own file, read only when that job runs. More isn't better.
Three real emails you were happy with beat 'friendly but professional'. It copies what it can see.
What changed, what was decided, what to do next time, written where it will read it tomorrow. That is how it gets better week on week.
Habits I run every day and coach my clients on.
Who this is for
A good fit if
Probably not if
How it works
You describe the business and the bits that annoy you. I tell you straight what AI will and won't do for you, roughly what it costs, and whether I'm the right person.
Free. If it's not a fit, I'll say so.
A one-page shortlist: the tools, what each costs a month, how much work to connect it, and what to do first. For a team, we do this live in the workshop.
Most people find two things on it they can do this week.
I connect the tools, train you, and build anything bespoke. You see it working on your real data within days, not at the end. Then handover notes, a handover call, and 30 days of support.
It asks before it acts: it drafts, you approve.
An example, in plain words
“Every Monday morning it checks what's running low across the store, works out what to reorder from the last two months of sales, and drafts an email to each supplier. I read them with a coffee and press send. That's the whole job.”
Bespoke services & agents
Every service here runs on a schedule, on a known monthly cost, and asks a person before it acts. The status is real: if one is paused or not built yet, it says so.
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The numbers so far
+28%
average order value
Shopify relaunch
Who's building it
Full-stack software engineer, now AI engineer · UK
I'm a full-stack software engineer who moved into AI. I've built and run live products end to end: the screens people use every day, the systems and data pipelines behind them, and the unglamorous parts that keep them working, from testing and security to hosting and costs.
Then I built a SaaS startup, a trading journal, end to end. It's also where the AI side took over: rather than add people, the routine work went to services I built, which watch the alerts, draft the posts, write the release notes and file the tickets, each one asking a human before it acts.
AI is moving fast. New tools come out every week, the good ones genuinely save hours, win sales and help a small team do more, and keeping up with it all is a job in itself. That's the hat I wear so you don't have to. I follow what's new, try it on real work, and know what these models can do this month and what to keep them away from.
That's the useful bit for you. I've shipped software that businesses run on, and I run this consultancy on tools I built myself. So when I look at your business I'm not selling AI. I'm looking for the hours you'd get back.
Pricing
Most people start with the workshop. Setting up and integrating tools is scoped on the call; most of it is a day or two. Every price comes with the running cost, shown before we start.
01
Start hereWhere most people start
£750–1,500
half a day or a full day, in person or remote
What AI can and can't do for your business, hands-on, and you leave with your Playbook set up in ChatGPT, Claude or Copilot. Half a day finds the wins and writes the first pages. A full day also builds your first bespoke service (agent) with you in the room.
02
Fixed price
£3,000–5,000
one job, one price
Something built for the one job nothing off the shelf covers: a service that runs it, or a small internal tool. Working in about two weeks.
03
Ongoing, month by month
£1,500–3,000
a month, depending on what you need. Cancel any time
For after a workshop or a build, when you want it to stick and keep growing. I stay on, keep what we built running, and keep finding the next hour to give back. Where in the range depends on how much of my time you need each month: how many sessions we do, and how many services I keep running for you.
Prices exclude VAT. Running costs are the real monthly bills for the AI tools and hosting, shown up front.
Questions
That's most people, and that's what the call and the workshop are for. Describe the business and the annoying bits; I'll tell you what's worth doing, what it costs, and what to leave alone.
No. I do the connecting and the setting up. You learn where the buttons are, what to glance at each week, and how to change the instructions when the business changes.
Yes, and it's the most common thing I fix. It's almost never the model. It's that nothing is written down, so every conversation starts from zero and every correction is lost by tomorrow. The workshop sets up your Playbook: who you are, how each job is done, what it must never do. After that, it reads it every time, and when you correct it, the fix stays.
Using ChatGPT for the odd email is a good start, and most businesses stop there. The difference is making it part of how the business runs: connected to your inbox, your calendar and the tools you already pay for, with clear instructions for your jobs, and a named person on your side who owns it. That is what usually goes missing when someone sets up AI and it quietly stops getting used after a fortnight. So every build here comes with a plain-English playbook, an owner, and sessions until it's routine.
Typically £10–30 a month for the AI tools and hosting behind it, and sometimes nothing: a lot of the best tools are free and open source, and where a free one does the job, that's the one I'll use. I'll give you the number before we start, and the handover notes show you where to check it.
No. The instructions are plain text files you can edit yourself, and the handover notes cover the routine things. You get 30 days of support after handover, and I am a message away after that.
Everything I build asks before it acts. It drafts, you approve. Nothing gets sent, posted or filed without a person saying yes, and if nobody says yes, it's dropped. Silence means no.
Yes. I've rebuilt several stores and built the reporting behind them, so store digests, listing writers and customer email triage are the builds I know best.
Your repeatable tasks, written down once in plain English so the tools do them the same way every time: the quote email, the product description, the weekly report, the supplier chase. It lives in your own files, you can edit it, and the bespoke services work from the same Playbook.
Yes, when they're the right answer. With AI in the loop, a dashboard, an internal app or a website rebuild takes days rather than months, so it's often the quickest way to give a business the tool it's missing. I don't take on big software projects, and I'll say so on the call if that's what you need.
Two kinds. Tools you may not have met: Granola, or Quill which is free, to take your meeting notes for you; Fastlane, which makes short videos for a store and posts them; Claude or ChatGPT set up for your business with your Playbook, rather than a blank tab. And the tools you already pay for, connected to AI so they do more: your CRM kept up to date from your calls and emails, your meeting notes filed where the team can find them, your accounts package drafting the invoice chasers. Most businesses I meet are using a fraction of what their tools can already do.
Yes. HubSpot, Pipedrive, Zoho, Salesforce and most of the others let tools like this read and write to them, so notes, deal stages and follow-ups can be kept up to date without anyone typing them in. If your CRM is a spreadsheet, that works too.
Book a 30-minute call. I'll tell you straight what's worth doing, what it costs to run, and whether I'm the right person to do it.
Thirty minutes, free, nothing to prepare.