Welcome to AI for SMBs #22!
This week's post is different. Instead of our usual step-by-step guide, I wanted to share some thoughts sparked by two posts I've found myself forwarding constantly over the past few weeks.
The first is Elena Verna's "The Rise of the AI-Native Employee" about her exper...
Your marketing agency just delivered another "campaign" that looks suspiciously like last month's work but with slightly different colors. Your IT vendor takes three days to respond to urgent requests, yet their contract auto-renewed six months ago. Your biggest supplier raised prices 15% with tw...
Your newest team member started three weeks ago and is still asking the same questions every day. "Where do I find the client files again?" "What's the approval process for expenses under $500?" "Who handles vendor payments when Sarah's out?"
Meanwhile, your most experienced employee just announc...
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You're staring at your pipeline dashboard, and it's not pretty. Last month's lead generation efforts produced 47 "prospects" - but only 3 turned into actual conversations, and precisely zero became customers. Meanwhile, your biggest competitor seems to be everywhere, responding to inquiries ins...
It's July, and while your competitors are either running the same tired "summer sale" promotions they've used for years or scrambling to figure out what to do before August hits, you have an opportunity to dominate the traditionally slower summer months.
Most businesses treat summer promotions li...
I'm speaking at the Just Curious AI Agency Accelerator on July 16th, sharing the practical "jigs" and operational strategies that help agencies move from AI experiments to predictable business impact. Only 8 spots left for this intimate, virtual event with senior agency leaders;Â grab your seat he...
Which model should I use for ___________?
I probably hear this question at least once a day; it's the single most common question that I get. You likely found AI for SMBs Weekly because of our AI Models for SMBs Comparison Chart (freshly updated on 6.18.25; subscribe to get a copy!).
But this cha...
Pro tip: Don't feel like reading this whole post? Prompt any frontier AI model to walk you through this approach step-by-step and then paste the entirety of this text in. Works great :)
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You just responded to another customer complaint at 9 PM on a Saturday. Your inbox shows 47 unread support ti...
Your star employee just quit, and you need to hire their replacement fast. You dust off the job description from when you hired them two years ago, update the salary range, and post it online.
But here's the problem: that job description was written for a different world. A world where AI couldn'...
Your biggest competitor just launched a new service that looks suspiciously similar to the idea you've been developing for months. Another rival seems to have automated their customer service overnight, dramatically cutting response times. A third competitor is suddenly appearing everywhere on so...
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Your costs have increased substantially over the past year. Raw materials are up 12%, labor costs have climbed 8%, and those ?!?!? tariffs we discussed in issue #6 have added another layer of complexity. And don't forget about inflation...
You know you need to adjust your prices, but how much...
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Meetings have tripled in the past four years, and the vast majority of us label most of them "unproductive. For SMBs with limited resources, every wasted meeting hour is an hour not spent growing your business.
But what if meetings could actually drive your business forward instead of holding...
