When it comes to AI, the little guy (finally) has an advantage

Anyone with a laptop or even a smartphone can now quickly and easily utilize artificial intelligence—many times for free. That level of accessibility makes it ripe for adoption at every level of business, from the one-person shop to massive global corporations and everything in between.

In particular, small businesses are extremely well poised to unleash the exponential advantage that can come from fully integrating artificial intelligence tools across every aspect of the company. With zero red tape and no budget, an individual employee can simply login to a multi-purpose AI tool like ChatGPT, Perplexity or Claude and be off to the races.

AI at Esoteric
That’s exactly what happened with John Reece, who handles marketing (and more) for Esoteric, a bespoke brewery in Walnut Hills. Beginning in 2022, he started chatting with ChatGPT and hasn’t stopped the conversation since. “For a long time, using AI seemed like such a way of cheating, so there was a reluctance to use them when they were first rolling out. But in 2022-23, I had a revelation that these AI tools can get stuff done quickly. And that is the biggest thing for a business with a small team,” he recalls.

The mean-lean team of 11 at Esoteric has a lot on their plates (and in their kegs) every single day. Reece constantly turns to ChatGPT (he uses the free version) for a myriad of tasks. Some days his AI assistant supplies copy for social media posts. At other times, it helps out with project management and planning.

Through his steady use of AI, Reece has effectively trained the model to understand the types of outputs he commonly needs. For instance, he might tell it: “I need a 12-pack, it’s a variety pack, can you help me get the best schedule for a roll-out of xx date? It basically spits out a quarter of milestones, what should be the next steps. It gives me this really robust timeline that I can then plug in the little ancillary details that it doesn’t necessarily know. Then I present that to my managers,” explains Reece.

Utilizing AI for time-consuming tasks makes business run much more efficiently. “It is so robust, and it does maximize my time; I can do things a lot faster than sitting in a meeting. It’s been a godsend, especially for a small business,” says Reece.

Be Smart about AI
How Reece is currently using AI is just a taste of what’s out there. Chatting with the free version of ChatGPT is akin to popping open the tab on the can of AI and taking that first intoxicating sip.

Local AI consultant and digital agency owner Kendra Ramirez.According to AI consultant and digital agency owner Kendra Ramirez, who travels the country speaking about AI, the next best step for a company of any size is to upgrade to private (aka paid) versions of AI tools. “If it’s free, you’re the product,” she warns. That’s because free models use your inputs to train the overall model, and if you’re sharing any sensitive or proprietary information, it could now flow freely to anyone else using the public version. Private models, on the other hand, are blocked off from being utilized by the larger AI.

Once you have a paid version of your preferred AI tool, you can create separate AI agents specifically trained on a certain task or type of work, or for an individual client.

Confused yet? It’s only natural, assures Ramirez. “To put things in perspective, there are currently 930,000 AI tools available. We’re seeing technology change every 6 months, so if you’re feeling overwhelmed, we all are, and that’s why we’re doing this together,” she says.

Take the AI Plunge
Ramirez is a proponent of leaping into AI, especially for small and nimble businesses free from levels of hierarchy—and who need to do whatever it takes to go fast now or fail. She encourages using ready-made AI solutions, leveraging off-the-shelf tools for content creation, analytics and efficiency, thus saving time and resources.

Her message is also completely egalitarian. “We have to stop waiting for someone to come and ‘save us,’” she says. “You can be the leader who paves the way for AI to be integrated into your company. You just need to be willing to raise your hand.”

Reece shares a similar outlook. His advice for other small businesses who are hesitant to dive in? “Just give it a shot, it might provide you with answers you weren’t expecting and it can help you figure out a better path. We’re bombarded by so many things every day, and it can help you get a clear direction, that can help you get on that path, collect your thoughts and not twiddle your thumbs. Don’t be scared to try it,” he says.

And above all, stay positive. “I think we have to approach some of this with childish optimism. Everybody is so pessimistic about everything, but if we can find that childish spirit, it won’t be as bad as we think it could be, it could go a long way,” says Reece. Cheers to that!