Small Business Digest | Series 2.2

We live in a time of great technological advancement. Almost every day, a new groundbreaking technology is introduced that promises to change our lives and work world forever, but often, these tools fall short of their promises. However, Artificial Intelligence (AI) is different. It is truly changing how people work and live. You’ve likely heard of AI and probably used it, even without realizing it. From Roomba vacuums to Netflix recommendations, AI is already a part of our daily lives!

While those forms of AI are deeply integrated into existing systems, the current AI revolution is centered around generative AI. Companies are investing billions of dollars into generative AI tools like ChatGPT (OpenAI), Gemini (Google), and Claude (Anthropic). The question you might have is, why? What does generative AI do that is so valuable to these major tech companies? Well, let’s start with how generative AI works. Generative AI works by learning patterns from large amounts of data and then using that knowledge to create new content – like text, images, or even code! This means that you can pose a question, or prompt, to a generative AI tool and it will create a response for you that is unique to that interaction. For example, I can ask ChatGPT to provide a healthy recipe for me to make based on only the ingredients that I have available. I could also as it to outline a presentation that I have to make to a group of stakeholders in an upcoming meeting. Even though those are two different tasks, the generative AI tool is capable of assisting with both as it is trained to synthesize the data in its memory and provide information to you that is unique and makes sense.

Now what can generative AI do for you? That’s a complex answer as each of the chatbots I listed above are capable of performing an incredible amount of tasks. As a starting point, I encourage you to think of AI as your assistant. If you have a task and are struggling to complete it, ask ChatGPT for some help. For example: in retail, you can have AI analyze sales data to predict trends, personalize recommendations, and help manage inventory. In the service industry AI can automate appointment scheduling, basic customer inquiries and provide feedback analysis. In marketing, AI can generate content for social media posts, email campaigns, and targeted ads. The best part? It can do all of this in mere seconds!

While this may seem amazing, and it is, it is important to keep in mind the human element. While AI can generate a social media campaign, it doesn’t know your followers like you know your followers. While it can answer basic customer inquiries, we know that people like to talk to a real person when they have complex questions that need to be answered. All to say, AI is a great assistant, but it is not a replacement for the experience of a real person in these fields.

With all that said, it is important to know that AI is not 100% accurate on all responses and can be very wrong or completely make up a response that they call a “hallucination.” It is important that when we are using AI, we are using it as a partner and not as a tool that does everything for us. I generally work by the 80/20 rule with AI, and that is, when I generate something with AI, I allow up to 80% of what I use to be AI created, and I have to modify at least 20% of the output to be my own. This allows me to ensure that what I’m creating with AI still has my authentic tone and voice and ensures that what it has generated is correct and in line with my objectives. For the sake of full transparency, I absolutely used AI in crafting this article, however, I used it for feedback and modification to ensure it was the best it could possibly be while retaining my authentic voice.

Generative AI is transforming work, offering small businesses an opportunity to increase their efficiency. So I encourage you to try out a generative AI tool on a task you are currently struggling with. See if it allows you to develop new insights into that issue and unlock new ideas. The AI revolution is here, and using AI could take your business to a new level of success!