Most small businesses are sitting on a gold mine they don't know how to use.
I've been having versions of the same conversation lately with organizations that have years of operational data locked up in their systems. Customer patterns, seasonal trends, workflow efficiencies they've refined over time. It's incredibly valuable.
The common first instinct? "Let's throw it into ChatGPT and see what it tells us."
There's a better conversation to have first.
What competitive advantages are hidden in this data?How do we build a foundation that lets us innovate without losing control?What technology choices serve us long term, not just this quarter?
These aren't AI questions. They're business strategy questions.
AI is just the tool. The real work is understanding what you have and what you're trying to build.
Here's the better approach:
First, clean and normalize the data (more on this topic Thursday). You can't build anything useful on a messy foundation, AI or otherwise.
Second, identify which processes can be automated without exposing proprietary information. There are plenty of workflow wins that don't require handing your competitive intelligence to a third party.
Third, ask: what does a technology foundation look like that actually serves this business in five years? Not just what's trendy right now.
SMBs have advantages that larger competitors don't: flexibility, deep customer relationships, institutional knowledge that isn't documented anywhere.
The right AI strategy protects those advantages and builds on them. The wrong one gives them away.
If you're exploring AI for your business, start here:
What do you actually have that's valuable? Not your product. Not your service. Your data, your processes, your knowledge.
Then ask: how do we use technology to make that more valuable, not less?
That's the conversation worth having.