I build AI tools that take real work off your plate.
An AI consultant for small businesses of 5 to 50 staff across Greater Philadelphia.
Alex Smith · Phoenixville, PA
What I do
Every business has work that quietly eats hours: quoting, scheduling, paperwork, converting files, answering the same questions over and over. AI can handle a lot of it now. Figuring out which parts, and building something your team actually uses, is the job.
That’s the work I do as an AI consultant: I find the parts worth automating, build a tool that does them, and stick around to make sure it keeps working, for businesses across Phoenixville, Chester County, and the Greater Philadelphia area.
Ways I can help
A few examples of what AI can take off your plate today. It’s not a fixed menu; what’s right depends on your business, but these are the problems I run into most for businesses around here.
When the thing you need doesn’t exist as a product, I build the tool for it, and once it’s running I train your team on it.
Not sure where AI fits? Start here.
- An AI audit to find where it’ll save you the most time and money
- A phased roadmap so you can start small and scale
- Which AI tools to actually buy versus build
Win more of the right customers, with less chasing.
- Targeted prospect lists that fit your ideal customer
- Personalized outreach with a custom message for every prospect, at scale
- Follow-up that never drops a lead
- Auto-drafted quotes and proposals
- Score and route inbound leads to the hot ones first
Show up everywhere, without living in your feeds.
- Content and newsletters written in your voice
- Turn one idea into a week of social posts
- Monitor and reply to Google and Yelp reviews
- Local SEO and listing copy
- Product descriptions for your online store
Answer every customer fast, without burning out.
- One inbox for email, text, Instagram, reviews, and phone
- Replies drafted in your voice
- A chatbot that answers hours, booking, and FAQs with your context
- Routine handled automatically, the rest passed to you
- After-hours phone answering and booking
- Support customers in more than one language
Kill the repetitive work that eats your week.
- Quotes, invoices, scheduling, and data entry, automated
- Pull data out of PDFs, forms, and receipts
- Turn intake forms into structured records
- Connect tools that don’t talk to each other
- Appointment reminders that cut no-shows
Close the books faster, with fewer errors.
- Accounts payable and receivable
- Expense and receipt categorization
- Month-end close assist
- Simple cash-flow reporting
When off-the-shelf can’t do it, I build it.
- Software for the one thing your business actually needs
- Turn messy spreadsheets into live dashboards
- Image and file processing pipelines
- Customer-facing product features
Get everyone working faster with AI.
- A Slack assistant trained on how your business works
- Onboarding and SOP documentation
- Training your team to actually use AI
- Meeting notes turned into action items
What clients say
Don’t take my word for it.
Alex has an ability to wrangle a variety of requirements to deliver an elegant and effective solution on time and on budget with a high level of responsiveness and service.
Santosh Sankar
Co-Founder & Managing Partner, Dynamo Ventures
Alex brings the rare mix of technical depth, business intuition, and hands-on execution that helped Genki become more AI-native.
Eddie Tsai
Co-founder and CEO, Genki
Alex built outreach that connected my practice with the right people, and made something I’d found intimidating feel genuinely simple to put in place.
Rebecca Tavangar
Owner, Better Mind Counseling
Who you’d be working with
I’m Alex Smith. For the last decade I’ve built software and led product, most recently as a senior product manager at Klarna, before that running Le Wagon’s coding schools across China and designing products for companies like Nike and IKEA. I do both the business thinking and the building myself, which is what lets me turn a problem into something working, fast.
I live in Phoenixville with my dog, Heizi, and work with businesses across Greater Philadelphia: Chester, Montgomery, Bucks, and Delaware counties. If you’re nearby, I’m happy to meet in person.
How working with me works
A free intro call, a $500 assessment, a fixed-price first project, then ongoing work or a care plan if you want more.
- 1
Intro call
Free
45 minutes
A 45-minute call where I learn how your business runs and where to start. The next step is usually the assessment.
- 2
AI assessment
$500
Fixed price
I spend up to half a day watching how the work runs, on site or over video. Within a week you get a written map of the workflows worth automating, ranked, with what each would take. The map becomes the proposal for your first project.
The $500 is credited in full toward a first project signed within 30 days.
- 3
First project
From $10,000
Fixed price
One workflow, a named result and a finish date.
You already know what you need
There’s a specific bottleneck you’ve put your finger on: a manual process, a tool that doesn’t exist, hours going somewhere they shouldn’t. I build the solution and get it running in your business. In that case you can skip the assessment and go straight to a proposal.
You know AI could help, but not where
You can tell technology should be doing more, but the exact opportunity isn’t clear yet. The assessment maps what’s worth automating, and the first project builds the first piece.
- 4
Ongoing work
From $5,000
Per month
I work as your embedded AI lead: one three-hour session at your office each week, and remote building the rest of the week. I take on one workstream at a time and finish as many each month as the pace allows.
Two workstreams in parallel is $10,000 a month. The first term is two months, then it runs month to month.
orCare plan
$500
Per month
After a first project, if all you need is upkeep, the care plan covers health checks on the tools I built, fixes when one breaks, updates when a vendor API or AI model changes, a 30-minute check-in each month and a reply the next business day.
New work and changes to what a tool does are ongoing work. The care plan doesn’t cover systems I didn’t build or same-day response, and you pay AI usage and subscriptions directly. The first term is three months, then it runs month to month.
A half day at your office, about 3.5 to 4 hours, where your team practices on its own tasks with the AI tools you already have. $2,500 for up to 15 staff at one site, or $3,500 for 16 to 30.
$500 of the fee is credited toward a first project booked within 30 days.
For nonprofits and public offices I do fixed-fee projects in place of ongoing monthly work, sized to fit a board or council budget.
What moves the price of a first project is in what an AI consultant costs, and the questions I’d want you to ask me, or anyone else, are in how to hire an AI consultant.
Where I work
Based in Phoenixville, working with small businesses across Greater Philadelphia. Remote-first, and in person across the Pennsylvania counties.
Phoenixville is where I live and where I do the most work in person, and Bucks County is the far end of the drive.
Common questions
A few things people ask before we talk.
If you’re still deciding what kind of help you need, the AI readiness checklist shows what to sort out first, and AI consultant vs agency vs IT company lays out who does what.
I find the work in your business that eats hours and doesn't need a person doing it, then build AI that handles it: drafting customer replies, quoting, scheduling, moving data between tools, following up on leads. The goal is fewer hours on repetitive work, not a science project.
The first call is free and runs 45 minutes. The assessment costs $500: up to half a day watching how the work runs, on site or over video, then within a week a written map of the workflows worth automating, ranked, with what each would take. The $500 is credited in full toward a first project signed within 30 days. A first project is a fixed price from $10,000, for one workflow with a named result and a finish date. After that, ongoing work starts at $5,000 a month: a two-month first term, then month to month. Nonprofits and public offices get fixed-fee projects in place of ongoing monthly work.
You do. The code, the documentation and admin access are handed over as each piece ships, and everything lives in your own accounts.
Everything I build is documented and lives in your accounts, so another developer or your IT provider can pick it up.
It stays in tools and accounts you control. I pick models and settings that don't train on your data, and before I touch anything sensitive, you and I agree on the rules for handling it.
Both. Some consultants hand you a strategy and leave the actual building to an automation agency. I do both myself: I find the work worth automating, build it, and stay on to keep it running. If you already know exactly what you want built, we can skip the strategy and go straight to building.
Fast. I start with a small working prototype, usually up in a few weeks, so you can watch it do real work before we invest in more. If it doesn't earn its place, we don't scale it.
No. I'm based in Phoenixville, but I work with small businesses across Greater Philadelphia, including Chester, Montgomery, Bucks, and Delaware counties and the Main Line. Most of the work is remote, and I meet in person around the Pennsylvania counties when it helps.
Like your business. Whether it's customer replies, content, or outreach, I build it on your information and your voice, and you stay in control of what goes out. AI does the drafting and the routine; the judgment stays yours.
Tell me where you’re stuck
Book a free 45-minute call, where I’ll learn how your business runs and where to start. The next step is usually a $500 assessment: I spend up to half a day watching how the work runs, and within a week I send a written map that becomes the proposal for your first project.
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