4 Ways AI Can Make Your Life Easier as an Independent Professional

Artificial intelligence, or AI, has been a growing buzzword over the past few years. Most recently, AI is being talked about with Chat GPT—a natural language processing chatbot that uses generative AI technology. AI promises a more innovative and growth-spurred future, so it’s no wonder that so many people believe AI will revolutionize the way we work. In fact, almost 30 percent of business leaders said that of new technologies, AI will have the greatest impact on their business in the next year.

But AI isn’t just for large organizations. It can have a big impact on small businesses as well, helping companies create better marketing campaigns, deliver more targeted customer experiences, and cut costs. Here are five ways AI services can make your life easier as an independent professional.

1. Improve Your Marketing Efforts

There’s no question about it, AI is changing the marketing game. If you’ve ever received a targeted ad after searching for a certain product, you’re probably aware that big companies like Facebook and Google use AI-based advertising to target specific customers.

The good news is small companies can do the same thing. Google Smart Campaigns, for example, assigns relevant search phrases to an ad you write. When someone searches for those phrases, it triggers your ad. Marketing can be time consuming and expensive for small business owners, but AI solutions provide ways to automate a lot of these tasks while targeting and engaging the clients you want.

Online marketing strategies, such as having a professional website, writing a blog, or using social networks, all have potential to be improved with the use of AI. When writing any sort of content related to your business online, use AI tools to learn the keywords your target clients are searching for, collect data on your audience to better focus your marketing efforts, or generate new content ideas.

2. Enhance Your Client Experience

When you run your own business, one of the most important things you can do is build strong, lasting relationships with your clients. AI tools come in handy here as well, helping you provide a certain level of professionalism.

Simple apps like Grammarly proofread your writing, content, or emails and provide feedback on spelling, grammar, and word usage. New subscription-based services like Superhuman are designed to streamline email by automatically triaging your messages to surface the most important ones, letting you work offline, and allowing you to send an email at the perfect moment.

Learn more: 13 Ways to Build Strong Relationships with Clients

3. Analyze Your Competition

There’s a lot of competition in maintaining a successful small business and keeping a close eye on your competitors is key to staying ahead of the pack. AI can help you gain insight into your competition, allowing you to streamline your own business processes and goals.

With Crayon, track competitors across their websites, social media, and web applications to see what customers are saying, when they change their pricing, or what content strategies they are employing. With this information in hand, you can better position your own business to fill gaps or capitalize on weak points.

4. Increase Efficiency, Decrease Spend

One of the most common uses of AI comes in the form of a virtual assistant. You’re probably already familiar with many of these tools such as Siri, Alexa, or Google Assistant. These unassuming yet powerful forms of AI can help you complete otherwise time-consuming tasks such as handling banking and payments, setting reminders, scheduling appointments on your calendar, or managing travel arrangements.

Check out: 6 Must-Have Online Collaboration Tools for Consultants

When looking into AI for your company or freelance work, it is important to keep in mind that we are just now beginning to see an integration of these tools and services into daily business management. Intelligence and capabilities will only continue to grow and evolve in the future. If you find something you think will be useful, try out a trial or basic version before committing to the full service.  AI tools can offer a great return on investment for small businesses—keep an eye on the horizon for those that can enhance the quality of services you offer.